THE

STATESMAN'S

HOPE FOR HIS

COUNTRY.

BY ISAAC MACLELLAN.

WHEN my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on States dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the Republic, now known and honored throughout the earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their original lustre, not a stripe erased nor polluted; not a single star obscured.' DANIEL WEBSTER.

WHENE'ER the vapory damps of death
Shall round my dying vision swim;
When heaven grows brighter as the earth
Fades like a rainy landscape dim;
May then my latest gaze behold,
In fancy's magic-glass displayed,
The bright, bold banner of the land,
In all its stripes and stars displayed.

As then I view GOD's blessed sun

In shining glory gild the world,
May it not shine on ruptured States,
Dishonored, from their station hurled;
On realms by civil discord rent,

All drenched with rich fraternal gore;
May it not see these hills in arms,
These cities mad with battle-roar !

But may upon my dying eyes

A softer, sweeter vision break;

A blissful, fruitful scene of peace

From Mexic Gulf to Northern Lake;

A vision of bright hills and plains

With golden harvests kindly crowned;
Where sister States in flowery bands
Their jocund dances move around.

Then far across the wild frontier,

Where roam the tribes in savage pride;

O'er the rude port may still our flag
Toss out its starry glories wide;

And high above the gilded spires
That o'er each mighty city shine,

May still its meteor-trophies blaze

At morning dawn and day's decline.

In battle-field, on deck of fame,

In other years full high it flew;

Though torn with shot and scorched with flame,

It triumphed, ever brave and true;

No blot, no stain, no dark disgrace
Upon its peerless folds were cast;
It shone the brightest in the storm
Of cannon-peal and battle-blast.

It is well to consider and analyze the preparatory influences which contribute to form a great character. It will in most cases be found that brilliant success is but the natural result of appreciable causes. The miracles of genius, like the dispensations of Providence, are wrought by adaptation of means to ends. They encourage not at all the empty self-exaggeration and idle presumptuousness, which lumber and clog the gateways to all the liberal careers; but they do afford instructions the most precious to large and aspiring natures, who seek, with manly endeavor, the paths of honor.

The first movement of young Pitt toward Parliament, was at the age of twenty-one. He was a candidate to represent the University of Cambridge, at the general election which took place in the fall of 1780; a constituency, perhaps, as little likely to be won by an untried youth, as any in the kingdom. His claims were not regarded with favor. Amusing anecdotes are related of the treatment he received during the canvass. Distinguished professors of that venerable institution are reported almost to have slammed their doors in his face, when he approached to solicit their suffrages. It was not to their taste to bestow the honors of their ancient and cherished seat of learning upon a boy. He was defeated, and, so far as now appears, without any circumstance to prevent his feeling to the full extent the mortification of his failure. Two years before, he had lost his father. In the summer previous to this election, his eldest sister died. Hard upon these afflictions, followed his political defeat; and the next year, his heart, already nearly

6

In

broken with the heavy weight of accumulated sorrows, was wrung with new and almost insupportable anguish, by the death of his younger brother, who had been winning distinctions in the naval service. these successive strokes, he felt that fulness of desolation, which, once experienced, leaves age no work to perform upon the heart. It is either crushed, or it rallies home its wandering sympathies, and learns to become sufficient unto itself. He felt the loss of his brother to have extinguished the favorite hope of his mind.' It seemed to him an 'untimely blow,' under which, had he been less 'tried in affliction,' he might not have been able to support himself. These events, upon a character so sensitive, manly, and affectionate, how can they be overlooked, in estimating the influences which formed his character? In his early dreams of glory, how immeasurably must he have counted upon the joy that his hoped-for triumphs would produce in the bosoms of that illustrious father, that loving sister, that dear brother! Let him declare, who has wrestled with the world for its applause, in what consisted the value of its acclaim. Was it in the tumultuous shout which bore his name upon the air, or in the knowledge that some of its reverberations might fall upon listening ears around the family hearthstone that they might make more strong the ties of some cherished friendship, or re-kindle the joys of some slumbering affection? Seeing young Pitt not chastened only, but so scathed and isolated, on the very threshold of his career, it needs no voice from the grave to tell us that in some way it must have affected and did affect the tone of his character. How vacant the world, how cheap the breath of applause, how barren the harvests of genius, since they who had nurtured and shared his hopes were for ever cold and insensible! Seeing how completely he soon gave himself to the public service, with what unhesitating purpose he stood ready, from time to time, to stake his prospects upon the hazard of a cast, how patiently he endured vituperation, how stern and unyielding he bore himself, alike unmoved by the hisses or applause of the multitude - who shall venture to assert that this was all the result of a cold and supercilious nature? Who shall venture to say how often, instead of consciously repelling the fickle smiles of the surrounding throng by a cold indifference, as he was supposed to do, he might have been finding his sweetest reward in a silent consciousness of deserving the approbation of the loved and lost!

It happened that the Duke of Rutland had been a great admirer of the Earl of Chatham, and had, by reason of so much admiration of the father, sought the acquaintance of William, the son, at an early period of his academical life; and there was consequently formed between them a close and lasting friendship. Through the influence of the Duke of Rutland, Sir James Lowther, at that time a stranger to Pitt, procured him to be elected to the House of Commons, from the borough of Appleby, in Westmoreland. So that, notwithstanding his defeat in the fall of 1780, he became a member of the House of Commons in January of the following year; and thus entered upon his theatre of action at the early age of twenty-two.

