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He was immediately removed from Oxford, and placed under the care of a tutor at Lausanne. To a Swiss pastor, named Pavillard, was entrusted the delicate office of disentangling the mind of Gibbon from the intricacies of popery, and leading it back again into the pale of the Protestant Church. He succeeded: by seasonable arguments, and judicious admonitions, aided perhaps by the influence of a mild and benevolent character, he prevailed over the hasty caprice of a powerful intellect; and on Christmas-day, in 1754, Gibbon publicly renounced his adopted creed, and received the sacrament in the church of Lausanne. There is no reason to suspect the sincerity of this recantation, or to believe that he had yet fallen either into scepticism, or indifference.

He remained, in the whole, five years at Lausanne, and by his "serious character, and soft and quiet manners" he won the respect and affection of his tutor. During this time he laid the foundation of those studious habits, which formed the pride and happiness of his later life. Besides a passionate devotion to French literature and great diligence in forming a correct style in that language, he read, according to a regular system, the whole of the Latin Classics; he acquired the rudiments of Greek; and gained some insight into the principles of mathematics. But this last pursuit he never afterwards renewed; though he would lead us to believe that a readiness in calculation was the talent of his childhood, and that nature had qualified him to succeed in that branch of application.

He was presented to Voltaire, at that time resident at Geneva, without being distinguished by any particular mark of his attention. Yet he was a constant spectator at the poet's little theatre, when he recited his own verses, and represented his own characters. It was likewise during this period that he formed an attachment for Madlle. Curchod, the daughter of a Swiss pastor, and afterwards the wife of Necker. The attachment appears to have been mutual; but his father prevented the marriage, and he remained faithful during the rest of his life to the memory of his youthful passion.

He returned to England in May, 1758, and remained there, with a short interval, for the twenty-five following years. His father's residence was Buriton, near Petersfield; and, as he passed some time there, he became in 1760 a captain in the South Hampshire militia: an incident which might well pass unnoticed in the life of an ordinary person, but which in this case is dignified by the value which Gibbon himself has set upon it, and the conviction long afterwards expressed by him--"that the captain of the Hampshire Grenadiers was not useless to the historian of the Roman Empire."

Gibbon then turned his thoughts to some historical subject; and among many that attracted him were The Life of Raleigh; The History of the Liberty of the Swiss; and that of the Republic of Florence under the House of Medici. But he appears not to have engaged seriously in any one of these, at the time of his second departure for the Continent. To the second of those subjects however he afterwards returned, again discarding his native tongue, for the use of what he deemed a more general language. He wrote his 'History of Switzerland' in Latin. But having caused a specimen of it to be recited in a society of literary foreigners in London, at which he was himself present, though not known as the author, he had the affliction of hearing its condemnation. He submitted to the sentence, and delivered the imperfect sheets to the flames. And it was in the same year that Hume addressed to him a very sensible exhortation to confine his compositions to his own language, as that which was destined, through conquest and colonization, to the most general prevalence in after-ages. It was worthy of the riper wisdom and genius of Hume, to direct the rising candidate for historical fame into the path wherein alone it was possible to find it; and to enlarge his views, to teach him to look beyond the actual and transient condition of the world, and fix his eyes upon the generations that were to come.

Gibbon mentions three works as having more than any others contributed to the formation of his mind: 'Pascal's Provincial Letters;' 'The Life of Julian, by the Abb? Bletterie;' and 'Giannone's History of Naples.' Not one of them was English; he acknowledges no early obligations to the literature of his own country; in fact, those five years which usually decide the character of the rest of life were entirely passed abroad, in the study and perpetual use of foreign languages, and the imitation of foreign literature. It was not then wonderful that he should continue for some time longer to follow the first impulse. But repeated failures would doubtless have shown him the false position in which he stood, even without the seasonable admonition administered by the authority of Hume.

Gibbon returned immediately from Italy to England, and retired to the peaceful retreat of his family and his books. Yet the five years which followed were those on which he reflected with least satisfaction. He was dependent on his father's generosity, he had no professional occupation for an active and ambitious mind, his very reading was somewhat desultory, and his whole energies were not yet devoted to one great object. He felt the absence of this; and it was ill supplied by his 'Critical Observations on the 6th Book of the AEneid,' or his attempt at the History of Switzerland. The death of his father, in 1770, placed him in possession of a moderate fortune and of entire independence; and then it was that he entered in good earnest on the 'History of the Decline and Fall.'

In 1772 he settled in London, and obtained a seat in parliament for Liskeard. He adhered to the Government of Lord North, and by "many a sincere and silent vote" on the American question, supported the rights , though not perhaps the interests, of the mother country. As a senator, he acquired no distinction. A mixture of timidity and pride, a want of physical energy and of that ready vigour of mind, which fits men for public life, better than habits of the sagest meditation, disqualified him for political polemics: and even his general opinions seem at that time to have been so little fixed, that when at last he accepted a place at the Board of Trade under Lord North, he gave surprise and offence to the opposition, who considered him as on their side. He fell with his patron; and his natural distaste for politics being probably increased by this and a subsequent disappointment, he retired for ever from the disquietudes of public life.

During his residence in London, he published the first three volumes of his History. On the composition of the first he had bestowed peculiar care, and its reception repaid his labours. A very laudatory letter, which he received from Hume, foretold the attacks to which the fifteenth and sixteenth chapters would subject him; for which he was entirely unprepared. And in his subsequent reflections on this subject, he admits that, had he foreseen the offence they were calculated to give, he "might perhaps have softened the two invidious chapters, which would create many enemies, and conciliate few friends." Among his ecclesiastical opponents, by far the most eloquent and powerful was Bishop Watson, whose high-minded hostility deserved the respect bestowed on it by the historian himself, in his celebrated Vindication.

