The Sun.
London, England, 1855-10-23 00:00:00

THE LATE SIR WM. MOLESWORTS.

Yesterday, about the hour of noon, Sir William
Mole,worth, late Secretary of State for the Colonies,
expired at his residence in Eaton-place, atter a brief but
severe illness. Sir William had only attained his forty-
fifth year, having been born in 1810. His father was a
Cornish baronet of old descent—his mother an Edin-
burgh lady, of the name of Brown. He lost his father
at the age of 13, and it is alike creditable to his natural
disposition and to the maternal care that be was un-
spoiled by the early attainment of wealth and areal pa.
salon. Scarcely any details of his non-age and educa-
tion have reached us ; indeed we only know that he
spent one year as a student at Edinburgh. His debut
in public life was as M.P. for Cornwall, which he
represented in Parliament from 1832 to 1837. From
the first ho avowed himself a member of the not nu-
merous but energetic and accomplished party which
went by the designation of the "Philosophical Radi-
cals." His most intimate associate during this period
of his career was Mr. Temple Leader, with whom
he for a time kept house in common. The men
were essentially most unlike; Molesworth a deep and
earnest thinker, with literary tastes ; Leader a dashing,
talented, impulsive spirit. Similarity of ago and inde-
pendent generous sentiments formed their bond of union.
Less akin in opinions, but more like to Molesworth in
his tastes and intellectual habits, was the late Charles
Buller, with whom he lived on terms of confidential in-
timacy. Common intellectual pursuits kept him in close
alliance with Mr. George Grote and Mr. John Stuart
Mill. A radical so peononco had small chance of retain-
ing his seat for Cornwall after the effervescence of the
Reform Bill period was over. But Leeds welcomed the
rejected of the squires and their " Chandos clause " vo-
ters. and he sat in Parliament for that borough from
1837 to 1841. How he came to lose his seat for
Leeds we could never rightly understand. He re-
mained out of Parliament till 1845, when he was re-
turned for the borough of Southwark, which he con-
tinued to represent till his death. While a member
of the House of Commons his voice and vote were
unreservedly given in favour of every liberal principle
and measure ; but it was chiefly as an enlight-
ened and able advocate of colonisation and reform in
our system of penal transportation that he distinguished
himself. To this it was owing that, when he consented
to accept administrative office, he was, after a short
time spent in the rather uncongenial Board of Works,
promoted to the Colonial Department. In the Cabinet,
however, Sir William's presence appears to have been
more important as a recognition of the principle of men
entertaining his opinions to office than for any very ac-
tive or influential part he took in the deliberations of
Government. Sir William took an active part in the
attempt to establish the short-lived London Review ; but
his principal literary effort was his collective edition of
the works of Hobbes. It is not a very encouraging syeap.
tem of the state of public opinion in England that this
munificent enterprise was, on one occasion, made a sub-
ject of grave accusation against Sir William at the hust-
ings. Be the opinions of Hobbes what they may, he is
the parent of English inteilectual analysis—the origins,.
tor of those inquiries to which we owe Berkeley, Hume,
Reid, and Stewart. The loss of .his works would leave
an irreparable gap in the history of English intellectual
moral and political science. Sir William married, in
1844, the daughter of Bruce Carstairs, Esq., whose first
husband was Temple West, Esq. He had no family by
this lady, who survives; as does also the Dowager
Lady Moleswortla.