It was during the period of Lord North's administration, and toward the close of what is spoken of by Americans as our revolutionary

6

war. England was not only engaged in a war with her American colonies, but also with France, Spain and Holland; while Russia, Denmark and Sweden had formed an alliance unfriendly to her, and she was without allies. Her affairs in India wore a gloomy aspect; and repeated failures in naval and military operations had lowered the spirit of the English people, and weakened their confidence in government. Business was not prosperous, the revenues were not equal to her expenditures, and the resources of the country seemed to be exhausted. On the twenty-sixth of February, 1781, Pitt, to use his own phrase, first heard his own voice in the House of Commons.' His friends, under the mistaken impression that he intended to speak, called him out, and he was induced to venture his first speech at a time when he had not intended to make one. He did not lose his self-possession, but succeeded in commanding the attention and admiration of the House. As the son of Chatham, very much was expected from him, and he was considered to have redeemed the promise of his name. He fully indicated, on that occasion, the qualities for which he was afterward distinguished. His argument covered the whole ground of the debate, and overlooked none of its important aspects. The maturity of his views, and the fulness of his information, were so much more than had been expected, that, with the warm congratulations for successful elocution, was mixed a good deal of the deference and respect due to a rising power. From this time, he became one of the most active members, and assumed, with great promptness, a position in the first rank of public characters. In June of the same year, Mr. Fox submitted a motion hostile to the war with America, and Mr. Pitt made a powerful speech against that war. He was, of course, in a minority; but he poured upon the contrivers and managers of that war a bold torrent of eloquent denunciation, which startled the ears and warmed the hearts of the British commons. In proportion to his earnestness, the regards of the British people gathered about him. He became one of the most formidable opponents of the administration of Lord North, whose strength visibly declined before the successive and redoubled assaults of Fox, Pitt, Wilberforce, and their associates. A decisive vote was soon obtained against the continuance of the American war; and, after a few more unsuccessful struggles, Lord North announced the end of his administration; an administration odious to Americans, and now generally considered eminently disastrous to his own country. Mr. Pitt was

by no means entitled to the entire credit of its overthrow; but it must be obvious to those who will read the debates of those times, that he infused new animation into the attacks of the opposition, and was entitled to a full share of the honors of the victory.

The Rockingham administration succeeded, with Mr. Fox and the Earl of Sherburne Secretaries of State. Under this administration, Mr. Pitt was offered several situations of considerable rank and emolument, but declined them, on the ground that he could not put himself under obligations to defend measures which he had no part in framing: in other words, he declined accepting any office which did not place him in the Cabinet. He gave his general support to the measures of the administration, and was regular in his attendance at the sittings of the 17

VOL. XLIII.

House of Commons. This was thought a favorable time to bring forward the project for Parliamentary Reform, and Mr. Pitt was selected as the fittest person to conduct it: the object being, to secure a more full representation of the counties in the House of Commons. Some differences arose, during this administration, between Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox, but none of a serious character. Lord Rockingham, however, lived but a short time; and when he died, Mr. Fox and Lord Cavendish resigned their offices. This step, of course, opened up the chances for an entire disorganization of forces, and for a loss of nearly all that had been gained by the victory over Lord North. It gave rise to animadversions, and Mr. Pitt joined in them. Their resignations were attributed to private pique, and not to public and justifiable causes. The places made vacant by the resignation of Mr. Fox and his colleague, were filled by others, and, in the new cast of characters, Mr. Pitt was made Chancellor of the Exchequer; or, in other words, the financeminister in the House of Commons. He was then a little more than twenty-three years old. Lord Shelburne was at the head of this administration. On the eleventh of July, 1782, Parliament was prorogued. During the vacation, it was found, upon a careful estimate of influences, that the administration had need of more strength, to render it secure. Mr. Pitt called on Mr. Fox, with an invitation to return to office, but he declined, so long as Lord Shelburne should remain Prime Minister. Mr. Pitt replied, that he did not come to betray Lord Shelburne, and, declaring it useless to negotiate on those terms, took leave. This is said to have been the last time those two remarkable men were in a private room together, and from this period dated their political hostility.

Their fathers had been rivals and enemies. The sons, down to this point, had acted together; but here they separated. It was a separation, both in the case of the fathers and the sons, in the nature of the case, unavoidable. The particular circumstances from which their opposition to each other was dated, were only an impulse to events sure to happen. Had those circumstances never existed, the same hostility would have sprung up from some other occasion. It was impossible for sympathy to exist between them. It was an opposition of tastes, of habits, of character, and a rivalry of ambition. At the next session of Parliament, Mr. Fox took the ground of open opposition to the ministry, and Mr. Pitt, as its principal defender, was prominent in every debate; and was compelled to bear up against the combined genius of Fox, Burke, and Sheridan. This administration negotiated peace with America, Spain, France, and Holland. But when the terms of the several treaties came to be discussed in Parliament, they were opposed by Lord North and his friends, and by Mr. Fox and his friends, who formed a coälition strong enough to overthrow the ministry. was a very surprising state of affairs. There had been, over and above political hostility, a great deal of personal bitterness and sharp denunciation between the two leaders of the coalition. Their new alliance struck the minds of impartial persons as grotesque and out of place; but it gave them political power to destroy the administration with which Pitt was connected, and, in the ordinary course of events, would,

It