x.] FOUR INTELLECTUAL ATHLETES 367 reply, "that the Honourable Gentleman was an enemy to mirth and wit in any house but his own," the Speaker immediately called him to order.1 William Pitt and Sheridan voted together in the minority when a division was taken. They seldom did so again. During a quarter of a century afterwards they were bitter antagonists and foremost among orators. Both were incomparable debaters. Tierney told Moore that Pitt had assured him he thought Sheridan "a far greater man than Mr. Fox."2 William Pitt and Fox, Burke and Sheridan are the four intellectual athletes who chiefly contributed to render the House of Commons, between 1780 and 1806, an unmatched arena for oratorical contests and triumphs. 1 The Parliamentary History, vol. xxi., pp. 1290, 1291. Moore quotes from this speech at p. 350 of the first volume of his "Memoirs" of Sheridan, while at p. 358 of that volume he writes: "Among the subjects upon which Sheridan appears to have been rather unaccountably silent, was the renewal of Mr. Burke's Bill for the Regulation of the Civil List." What is really unaccountable is that Moore should have blundered by denying on p. 358 what he had truthfully affirmed on p. 350. 2 Moore's Diary, vol. ii., p. 226. XI. IN POLITICAL HARNESS. SHERIDAN'S Connexion with Drury Lane Theatre was a triumph and trial of his life. He depended upon the theatre for his daily bread, when his heart was in Parliament. He had deliberately devoted himself to the service of the public and subjected himself to the yoke of a task-master who is always over-exacting, who is generally ungrateful and whose service is perfect drudgery. The humble villager who might have swayed the rod of empire, often moaned, perhaps, about the rigour of his lot, yet he would have been little the happier if he had risen to be Prime Minister. Prince Bismarck ruefully avowed that, during his long tenure of high office, he had known but twenty-four hours of happiness. Had Sheridan enjoyed "the glorious privilege," as Burns aptly phrases it, of being independent in money matters, his career would have been less agitated and exhausting. Junius rightly advised Henry Sampson Woodfall to let all his views in life be directed "to a solid, however moderate independence. Without it no man can be happy, nor even XI.] WHIGS AND RADICALS 369 ניי honest." If his conscience had been elastic and his services purchaseable, he would easily have obtained an ample income out of the public purse after making his mark in the House of Commons; but he earned the right to boast in his old age that he had preserved his political virtue untarnished. He might then have added, with perfect justice, that he had never faltered in allegiance to the progressive and enlightened branch of the Whig party which, in his day, was led by Charles James Fox and was afterwards directed and adorned by Earl Grey, Macaulay and Lord John Russell. The Whiggism of Sheridan, and of Fox, its great high-priest, would have been denounced in 1831 as wild Radicalism and would be Liberalism of an advanced type at the present day. Fox told the House of Commons in 1783, when Secretary for Foreign Affairs and its leader, that in his opinion "mankind were made for themselves, not for others, and that it was the best government where the people had the greatest share of it." A thoroughgoing Whig, like the Duke of Richmond, had advocated universal suffrage. William Pitt in his earlier years and Fox, after he became leader of the Whigs, voted for the equal representation of the people in Parliament. Sheridan was of the same mind; but he preferred triennial Parliaments in opposition to annual ones, which were favoured by some statesmen of his day as well as by many demagogues. Lord Shelburne, who had an open mind for reform, was more inclined than 1 "Junius," edition 1812, vol. i., p. 253. VOL. I. 24 others who did not seriously disagree with his politics to regard the Prime Minister as the official exponent of the Sovereign's personal sentiments and a mere instrument for giving effect to his will. He held that the business of Parliament consisted, to use a commercial phrase, in endorsing the King's commands. It is probable that Shelburne considered himself capable, as Premier, of humouring George the Third; getting his own way in important matters by making concessions in minor ones and circumventing, by astute management, the mischievous influence of those who posed as the King's friends.1 Dunning was one of Shelburne's ablest followers and he regarded the insidious and increasing power of the Crown with greater dismay and jealousy than his chief; his famous motion to which the House assented was supported by Fox and Sheridan in the hope that it would not remain a dead letter after having been sanctioned by the House of Commons. Burke undertook the hopeless task of lessening the domination of the Sovereign over the representatives of the nation and Sheridan battled magnificently by his side. Indeed, Burke, Fox, and Sheridan fought the good fight together during the dark and evil days when the Opposition in Parliament could do little more than vainly protest against the headstrong and fatal policy which the Ministry 1 Dr. Johnson said to Boswell, in reply to the inquiry, "How did Shelburne get into favour with the King ?" "Because, sir, I suppose he promised the King to do whatever the King pleased." "Life of Johnson," G. B. Hill's edition, vol. iv., p. 174. XI.] STAMPED AS A STATESMAN 371 pursued at the instigation and with the cordial approval of the King, a policy which was alike irrational and wicked, which made Britons in America the declared enemies of Britons at home and which, being as devoid of success as of sense, finally rent the Empire in twain. Those who expected that Sheridan would play in Parliament the part of Charles Surface on the stage, were surprised to observe that he was unflagging in his attendance, that he was thoroughly practical in his methods, that he never wearied the House with irrelevant speeches and that his wit, instead of being a worthless rhetorical firework, was made subservient to the inculcation of shrewd common sense. When most amusing, he was as much in earnest and as wise in suggestion and comment as Sydney Smith was in other places and after days. The fourth speech which Sheridan delivered in Parliament stamped him as a statesman. It related to the Gordon riots, when a ravening mob, maddened with bigotry and gin, carried havoc through the cities of London and Westminster and was not cowed and dispersed till vigorously opposed by the army at the bidding of the King. When Sheridan called upon the House of Commons on the 5th of March, 1781, to condemn the state of the Police in Westminster, he made out a strong case against the magistrates of that City. Yet their conduct admitted of palliation. They were afraid to invoke the aid of the military lest they should be placed in the dock, as had happened to a Surrey magistrate who, after reading the Riot Act |