The second and third volumes were not so favourably received as the first; the author himself admits that they are possibly too minute and prolix: and the work made as yet no progress on the continent. But he persevered with increasing zeal in the labour which was now become necessary to his happiness; and that he might the more exclusively devote himself to it, he returned to establish himself at Lausanne, in 1783, nearly twenty years after his second visit to that place. He made it his residence until 1793, and there composed the last three volumes of his history: and he has carefully recorded, that it was on the 27th of June, 1787, between eleven and twelve at night, in a summer-house in his garden, that he wrote the last sentence. His fourth volume cost him rather more than two years, his fifth rather less, and the sixth little more than one. It had been his habit, till quite at last, to close his studies with the day, and commonly begin them with the morning, and the result of this late change is observed in the increased rapidity with which the latter portion of the work was written. He visited England to superintend the printing of these three volumes, and published them together on his fifty-first birthday.

He lived only five years and seven months longer: and his premature death may be ascribed to his own singular improvidence. He had been afflicted above thirty years by a disease requiring surgical assistance, which he altogether neglected till it became incurable. He died January 16, 1794, at the house of his friend Lord Sheffield, and was buried in his lordship's family vault at Fletching in Sussex.

Of his miscellaneous works, the following are some of the most remarkable:--

SCALIGER.

In the sixteenth and the latter part of the fifteenth century, a man of learning filled a very prominent and distinguished place in the world's esteem. Public attention was not then distracted by the multitude of claimants; for scarcely any country but Italy possessed a national literature; and few branches of knowledge were much prized, except the faculties of divinity, law, and physic, and the newly-opened stores of Greek and Roman antiquity. As Latin was still the universal language of Europe, that which was done in one country soon and readily became known to the learned men of all; and if the general standard of information was low, those who possessed it abundantly towered the higher above their fellows. Though there were then fewer helps to learning, it was a time of great discoveries and much excitement. A modern scholar of far inferior calibre may have a more accurate knowledge of antiquity, and a deeper insight into the minutiae of the ancient languages, than the greatest men of the age of which we speak; but as far as regards the mass of information gained by their individual labour, few indeed could venture to compete with such men as Casaubon, Lipsius, Graevius, the Scaligers, and others. And the honour paid them was proportionate to their merits. Princes and States courted them, Universities competed for their residence, Europe at large took an interest in their quarrels and controversies; and as humility and charity were not the graces in which they most abounded, the interest in these subjects was in no danger of perishing for want of agitation. Of this remarkable class of men, none were more admired by their contemporaries than the two Scaligers.

Julius Caesar Scaliger, the elder, was as singular a mixture of great talent, learning, vanity, and presumption, as the world has often seen. He was born, probably at Verona, in 1484, being the son, according to the best authorities, of a miniature painter, named Benedict Bordoni, was baptized by the name of Julius, studied at the University of Padua, adopted the medical profession, and having attracted the favourable notice of Antoine de la Rovere, Bishop of Agen in Gascony, accompanied him thither, in 1525, in the quality of domestic physician. We are not informed of the exact time at which he thought fit to make addition to his real name, but in 1528 he obtained letters of naturalization under the sounding appellation of Julius Caesar de Lescalle de Bordoms, or Bordonis; and in 1529 he married a girl of sixteen, by whom he had a very numerous family. This is his real history, as far as it is known; but the truth was far too commonplace to satisfy his passion for notoriety, and he invented a new version of his history, to the following effect:--

He called himself the son of Benedict de la Scala, one of the bravest captains of the fifteenth century , and through him descended from the ancient family of Princes of Verona. He was born near the Lago di Guarda; and having narrowly escaped, in infancy, the jealous search of the Venetians, who were anxious to cut off every scion of his house, was brought up as a page in the service of the Emperor Maximilian. He served with distinction in the Italian wars. But the desire of recovering Verona, the inheritance of his family, from Venice, ever haunted him; and seeing no chance any other way, he became a monk, in hope of rising to the Holy Chair, and rendering the resources of the papacy subservient to the gratification of this ruling passion. The frivolous and wearisome observances of the cloister soon disgusted him, and he returned to his old trade as a soldier, and again distinguished himself in the wars of Piedmont, while at the same time he studied the ancient languages, philosophy, and medicine. At the solicitation of the Bishop of Agen he closed his adventurous course, as is above related. This extravagant story, entirely without foundation in any of its parts, and garnished with abundance of gasconade, was stoutly upheld by the elder Scaliger, and generally believed by his contemporaries: the younger Scaliger wrote a book to maintain it, with equal stoutness, but without equal success.

