king; his foreness and irritation on the fubject, and his earnestly and industriously affecting a marked inattention, a seemingly important negligence of minifters and court measures. The almost extinguished sparks of doubt or of fufpicion, were also somewhat lighted up a few years fince, by a ridiculous, unauthorized negociation, created or imagined in the declining dotage, and officious garrulity of the late Dr. Adding

ton.

The following character is drawn by an inveterate enemy, who enjoyed, or pretends to have enjoyed more than common opportunities of minutely infpecting the life and

character of Lord Bute.

"Falfe without system to others and himself; reserved inward and darkfome, fequeftering himself in the fhades of retirement, as a refuge of vanity from contempt. Clandeftine without concealment, fad without forrow, domestic without familiarity, haughty without elevation, stubborn without firmnefs, and ambitious without fpirit; a frigid friend, a mean enemy, without eafe, manners or dignity. Bookish without learning, a dabler in the fine arts without tafte, displaying all the parade of a vast library, yet as unconverfable on literature, as a deaf man on music, or a blind man on paintings. A tutor without knowledge, a minifter without ability, and a favorite without gratitude."

To this portrait of a minifter, evidently drawn by a difappointed party man, who may thank his own abfurd fingularities for all his failures; had I a talent for perfonal comparison, I would attempt

to add a sketch of HENRY BILSON LEGGE, the first in every sense of the word, the first of Lord Bute's political victims, who gave an early alarm of the overwhelming inAuence of the favorite, and recommended inftant refignation to all his affociates. Had they attended to this advice when the lion first difcovered his paw, he might have been fuccessfully refifted; but the Thane had the art, that art in the prefent reign so often repeated, to foment their diffenfions, to attack each man fingly, and finally, to fubvert a formidable phalanx, who would have been invincible, could they have been prevailed on to hold together by common interest or common fenfe; perhaps it is well for the country that fuch powerful combinations contain within themselves the feeds of difcord and decay, we might otherwife be governed by an hereditary defpotic ariftocracy.

Mr. Legge was educated on an elaborate but private system, in conformity with the wishes of a near relation, who dreaded the lax morality of a public school; a found judgment, a retentive memory, and a peculiar turn for arithmetic calculation and finance, but not a brilliant imagination, were improved by claffical erudition, manly exercifes, and the belles lettres. After a fufficient perufal of books, he was introduced to bufinefs and men, and paffed the ufual official, parliamentary, and diplomatic routine, at the Treafury, the Admiralty, and Berlin, with exemplary diligence and propriety. Educated under the tried abilities of the Walpoles, and the dignified probity of the

Pelham,

Pelhams, he was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer; he deferved and fhared with Lord Chatham, the gratitude and applaufe of his country, but confiderably excelled his affociate in temper and difinterested political independence; without pretending to eloquence, he was heard with attention; and those who came predetermined to vote against him, could not help feeling regret at oppoting fo honeft a minifter, and fo amiable a

man.

When I called his imagination not brilliant, I meant that it was not the prominent feature of his character, for in this particular, he was fecond to few; thofe not intimately acquainted with him, and who had confidered him only as a fiatefman, were furprized on a clofer view to find him the pleafanteft man in company. With out the overacted formalities of a courtier, or the frivolous French grimace of the ancien regime, he was kind, fociable, and endearing; fulfilling, in his day, what are rarely fulfilled, the duties of a country

gentleman.

By the influence of private worth and perfonal attachment, Mr. Legge was called on by the general voice of a confiderable county, to reprefent them in parliament; a bufinefs in which, after having pledged himself beyond retreat, the Earl of Bute wifhed him to reJinquifh in favor of his relation, Sir Simeon Stewart. The minif terial application was anfwered with opennefs and mildness, but with firmnefs: "If a fingle hint had been given of his Lordship's wishes before my honor was engaged, and the interval was fuffi.

ciently long, I would not have moved a step; but after fuch flattering proofs of attachment as I have received, I would spend my last fhilling rather than act a difhonorable part with my friends in the country." Unused to oppofition, confident of his ftrength, and perhaps glad to rid himself of a man whofe uncorrupt principles were dreaded, the Premier gave the fignal of dimiffion. It was on this occafion a man, who notwithftanding his unpromifing countenauce, poffeffed a confiderable share of political acumen, and knowledge of the world, though he was afterwards branded by a certain literary drawcanfir, famous for making all his perfonages, gods or devils, with the name of the creamcoloured parafite; it was on this memorable occafion, he exclaimed, almost in the words applied to Swift in another part of this collection: "We have not honesty enough ourselves, my Lord, to affociate with thefe fellows who have."

ST

TUART, Dr. author of a Hiftory of Scotland, and editor of the Political Herald, a virulent, but well written periodic. publication.

His Life of Mr. Fox, conceived and executed in a ftrain of elaborate, unvaried panegyric, cannot be perufed by the warmeft admi'rers of that gentleman, without a figh or a blufh.

