these charges were intended to take a wider range, and to embrace a much more extensive sphere, and it is therefore that I have felt myself called upon to rise for the purpose of entering into a vindication of my conduct, and, however unequal the contest may be between the noble baron and myself, to justify to your Lordships and the country the part which I have taken in these proceedings. My Lords, it does appear to me that those who sit on this side of the House have been most moderate and forbearing towards his Majesty's Government. We have made no motion for papers, none for inquiry. We have passed no resolutions of distrust or censure. We have not used the ordinary weapons of those usually engaged in opposition in this or the other House of Parliament, and which must be so familiar to the noble lords opposite. Our conduct throughout the session has been entirely defensive. When a bill has been laid on the table by any of his Majesty's Government, or when it has come up from the other House of Parliament, we have examined it with care, with attention, and industry. If we have found it vicious in principle we have proposed its rejection; while, if it has occurred to us, on a careful investigation, that it might be so modelled as to answer the purpose for which it was intended, we have carefully directed our efforts to the accomplishment of that object. I am justified, then, in saying, that during the whole of this session, adverting to the course we have pursued, our conduct has been purely defensive, and that we have exercised towards his Majesty's Government as much moderation and forbearance as was consistent with a due discharge of the duty which we owe to the country. My Lords, it is impossible to enter into a consideration, however general, of the subjects to which I am about to direct your attention without referring to his Majesty's speech at the commencement of the present session, and without contrasting the brilliant anticipations contained in that speech, with the sad reality that has since occurred; a result as disproportionate in execution to the expectations that were held out, as the lofty position of the noble viscount at that period, to what he will allow me to style his humble condition at the present moment. Gazing on these two pictures, one is tempted to apply to the noble lord that which was said of a predecessor of his in the high office of first minister of the Crown, and who, in the careless confidence of his character, bore some resemblance to the noble viscount: "His promises were, as he then was, mighty, His performance, as he now is-nothing." [The speaker then went over seriatim the various measures recommended in the king's speech, and showed that notwithstanding his desire to support them as far as he could conscientiously, they had either entirely miscarried in Parliament, or had been partially adopted in an altered form. He concluded as follows:] In former times, my Lords, amid such defeats, and unable to carry those measures which he considered essential, a minister would have thought he had only one course to pursue. But these are antiquated notions-everything has changed. This fastidious delicacy forms no part told us, and his acts correspond with his assertions, that notwithstanding the insubordination that prevails around him, in spite of the mutinous and sullen temper of his crew, he will stick to the vessel while a single plank remains afloat. Let me, however, as a friendly adviser of the noble viscount, recommend him to get her as speedily as possible into still water. of the character of the noble viscount. He has After all, there is something in the efforts and exertions of the noble viscount not altogether unamusing or uninstructive. It is impossible, too, under any circumstances, not to respect "The brave man struggling in the storms of fate." May a part at least of what follows be averted: "And greatly falling with a falling state." My consolation is, that whatever be the disposition of the noble viscount, he has not sufficient strength, though his locks, I believe, are yet unshorn, to pull down the pillars of the building, and involve the whole in his ruin. I trust it will long survive his fall. DANIEL O'CONNELL. COLONIAL SLAVERY, 1831. 1775-1847. No man can more sincerely abhor, detest, and abjure slavery than I do. I hold it in utter detestation, however men may attempt to palliate or excuse it by differences of colour, creed, or clime. In all its gradations, and in every form, I am its mortal foe. The speech of an opponent on this question has filled me with indignation. "What," said this party, "would you come in between a man and his freehold !" I started as if something unholy had trampled on my father's grave, and I exclaimed with horror, "A freehold in a human being!" I know nothing of this individual; I give him credit for being a gentleman of humanity; but, if he be so, it only makes the case the stronger; for the circumstance of such a man upholding such a system shows the horrors of that system in itself and its effect in deceiving the minds of those who are connected with it, wherever it exists. We are told that the slave is not fit to receive his freedom-that he could not endure freedom without revolting. Why, does he not endure slavery without revolting? With all that he has to bear, he does not revolt now; and will he be more ready to revolt when you take away the lash? Foolish argument! But I will take them upon their own ground --the ground of gradual amelioration and preparation. Well; are not eight years of education sufficient to prepare a man for anything? Seven years are accounted quite sufficient for an apprenticeship to any profession, or for any art or science; and are not eight years enough for the negro? If eight years have passed away without preparation, so would eighty, if we were to allow them so many. There is a time for everything-but it would seem there is no time for the emancipation of the slave. Mr Buxton most ably and unanswerably stated to the House of Commons the awful decrease in population; that, in fourteen colonies, in the course of ten years, there had been a decrease in the