Britain and Ireland; he endeavoured to rouse every part of the Continent. His son was sent to a meeting of princes and ministers at Coblentz. The Emperor Leopold and the King of Prussia were excited by Mr. Burke's publications. In a word, he left no means unemployed to inflame the whole of Europe to the adoption of his opinion. And the late Sir Philip Francis used to say that if the friends of peace and liberty had, at this time, subscribed 30,000l. to relieve Burke's pecuniary embarrassments, there would have been no war against the French Revolution,"

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ALLEGED INSANITY OF BURKE.

When the far-seeing sagacity of Burke, in foretelling the unhappy results of the French Revolution, first struck into the minds of his party, from whom he had separated, it was reported that he was in a state of mind bordering on insanity, especially after he had, in the House of Commons, addresed to the chair with much vehemence of manner, the words of St. Paul: "I am not mad, most noble Festus; but speak the words of truth and soberness." His niece ventured to name to him the above absurd rumour, when he very sensibly replied: "Some part of the world, my dear—I mean the Jacobins, or unwise part of it-think, or affect to think, that I am mad; but believe me, the world twenty years hence will, and with reason too, think from their conduct that they must have been mad."

These rumours, however, gained strength, particularly after the death of Burke's son: he was said to wander about his grounds kissing his cows and horses. Now, his affection for domestic animals was remarkable from his early manhood, as we have seen in the instance of his interference between the horse-rider and his ill-used steed. That caressing animals was now his practice would seem to be indicated in a picture which Mr. Prior mentions to have been painted by Reinagle; in which Burke is represented in his grounds patting a favourite cow, and Mrs. Burke and a female friend are walk

ing at a little distance. This picture may have given colou to the silly rumour. However, it brought from London to Beaconsfield an old friend, to ascertain the truth or falsehood of the story; when concealing from Burke the object of his visit, the statesman unsuspiciously showed him portions d the Letters on a Regicide Peace, which he was then writing.

Before leaving Butler's Court, the friend hinted the object of his journey to Mrs. Burke, who related the following incident, which may have had a greater share in giving rise to: the rumour than even Reinagle's picture. In the grounds was a fine old horse, which had been a favourite with the younge Burke. His father, while walking one day, serious and sad was approached by the favourite horse, that stood to gaze at him, and then, after a moment's pause, with seeming knowledge and remembrance, it placed its head upon his bosom. This strange act, Burke,-in his state of mind, ful of all-absorbing grief and sensibility,-felt to convey the sympathy of the animal with his own sufferings. He was deeply affected. The faithful creature's attachment, and more than all, the memory the incident awakened of its dead master-the fondly-cherished son-crowded in the heart of the sorrow-stricken father, and his firmness was gone. Throwing his arms round the horse's neck, he wept and sobbed convulsively.

BURKE'S VARIED TALENTS.

The studies of this extraordinary man not only covered the whole field of political inquiry, but extended to an immense variety of subjects, which, though apparently unconnected with politics, do in reality bear upon them as important adjuncts. Nicholls, who knew Burke, says, his political knowledge might be considered an encyclopædia: every man who approached him received instruction from his stores. Robert Hall says: "The excursions of his genius are immense: his imperial fancy has laid all nature under tribute, and has collected riches from every scene of the creation, and every walk of art." Lord Thurlow is said to have declared

what Mr. Butler supposes is now the general opinion of competent judges, that the fame of Burke would survive that of Pitt and Fox.* But the noblest eulogy on Burke was pronounced by Fox himself, who, in 1790, stated in the House of Commons, "that if he were to put all the political information which he had learnt from books, all which he had gained from science, and all which any knowledge of the world and its affairs had taught him, into one scale, and the improve■ment which he had derived from his right hon. friend's instruction and conversation were placed in the other, he should be at a loss to decide to which to give the preference." Lord Campbell says: "Burke, a philosophic statesman, deeply imbued with the scientific principles of jurisprudence." Barry, in his celebrated Letter to the Dillettanti Society, regrets that Burke should have been diverted from the study of the fine arts into the pursuit of politics, because he had one of those minds of an admirable expansion and catholicity, so as to embrace the whole concerns of art. And Sir Joshua Reynolds is said to have deemed Burke the best judge of pictures that he ever knew. Professor Winstanley writes: "It would have been exceedingly difficult to have met with a person who knew more of the philosophy, the history, and filiation of languages, or of the principles of etymological deduction, than Mr. Burke."

