Delphi Complete Works of Richard Brinsley Sheridan

by Richard Brinsley Sheridan

  “A call of the House is ordered for the first Tuesday after the recess, and circular letters from the Speaker worded in this remarkable manner, “that the members do attend on that day as they tender the rights of Ireland.” In short, nothing will satisfy the people but the most unequivocal assertion of the total independence of the Irish legislature. This flame has been raised within this six weeks, and is entirely owing either to the insidious design or unpardonable inattention of the late administration, in including, or suffering to be included, the name of Ireland in no less than five British statutes passed last sessions. People here were ignorant of this till Grattan produced the five Acts to the House of Commons, one of which Eden had been so imprudent as to publish in the Dublin gazette. Previous to this the general sense of the country was, that the mere question of right should be suffered to sleep, provided the exercise of the power claimed under it should never again be resorted to in a single instance.

  “The sooner you repeal the 6th of G. I. the better; for, believe me, nothing short of that can now preserve union and cordiality between the two countries.

  “I hope my father and you are very good friends by this. I shall not be able to send you the remaining 50l. till October, as I have been disappointed as to the time of payment of the money I expected to receive this month. Let me entreat you to write to me shortly a few words. I beg my love to Mrs. S. and Tom.

  “I am, dear Dick,

  “Your very affectionate brother,

  “C. F. SHERIDAN.”

  The expectations of the writer of this letter were not disappointed. The influence of Mr. Sheridan, added to his own claims, procured for him the office of Secretary of War in Ireland, — a situation, which the greater pliancy of his political principles contrived to render a more permanent benefit to him than any that his Whig brother was ever able to secure for himself.

  The death of the Marquis of Rockingham broke up this shortlived Ministry, which, during the four months of its existence, did more perhaps for the principles of the Constitution, than any one administration that England had seen since the Revolution. They were betrayed, it is true, into a few awkward overflowings of loyalty, which the rare access of Whigs to the throne may at once account for and excuse: — and Burke, in particular, has left us a specimen of his taste for extremes, in that burst of optimism with which he described the King’s message, as “the best of messages to the best of people from the best of kings.” But these first effects of the atmosphere of a court, upon heads unaccustomed to it, are natural and harmless — while the measures that passed during that brief interval, directed against the sources of Parliamentary corruption, and confirmatory of the best principles of the Constitution, must ever be remembered to the honor of the party from which they emanated. The exclusion of contractors from the House of Commons — the disqualification of revenue-officers from voting at elections — the disfranchisement of corrupt voters at Cricklade, by which a second precedent [Footnote: The first was that of the borough of Shoreham in 1771.] was furnished towards that plan of gradual Reform, which has, in our own time, been so forcibly recommended by Lord John Russell — the diminution of the patronage of the Crown, by Mr. Burke’s celebrated Bill [Footnote: This Bill, though its circle of retrenchment was, as might be expected, considerably narrowed, when the Treasury Bench became the centre from which he described it, was yet eminently useful, as an acknowledgment from ministerial authority of the necessity of such occasional curtailments of the Royal influence.] — the return to the old constitutional practice [Footnote: First departed from in 1769. See Burke’s powerful exposure of the mischiefs of this innovation, in his “Thoughts on the Causes of the present Discontents.”] of making the revenues of the Crown pay off their own incumbrances, which salutary principle was again lost in the hands of Mr. Pitt — the atonement at last made to the violated rights of electors, by the rescinding of the Resolutions relative to Wilkes — the frank and cordial understanding entered into with Ireland, which identifies the memory of Mr. Fox and this ministry with the only oasis in the whole desert of Irish history — so many and such important recognitions of the best principles of Whiggism, followed up, as they were, by the Resolutions of Lord John Cavendish at the close of the Session, pledging the ministers to a perseverance in the same task of purification and retrenchment, give an aspect to this short period of the annals of the late reign, to which the eye turns for relief from the arbitrary complexion of the rest; and furnish us with, at least, one consoling instance, where the principles professed by statesmen, when in opposition, were retained and sincerely acted upon by them in power.

