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THE WORKS

OF THE

RIGHT HON. EDMUND BURKE.

WITH

▲ BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL INTRODUCTION,

BY HENRY ROGERS.

AND PORTRAIT AFTER SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

VOL. I.

LONDON:

HENRY G. BOHN, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN.

MDCCCXLI.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL INTRODUCTION.

Black and relentless fate he tramples on,
And all the rout of greedy Acheron.
Happy whose life the rural god approves,

The guardian of his growing flocks and groves;
Harmonious Pan and old Sylvanus join
The sister nymphs, to make his joys divine;
Him not the splendours of a crown can please,
Or consul's honours bribe to quit his ease.
Though on his will should crowding armies wait,
And suppliant kings come suing to his gate;
No piteous objects here his peace molest,
Nor can he sorrow while another's blest;
His food alone what bounteous nature yields,
From bending orchards and luxuriant fields,
Pleased he accepts, nor seeks the mad resort
Of thronging clients and litigious court.

Now winter's frozen hand benumbs the plain,
The winter too has blessings for the swain;
His grunting herd is fed without his toil,
His groaning presses overflow with oil;

The languid autumn crown'd with yellow leaves,
With bleeding fruit and golden-bearded sheaves,
Her various products scatters o'er the land,
And rears the horn of Plenty in her hand.

Nor less than these, wait his domestic life,
His darling children, and his virtuous wife,
The day's long absence they together mourn,
Hang on his neck, and welcome his return;
The cows, departing from the joyful field,
Before his door their milky tribute yield,
While on the green, the frisky kids engage,
With adverse horns, and counterfeited rage.
He too, when marked with white the festal day,
Devotes his hours to rural sport and play;
Stretch'd on the green amid the jovial quire,
Of boon companions that surround the fire,
With front enlarged he crowns the flowing bowl
And calls thee, Bacchus, to inspire his soul;

Now warm'd with wine, to vigorous sports they rise;

High on an elm is hung the victor's prize;

To him 'tis given, whose force with greatest speed

Can wing the dart, or urge the fiery steed.

Such manners made the ancient Sabines bold,
Such the life led by Romulus of old;

By arts like these divine Etruria grows,
From such foundations mighty Rome arose,

Whose god-like fame the world's vast circuit fills,
Who with one wall hath circled seven vast hills;
Such was, ere Jove began his iron reign,
Ere mankind feasted upon oxen slain,
The life that Saturn and his subjects led,
Ere from the land offended justice fled;
As yet the brazen use of arms unknown,

And anvils rung with scythes and shares alone."

DA 506

B8 1841 138139 v.l

During his residence in the University he was in the habit of attending the meetings of the "Historical Society," then first established. It consisted of the students of Trinity College; it was kept up with considerable spirit, and numbered amongst its members many who afterwards ranked amongst the most celebrated men of Ireland. Burke commenced political writer while at the University, at the early age of nineteen. His first attempt was at the refutation of a too ambitious apothecary, named Dr. Charles Lucas; a

GIFT

factious but insignificant demagogue, whose importance was solely owing to the absurd and injudicious severity of government. It is said that, in this youthful effort, Burke refuted his antagonist by the very same species of argument, which he afterwards so successfully employed against Bolingbroke the reductio ad absurdum. He ironically adopted the premises of his opponent, and then convicted them of leading to pernicious consequences.

Having been always designed, it is said, for the English bar, his name was entered at the Middle Temple so early as 1747. In 1750 he arrived in London to keep Terms. He has recorded the feelings with which he first visited the metropolis in certain letters to his friends, still preserved. They are written in a very lively manner, indicating a very intelligent and observant mind, and betraying in almost every sentence his intellectual tastes and peculiarities. He calls the House of Commons and Westminster Hall (those theatres on which he was destined to act a part so important) the "chosen temples of fame;" with his characteristic taste, speaks of the stage as sunk (as it assuredly was) in the lowest degree; while he breaks out into rapture when expressing the emotions with which he visited some of the more splendid monuments of art, especially Westminster Abbey. There is here and there a floridity, and in one or two instances even a degree of bombast about these letters, which Burke's more matured taste would have corrected. Thus in one part, when speaking of so plain a matter as the encouragement afforded to literature in England, he tells his correspondent." Notwithstanding this discouragement, literature is cultivated in a high degree. Poetry raises her enchanting voice to heaven. History arrests the wings of Time in his flight to the gulf of oblivion. Philosophy, the queen of arts, and the daughter of heaven, is daily extending her intellectual empire. Fancy sports on airy wing like a meteor on the bosom of a summer cloud; and even Metaphysics spins her cobwebs, and catches some flies."

