• BOOKS.
LORD STANHOPE'S LIFE OF PITT.* SECOND NOTICE- GEORGE M. was not very sorry to be relieved from the service of Mr. Pitt. He did not see hint when he left, but he wrote to him a very curious letter, whieh is now printed for the first time. It ran:
My Dear Pitt,—As you are dosing, much to my regret, your political career, I cannot help azpreseing the joy I feel that the Ways and Means for the present year have been this day agreed to in the committee without any debate, and apparently to the satisfaction of the House.
G. R.
That was all, but in those times it was deemed much. That George III, should address a statesman. as "My dear Pitt" was esteemed a prodigy of favour, and almost a recompense for the loss of power.
It is remarkable that George LEL evidently considered Mr. Pitt's retirement as a final one—as the close of his political career. He knew that he would not yield as to the Catholics; he believed Mr. Pitt would not yield, and apparently he expected to live for ever. And he was greatly pleased at the new Minister whom fate had sent. In opinion, Mr. Addington was a mitigated George III.; he had the same prejudices, though less intense; the same common-place in- tellect, though less eager' the same tenets, though he held them sanely and not insanely. In cunning George ILL was far superior, and. in general ability perhaps not much inferior. The King was muck delighted to have a diluted resemblance, a parliamentary fac-simile of himself substituted for a proud man of genius, whose plans he could not anticipate, and whose measures he could hardly oppose. Nevertheless, although the result of the change was pleselant to the King, the excitement of it was too much for him; he went mad. He called all his family together, read to them his coronation oath, and explained to them that if he failed to keep that oath he was no longer is law King of England, and that the legal sovereignty passed to the House of Savoy. His whole manner and conduct indicated great excitement. For several days he was unable to see either the Ministers who were going out, or the Ministers who were coming in. It was considered necessary to seclude him even from the Queen and the Princesses. A more critical incident at that particular juncture could not be conceived. Mr. Pitt was resigning because he could not agree with the King on one question. Mr. Addington was coming in because he did agree with the King upon that question—on a sudden the power passed from the King. The course of events seemed. to bring back the position of 1787, and to revive the necessity of a regency. But the regent was George IV., the friend of Mr. Fox. What was likely to be his view of the retiring and the expectant Ministry, and of Catholic emancipation? Most men irt Mr. Pitt's position wouldhave tried to be pleasant to the Prince, but Mr. Pitt was not so. He had no wish to receive power as a boon and a condescension. He had been used to possess it by right, as it were, in virtue of his owls influence in Parliament and in the nation. He could not stoop to beg for place. Accordingly he said the- three most unselfish things he could say. He said that he should, as de facto Minister,propose the same restrictions—pretty severe restrictions—upon the Prince Regent, as Upon a former occasion ; he "respectfully hoped" his Royal Highness would not advise with his own friends, the opposi- tion : he said that he considered Mr. Addington as the Minister de jure, the Minister selected by the old King, the proper person to carry on the Government. "1 am afraid,' said a close and shrewd observer, "Mr. Pitt, when sent for by the Prince, was more stiff and less accommodating than he should have been." On every reason of public advantage and of common sense Mr. Pitt was bouna to have persuaded the Prince Regent to consent to Catholic emancipation. He considered that measure to be essential to the national well-being—so essential that he was resigning be- cause George III. would not consent to it. If it was not essential his past conduct was absurd, and if it was essential he was bound to press it, to press it eagerly, with "all his power, might, and amity.," on the Prince Regent. It was apparently magnanimous, but really futile, to recommend Mr. Addington, of whose opinions he disap- proved, and whose abilities he despised. George Rose, the Secretary to the Treasury, a plain. practical man, was much puzzled at this par-
tiality for the enemy. Depend on it," he said, "your friends do not wish it, and the public will not bear it." We believe that Mr. Pitt was guided partly by his own pride, as we have explained, and partly by the superstition of royalty. He could not bear to sue to the incoming Regent, and he could not bear to do what the incapacitated King would regard as an attack on the royal prerogative and as an insult to himself George /II. had laid a spell on those about him, and even Mr. Pitt, though not made senseless by it, was nevertheless controlled by it. Redoubt-
