it immeasurably extended the influence of parliamentary speaking, and did much to purify it from extravagance and bombast, thus promoting its literary excellence. The orator knew that language may exercise a thrilling effect in delivery, which would be insufferable if submitted the next day to the cold criticism of unimpassioned readers.

The principal figure of this group was Burke. Born in Dublin, in 1730, he came to London in 1750, a poor and unknown adventurer; rose by dint of work and merits, and entered Parliament at the age of thirty-five, trained in law, history, philosophy, and literature; lifted himself into fame by his speeches on the Stamp Act and the American War, and won the crown of his glory as an orator when in the great Hall of Westminster, in the presence of the fairest and most gifted of the land, he voiced the thunders of his eloquence in the impeachment of Warren Hastings. His reading was extensive and varied, his intellect broad, his imagination fertile and precise, his emotions warm and abundant. 'I have learned more from him,' exclaimed Fox, 'than from all the books I ever read.' His style is the outpouring of a great heart and a deep mind, rolling and impetuous, broad as the sea, brilliant with color. Take an example:

'It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then the dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she just began to move in,-glittering like the morning star, full of life, and splendor, and joy. Oh! what a revolution! and what an heart must I have to contemplate without emotion that elevation and that fall! Little did I dream, when she added titles of veneration to that enthusiastic, distinct, respectful love, that she should ever be obliged to carry the sharp antidote against disgrace concealed in that bosom; little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fallen upon her in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honour and of cavaliers. I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards to avenge even a look that threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone. That of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded, and the glory of Europe is extinguished forever. Never, never more shall we behold that generous loyalty to rank and sex, that proud submission, that dignified obedience, that subordination of the heart, which kept alive, even in servitude itself, the spirit of an exalted freedom. The unbought grace of life, the cheap defence of nations, the nurse of manly sentiment and heroic enterprise is gone! It is gone, that sensibility of principle, that chastity of honour, which felt a stain like a wound, which inspired courage whilst it mitigated ferocity, which ennobled whatever it touched, and under which vice itself lost half its evil by losing all its grossness."

In advanced years, he had reluctantly accepted a pension, and was reproached by the Duke of Bedford, to whom he answered: 1 Reflections on the Revolution in France.

'The grants to the house of Russell were so enormous, as not only to outrage economy, but even to stagger credibility. The Duke of Bedford is the leviathan among all the creatures of the crown. He tumbles about in his unwieldy bulk; he plays and frolicks in the ocean of the royal bounty. Huge as he is, and whilst "he lies floating many a rood," he is still a creature. His ribs, his fins, his whalebone, his blubber, the very spiracles through which he spouts a torrent of brine against his origin, and covers me all over with the spray,-everything of him and about him is from the throne."

In the September election of 1780, he was rejected for the part he had taken in a recent mitigation of the penal laws against the Romanists. His address to the electors of Bristol has this noble conclusion:

Gentlemen, I have had my day. I can never sufficiently express my gratitude to you for having set me in a place wherein I could lend the slightest help to great and laudable designs. If I have had my share in any measure giving quiet to private property, and private conscience; if by my vote I have aided in securing to families the best possession, peace; if I have joined in reconciling kings to their subjects, and subjects to their prince; if I have assisted to loosen the foreign holdings of the citizen, and taught him to look for his protection to the laws of his country, and for his comfort to the good-will of his countrymen; if I have thus taken my part with the best of men in the best of their actions; I can shut the book: I might wish to read a page or two more, but this is enough for my measure. I have not lived in vain.