population of 145,801—that is, in other words, 145,801 human beings had been murdered by this system-their bodies gone to the grave their spirits before their God. In the eight years that they have had to educate their slaves for liberty, but which have been useless to them-in those eight years, one-twelfth have gone into the grave murdered! Every day, ten victims are thus despatched! While we are speaking, they are sinking; while we are debating, they are dying! As human, as accountable beings, why should we suffer this any longer? Let every man take his own share in this busi ness. I am resolved, if sent back to Parliament, that I will bear my part. I purpose fully to divide the House on the motion, that every negro child born after the first of January 1832 shall be free. They say, "Oh, do not emancipate the slaves suddenly; they are not prepared, they will revolt!" Are they afraid of the insurrection of the infants? Or, do you think that the mother will rise up in rebellion as she hugs her little freeman to her breast, and thinks that he will one day become her protector? Or, will she teach him to be her avenger? Oh, no! there can be no such pretence. I will carry with me to my own country the recollection of this splendid scene. Where is the man that can resist the argument of this day? I go to my native land under its influence; and let me remind you that land has its glory, that no slave ship was ever launched from any of its numerous ports. I will gladly join any party to do good to the poor negro slaves. Let each extend to them the arm of his compassion; let each aim to deliver his fellowman from distress. I shall go and tell my countrymen that they must be first in this race of humanity. THE IRISH DISTURBANCES BILL, 1833.* I do not rise to fawn or cringe to this House; I do not rise to supplicate you to be merciful towards the nation to which I belong-towards a nation which, though subject to England, yet is distinct from it. It is a distinct nation; it has been treated as such by this country, as may be proved by history, and by seven hundred years of tyranny. I call upon this House, as you value the liberty of England, not to allow the present nefarious bill to pass. In it are involved the liberties of England, the liberty of the press, and of every other institution dear to Englishmen. Against the bill I protest in the name of the Irish people, and in the face of heaven. I treat with scorn the puny and pitiful assertions that grievances are not to be complained of, that our redress is not to be agitated; for, in such cases, remonstrances cannot be too strong, agitation cannot be too violent, to show to the world with what injustice our fair claims are met, and under what tyranny the people suffer. There are two frightful clauses in this bill. The one which does away with trial by jury, and which I have called upon you to baptize; * Delivered in the House of Commons in 1823. you call it a court-martial-a mere nickname; I stigmatise it as a revolutionary tribunal. What, in the name of heaven, is it, if it is not a revolutionary tribunal? It annihilates the trial by jury: it drives the judge off his benchthe man who, from experience, could weigh the nice and delicate points of a case-who could discriminate between the straightforward testimony and the suborned evidence-who could see, plainly and readily, the justice or injustice of the accusation. It turns out this man who is free, unshackled, unprejudiced-who has no previous opinions to control the clear exercise of his duty. You do away with that which is more sacred than the throne itself; that for which your king reigns, your Lords deliberate, your Commons assemble. If ever I doubted before of the success of our agitation for repeal, this bill, this infamous bill, the way in which it has been received by the House, the manner in which its opponents have been treated, the personalities to which they have been subjected, the yells with which one of them has this night been greeted-all these things dissipate my doubts, and tell me of its complete and early triumph. Do you think those yells will be forgotten? Do you suppose their echo will not reach the plains of my injured and insulted country; that they will not be whispered in her green valleys, and heard from her lofty hills? Oh! they will be heard there; yes, and they will not be forgotten. The youth of Ireland will bound with indignation; they will say, "We are eight millions, and you treat us thus, as though we were no more to your country than the Isle of Guernsey or Jersey!" I have done my duty; I stand acquitted to my conscience and my country: I have opposed this measure throughout; and I now protest against it as harsh, oppressive, uncalled for, unjust, as establishing an infamous precedent by retaliating crime against crime-as tyrannous, cruelly and vindictively tyrannous. LORD BROUGHA M.* INAUGURAL DISCOURSE.+ 1779-1868. It now becomes me to return my very sincere and respectful thanks for the kindness which has placed me in a chair, filled at former times by so many great men, whose names might well make any comparison formidable to a far more worthy successor. While I desire you to accept this unexaggerated expression of gratitude, I am anxious to address you rather in the form which I now adopt, than in the more usual one of an unpremeditated discourse. I shall thus, at least, prove that the remarks which I deem it my duty to make are the fruit of mature reflection, and that I am unwilling to discharge an important office in a perfunctory manner. I feel very sensibly that if I shall now urge you by general exhortations to be instant in the pursuit of the learning which, in all its branches, flourishes under the kindly shelter of these roofs, I may weary you with the unprofitable repetition of a thrice-told tale; and if I presume to offer my advice touching the conduct of your studies, I may seem to trespass upon the province of those venerable persons under whose care you have the singular happiness to be placed. But I would nevertheless expose myself to either charge, for the sake of joining my voice with theirs in anxiously entreating you to believe