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FORE:Again, on the 22nd of March, Burke made another earnest effort to induce the infatuated Ministers and their adherents in Parliament to listen to reason. In one of the finest speeches that he ever made, he introduced a series of thirteen resolutions, which went to abolish the obnoxious Acts of Parliament, and admit the principle of the colonial Assemblies exercising the power of taxation. In the course of his speech he drew a striking picture of the rapid growth and the inevitable future importance of these colonies. He reminded the House that the people of New England and other colonies had quitted Great Britain because they would not submit to arbitrary measures; that in America they had cultivated this extreme independence of character, both in their religion and their daily life; that almost[216] every man there studied law, and that nearly as many copies of Blackstone's "Commentaries" had been sold there as in England; that they were the Protestants of Protestants, the Dissenters of Dissenters; that the Church of England there was a mere sect; that the foreigners who had settled there, disgusted with tyranny at home, had adopted the extremest principles of liberty flourishing there; that all men there were accustomed to discuss the principles of law and government, and that almost every man sent to the Congress was a lawyer; that the very existence of slavery in the southern States made white inhabitants hate slavery the more in their own persons. "You cannot," he said, "content such men at such a distance��Nature fights against you. Who are you that you should fret, rage, and bite the chains of Nature? Nothing worse happens to you than does to all nations who have extensive empires. In all such extended empires authority grows feeble at the extremities. The Turk and the Spaniard find it so, and are compelled to comply with this condition of Nature, and derive vigour in the centre from the relaxation of authority on the borders." His resolutions were negatived by large majorities.
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FORE:Pitt dead, there remained a difficulty of no ordinary kind in the construction of a new Cabinet. Various persons were applied to to fill the arduous post of prime minister, who all declined, knowing the powerful opposition which would be arrayed against them by coalescing parties. Amongst these were Lord Hawkesbury, Sidmouth, and the Marquis Wellesley, who had just returned from India. There was nothing for it, then, but to endeavour to diminish the opposition of all parties by bringing in some of all parties, and hence the construction of the Ministry of "All the Talents." Grenville assumed the helm as First Lord of the Treasury, and, of course, brought in Fox, notwithstanding the repugnance of the king. Fox became Secretary for Foreign Affairs��Fox, who had so long and so vehemently condemned the whole of Pitt's foreign policy. Sidmouth, though refusing the responsibility of the Premiership, accepted the office of Privy Seal; Lord Fitzwilliam became Lord President of the Council; Grey, now Lord Howick, First Lord of the Admiralty; Lord Moira, Master-General of the Ordnance; Lord Spencer, Secretary of State for the Home Department; Windham, Secretary for the Colonies; Lord Henry Petty, Chancellor of the Exchequer; Erskine, Lord Chancellor; and Sir Gilbert Elliot, now made Lord Minto, President of the Board of Control. Sheridan was not placed in the Cabinet, because he had not been found staunch to any party, and because, in his daily drunken fits, he was likely to disclose State secrets��as if, said he, there were any secrets to be disclosed. Lord Auckland was made President of the Board of Trade, and Lord Temple Vice-President. Temple, also, was made joint Paymaster of the Forces with Lord John Townshend, and General Fitzpatrick Secretary at War. In the law departments, Lord Ellenborough, the Chief Justice of the King's Bench, had, though quite out of rule, a seat in the Cabinet; Pigott became Attorney-General, Sir Samuel Romilly Solicitor-General. The Duke of Bedford was enabled to gratify his dependents by being appointed Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland. Such was the Ministry of "All the Talents," amongst whom, however, did not appear Canning, who had more talent than three-fourths of them. It was clear that such a Ministry could not long hold together. There were scarcely two of them who did not cherish the most irreconcilable views. Fox, at the instigation of Francis, was desirous to call in question the proceedings of Lord Wellesley in India, and Lord Grenville was as resolute against it. Windham, Grenville, Fox, and Sidmouth held, every one of them, different notions of foreign policy. Fox and some others were advocates of Catholic emancipation; Sidmouth was utterly averse from it. Then, how were so many heads to find comfortable berths for their followers?
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FORE:
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FORE:FROM THE PAINTING BY CLARKSON STANFIELD, R.A., IN THE CORPORATION ART GALLERY, GUILDHALL.The chief governor of Ireland, at that time, was no timid civilian. He was a brave and distinguished soldier��a man of chivalrous honour himself, and therefore not prone to entertain doubts injurious to the honour of the profession of which he was an ornament. But Lord Anglesey was also capable of estimating the force of popular contagious influences on military discipline and fidelity in an extraordinary national crisis; and he was so alarmed at the state of things developed by the Clare election, that he wrote confidentially to Mr. Peel, cautioning him against supposing that Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald, from vexation and disappointment, should exaggerate the danger of the crisis, and telling him that he would send Major Warburton on a secret mission, known only to his private secretary, to explain to the Government in London the state of affairs. Major Warburton, a very intelligent and trustworthy officer, was at the head of the constabulary, and commanded the force at Clare during the election. He testified, as the result of his observation there, that, even in the constabulary and the army, the sympathies of a common cause, political and religious, could not be altogether repressed, and that implicit reliance could not long be placed on the effect of discipline and the duty of obedience. On the 20th of July Lord Anglesey wrote as follows:��"We hear occasionally of the Catholic soldiers being ill-disposed, and entirely under the influence of the priests. One regiment of infantry is said to be divided into Orange and Catholic factions. It is certain that, on the 12th of July, the guard at the Castle had Orange lilies about them." On the 26th of July the Viceroy wrote another letter, from which the following is an extract:��"The priests are using very inflammatory language, and are certainly working upon the Catholics of the army. I think it important that the dep?ts of Irish recruits should be gradually removed, under the appearance of being required to join their regiments, and that whatever regiments are sent here should be those of Scotland,[279] or, at all events, of men not recruited from the south of Ireland. I desired Sir John Byng to convey this opinion to Lord Hill."
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