Joseph Justus Scaliger, the tenth child of this singular man, was born at Agen, August 4, 1540. At the age of eleven he was sent with two of his brothers to study at the University of Bourdeaux; but at the end of three years the plague broke out, and he returned in consequence to his paternal home. The elder Scaliger from that time forward took charge of Joseph's education: concerning his method of teaching we know little more than that he obliged his pupil to compose an essay every day upon some historical subject. He died in 1558; and in the following year Joseph Scaliger went to Paris, and devoted himself to the study of Greek under the celebrated Turnebus. At that time his acquaintance, if he had any, with the language was very slight. Before two months elapsed he found the progress of his master too slow to please him; and resolving to take the matter into his own hands, he made himself cursorily acquainted with the conjugations, and set to work at once upon Homer, whom he read through in twenty-one days, constructing a grammar for himself as he went along. The other Greek poets he perused in the same manner in four months. The orators and historians he took next in order; but these extraordinary exertions rest upon his own testimony, which in things connected with the gratification of his vanity cannot be considered unimpeachable. After two years' study of Greek he undertook Hebrew and other Oriental languages, which he learned without assistance in the same manner. He certainly possessed an uncommon talent for the study of languages: it is stated by Du Bartas that he knew thirteen,--Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Spanish, Italian, German, French, English, Ethiopian, Arabic, Syriac, Chaldaic, and Persian. His habits throughout life were very laborious; he slept little, and sometimes passed days almost without taking food. Heinsius, in his first oration, reports that he had often heard Scaliger speak of having been in Paris during the massacre of St. Bartholomew, and engaged so deeply in his Hebrew studies as for a long time not to be aware of the tumult without. On the contrary, the Vassans, collectors of the 'Scaligera secunda,' state, also on the authority of Scaliger's private conversation, that he was at Lausanne when the massacre took place. The matter is of little moment, excepting in so far as it may serve to illustrate the speaker's boastful disregard for veracity.

Joseph Scaliger embraced the Reformed religion in 1562, and in the following year became domestic tutor in a noble family named Roche-Pozay. In this connexion he was very fortunate: his patron was a generous and discerning man, by whose liberality he was enabled to visit the principal Universities of France and Germany. He studied theology at Geneva under Beza, and shortly after the massacre of St. Bartholomew, in 1572, was invited to accept the chair of philosophy in the University of that city: this he declined, but it appears that he did give lectures there in 1578. In 1573 he ventured to return to his patron's estate near Tours, and there composed the greater portion of his works. He visited Italy, whence he brought home a number of inscriptions, which he communicated to Gruter, with leave to publish them in his 'Thesaurus;' and he even extended his travels to our northern, and then uninviting, realm of Scotland.

The multiplicity of Scaliger's labours did not enrich him. "Poverty," he says in one of his letters, "has been my faithful companion through life, and I never thought to lose her company." But his spirit was lofty and independent, and he refused on more than one occasion large sums of money, which those who esteemed his merits would have forced upon him. In 1593 he was invited by the States of Holland to accept the professorship of belles-lettres at Leyden, with a liberal salary. This he accepted, so that the close of his life was spent in independence. Unfortunately for his tranquillity, his evil genius of vanity led him in 1594 to publish his testimony to the truth of his own illustrious descent, in his 'Letter concerning the Antiquity of the Family Della Scala' . It is here, says Niceron, that the vanity and presumption of Scaliger appear to the greatest advantage; and Scioppius, a brother critic and scholar, who expressed the highest regard and admiration for the Leyden professor, so long as they were on terms of mutual admiration, no sooner felt a touch of Scaliger's power of sarcasm, than he attacked him in this weak point, in the 'Scaliger hypobolimaeus; hoc est, Elenchus Epistolae Joan. Burdonis, pseudo-Scaligeri, de vetustate et splendore gentis Scaligerae: 1607.' Scaliger replied in 'Confutatio stultissimae Burdonum fabulae: 1608,' in which, though the letter of his adversary was short enough, he professed to have detected 499 falsities. Scaliger retorted on Scioppius, whose life and conversation were open enough to attack, in his 'Confutatio stultissimae Burdonum fabulae: 1608,' published under the name of Rutgersius, one of his pupils. It has been said that the veteran controversialist died of chagrin in consequence of Scioppius's book. This, however, is not much in accordance with his character; at all events, his annoyance was long in killing him, for he did not die till 1609, and his disease was a dropsy. High honours were paid by the University to his memory; a funeral oration was pronounced in his praise by the eminent scholar Heinsius, and a monument was erected to him at the public expense.

Concerning Scaliger's character as a critic, we may quote the opinion of Bayle--'Nouvelles de la R?publique des Lettres,' for June 1684--"I know not whether it might not be said that Scaliger had too much wit and learning to write a good commentary; for his wit enabled him to find in the authors on whom he commented more refinement and genius than in fact they possessed; and his deep knowledge of literature was the cause of his fancying a thousand points of connexion between the thoughts of a writer and some rare matter of antiquity. And having made up his mind as to the reference contained in the passage, he proceeded forthwith to correct it accordingly. Unless it should rather be thought that the desire of throwing light upon some mystery of learning, unobserved by previous critics, led him to fancy hidden meanings where they did not really exist. Be this as it may, his notes are full of conjectures, bold, ingenious, and learned; but it is not clear that the authors always meant to say all that he has made them. It is possible to go as far wide of the real meaning, by having too much wit, as by having too little; and it will not do to believe that the lines of Horace and Catullus contain all the erudition which it pleases Messieurs the notemakers to bestow upon them." This passage will sufficiently explain the grounds of the bitter saying, that Scaliger was born to corrupt, rather than to correct, the classics.

The praises bestowed on him by his contemporaries, however, were most extravagant. Heinsius says, in his Funeral Oration, "Men call him differently, an abyss of erudition, a sea of sciences, the sun of doctors, the divine progeny of a divine father, of the race of gods, the greatest work and miracle, the extreme reach of Nature." His great contemporaries, Casaubon, Lipsius, and De Thou, adopt a somewhat similar style of exaggerated commendation. Such expressions of course are to be taken with allowance; rather as specimens of the taste of the age than as the deliberate testimony of those who use them. That Scaliger was profoundly learned and of immense acquirement, will not be denied; that it is impossible to push things farther than he has, will not now be asserted, "because," says Niceron, "it has been done by many." Unfortunately, this extravagant admiration contributed, no doubt, by feeding his vanity, to exacerbate that intolerably scurrilous and malignant humour, the worst part of his character, which he inherited, with his great talents, from his remarkable father.