* Ate of the Right Honourable William rat. By Earl Stanhope. Vols. ILL and IV. Murray. less felt that by stirring the Catholic question he had occasioned the King's insanit:r, and would not use the opportunity of that insanity to carry the question. He would not append an unre, n- tlemanly act to a calamitous accident. It was dubious, too, whe- ther with the consent of George IV. the question could 110AV have been carried. Time for consideration had been given, and that time here meant thee for the revival of prejudices. But another turn of events was at hand. On the second of March George III. was so ill, mentally and physically, that his life was despaired of; and, as often happens, the crisis of the bodily malady was the. turning-point of the mental one. He went into a refreshing sleep, and awoke comparatively well. From that time there was continuous amendment, and the thence of recovery much preponderated. This news was brought by 3fr. Addington to Mr. Pitt at eight o'clock on the morning of the third, long before Mr. Pitt was up. They both saw that it must change the entire position ; that the regency would not be necessary; that the opi- nions of George IV. were no longer material; but Mr. Addington was probably wholly unprepared for one result of it. Mr. Pitt desired to retain office.
Of all the perverse wishes this may seem the most perverse, and it has been harshly criticized. Si; George Lewis, who has a plain literal consistent mind, and who has not mach else, says that such conduct is unintelligible. Lord Stanhope, on the other hand, defends it. He says Pitt was shocked at having occasioned the King's in- sanity ; was determined not to do so a second time ; was resolved, accordingly, not again to move the dangerous topic so long as the King lived. Why, then, should Mr. Pitt go out ?- He was the Minister most acceptable to the country, infinitely the most accept- able. On all but one question he agreed with the King and that question he would promise not to stir. There is no reply to this argument, but it proves too much. It proves that Mr. Pitt should never have resigned. As we last week ex lained, he never intended to agitate the Catholic question while in o position; he knew that
II he had no chance of agitating it successful y unless backed by the prestige of- place, and the support of the crown. He was conscious that he was in advance of his time, and that he should not count upon the support of the country.. He resigned, therefore, with no inten- tion to attack. He did not cease to agitate because George III. became insane, for he would not have agitated had George III. continued sane. His last wish not to -resign may have been more rational than his first intention to resign, but no occurrence in the interval is sufficient to explain the change.
We believe that Mr. Pitt found out his blunder. He saw that he was committing an absurdity. His reasons for resigning were what an old writer calls "reasons of tenuity." They were so thin that no one could long remember them : and so impalpable that no practical man of business could long submit to act upon them. He was resigning both power and principle. He was leaving place for a question which he did not mean to stir when out of place. This was too foolish to last. The delay interposed by the King's illness gave Mr. Pitt time to reflect, and, very naturally, he did not wish to abandon the summit of life.
But it was very natural also that Mr. Addington should wish to attain the summit. Most men—all but an infinitesimal fraction of every generation—have to endure the consciousness that they are not Prime Ministers ; most men endure it very easily. They no more desire it than they desire to be eight feet high. But to be appointed Prime Minister, and then not to be Prime Minister after all, is hard to bear. Scarcely any man could bear it patiently. In this case there was nothing to ameliorate the dissatisfaction. The blame could not be thrown on George III. His insanity had given an accidental opportunity for Mr. Pitt's change of intention, but he had not wished to go mad. And so far his wishes were efficacious; he decidedly preferred Mr. Addington to Mr. Pitt. Mr. Pitt was alone to blame. Retook a whim to go out, so his competitor might be pardoned for reasoning, and now he was taking another whim to . remain. It is much that a man, however great, should have the choice of being Prime Minister : surely it is not too mach to ask that so fortunate a person should at least be content to choose.
