foundations of oratory, and ample stores of political information, his range did not extend. Of natural science, of metaphysical philosophy, of political economy, he had not even the rudiments; and he was apt to treat those matters with the neglect, if not the contempt, which ignorance can rather account for than excuse. He had come far too early into public life to be well grounded in a statesman's philosophy; like his great rival, and indeed like most aristocratic politicians, who were described as "rocked and dandled into legislators" by one,* himself exempt from this defective education; and his becoming a warm partisan at the same early age, also laid the foundation of another defect, the making party principle the only rule of conduct, and viewing every truth of political science through this distorting and discolouring medium. But if such were the defects of his education, the mighty powers of his nature often overcame them, always threw them into the shade. A preternatural quickness of apprehension, which enabled him to see at a glance what cost other minds the labour of an investigation, made all attainments of an ordinary kind so easy, that it perhaps disinclined him to those which not even his acuteness and strength of mind could master without the pain of study. But he was sure as well as quick; and where the heat of passion, or the prejudice of party, or certain little peculiarities of a personal kind, certain mental idiosyncrasies in which he indulged, and which produced capricious fancies or crotchets,-left his faculties unclouded and unstudied, * Mr. Burke. no man's judgment was more sound, or could more safely be trusted. Then, his feelings were warm and kindly; his temper was sweet though vehement; like that of all the Fox family, his nature was generous, open, manly; above everything like dissimulation or duplicity; governed by the impulses of a great and benevolent soul. This [virtue, so much beyond all intellectual graces, yet bestowed its accustomed influence upon the faculties of his understanding, and gave them a reach of enlargement to which meaner natures are ever strangers. It was not more certain that such a mind as his should be friendly to religious toleration, eager for the assertion of civil liberty, the uncompromising enemy of craft and cruelty in all their forms,from the corruption of the Treasury and the severity of the penal code, up to the oppression of our American colonies and the African slave-traffic,-than that it should be enlarged and strengthened, made powerful in its grasp and consistent in its purpose, by the same admirable and amiable qualities which bent it always towards the right pursuit. The great intellectual gifts of Mr. Fox, the robust structure of his faculties, naturally governed his oratory, made him singularly affect argument, and led him to a close grappling with every subject; despising all flights of imagination, and shunning everything collateral or discursive. This turn of mind, too, made him always careless of ornament, often negligent of accurate diction. There never was a greater mistake, as has already been remarked, than the fancying a close *Lord Chatham. resemblance between his eloquence and that of Demosthenes; although an excellent judge (Sir James Mackintosh) fell into it, when he pronounced him "the most Demosthenean speaker since Demosthenes." That he resembled his immortal predecessor in despising all useless ornament, and all declamation for declamation's sake, is true enough; but it applies to every good speaker as well as to those two signal ornaments of ancient and modern rhetoric. That he resembled him in keeping more close to the subject in hand, than many good and even great speakers have often done, may also be affirmed; yet this is far too vague and remote a likeness to justify the proposition in question; and it is only a difference in degree, and not a specific distinction between him and others. That his eloquence was fervid, rapid, copious, carrying along with it the minds of the audience, nor suffering them to dwell upon the speaker or the speech, but engrossing their whole attention, and keeping it fixed on the question, is equally certain; and is the only real resemblance which the comparison affords. But then the points of difference are as numerous as they are important, and they strike indeed upon the most cursory glance. The one was full of repetitions, recurring again and again to the same topic, nay, to the same view of it, till he had made his impression complete; the other never came back upon a ground which he had utterly wasted and withered up by the tide of fire he had rolled over it. The one dwelt at length, and with many words on his topics; the other performed the whole at a blow, sometimes with a word, always with the smallest number of words possible. The one frequently was digressive, even narrative and copious in illustration; in |