  On the death of the Marquis of Rockingham, Lord Shelburne, without, as it appears, consulting any of the persons attached to that nobleman, accepted the office of first Lord of the Treasury; in consequence of which Mr. Fox, and the greater number of his friends — among whom were Mr. Burke and Mr. Sheridan — sent in their resignations; while General Conway, the Duke of Richmond, and one or two other old allies of the party, remained in office.

  To a disposition so social as that of Mr. Fox, the frequent interruption and even loss of friendships, which he had to sustain in the course of his political career, must have been a sad alloy to its pleasure and its pride. The fable of the sheep that leaves its fleece on the bramble bush is but too apt an illustration of the fate of him, who thus sees himself stripped of the comforts of friendship by the tenacious and thorny hold of politics. On the present occasion, however, the desertion of his standard by a few who had followed him cordially in his ascent to power, but did not show the same alacrity in accompanying his voluntary fall, was amply made up to him by the ready devotion, with which the rest of the party shared his fortunes. The disinterestedness of Sheridan was the more meritorious, if, as there is every reason to believe, he considered the step of resignation at such a moment to be, at least, hasty, if not wholly wrong. In this light it was, indeed, viewed by many judicious persons at the time, and the assurances given by the Duke of Richmond and General Conway, of the continued adherence of the cabinet to the same principles and measures, to which they were pledged at the first formation of the ministry, would seem to confirm the justice of the opinion. So much temper, however, had, during the few months of their union, been fermenting between the two great masses of which the administration was composed, that it would have been difficult, if not impossible, for the Rockingham party to rally, with any cordiality, round Lord Shelburne, as a leader — however they might still have been contented to co-operate with him, had he remained in the humble station which he himself had originally selected. That noble Lord, too, who felt that the sacrifice which he had considerately made, in giving up the supremacy of station to Lord Rockingham, had, so far from being duly appreciated by his colleagues, been repaid only with increased alienation and distrust, could hardly be expected to make a second surrender of his advantages, in favor of persons who had, he thought, so ungraciously requited him for the first. In the mean time the Court, to which the Rockingham party was odious, had, with its usual policy, hollowed the ground beneath them, so as to render their footing neither agreeable nor safe. The favorite object in that quarter being to compose a ministry of those convenient ingredients, called “King’s friends,” Lord Shelburne was but made use of as a temporary instrument, to clear away, in the first plane, the chief obstacles to such an arrangement, and then, in his turn, be sacrificed himself, as soon as a more subservient system could be organized. It was, indeed, only upon a strong representation from his Lordship of the impossibility of carrying on his government against such an Opposition, without the infusion of fresh and popular talent, that the royal consent was obtained to the appointment of Mr. Pitt — the memory of whose uncompromising father, as well as the first achievements on his own youthful shield, rendered him no very promising accession to such a scheme of government, as was evidently then contemplated by the Court.

  In this state of affairs, the resignation of Mr. Fox and his friends was but a prompt and spir
ited anticipation of what must inevitably have taken place, under circumstances much less redounding to the credit of their independence and disinterestedness. There is little doubt, indeed, that with the great majority of the nation, Mr. Fox by this step considerably added to his popularity — and, if we were desired to point out the meridian moment of his fame, we should fix it perhaps at this splendid epoch, before the ill-fated Coalition had damped the confidence of his friends, or the ascendancy of his great rival had multiplied the number of his enemies.

  There is an anecdote of Mr. Burke, connected with this period, the credibility of which must be left to the reader’s own judgment. It is said that, immediately upon the retirement of Mr. Fox, while Lord John Cavendish (whose resignation was for a short time delayed by the despatch of some official business) was still a minister, Mr. Burke, with a retrospect to the sweets of office which showed that he had not wholly left hope behind, endeavored to open a negotiation through the medium of Lord John, for the purpose of procuring, by some arrangement, either for himself or his son, a Tellership then in the possession of a relative of Lord Orford. It is but fair to add that this curious anecdote rests chiefly upon the authority of the latter nobleman. [Footnote: Unpublished Papers.] The degree of faith it receives will, therefore, depend upon the balance that may be struck in our comparative estimate between the disinterestedness of Burke and the veracity of Lord Orford.