The Doctor, a fpirited writer, and a hearty partizan, was occafionally mifled by a heated imagination, ftrong refentments, and the mortification of disappointed hopes, into bitterness and malignity, long kept alive by the indecent and irritating

irritating provocations of triumphant adverfaries. Under thefe impreffions, his defcriptions as an hiftorian, and his impartiality as a critic, were occafionally and unwarrantably warped by party prejudice, expreffed in harfh epithets of coarfe contempt. Dr. Henry, Author of a Hiftory of England, whofe departmental arrangement of matter, and copious information, amply compenfate for drynefs, and a want of the attractions of ornament, was the conftant object of Stuart's inveterate attacks, both in print and converfation; whether this hoftile difpofition was produced by Henry's fuccefs, or by perfonal injury, I have not yet been informed.

In the defpondency of a fhipwrecked party, and infulted by more fuccessful rivals, he is faid to have foothed his forrows with Nottingham ale, a pleasant, but glutinous and ftupifying liquor, injurious to health of body and intellectual exertion. "If you call fo frequently for beer," faid Bishop Warburton to a young parfon who was luftily bellowing for the tankard, your fermons will be malt and hops."

66

A fenfible writer, confeffedly unfavourable in his prepoffeffions against the fubject of this article, after a long converfation, reluctantly allowed, that he poffeffed rapid conception, and an animated ftile: "But any man," he added, "with common powers, by adopting the fyftem of Stuart, might have equalled him in literary reputation." "What was his fyftem?" faid a byeftander, "that of Churchill, Hill, and a long list of literary adventurers; refolution and effrontery, VOL. II.

to write or fay any thing." A defcription of Dr. Stuart, in which the editor of this collection cannot wholly agree.

A clergyman of the Church of England, being invited to dine at a gentleman's houfe, was informed, as he alighted from his horfe, that our Scotch Hiftorian was one of the company; he directly re-mounted, and trotted home, quitting a fumptuous entertainment, and attic fociety, for a country clergyman's Saturday's repaft, cold mutton, and the comfortable chorus of mops, brushes, and brooms. He apologized to his friend the next day for fo abrupt a departure, and putting Dr. Stuart's Hiftory into his hand, pointed out the following paffage, obferving, that he could not venture to affociate with a man who avowed fuch principles.

"The members of every church contend for their respective tenets, and when they are not corrupted by riches into an indolent indifference, are too apt, by diffufing malevolence and kindling the angrieft and moft incurable paffions of the human heart, to check that univerfal benevolence, which ought to be the spirit of every religion.

"The advantage produced by fuch zeal, by no means compenfates for the calamities it produces, and it would be fortunate, if the expences, formalities and abuses of ecclefiaftical establishments, were for ever at an end; if the pontiff, the bifhop, and the prefbyter, were difimiffed; if religion, like philofophy and fcience, were left unfettered; if nations were not harneffed in matters of opinion, like E e

horfes

horfes to a carriage; and if every man's heart were the only temple in which he was to worship his God."

I fhall not prefume to determine whether it was the duty of a minifter of the gospel to fecede, or boldly meet the foe. Perhaps the timid, or the prudent rector, was of an opinion, which I have heard feriously fupported, that religion was a fubject which a clergyman fhould never introduce out of the pulpit, nor fpeak of any thing elfe in it; he feems at least to have thought that the better part of valour was difcretion. Much it is true may be faid in favour of liberal difcuffion, and that many important truths have been ftruck out by a collifion of the flint and steel of controversy. Yet it has been doubted, if one convert was ever gained by fuch conflicts; and it is to be feared, that the acrimonious heat, and indecent violence, into which religious difputes in particular, are fo apt to lead us, have often injured a good caufe, by affording opportunities to malevolence and ill-defign, for levelling the infidious arrows of ridicule, against a cause, which had nothing to fear from candour and impar tiality.

unfortunate

SULLIVAN, an Sriman, hurried by impetu

to an amiable young woman, of polifhed and engaging manners, he was admitted as her lover; but, from fome trifling difagreement, in which his conftitutional ardor fomewhat over-leaped the bounds of discretion and decorum, his vifits had, for a fhort time, been forbidden Stung with keen defire, and wearied by tedious expectation, he broke into her mother's house at the dead of night, feized her in his arms, and in spite of outcries, tears, and refiftance, conveyed her to a lonely fequestered fpot in the county of Limerick.

After fecuring the avenues of his retreat, which was an ancient castle, and confidering himself as fafe from the danger of immediate purfuit, he conducted the trembling fair one into a retired chamber, and addreffed her in the following words:

"You have tortured me fo long on the tenterhooks of fufpence, and in the agonies of delayed hope, that it is not poffible to flatter myfelf with enjoying the least share of your affections:-but it is now too late to ftruggle against an infatuation which has wound itself round the fibres of my heart; it fhall not," (continued Sullivan, his eyes flashing at once with vengeance and fierce defire) "it fhall not remain for an infulting rival, to riot on those beauties, which, to contemplate, has been, for many a day, the only folace of my life.'

and