The Table-Talk, as we may call it, of Scaliger has been collected in two series, entitled 'Scaligerana, Prima et Secunda.' For the history of these see Niceron, or the preface to Des Maizeaux's edition. They bear the same unfavourable impress of character as the rest of his writings: "the pride, arrogance, and venom of an angry pedant reign from the first leaf to the last; and they are sometimes defective in point of learning." So says Vigneul Marville, and his judgment is fully confirmed by others. "The Scaligerana," says D'Israeli, "will convince us that he was incapable of thinking or speaking favourably of any person." We have already quoted one passage which gives a specimen of the strange way in which French and Latin are mixed up in the second series, and we conclude with another, which contains an amusing instance of his vanity, both for himself and his father:--"Auratus dicebat Jul. Caes. Scaligerum Regi alicui facie similem. Oui, ? un Empereur! Il n'y a Roi qui e?t si belle fa?on que lui. Regardez moi! je lui ressemble en tout, et partout, le nez aquilin."

PENN.

Admiral Penn, who like most sailors possessed a quick temper and high notions of discipline and obedience, was little pleased with this event, and still less satisfied with his son's grave demeanour, and avoidance of the manners and ceremonies of polite life. Arguments failing, he had recourse to blows, and as a last resource, he turned his son out of doors; but soon relented so far as to equip him, in 1662, for a journey to France, in hope that the gaiety of that country would expel his new-fashioned and, as he regarded them, fanatical notions. Paris, however, soon became wearisome to William Penn, and he spent a considerable time at Saumur, for the sake of the instruction and company of Moses Amyrault, an eminent Protestant divine. Here he confirmed and improved his religious impressions, and at the same time acquired, from the insensible influence of those who surrounded him, an increased polish and courtliness of demeanour, which greatly gratified the Admiral on his return home in 1664.

Admiral Penn went to sea in 1664, and remained two years on service. During this time the external effects of his son's residence in France had worn away, and he had returned to those grave habits, and that rule of associating only with religious people, which had before given his father so much displeasure. To try the effect of absence and change of associates, Admiral Penn sent William to manage his estates in Ireland, a duty which the latter performed with satisfaction both to himself and his employer. But it chanced that, on a visit to Cork, he again attended the preaching of Thomas Loe, by whose exhortations he was deeply impressed. From this time he began to frequent the Quakers' meetings; and in September, 1667, he was imprisoned, with others, under the persecuting laws which then disgraced our statute-book. Upon application to the higher authorities, he was soon released.

Upon receiving tidings that William had connected himself with the Quakers, the Admiral immediately summoned him to England; and he soon became certified of the fact, among other peculiarities, by his son's pertinacious adherence to the Quakers' notions concerning what they called Hat Worship. This led him to a violent remonstrance. William Penn behaved with due respect: but in the main point, that of forsaking his associates and rule of conduct, he yielded nothing. The father confined his demands at last to the simple point, that his son should sit uncovered in the presence of himself, the King, and the Duke of York. Still William Penn felt bound to make not even this concession; and on this refusal, the Admiral again turned him out of doors.

Soon after, in 1668, he began to preach, and in the same year he published his first work, 'Truth Exalted, &c.' We cannot here notice his very numerous works, of which the titles run, for the most part, to an extraordinary length: but 'The Sandy Foundation Shaken,' published in the same year, claims notice, as having led to his first public persecution. In it he was induced, not to deny the doctrine of the Trinity, which in a certain sense he admitted, but to object to the language in which it is expounded by the English Church; and for this offence he was imprisoned for some time in the Tower. During this confinement, he composed 'No Cross, No Crown,' one of his principal and most popular works, of which the leading doctrine, admirably exemplified in his own life, was, that the way to future happiness and glory lies, in this world, not through a course of misery and needless mortification, but still through labour, watchfulness, and self-denial, and continual striving against corrupt passions and inordinate indulgences. This is enforced by copious examples from profane as well as sacred history; and the work gives evidence of an extent of learning very creditable to its author, considering his youth, and the circumstances under which it was composed. He was detained in prison for seven months, and treated with much severity. In 1669 he had the satisfaction of being reconciled to his father.

William Penn was one of the first sufferers by the passing of the Conventicle Act, in 1670. He was imprisoned in Newgate, and tried for preaching to a seditious and riotous assembly in Gracechurchstreet; and this trial is remarkable and celebrated in our criminal jurisprudence, for the firmness with which he defended himself, and still more for the admirable courage and constancy with which the jury maintained the verdict of acquittal which they pronounced. He showed on this, and on all other occasions, that he well understood and appreciated the free principles of our constitution, and that he was resolved not to surrender one iota of that liberty of conscience which he claimed for others, as well as for himself. "I am far from thinking it fit," he said, in addressing the House of Commons, "because I exclaim against the injustice of whipping Quakers for Papists, that Papists should be whipped for their consciences. No, for though the hand pretended to be lifted up against them hath lighted heavily upon us, and we complain, yet we do not mean that any should take a fresh aim at them, or that they should come in our room, for we must give the liberty we ask, and would have none suffer for a truly sober and conscientious dissent on any hand." His views of religious toleration and civil liberty he has well and clearly explained in the treatise entitled 'England's present Interest, &c.,' published in 1674, in which it formed part of his argument that the liberties of Englishmen were anterior to the settlement of the English church, and could not be affected by discrepancies in their religious belief. He maintained that "to live honestly, to do no injury to another, and to give every man his due, was enough to entitle every native to English privileges. It was this, and not his religion, which gave him the great claim to the protection of the government under which he lived. Near three hundred years before Austin set his foot on English ground the inhabitants had a good constitution. This came not in with him. Neither did it come in with Luther; nor was it to go out with Calvin. We were a free people by the creation of God, by the redemption of Christ, and by the careful provision of our never-to-be-forgotten, honourable ancestors: so that our claim to these English privileges, rising higher than Protestantism, could never justly be invalidated on account of non-conformity to any tenet or fashion it might prescribe."