  At the commencement of the following session that extraordinary Coalition was declared, which had the ill-luck attributed to the conjunction of certain planets, and has shed an unfavorable influence over the political world ever since. Little is, I believe, known of the private negotiations that led to this ill-assorted union of parties; but, from whichever side the first advances may have come, the affair seems to have been dispatched with the rapidity of a Siamese courtship; and while to Mr. Eden (afterwards Lord Auckland) is attributed the credit of having gained Lord North’s consent to the union, Mr. Burke is generally supposed to have been the person, who sung the “Hymen, oh Hymenae” in the ears of Mr. Fox.

  With that sagacity, which in general directed his political views, Mr. Sheridan foresaw all the consequences of such a defiance of public opinion, and exerted, it is said, the whole power of his persuasion and reasoning, to turn aside his sanguine and uncalculating friend from a measure so likely to embarrass his future career. Unfortunately, however, the advice was not taken, — and a person, who witnessed the close of a conversation, in which Sheridan had been making a last effort to convince Mr. Fox of the imprudence of the step he was about to take, heard the latter, at parting, express his final resolution in the following decisive words:— “It is as fixed as the Hanover succession.”

  To the general principle of Coalitions, and the expediency and even duty of forming them, in conjunctures that require and justify such a sacrifice of the distinctions of party, no objection, it appears to me, can rationally be made by those who are satisfied with the manner in which the Constitution has worked, since the new modification of its machinery introduced at the Revolution. The Revolution itself was, indeed, brought about by a Coalition, in which Tories, surrendering their doctrines of submission, arrayed themselves by the side of Whigs, in defence of their common liberties. Another Coalition, less important in its object and effects, but still attended with results most glorious to the country, was that which took place in the year 1757, when, by a union of parties from whose dissension much mischief had flowed, the interests of both king and people were reconciled, and the good genius of England triumphed at home and abroad.

  On occasions like these, when the public liberty or safety is in peril, it is the duty of every honest statesman to say, with the Roman, “Non me impedient privatae offensiones, quo minus pro reipublicae salute etian cum inimicissimo consentiam.” Such cases, however, but rarely occur; and they have been in this respect, among others, distinguished from the ordinary occasions, on which the ambition or selfishness of politicians resorts to such unions, that the voice of the people has called aloud for them in the name of the public weal; and that the cause round which they have rallied has been sufficiently general, to merge all party titles in the one undistinguishing name of Englishman. By neither of these tests can the junction between Lord North and Mr. Fox be justified. The people at large, so far from calling for this ill- omened alliance, would on the contrary — to use the language of Mr. Pitt — have “forbid the banns;” and though it is unfair to suppose that the interests of the public did not enter into the calculations of the united leaders, yet, if the real watchword of their union were to be demanded of them in “the Palace of Truth,” there can be little doubt that the answer of each would be, distinctly and unhesitatingly, “Ambition.”

  One of the most specious allegations in defence of the measure is, that the extraordinary favor which Lord Shelburne enjoyed at court, and the arbitrary tendencies known to prevail in that quarter, portended just then such an overflow of Royal influence, as it was necessary to counteract by this double embankment of party. In the first place, however, it is by no means so certain that the noble minister at this period did actually enjoy such favor. On the contrary, there is every reason to believe that his possession of the Royal confidence did not long survive that important service, to which he was made instrumental, of clearing the cabinet of the Whigs; and that, like the bees of Virgil, he had left the soul of his own power in the wound which he had been the means of inflicting upon that of others. In the second place, whatever might have been the designs of the Court, — and of its encroaching spirit no doubt can be entertained, — Lord Shelburne had assuredly given no grounds for apprehending, that he would ever, like one of the chiefs of this combination against him, be brought to lend himself precipitately or mischievously to its views. Though differing from Mr. Fox on some important points of policy, and following the example of his friend, Lord Chatham, in keeping himself independent of Whig confederacies, he was not the less attached to the true principles of that party, and, throughout his whole political career, invariably maintained them. This argument, therefore, — the only plausible one in defence of the Coalition, — fails in the two chief assumptions on which it is founded.