how incomparably the present season is verily and indeed the most precious of your whole lives. It is not the less true, because it has been oftentimes said, that the period of youth is by far the best fitted for the improvement of the mind, and the retirement of a college almost exclusively adapted to much study. At your enviable age everything has the lively interest of novelty and freshness; attention is perpetually sharpened by curiosity; and the memory is tenacious of the deep impressions it thus receives, to a degree unknown in after-life; while the distracting cares of the world, or its beguiling pleasures, cross not the threshold of these calm retreats; its distant noise and bustle are faintly heard, making the shelter you enjoy more grateful; and that troublous sea are viewed from an eminence, the struggles of anxious mortals embarked upon the security of which is rendered more sweet by the prospect of the scene below. Yet a little path themselves. In a word, they would treat the perishable results of those labours as the standard, and give themselves no care about the immortal originals. This argument, the thin covering which indolence weaves for herself, would speedily sink all the fine arts into barrenness and insignificance. Why, according to such reasoners, should a sculptor or painter encounter the toil of a journey to Athens or to Rome? Far better work at home, and profit by the labour of those who have resorted to the Vatican and the Parthenon, and founded an English school adapt while, and you too will be plunged into those waters of bitterness; and will cast an eye of regret, as now I do, upon the peaceful regions you have quitted for ever. Such is your lot as members of society; but it will be your own fault if you look back on this place with repentance or with shame; and be well assured that, whatever time-ay, every hour-you squander here on unprofitable idling, will then rise up against you, and be paid for by years of bitter but unavailing regrets. Study, then, I beseech you, so to store your minds with the exquisite learning of former ages, that you may always possess within your-ed to the taste of our own country. Be you selves sources of rational and refined enjoyment, which will enable you to set at naught the grosser pleasures of sense, whereof other men are slaves; and so imbue yourselves with the sound philosophy of later days, forming your-whelming compositions of them that "resistless selves to the virtuous habits which are its legitimate offspring, that you may walk unhurt through the trials which await you, and may look down upon the ignorance and error that surround you, not with lofty and supercilious | contempt, as the sages of old times, but with the vehement desire of enlightening those who wander in darkness, and who are by so much the more endeared to us by how much they want our assistance. Assuming the improvement of his own mind and of the lot of his fellow-creatures to be the great end of every man's existence, who is removed above the care of providing for his sustenance, and to be the indispensable duty of every man, as far as his own immediate wants leave him any portion of time unemployed, our attention is naturally directed to the means by which so great and urgent a work may best be performed; and as in the limited time allotted to this discourse I cannot hope to occupy more than a small portion of so wide a field, I shall confine myself to two subjects, or rather to a few observations upon two subjects, both of them appropriate to this place, but either of them affording ample materials for an entire course of lectures the study of the rhetorical art, by which useful truths are promulgated with effect, and the purposes to which a proficiency in this art should be made subservient. It is an extremely common error among young persons, impatient of academical discipline, to turn from the painful study of ancient, and particularly of Attic composition, and solace themselves with works rendered easy by the familiarity of their own tongue. They plausibly contend, that as powerful or captivating diction in a pure English style is, after all, the attainment they are in search of, the study of the best English models affords the shortest road to this point; and even admitting the ancient examples to have been the great fountains from which all eloquence is drawn, they would rather profit, as it were, by the classical labours of their English predecessors, than toil over the same assured that the works of the English chisel fall not more short of the wonders of the Acropolis, than the best productions of modern pens fall short of the chaste, finished, nervous, and over fulmined over Greece." Be equally sure that, with hardly any exception, the great things of poetry and of eloquence have been done by men who cultivated the mighty exemplars of Athenian genius with daily and with nightly devotion. Among poets there is hardly an exception to this rule, unless may be so deemed Shakespeare, an exception to all rules, and Dante, familiar as a contemporary with the works of Roman art, composed in his mother tongue, having taken, not so much for his guide as for his "master," Virgil, himself almost a translator from the Greeks. But among orators I know of none among the Romans, and scarce any in our own times. Cicero honoured the Greek masters with such singular observance, that he not only repaired to Athens for the sake of finishing his rhetorical education, but afterward continued to practise the art of declaiming in Greek; and although he afterward fell into a less pure manner through the corrupt blandishments of the Asian taste, yet do we find him ever prone to extol the noble perfections of his first masters as something placed beyond the reach of all imitation. Nay, at a mature period of his life, he occupied himself in translating the greater orations of the Greeks which composed almost exclusively his treatise "De optimo genere Oratoris;" as if to write a discourse on oratorial perfection were merely to present the reader with the two immortal speeches upon the Crown. Sometimes we find him imitating, even to a literal version, the beauties of those divine originals-as the beautiful passage of Æschines, in the "Timarchus," upon the torments of the guilty, which the Roman orator has twice made use of, almost word for word; once in the oration for Sextus Roscius, the earliest he delivered, and again in a more mature effort of his genius, the oration against L. Piso.