This constitution, as originally organized by Penn, consisted, says Mr. Clarkson, "of a Governor, a Council, and an Assembly; the two last of which were to be chosen by, and therefore to be the Representatives of, the people. The Governor was to be perpetual President, but he was to have but a treble vote. It was the office of the Council to prepare and propose bills, to see that the laws were executed, to take care of the peace and safety of the province, to settle the situation of ports, cities, market-towns, roads and other public places, to inspect the public treasury, to erect courts of justice, to institute schools for the virtuous education of youth, and to reward the authors of useful discovery. Not less than two-thirds of these were necessary to make a quorum, and the consent of not less than two-thirds of such quorum in all matters of moment. The Assembly were to have no deliberative power, but when bills were brought to them from the Governor and Council, were to pass or reject them by a plain Yes or No. They were to present Sheriffs and Justices of the Peace to the Governor; a double number, for his choice of half. They were to be chosen annually, and to be chosen by secret ballot." This ground-work was modified by Penn himself at later periods, and especially by removing that restriction which forbade the Assembly to debate, or to originate bills: and it was this, substantially, which Burke, in his 'Account of the European Settlements in America' describes as "that noble charter of privileges, by which he made them as free as any people in the world, and which has since drawn such vast numbers of so many different persuasions and such various countries to put themselves under the protection of his laws. He made the most perfect freedom, both religious and civil, the basis of his establishment; and this has done more towards the settling of the province, and towards the settling of it in a strong and permanent manner, than the wisest regulations could have done on any other plan."

In 1682 a number of settlers, principally Quakers, having been already sent out, Penn himself embarked for Pennsylvania, leaving his wife and children in England. On occasion of this parting, he addressed to them a long and affectionate letter, which presents a very beautiful picture of his domestic character, and affords a curious insight into the minute regularity of his daily habits. He landed on the banks of the Delaware in October, and forthwith summoned an assembly of the freemen of the province, by whom the frame of government, as it had been promulgated in England, was accepted. Penn's principles did not suffer him to consider his title to the land as valid, without the consent of the natural owners of the soil. He had instructed persons to negotiate a treaty of sale with the Indian nations before his own departure from England; and one of his first acts was to hold that memorable Assembly, to which the history of the world offers none alike, at which this bargain was ratified, and a strict league of amity established. We do not find specified the exact date of this meeting, which took place under an enormous elm-tree, near the site of Philadelphia, and of which a few particulars only have been preserved by the uncertain record of tradition. Well and faithfully was that treaty of friendship kept by the wild denizens of the woods: 'a friendship,' says Proud, the historian of Pennsylvania, 'which for the space of more than seventy years was never interrupted, or so long as the Quakers retained power in the government.'

In labouring to secure kind treatment, to raise the character, and to promote the welfare of the Indians, Penn was active and constant, during this visit to America, as before. The legislative measures which took place while he remained, and the bickerings between the Assembly and himself, we pass over, as belonging rather to a history of Pennsylvania, than to the biography of its founder. For the same reason we omit the charges preferred against him by Dr. Franklin. The union in one person of the rights belonging both to a governor and a proprietor, no doubt is open to objection; but this cannot be urged as a fault upon Penn: and we believe that it would be difficult to name any person who has used power and privilege with more disinterested views. That he was indifferent to his powers, or his emoluments, is not to be supposed, and ought not to have been expected. He spent large sums, he bestowed much pains upon the colony: and he felt and stated it to be a great grievance, that, whereas a provision was voted to the royal governor during the period of his own suspension, not so much as a table was kept for himself, and that instead of contributing towards his expenses, even the trivial quit-rents which he had reserved remained unpaid: nay, it was sought by the Assembly, against all justice, to divert them from him, towards the support of the government. It is to be recollected that Franklin wrote for a political object, to overthrow the privileges which Penn's heirs enjoyed.

The Governor returned to England in 1701, to oppose a scheme agitated in Parliament for abolishing the proprietary governments, and placing the colonies immediately under royal control: the bill, however, was dropped before he arrived. He enjoyed Anne's favour, as he had that of her father and uncle, and resided much in the neighbourhood of the court, at Kensington and Knightsbridge. In his religious labours he continued constant, as heretofore. He was much harassed by a law-suit, the result of too much confidence in a dishonest steward: which being decided against him, he was obliged for a time to reside within the Rules of the Fleet Prison. This, and the expenses in which he had been involved by Pennsylvania, reduced him to distress, and in 1709, he mortgaged the province for ?6,600. In 1712 he agreed to sell his rights to the government for ?12,000, but was rendered unable to complete the transaction by three apoplectic fits, which followed each other in quick succession. He survived however in a tranquil and happy state, though with his bodily and mental vigour much broken, until July 30, 1718, on which day he died at his seat at Rushcomb, in Berkshire, where he had resided for some years.