  It has been truly said of Coalitions, considered abstractedly, that such a union of parties, when the public good requires it, is to be justified on the same grounds on which party itself is vindicated. But the more we feel inclined to acknowledge the utility of party, the more we must dread and deprecate any unnecessary compromise, by which a suspicion of unsoundness may be brought upon the agency of so useful a principle — the more we should discourage, as a matter of policy, any facility in surrendering those badges of opinion, on which the eyes of followers are fondly fixed, and by which their confidence and spirit are chiefly kept alive — the more, too, we must lament that a great popular leader, like Mr. Fox, should ever have lightly concurred in such a confusion of the boundaries of opinion, and, like that mighty river, the Mississippi, whose waters lose their own color in mixing with those of the Missouri, have sacrificed the distinctive hue of his own political creed, to this confluence of interests with a party so totally opposed to it.

  “Court and country,” says Hume, [Footnote: Essay “on the Parties of Great Britain.”] “which are the genuine offspring of the British government, are a kind of mixed parties, and are influenced both by principle and by interest. The heads of the factions are commonly most governed by the latter motive; the inferior members of them by the former.” Whether this be altogether true or not, it will, at least, without much difficulty be conceded, that the lower we descend in the atmosphere of party, the more quick and inflammable we find the feeling that circulates through it. Accordingly, actions and professions, which, in that region of indifference, high life, may be forgotten as soon as done or uttered, become recorded as pledges and standards of conduct, among the lower and more earnest adherents of the cause; and many a question, that has ceased to furnish even a jest in the drawing-rooms of the great, may be sti
ll agitated, as of vital importance, among the humbler and less initiated disputants of the party. Such being the tenacious nature of partisanship, and such the watch kept upon every movement of the higher political bodies, we can well imagine what a portent it must appear to distant and unprepared observers, when the stars to which they trusted for guidance are seen to “shoot madly from their spheres,” and not only lose themselves for the time in another system, but unsettle all calculations with respect to their movements for the future.

  The steps by which, in general, the principles in such transactions are gradually reconciled to their own inconsistency — the negotiations that precede and soften down the most salient difficulties — the value of the advantages gained, in return for opinions sacrificed — the new points of contact brought out by a change of circumstances, and the abatement or extinction of former differences, by the remission or removal of the causes that provoked them, — all these conciliatory gradations and balancing adjustments, which to those who are in the secret may account for, and more or less justify, the alliance of statesmen who differ in their general views of politics, are with difficulty, if at all, to be explained to the remote multitude of the party, whose habit it is to judge and feel in the gross, and who, as in the case of Lord North and Mr. Fox, can see only the broad and but too intelligible fact, that the leaders for whom both parties had sacrificed so much — those on one side their interest, and those on the other, perhaps, their consciences — had deserted them to patch up a suspicious alliance with each other, the only open and visible motive to which was the spoil that it enabled them to partition between them.

  If, indeed, in that barter of opinions and interests, which must necessarily take place in Coalitions between the partisans of the People and of the Throne, the former had any thing like an equality of chance, the mere probability of gaining thus any concessions in favor of freedom might justify to sanguine minds the occasional risk of the compromise. But it is evident that the result of such bargains must generally be to the advantage of the Crown — the alluvions of power all naturally tend towards that shore. Besides, where there are places as well as principles to be surrendered on one side, there must in return be so much more of principles given up on the other, as will constitute an equivalent to this double sacrifice. The centre of gravity will be sure to lie in that body, which contains within it the source of emoluments and honors, and the other will be forced to revolve implicitly round it.