This would not have been mentioned, were it not that Mr. Prior has observed that these letters, though "really despatched off hand," as he expresses it, were by many believed to be studied compositions. It is presumed that the biographer means by this, that the style was so excellent as to have passed for deliberate composition. If that be his meaning, few will agree with him. That these letters want altogether the simplicity and carelessness of expression, which will always characterize the genuine epistolary style, is, indeed, most true; but they have no other marks of deliberate composition. The deliberate composition of one, who was so soon to write the "Vindication of Natural Society," could not have resembled the above extract. The fact is, the letters bear the marks of haste, but not of simplicity; of an imagination not yet sufficiently accustomed to the restraints of taste, to yield a uniform obedience to them, when careful composition did not demand it.

Burke, while in London, studied with his accustomed ardour and diligence; but it has been rightly conjectured, that his pursuits were somewhat too excursive to permit him to obtain a very profound knowledge of the law; not to mention that his health, still delicate, demanded frequent relaxation. From one or other of these causes, or more probably from both, he soon abandoned altogether the profession to which he had been destined; a step, as may be imagined, not very agreeable to his father. The knowledge he had obtained, however, was respectable and of considerable use to him in after-life; while the discipline which his legal studies afforded, exerted a most beneficial influence on the general character of his mind.

Meanwhile the character of his intellect was more unequivocally developing itself. This is obvious from the terms in which he expresses himself in certain letters to his college friends. It was at this time that he became acquainted with Arthur Murphy, then carrying on the Gray's Inn Journal.

About this period, it is said, he applied for the Logic chair at the University of Glasgow, then vacant. It has been plausibly conjectured, that he was encouraged to this act of youthful ambition by the fact that Dr. Hutcheson, formerly professor of Moral Philosophy

Some persons may tendency is to produce, haske, negligence. is an excellent literary apprenticeship. I do not : Its thunk that writing for periodicals

and ui accura

at Glasgow, was a native of Ireland. That he was a great admirer of Hutcheson is certain. It was, indeed, the " Inquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue," that suggested to Burke the "Inquiry into our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful." Nevertheless, the story of this application for the Logic chair at Glasgow seems to rest on no sufficient foundations. Dugald Stewart, who certainly had access to the best sources of information, expressly declares that he knew of nothing to justify it.

He continued to pursue his studies with undiminished assiduity; assiduity, in fact, just as great as though he had not been a genius. Nor was he free merely from that intellectual dissipation, which so often enervates minds of a superior order; he was equally free from excesses of a more serious character. Vice, scarcely less opposed to knowledge than to virtue, never withdrew him from his studies. Few men, indeed, who ventured within that magic circle where wit and genius were too frequently combined with profligacy, ever came out more untainted.-Garrick was now amongst his acquaintance.

There is abundant reason to believe, that at this period of his life Burke wrote much and frequently for the various periodicals of the day. These early efforts are now, for the most part, unknown; nor has the public, probably, very much reason to regret their loss. Such productions are often hasty; frequently the more so, that, being anonymous, their authors feel themselves secure from the severity of criticism. At the very best, they are written during a writer's apprenticeship to fame; and a tolerable exemption from faults, therefore, will generally be their highest merit. To the author himself, the discipline and exercise of mind they afford are exceedingly valuable; the more so, that he is not to answer for the follies of an inexperienced pen with his reputation. Thus protected, he can sustain failures without shame if not without disappointment, and can learn wisdom from experience at something less than the costly price at which experience usually sells her lessons. He can correct his faults and polish his style by practice and repeated effort, without sacrificing his future fame in the very process by which he is learning how to acquire it. Burke's first important work was the celebrated "Vindication of Natural Society," published in a large octavo pamphlet. It was written in imitation of the style and reasoning of Lord Bolingbroke. Some further remarks on it will be found at the close of this Introductory Essay, to which place we refer the reader for the observations it may be necessary to make on the other productions of our author. This biographical sketch will merely indicate the period and circumstances of their publication.-This first effort excited considerable attention. In the same year appeared his celebrated Essay, entitled " A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful." The severe application which this publication demanded seriously injured his health, and compelled him to seek repose. For this purpose he visited Bath and Bristol, where he soon recovered. At Bath he was attended by his countryman, Dr. Christopher Nugent. This amiable man invited Mr. Burke to his house, where he remained till the re-establishment of his health; and the consequence of this visit was an attachment between Burke and the daughter of his kind host, Miss Jane Mary Nugent. It has sometimes been asserted, that this lady was a catholic; and that Burke kept a priest in the house for her, on whom he was in the habit of " playing off his sceptical raillery." The fact is, that though Dr. Nugent was a catholic, his wife and daughter were both presbyterians.

This lady was well worthy of Burke's affections. To considerable endowments of intellect she added the utmost amiability of disposition. Proud of her conquest over such a man, proud of his genius, and still prouder of his affections, he was the object of almost idolatrous attachment; and to the promotion of his happiness she dedicated her whole life. It was well for him that it was so. Never did man need more than he did a sanctuary and a refuge in the quiet of domestic love from the incessant agitation of his public life; a spot of inviolable serenity, round which the storms of politics might roar and bluster, but never

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