And now, gentlemen, on this serious day, when I come, as it were, to make up my account with you, let me take to myself some degree of honest pride on the nature of the charges that are brought against me. I do not here stand before you accused of venality or of neglect of duty. It is not said, that, in the long period of my service, I have in a single instance sacrificed the slightest of your interests to my ambition, or to my fortune. It is not alleged that, to gratify any anger or revenge of my own, or of my party, I have had a share in wronging or oppressing any description of men, or any one man of any description. No! the charges against me are all of one kind;- that I have pushed the principles of general justice and benevolence too far; further than a cautious policy would warrant, and further than the opinions of many would go along with me. In every accident which may happen through life, in pain, in sorrow, in depression, and distress-I will call to mind this accusation, and be comforted."

Long before he retired from the House, he stood almost alone; for the length of his speeches, the profundity of his argument, the profusion of his imagery, his want of temper and discretion, wearied and perplexed the squires and merchants about him. Too philosophical, he—

'Still went on refining,

And thought of convincing when they thought of dining.' But if his eloquence flew over the heads of those to whom it was addressed, it was to be the admiration of future ages. Few speeches can be read with profit when the hearer and speaker have long been turned to dust; but 'the immortality of Burke is that which is common to Cicero or to Bacon-that which can never be interrupted while there exists the beauty of order or

1A Letter to a Noble Lord.

the love of virtue; and which can fear no death except what barbarity may impose on the globe.'

Through the trials of obscurity and the seductions of splendor, he preserved a pure reputation and an unscathed conscience, fighting nobly for noble causes, the friend of the afflicted, the champion of principle, and the persecutor of vice:

'His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal;

Nor number nor example with him wrought

To swerve from truth or change his constant mind.'

Résumé. The closing years of the period were marked by a revival of interest in early English poetry, by political and social conflicts. Physical science was rapidly enlarging its acquisitions. The scepticism of Hume was calling forth a new school of metaphysicians, who emphasized the intuitive nature of man, and thus helped to deepen its spiritual impulses. Political Economy formed a new intellectual movement of vast importance to the interests of peace, and therefore of civilization. Able and devout men were giving proof of the practical control of Christian truth, as well as of its theoretical force. Cowper and Burns ushered in a new school of poetry, natural, spontaneous, and sincere. It was preeminently an age of historical inquiries and historical methods of investigation; wakeful, speculative, germinant.

The century developed, in prose, two distinct modes of literary expression, the colloquial elegance of Addison, and the impressive pomp of Johnson. The first is English, the second is Latinistic. Both contribute to the formation of modern style, in which poetry combines polish with nature and feeling, and prose becomes at once vigorous and easy.

GIBBON.

Pardon me, sir, but, as much as I admire your abilities, I cannot bear without indignation your sarcastic slyness upon Christianity, and cannot see without pity your determined hostility to the Gospel.- Whitaker.

Biography.-Born in the village of Putney, in the county of Surrey, in 1737.

'Nor can I reflect without pleasure on the bounty of Nature, which cast my birth in a free and civilized country, in an age of science and philosophy, in a family of honorable rank, and decently endowed with the gifts of fortune.'

He was succeeded by five brothers and one sister, all of whom died in infancy. He was himself so frail that the most tender assiduity was scarcely sufficient to rear him:

'As soon as the use of speech had prepared my infant reason for the admission of knowledge, I was taught the arts of reading, writing, and arithmetic.'

In his ninth year he was sent to Kingston, whence he was recalled, after a residence of two years, by the death of his mother:

'I was too young to feel the importance of my loss; and the image of her person and conversation is faintly imprinted in my memory. My poor father was inconsolable. I can never forget the scene of our first interview, some weeks after the fatal event; the awful silence, the room hung with black, the mid-day tapers, his sighs and tears; his praises of my mother, a saint in heaven; his solemn adjuration that I would cherish her memory, and imitate her virtues; and the fervor with which he kissed and blessed me as the sole surviving pledge of their loves.'

At fifteen he was sent to Oxford, carrying there a stock of erudition that would have puzzled a doctor, and a degree of ignorance of which a school-boy would have been ashamed. His reading was extensive, but desultory; and his education without direction or discipline. Hence, as he himself states, he spent fourteen months at college idly and unprofitably. While here, he read himself into Romanism.