BURKE IN ADVANCE OF HIS AGE.†

So far was this remarkable man in advance of his contemporaries, that there are few of the great measures of the present generation which he did not anticipate and zealously defend. Not only did he attack the absurd laws against forestalling and regrating, but by advocating the freedom of trade he struck at the root of all similar prohibitions: in his

* The meaning of Lord Thurlow is evident; but the same phrase was used by Mr. Porson, with a happy ambiguity. When Mr. Cumberland presented his poem, entitled Calvary, to that gentleman, "Your poem,' said Porson, "will certainly be read and admired, when Milton and Shakspeare shall be forgotten."

+ Selected and abridged from Buckle's History of Civilization, vol. i.

letter to Burgh, he says: “That to which I attached myself the most particularly, was to fix the principle of a free trade in all the ports of these islands, as founded in justice, and beneficial to the whole; but principally to this, the seat of the supreme power." He supported those claims of the Roman Catholics, which, during his lifetime, were obstinately refused, but which were conceded, many years after his death, as the only means of preserving the integrity of the empire. He supported the petition of the Dissenters, that they might be relieved from the restrictions to which they were subjected. Into other departments of politics he carried the same spirit. He opposed the cruel laws against insolvents, by which, in the time of George III., our statute-book was still defaced; and he vainly attempted to soften the increasing severity of the penal code. He wished to abolish the old plan of enlisting soldiers for life, which, nine years after his death, was changed to a term of years. He attacked the Slave Trade several years before Wilberforce began to advocate its Abolition. He refuted, but, owing to the prejudices of the age, was unable to subvert, the dangerous power exercised by the judges, who, in criminal prosecutions for libel, confined the jury to the mere question of publication; thus taking the real issue into their own hands.

And, what many will think not the least of his merits, he was the first in that long line of financial reformers to whom we are deeply indebted. Notwithstanding the difficulties thrown in his way, he carried through parliament a series of bills by which several useless places were entirely abolished. He was the first man who laid before parliament a general and systematic scheme for diminishing the expenses of Government.

When Adam Smith came to London, full of those discoveries which have immortalized his name, he found to his amazement that Burke had anticipated conclusions, the maturing of which cost Smith himself many years of anxious and unremitting labour; or, in Smith's words, "he was the

only man who, without communication, thought on these topics exactly as he did."*

BURKE'S POLITICAL PREDICTIONS.

Mr. Fox is said to have more than once expressed his astonishment at the singular fulfilment of Mr. Burke's predictions. When a nobleman of political celebrity, alluding to the vehemence of Burke on revolutionary politics, hinted that he was a splendid madman,-" Whether mad or inspired," is said to have been the answer, 66 fate seems to have determined that he should be an uncommon political prophet." When the negotiations at Lisle were thought to promise peace, he declared from the first that such a result was impossible :- "He was only astonished how the people of England, or such a body of men as the English Ministry, could for a moment believe that the republican leaders would grant peace, even were peace desirable, without first requiring the surrender of our national honour. They are doubly foes," he added; "for they would not only injure you, but insult you."

To one who began to talk to him on the probable success of the negotiation then pending, and the consequent termination of the Revolution, he exclaimed: "The termination of the Revolution! to be sure! The Revolution over! Why, Sir, it has scarcely begun! As yet you have only heard the first music; you'll see the actors presently; but neither you nor I shall see the close of the drama."

The Thoughts on a Regicide Peace are full of these prophetic truths. Writing with a strong impression of his death being not far distant," I shall not live to see," he says in the first page, "the unravelling of the intricate plot which

* Mr. Charles Butler relates that when spending a day tête-à-tête with Mr. Fox, at St. Anne's Hill, he mentioned that "he had never read Adam Smith's celebrated work on the Wealth of Nations." "To tell you the truth," said Mr. Fox, "nor I either. There is something in all these subjects which passes my comprehension;-something so wide, that I could never embrace them myself, or find any one who did."

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