His first wife died in 1693. He married a second time in 1696; and left a family of children by both wives, to whom he bequeathed his landed property in Europe and America. His rights of government he left in trust to the Earls of Oxford and Powlett, to be disposed of; but no sale being ever made, the government, with the title of Proprietaries, devolved on the surviving sons of the second family.

Penn's numerous works were collected, and a life prefixed to them, in 1726. Select editions of them have been since published. Mr. Clarkson's 'Life,' Proud's 'History of Pennsylvania,' and Franklin's 'Historical Review, &c. of Pennsylvania,' for a view of the exceptions which have been taken to Penn's character as a statesman, may be advantageously consulted.

DE THOU.

Jacques Auguste de Thou, whom it is no exaggerated praise to call the greatest writer of contemporary history that has appeared since the extinction of Roman literature, was descended of a noble family of the Orleanois; and his immediate ancestors for three generations had filled with honour the higher legal offices of the realm. He was born in Paris, October 9, 1553. His temper was naturally studious; but the extreme weakness of his childhood interfered greatly with the early cultivation of his mind, and almost incapacitated him for severe application. He received, however, the best instruction which Paris could afford, until 1570, when he went to the University of Orleans to study law. Thence he removed to Valence in Dauphiny, to attend the lectures of the celebrated civilian Cujas.

De Thou returned to Paris in 1572, and meaning to take orders, applied himself principally to the study of Greek and of the canon law. In the next year he visited Italy in the train of Paul de Foix, ambassador of France to the Pope and other Italian sovereigns, and employed himself diligently and profitably in cultivating the acquaintance of learned men, and in collecting materials for his history, the design of which he had already conceived. He returned to Paris in 1575, and during four years applied himself chiefly to study, taking various occasions to extend his travels into Flanders and Germany. In 1578 he was appointed Conseiller-clerc to the parliament of Paris, and in 1581, one of a commission sent into Guienne, to provide for the better administration of justice, which had been greatly impeded by religious dissension. Returning to Paris in November, 1582, immediately after the decease of his father, and having become the head of his family by the death of two elder brothers, he determined to abandon the ecclesiastical profession, and exchanged his place of Conseiller-clerc, for the lay appointment of Ma?tre des Requ?tes. In 1586 he obtained the reversion of the office of Pr?sident ? Mortier, held by his uncle Augustin de Thou; and having obtained a dispensation from the ecclesiastical engagements which he had contracted, he married, in 1587, Marie de Barbanson.

The History is written in Latin: the style is good, but it is disfigured by the affectation not only of Latinizing names, but of expressing modern offices by classical phrases, which of necessity bear a very forced, or no analogy to the things which they are tortured to denote. For instance, it would be difficult to recognise the Constable of France under the title Magister Equitum. This makes the assistance of an explanatory dictionary very requisite, and such a one was published by Jacques Dupuy, in 1634, under the title, Index Thuani. The History is comprised in 138, or, as divided in some editions, into 143 books; and, in the London edition of 1733, fills six ponderous folios. In the relation of foreign affairs, De Thou's authority is less valuable, for it is stated that he received with little examination the accounts which were transmitted to him from abroad: but for the history of France during the sixteenth century, his work is the standard authority on which later writers have relied. The best and wisest men of all parties have joined, since his death, in according to him the praise of strict integrity and impartiality, a generosity of temper which scorned to suppress or pervert the truth, and great diligence, as well as unusual opportunities, in ascertaining the real course of events. It is not meant to claim for him an entire exemption from the errors of limited information, or the faults of temper and prejudice: defects such as these are incident to all human productions. It is to be observed that the heaviest charges against him on this head have been made by those who were of his own religion.

A doubt has been expressed whether the Latin memoirs which profess to be written by De Thou, proceed from his own pen, or from that of Rigault. They are translated into French, and printed by themselves. They are interspersed with many pieces in Latin verse, which De Thou took pleasure in composing, and wrote with elegance. He composed a poem on Hawking, entitled "Hieracosophion", and translated the Book of Job, and several portions of the Prophecies. The gleanings of his conversation, extant under the title Thuana, are scarcely worthy of his high reputation.

CHATHAM.

William Pitt, the first Earl of Chatham, was born in Westminster, November 15, 1708. He was sent to Eton at an early age, and admitted a gentleman-commoner of Trinity College, Oxford, in January, 1726. His father, Robert Pitt, Esq., of Boconnock, in Cornwall, died in the following year, and left to him the scanty inheritance of a younger son. He quitted Oxford without taking a degree; spent some time in travelling on the Continent; and entered the army shortly after his return. He obtained a seat in Parliament for Old Sarum in 1735, and attached himself to the party in opposition, then headed in the lower house by the Pulteneys, and favoured in the upper by the Prince of Wales. His known talents, and his determined hostility, soon drew upon him the anger of Sir Robert Walpole, who is reported to have said, "We must at all events muzzle that terrible cornet of horse." Failing in this, he had recourse to a method of revenge which would not have been tolerated in later times, and took away Pitt's commission. For this injury, however, the sufferer received an ample recompense in the increased estimation of the public.

