The circumstances of his death combined with the ge neral character of his life to render that event peculiarly impressive. News of it being conveyed to London by ex press, Colonel Barre reported the intelligence to parlia ment, where it suspended all other business. The sense which the public entertained of their loss was manifested by the honours done to his memory. Party differences seemed to be forgot ; all joined in voting that his debts should be paid by the nation, and that a yearly sum of 4000 should be permanently added from the civil list to the title he had borne. He was buried in Westminster Abbey with all the pomp of a public funeral ; and a piece of sculpture was afterwards erected by way of monument, representing the last scene of his parliamentary life, and inscribed as the tribute of the King and Parliament to the Earl of Chatham.
The chief lineaments of Chatham's character may be gathered from the most meagre chronicle of his actions. That he was a man of a splendid and impetuous genius— adapted for the duties of an orator by the vehemence of his feelings, and the rich gifts of his intellect ; for the duties of a statesman, by his vastness of conception, his unwearied assiduity in ordering, his inflexible energy in execution— the highest and the humblest qualities that should com bine to form a public man—may be learned from contem plating any portion of his public life. A survey of the .whole will better show in how extraordinary a degree he possessed these requisites, and hoWriehly he adorned them all by a truly noble style of sentiment, a rigid adherence to the great principles of honour and generosity, and every manly virtue. And as his mind was singularly elevated, so has his fortune been singularly good. Few men that have acted so conspicuous a part, have united so great a plurality of suffrages in their favour. The reason is, that he founded no sect, was the father of no party, but of the party that love their country and labour for it; and having thus been a genuine-catholic in politics, his merits are ad mitted by all. Accordingly, the clamours that assailed him in life, the voice of obloquy and opposition, the me mory of his failings, have long since died quite away; and Chatham is one, in praise of whom the bitterest of party men forget their bitterness. He stands in the annals of
Europe, " an illustrious and venerable name," admired by countrymen and strangers, by all to whom loftiness of mo ral principle and greatness of talent are objects of regard.
" His private life," says Lord Chesterfield," was stained by no vice, nor sullied by any meanness. All his senti ments were liberal and elevated. His ruling passion was an unbounded ambition, which, when supported by great abilities, and crowned by great success, makes what the world calls a great man. He was haughty, imperious, im patient of contradiction, and overbearing; qualities which too often accompany, but always clog, great ones. He had manners and address; but one might discover through them too great a consciousness of his own superior talents. He was a most agreeable and lively companion in social life, and had such a versatility of wit, that he could adapt it to all sorts of conversation. He had a most happy turn to poetry, but seldom indulged, and seldom avowed it. His eloquence was of every kind, and he excelled in the argumentative as well as the declamatory way. But his invectives were terrible, and uttered with such energy of diction, and such dignity of action and countenance, that he intimidated those who were most willing and best able to encounter him. Their arms fell out of their hands, and they struck under the ascendant which his genius gained over theirs." If Chatham's faculties had not been more worthily em ployed, we might have regretted that he left so few me morials of them in a literary shape. Many of his speeches, under all the deformities of incorrect reporting, are full of beauty ; and a volume of " Letters" to his nephew, pub lished some years ago, may be read with a pleasure inde pendent of their author. See Life of Chatham, in 3 vols. and the public histories of the time.