'Youth is sincere and impetuous, and a momentary glow of enthusiasm had raised me above all temporal considerations.'

To reclaim him, he was immediately sent to Lausanne, to be under the care of a Calvinist minister, whose prudent management, in the absence of opposing influences, effected his return to Protestantism. It is more than probable, however, that he was now indifferent to either faith, and the change was a mere matter of form; since we are told that for the rest of his life he was a 'philosopher,' as the eighteenth century understood the term; in other words, a disbeliever in revealed religion. His disorders had wonderfully vanished, and he was able to pursue, with astonishing success, a regular and severe system of study in the Latin and French languages, and in general literature. During his residence here, he became the devoted admirer of a charming girl, refined by education and exalted by piety. It is curious to speculate on the effect of such a union upon his character and opinions, but he was to be one of the illustrious men who have felt keenly the disappointment of their affection.

'I need not blush at recollecting the object of my choice; and though my love was disappointed of success, I am rather proud that I was once capable of feeling such a pure

and exalted sentiment.

The wit, the beauty, and erudition of Mademoiselle Curchod were the theme of universal applause. The report of such a prodigy awakened my curiosity; I saw and loved. I found her learned without pedantry, lively in conversation, pure in sentiment, and elegant in manners; and the first sudden emotion was fortified by the habits and knowledge of a more familiar acquaintance. She permitted me to make her two or three visits at her father's house. I passed some happy days there, in the mountains of Burgundy; her parents honorably encouraged the connection. In calm retirement the gay vanity of youth no longer fluttered in her bosom; she listened to the voice of truth and passion; and I might presume to hope that I had made some impression on a virtuous heart. At Crassy and Lausanne I indulged my dream of felicity; but on my return to England I soon discovered that my father would not hear of this strange alliance, and that without his consent I was myself destitute and helpless. After a painful struggle, I yielded to my fate; I sighed as a lover, I obeyed as a son; my wound was insensibly healed by time, absence, and the habits of a new life. My cure was accelerated by a faithful report of the tranquillity and cheerfulness of the lady herself; and my love subsided in friendship and esteem. The minister of Crassy soon afterwards died; his stipend died with him, his daughter retired to Geneva, where, by teaching young ladies, she earned a hard subsistence for herself and her mother; but in her lowest distress, she maintained a spotless reputation and a dignified behavior. A rich banker from Paris, a citizen of Geneva, had the good fortune and good sense to discover and possess this inestimable treasure; and in the capital of taste and luxury she resisted the temptations of wealth, as she had sustained the hardships of indigence. The genius of her husband has exalted him to the most conspicuous station in Europe. In every change of prosperity and disgrace he has reclined on the bosom of a faithful friend; and Mademoiselle Curchod is now the wife of M. Necker, the minister, and perhaps the legislator, of the French monarchy.'

In 1758 he returned to England, spent two years and a half in the unpromising occupation of a militia captain; travelled and studied in France and Italy, his indiscriminate appetite having subsided by degrees into the historic line. While at Rome, his long cherished desire to write some historical work took definite shape from a romantic incident:

'As I sat musing amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefooted friars were singing vespers in the temple of Jupiter, the idea of writing the decline and fall of the city first started in my mind.'

Some years elapsed, however, before he was seriously engaged in the execution of his scheme. In 1778 he settled in London. Once seated in his library, he began the composition of his history:

'At the outset all was dark and doubtful,—even the title of the work, the true era of the Decline and Fall of the Empire, the limits of the introduction, the division of the chapters, and the order of the narrative,—and I was often tempted to cast away the labor of seven years.'

а

Entered Parliament, where, through eight sessions, he was 'a mute member,' for the great speakers filled him with despair, and the bad ones with terror. Finding it necessary to retrench, and disappointed of a lucrative place for which he had hoped from ministerial patronage, he retired to Lausanne, the paradise of his