On the death of Henry Pelham, March 6, 1754, his brother, the Duke of Newcastle, became First Lord of the Treasury. Pitt's wishes certainly pointed to the office of Secretary of State, vacated by the Duke, but he received no promotion. This was excused on the ground of the King's personal dislike; but Pitt felt himself aggrieved; and having neither regard nor respect for the prime minister, he gradually placed himself in decided opposition to the government. Still he retained his place as Paymaster, until November 20, 1755, on which day, with his friends Legge and George Grenville, he was dismissed. In opposition, he resumed his former activity; and he had abundant ground for invective against the incapacity which led to those reverses in the Mediterranean, in America, and in India, which raised a general cry of indignation through the country. The Duke tried in vain to strengthen himself, by making overtures of reconciliation to Mr. Pitt, and at last resigned, November 11, 1756. The Duke of Devonshire went to the Treasury, Pitt was made Secretary of State, and Legge and Grenville both were taken into office. This arrangement was short-lived. The King was ill-pleased at the way in which the present ministry had been forced upon him; and he had a personal dislike to some of them, especially to Pitt, and to the first Lord of the Admiralty, Lord Temple, who was dismissed in April, 1757. Upon this Pitt resigned. During the short period of this administration, he had displayed his vigour and decision in originating measures to repair the loss which we had sustained in America; and had endeavoured, but in vain, to save the unfortunate Admiral Byng.

A sort of ministerial interregnum succeeded, and lasted until the beginning of June. The King tried in vain to construct an administration. Meanwhile Pitt was at the height of popularity; and addresses of approbation were showered on him from all parts of the kingdom. At last the King was compelled to recall him; and, after considerable negotiation, he consented to form a government in union with the Duke of Newcastle, whose parliamentary influence conferred on him a degree of importance quite disproportioned to the weakness of his character. Pitt, with the power of Premier, returned to his post as Secretary, and the Duke took the office of First Lord of the Treasury.

To the scheme for raising a revenue in America, Mr. Pitt was very strongly opposed. Illness prevented his attendance in the House of Commons when that scheme was first brought forward; but in his speech on the meeting of parliament, January 14, 1766, after tidings of the disturbances in America had been received, he declared his opinion in the strongest terms. "It is a long time, Mr. Speaker, since I have attended in parliament. When the resolution was taken in the House to tax America, I was ill in bed. If I could have endured to have been carried in my bed, so great was the agitation of my mind for the consequences, I would have solicited some kind friend to have laid me down on this floor, to have borne my testimony against it.... It is my opinion that this kingdom has no right to lay a tax upon the colonies. At the same time I assert the authority of this kingdom over the colonies to be sovereign and supreme in every circumstance of government and legislation whatsoever." He recommended that the Stamp Act should be repealed absolutely and immediately, but that the repeal should be accompanied with an assertion of the sovereign power of this country over the colonies, couched in the strongest terms that could be devised, in every point whatsoever, except that of taking their money out of their pocket without their consent. These declarations coincided with the policy of the Marquis of Rockingham, who had been summoned by the King to form an administration in July, 1765, and who, without any fault on his side, was involved in all the difficulties and dangers which resulted from his predecessor's ill-judged scheme for taxing America. Mr. Pitt had previously been applied to, but declined taking office upon the terms proposed; and he showed a coolness towards the Rockingham administration, which appears to have been uncalled for by any difference in their political opinions, and which, as far as we can conjecture from the course of events, was very prejudicial to the country. Disliked by the King, slighted by Mr. Pitt, whose influence in the nation was at this time at its height, harassed by a powerful opposition which regarded it base to yield to the demands of America, the Rockingham government rather fell to pieces than was broken up, little more than a year after its formation; and Mr. Pitt reached the utmost limit of ambition in being commissioned by the King to form a ministry, without the smallest limitation as to terms, in July, 1766.

Whatever gratification he may have felt at the moment, this high position added neither to his glory nor his happiness. It led in the first place to a violent quarrel with his most intimate friend and political associate, Lord Temple, who felt himself slighted by Mr. Pitt's arrangements. Many of the most important persons, whose support he desired, felt aggrieved by his past conduct, or were offended by the haughtiness of his demeanour: Lord Rockingham, in particular, refused even to grant him an interview. And when the government was formed at last, it was of that ill-assorted and motley character which led Burke, in an often-quoted passage of his great speech on American taxation, to describe it as a "tesselated pavement without cement." The Duke of Grafton was placed at the Treasury, and for himself Pitt took a peerage and the Privy Seal. The astonishment of every body at this was extreme. Lord Chesterfield says, "Mr. Pitt, who had a carte blanche given him, named every one of them ; but what would you think he named himself for?--Lord Privy Seal, and Earl of Chatham. The joke here is, that he has had a fall up stairs, and has done himself so much hurt that he will never be able to stand upon his legs again. Every body is puzzled how to account for this step; though it would not be the first time that great abilities have been duped by low cunning. But, be it what it will, he is now certainly only Earl of Chatham, and no longer Mr. Pitt in any respect whatever. Such an event, I believe, was never heard nor read of. To withdraw in the fullness of his power, and in the utmost gratification of his ambition, from the House of Commons , and to go into that hospital of incurables, the House of Lords, is a measure so unaccountable, that nothing but proof positive could have made me believe it; but true it is."