Mr. Addi 2-,ton, however, had a characteristic and an effectual retort. He said that, "Really, under present circumstances, he could not take the responsibility of suggesting the matter to the King, but those who were more interested in promoting it might do so, if they wished. Only he hoped they would consider what might be the effect of such a communication upon his Majesty in his present state of health." Which was equivalent to saying, "I will not help you ; I will be a gentle obstructive; and you who caused the first Illness of his Majesty by proposing what he disliked shall have the entire responsibility of risking a second, by suggesting the alteration of an arrangement to which you know he is partial." Mr. Pitt would not do this. He Wished to stay, but he did not wish to ask to stay-; still less dicl he wish to begin a dangerous negotiation in order to stay.
Mr. Addington came in, and for a few months all was cordiality between him and Pitt. Sheridan cribbed from a learned friend a passage from Aristophanes, and observed that, " The poliey of the new Ministries seemed to be the same precisely. The late Minister had gone out, yet he had left his sitting part still upon the Treasury benches." But there was an organized machinery for creating differences between them. Every statesman—such was the opera- tion of the patronage system—had in that age a set of peculiar per- sonal followers. There is hardly such a following now left. We have the Liberal party, the Conservative party, or the Radical party, but. there is no such thing as a personal following. The liberal ex-
pedants, for example, to the leadership of the House of Commons upon the death of Lord Palmerston, cannot count upon a single attached attendant. Sir George Lewis has no satellites, nor has Mr. Gladstone. It was once said that "Mr. Knatchbull Hugessen com- posed Lord John's party ;" but this was a jocose exaggeration. Our statesmen have no means of buying servants; but the statesmen of our fathers' time had ample means. They had places and sinecures and pensions in their gift, which they could confer on those who gave to them—not to their party, but to them—en critical occasions a serviceable aid. Accordingly, Mr. Pitt had attached to him occasions, Dandas, Mr. Rose, Mr. Long, and, if gratitude counted for anything., should have had Lord Grenville. Mr. Addington already count& his brother, a Mr. Bragge, and two or three common-place congenial persons besides, as his close and hopeful satellites. The consequence will be evident to every one with a sound knowledge of human nature. The leaders might be friends, the followers could not. The sensation of magnanimity might help the great man, but it would be ridiculous in the little man to pretend to that large virtue. The great man had at least the dignity of self-sacrifice, butothe little man had not a particle of it. Every one knew that they were not sacri- ficed by themselves, but by their "great man." The satellites soon embroiled the leaders. As Mr. Pitt did not at the last wish to go out, he was soon, and very naturally, by no means unwilling to re- turn. But he would not scheme and contrive to return. His support to his successors, which was at first warm, became cold; his intimacy with them, whichwas at first close and confidential, first became distant, and then died away. But he would do nothing. Mr. Canning dis- cussed the question whether he should or should not come up from Bath, as if not only his own income, but the fate of the empire, hung upon the decision. Mr. Addington made peace with France, and so long as it continued the nation was passive, but so soon as the war revived the desire for Pitt revived also. His name represented a great capital of confidence; we should be more in heart and more bold if he was at the head of the natiorrthan if he was not. At last he was borne back to office, but not to such an office as he left. In 1801 he left an unquestioning majority—a despotic power; in 1804 he returned to a feeble majority, and a power not greater than other men's— the power of rather a weak Minister. He exemplified the truth that great influence which rests on great credit may indeed be resigned but cannot be regained.
We have given a somewhat full account of these curious transac- tions, because it would not be very easy for a reader unfamiliar with them to gain a clear conception of them from Lord Stanhope's columns. They are most important to a full comprehension of Mr. Pitt's character. He rose wonderfully early to unexampled power: so long as he retained that power he wielded it with stately dignity, but he was confused when it became a question whether he should have that power or not, and he was hopelessly confused when he lost it. Early authority has many merits, but a great defect. It deprives its possessor of a varied experience—of the experience which is ne- cessary when he has no longer authority.
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