* "Let no one think that crimes arise from the insti gation of the gods, and not from the rash intemperance of men; or that the profane are driven and chastised, as we see them on the stage, by furies with blazing torches. The eager lusts of the flesh, and the I have dwelt the rather upon the authority of M. Tullius, because it enables us at once to answer the question, Whether a study of the Roman orators be not sufficient for refining the taste? If the Greeks were the models of an excellence which the first of Roman orators never attained, although ever aspiring after itnay, if so far from being satisfied with his own success, he even in those his masters found something which his ears desiderated ("ita sunt avidæ et capaces; et semper aliquid immensum infinitumque desiderant" [so eager are they and capacious, so continually desirous of something boundless and infinite]), he either fell short while copying them, or he failed by diverting his worship to the false gods of the Asian school. In the one case, were we to rest satisfied with studying the Roman, we should only be imitating the imperfect copy, instead of the pure original like him who should endeavour to catch a glimpse of some beauty by her reflection in a glass, that weakened her tints, if it did not distort her features. In the other case, we should not be imitating the same, but some less perfect original, and looking at the wrong beauty; not her whose chaste and simple attractions commanded the adoration of all Greece, but some garish damsel from Rhodes or Chios, just brilliant | and languishing enough to captivate the less pure taste of half-civilised Rome. him on the merits of the case, and in defence against the charge, might be spoken in mitigation of punishment after a conviction or confession of guilt; but, whether we regard the political or forensic orations, the style, both in respect of the reasoning and the ornaments, is wholly unfit for the more severe and less trifling nature of modern affairs in the senate or at the bar. Now it is altogether otherwise with the Greek masters. Changing a few phrases, which the difference of religion and of manners might render objectionable-moderating, in some degree, the virulence of invective, especially against private character, to suit the chivalrous courtesy of modern hostility-there is hardly one of the political or forensic orations of the Greeks that might not be delivered in similar circumstances before our senate or tribunals; while their funeral and other panegyrical discourses are much less inflated and unsubstantial than those of the most approved masters of the epideictic style, the French preachers and academicians. Whence this difference between the masterpieces of Greek and Roman eloquence? Whence but from the rigid steadiness with which the Greek orator keeps the object of all eloquence perpetually in view, never speaking for mere speaking's sake; while the Latin rhetorician, “ingenii sui nimium amator" [too fond of his own ingenuity], and, as though he deemed his occupation a trial of skill or display of accom the subject-matter in the attempt to illustrate and adorn it; and pours forth passages sweet indeed, but unprofitable-fitted to tickle the ear, without reaching the heart. Where, in all the orations of Cicero, or of him who almost equals him, Livy, "miræ facundiæ homo" [admirable for his command of language],* shall we find anything like those thick successions of short questions in which Demosthenes oftentimes forges, as it were, with a few rapidly following strokes, the whole massive chain of his argument, as in the "Chersonese:""Let this force be once destroyed or scattered, and what are we to do if Philip marches on the Cheronese? Put Diopeithes on his trial? But how will that better our condition? And how shall we send them succour if prevented by the winds? But, by Jupiter, he will not march! And who is our surety for that?" + or, comprising all of a long narrative that suits his argument in a single sentence, presenting a lengthened series of events But there are other reasons too weighty to be passed over, which justify the same decided pre-plishments, seems ever and anon to lose sight of ference. Not to mention the incomparable beauty and power of the Greek language, the study of which alone affords the means of enriching our own, the compositions of Cicero, exquisite as they are for beauty of diction, often remarkable for ingenious argument and brilliant wit, not seldom excelling in deep pathos, are nevertheless so extremely rhetorical, fashioned by an art so little concealed, and sacrificing the subject to a display of the speaker's powers, admirable as those are, that nothing can be less adapted to the genius of modern elocution, which requires a constant and almost exclusive attention to the business in hand. In all his orations which were spoken (for, singular as it may seem, the remark applies less to those which were only written, as all the "Verrine," except the first, all the "Philippics," except the first and ninth, and the "Pro Milone") hardly two pages can be found which a modern assembly would bear. Some admirable arguments on evidence and the credit of witnesses, might be urged to a jury;* several passages, given by insatiable desire for more-these swell the ranks of the robber, and crowd the deck of the pirate-these are to every one his own fury!" "There is a singular example of this in the remarks on the evidence and cross-examination in the oration for L. Flaccus, pointed out to me by my friend Mr Scarlett (now Lord Abinger), the mention of whose name affords an illustration of my argument, for, as a more consummate master of the forensic art in all its Of many of the original Greek and Latin quotations given in the course of the speech, only the English equivalent has been retained. |