The Sun.
London, England, 1868-10-22 00:00:00

AND HIS TIMES.

Mr. Goldwin Smith's lecture on " Chatham and his
Times" was delivered on Wednesday. It did not merely
refer to Chatham. But of him Mr. Smith said that he
was one of the meteors of history; nowhere was he more
meteoric than in Macaulay's famous article. Historians
hardly dared to criticise him fully, but contented them-
selves with tracking his splendid path across the heavens.
Yet, perhaps, there was no statesman who required
more to be studied in connection with the circum-
stances of his age in order to do him justice.
Chatham came at a time when the country stood in
the greatest need of reform—ecclesiastical, social, legal,
and political ; but instead of reform he gave us nothing
but war. He came in an age of scepticism, but it was a
scepticism unlike that of the present day. Modern scep-
ticism was at least an earnest seeking after truth, while
fundamentally it was religious, and allied with and even
producing the highest purity of character. The Church
in England, although not so scandalously corrupt as that
of France, was terribly worldly. Horace Walpole had
shewn us that the bishops cut but a poor figure, while
the only active religion was Methodism, which became
o fashionable that women in high circles grew as fond
of it as of a game of cards. In those days real power
was still supposed to reside iu the King. The American
Constitution was evidently framed upon a model of ours at
that time, substituting the President for the King, the
Senate for the House of Lords, Congress for the House of
Commons. The framers of that constitution were not
aware that no real power was to reside in the King. They
placed real power in the President, and the consequence
has been the recent collision between the President and

;he Representative Assembly. Thus once more is it proved

hat in framing constitutions we cannot divide power.
Chatham entered public life with the idea that the best
thing to be done for the nation was to make it glorious in
war. He opposed Sir Robert Walpole, who, though cor-
rupt, was by no means so corrupt as he has been
represented. Joining the opposition to Walpole, Chatham
commenced those invectives for which he was afterwards
so famous. Walpole ultimately fell ;he forgot that the
first duty of a statesman was to preserve his own honour ;
and that if a statesman has no honour he cannot serve the
public weal. "In English history we have (Mr. Smith
continued) had four great orators. Pym was the first, and
perhaps he still remains greatest of all. The second, if we
may credit tradition, was Bolingbroke ; but not a frag-
ment of his speeches remains, and his admirers confine
their descriptions to his style rather than matter.
Then comes Chatham, whose eloquence was rather
of a peculiar kind, and characterise,l by much rhe-
toric. The day is now approaching when rhetoric in
statesmen will grow weak, when we shall see political ques-
tions dealt with as questions of science, and the rhetoric
even of a Chatham will he powerless. The fourth Eng-
lish orater I venture to think is John Bright. Bright's
friend Cobden once told me that he had been read-
ing the orations of Demosthenes from a translation,
and he was evidently surprised at their character. He
had expected something more brilliant and declamatory.
I told him, of course, that the beauty of the language was
lost in a translation ; but in the second place I said he
was mistaken in supposing that Demosthenes was a
declaimer. The political speeches of Demosthenes were
not declamation, but counsel. I would say the same of the
speeches of John Bright. Therefore the speeches of John
Bright will live ; they will live not only for their force of
language and beauty of form, but because they contain
the counsels given by a great public man to the nation of
his time." Chatham's wars were next criticised by the
lecturer, who thought it was.a mistake to suppose that
Chatham made commerce flourish through war. Com-
merce never flourished through war ; only a few great
merchants reaped wealth, while smaller traders suffered
depression. Incidentally mentioning Frederick the
Great, the lecturer thought it was high time the
character of that monarch should be spoken of reasonably.
We have just had, he remarked, a life of Frederick the
Great from a man of genius, whose philosophy, it seems
to me, is reduced ad abaurdum in that book. No doubt
Frederick was a great captain. It was fortunate for him
that he was a king, else once or twice his failures would
have been his ruin. He was a great ruler and a great
civiliser, though rather in a shallow way. Frederick was,
in plain truth, a robber, in excuse of which we may no
doubt plead that the powers of Europe at that time
generally partook of the same character. Resuming
the general subject of the Chatham wars, the lecturer
said it was from them we derived our imperial notions
—our passion for " an empire upon which the sun never
sets." He also said that the only effectual check on war
was to make every age pay for its own wars, and that the
same fallacious arguments were used in Chatham's time
as now for robbing posterity. The attention of the
audience was then called to Chatham's fall, to the
American war, and to the general character of the man
whose life had been the subject of the address. The
application of Mr. Bright's charge of "pompousness and
servility " against the present Prime Minister, to Chat-
ham in his intercourse with his sovereign, was loudly
cheered. Chatham's life, the lecturer said, was theatric,
but really splendid. The lecture closed with the following
words :—" Cobden sleeps in a country churchyard, and a
country churchyard is the best grave for one whose life
was devoted to real beneficence. It was meet that such a
worker as he should, in death, mingle his dust with the
dust of the people. Chatham proper place is where he
lies, in Westminster Abbey. He was the real hero of his
own age— an age of war and glory ; and we may look back
upon his name with veneration and love, though we may
way that his age may return no more.

Mr. C. Evans, chancellor of the diocese of Nor-
wich, and one of the oldest barristers on the Norfolk
circuit, was thrown from his horse on Wednesday, and was
so severely injured that he died shortly afterwards.

THE " COUNTESS OF DERIVENTWATER."—The
Highway Board of Hexham held a special meeting on
Tuesday to consider what action should be taken in the
matter of the Countess of Derwentwater. A resolution
was moved to the effect that the clerk be instructed to lay
information and take out summonses against the occupant
of the obstruction, and against any person who may place,
or has placed, any part of the obstruction on the road.
An amendment was brought up in favour of inaction.
Only :three waywardens voted for it, however, and the
original resolution was carried by a decisive majority.
ARCHDEACON DENISON. —The Church Associa-

tion have just addressed the followircr challenge to Arch-
deacon Denison :—" Sir, lam dir tte by the Council of
the Church Association to inform y‘ u that if you are :so
satisfied with the orthodoxy of your doctrines as to re-
publish the three sermons upon which the Rev. James
Ditcher founded his proceedings against you, and which
we are informed by the publisher are withdrawn from cir-
culation, admit their circtOation and authorship, and join
in an application to the bisl top to send the case by lett, rs
of request to the Court of At..ches, the Church Association
will undertake to adopt the n( c .ssary steps for obtainicg
a judicial decision on the suL fiect.—l am, sir, yours very
taig4tilly, FREDERICK DITIJi&S, Secretary.",