At this time often recurring paroxysms of gout had greatly shattered Lord Chatham's constitution, and incapacitated him for that comprehensive superintendence over the affairs of government which he had exercised during his former glorious administration. Surrounded by a disjointed set of men, fluctuating in opinion, attached neither to each other nor to their chief, it was more than ever necessary that the master-hand should retain its wonted dexterity and power. But the case was very different. During the whole session of Parliament in 1767, Lord Chatham was prevented from attending to business by illness; and after the rising of Parliament he was compelled to inform the King, that "such was his ill state of health, that his Majesty must not expect from him any further advice or assistance in any arrangements whatever." This declaration may be considered as equivalent to a resignation; but unfortunately he continued nominally in office until October 15, 1768, lending the sanction of his great name to a course of policy the reverse of that which he had advocated, especially in regard of the renewal of the attempt to tax America. On this subject Mr. Thackeray remarks, "A greater contrast in the feelings of the Cabinet and of the nation upon the present resignation of Lord Chatham, to those which were evinced upon his dismission from office in 1757, and upon his retirement in 1761, can hardly be imagined. His dismission in 1757 excited one common cry of enthusiastic admiration towards himself, and of indignation against his political opponents. The attention, not only of Great Britain, but of the whole of Europe, was attracted by his resignation in 1761; and, although the voices of his countrymen were not so universally united in his favour as upon the former occasion, the event was considered as affecting the interests of nations in the four corners of the globe. The resignation of Lord Chatham in 1768 was in fact nothing more than the official relinquishment of an appointment in which he had long ceased to exercise his authority, or to exert his abilities. It was expected by the ministry, it was little regarded by the people of Great Britain, it was almost unknown on the Continent of Europe."

Repose soon wrought a favourable change in Lord Chatham's health, for in 1770 he led the opposition in the House of Lords. The proceedings in the House of Commons against Mr. Wilkes formed the principal topic of his first attack: but he warned the House against the fatal tendency of the attempts to raise a revenue in America; and he took occasion, at an early period of the session, to express his belief of the necessity of introducing some reform into the representation of the people, and to proclaim his cordial reconciliation and union with the Rockingham party. At the end of January, to the general surprise, the Duke of Grafton resigned; and Lord North succeeding him, formed the first durable administration which had existed since the death of Henry Pelham. During the years 1771, 1772, 1773, and 1774, Lord Chatham very seldom appeared in Parliament. At the beginning of 1775, he made two vain attempts to induce the government to offer overtures of reconciliation to America: but during the greater part of that year, and the whole of 1776, the shattered state of his health prevented him from taking any part in public affairs. May 30, 1777, he came down to the House swathed in flannel, to move an address imploring the King to take the most speedy and effectual measures for putting a stop to hostilities in America, by removing the accumulated grievances of that country: and predicted, with his usual energy and eloquence, the certain results of the conduct which we were pursuing. "You may ravage, you cannot conquer; it is impossible, you cannot conquer the Americans. You talk of your numerous friends to annihilate the Congress, and of your powerful forces to disperse their army. I might as well talk of driving them before me with this crutch. What you have sent there are too many to make peace, too few to make war. If you conquer them, what then? You cannot make them respect you, you cannot make them wear your cloth: you will plant an invincible hatred in their breasts against you. Coming from the stock they do, they can never respect you." The events of that year, the capture of Philadelphia, and the surrender of Burgoyne, fully justified his predictions. These events had not been announced in England in November, when Parliament again met; but in the debate on the Address on the 18th, Lord Chatham again raised his warning voice to predict the certain failure of the contest in which we were engaged. "I love and honour the English troops: I know their virtues and their valour: I know they can achieve anything except impossibilities; and I know that the conquest of English America is an impossibility. You cannot, I venture to say it, you cannot conquer America." His speech on this occasion fortunately is very fully reported, and the records of our Parliament contain none more eloquent.

In February, 1778, Lord North announced the resolution of government to yield every point in question to the Americans, except their nominal independence of the crown. To this, little opposition was offered in either house; it probably was the line of conduct which Lord Chatham at this late hour would have advised. But the Americans had declared their independence, and were not now to be satisfied with anything short of a formal acknowledgment of it; and here the two great sections of opposition, the Rockingham and Shelburne parties, were divided. The latter, with Lord Chatham at their head, regarded such an acknowledgment as the prelude to the total ruin and degradation of the country. The former held that it was impossible to avoid it at last, and earnestly desired, since the colonists could not be retained as subjects, to secure their alliance to this country, and not to drive them into the arms of France. The Duke of Richmond moved an address embodying these views, April 7th, a day memorable for the most affecting scene ever witnessed within the walls of Parliament. We relate it as nearly as possible from the account communicated to Mr. Seward by an eyewitness, and published in his Anecdotes of distinguished Persons.

"Lord Chatham came into the House of Lords leaning on two friends, wrapped up in flannel, pale and emaciated. Within his large wig little more was to be seen than his aquiline nose, and his penetrating eye. He looked like a dying man; yet never was seen a figure of more dignity; he appeared like a being of superior species.

"He rose from his seat with slowness and difficulty, leaning upon his crutches, and supported under each arm by his two friends. He took one hand from his crutch, and raised it, casting his eyes towards Heaven, and said, 'I thank God that I have been enabled to come here this day, to perform my duty, and to speak on a subject which has so deeply impressed my mind. I am old and infirm--have one foot--more than one foot, in the grave. I am risen from my bed, to stand up in the cause of my country!--perhaps never again to speak in this House.'

"The reverence, the attention, the stillness of the house, was most affecting: if any one had dropped an handkerchief, the noise would have been heard. At first he spoke in a very low and feeble tone; but as he grew warm his voice rose, and was as harmonious as ever; oratorical and affecting perhaps more than at any former period; both from his own situation and from the importance of the subject on which he spoke. He gave the whole history of the American war; of all the measures to which he had objected; and all the evils which he had prophesied in consequence of them; adding, at the end of each, 'And so it proved.'" He concluded with an energetic appeal against the "dismemberment of this ancient and most noble monarchy." To the Duke of Richmond's reply he listened with attention and composure: he then rose again, but his strength failed, and he fell back in convulsions in the arms of the Peers who surrounded him. The House immediately adjourned. On the following day the Duke of Richmond's motion was negatived.

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