LIKE his great cotemporaries, Fox and Pitt, this accomplished author, orator, and statesman, was a younger son. He was born on Arran Quay, Dublin, on the 1st of January, 1730. His father was an attorney, who, for many years, enjoyed a very extensive practice in the Irish capital; and his mother was a relative of the gallant Sir Edmund Nagle.

Burke, who was a very delicate child, received the first rudiments of education from an old woman, who lived near his father's house. He afterwards went to a school at Castletown Roche: whence he was removed to another in Dublin, where he remained about a year; and, on the 26th of May, 1741, he was sent to a classical academy at Ballitore, in the county of Kildare, which was then under the superintendence of Abraham Shackleton, an intelligent member of the society of Friends. Among the numerous errors which occur in many of the biographies of Burke, it is stated, that while at school he did not display any promise of future greatness: whereas it has been incontestibly proved that, within a short period after his arrival at Ballitore, he exhibited very extraordinary powers for a lad of his age; and possessed, not merely an ardent desire, but a singular capacity, for the acquirement of knowledge. An anecdote is recorded of him which shews, that even at this early period of his life, he occupied a superior station among his companions, and was capable, as in afterlife, of successfully exerting his abilities on a sudden emergency. Burke and his schoolfellows were one day permitted to go and see the procession of the judges of assize, on condition that all the senior boys should, after their return, write an account of the spectacle in Latin verse. When Burke had finished his own task on the occasion, he was earnestly solicited to prepare another description of the scene, for a schoolfellow to whom he had often before rendered a similar service. Hoping to obtain some hint for a second

composition on the same subject, he asked the lad, what had struck him as being most remarkable in the procession. The boy replied, that he had noticed nothing particular, but a fat piper in a brown coat. On this, Burke immediately commenced, and, in a short time, completed, a humorous doggerel poem, on the prescribed subject, the first line of which ran as follows:

Piper erat fattus, qui brownum tegmen habebat.

A circumstance is also related of him. which shews that in boyhood, as well as during his riper years, he felt an invincible hatred to oppression. A poor man having been compelled to pull down his humble cottage, by the surveyor of the roads, because it was denounced as standing too near the highway, Burke, who saw the cottager performing his melancholy task, observed, with indignation, that if he were in authority, such tyranny should never be exercised over the defenceless with impunity.

On the 14th of April, 1744, after having been about three years at Ballitore school, he was entered as a pensioner at Trinity college, Dublin. In June, 1746, he was elected a scholar of the house: a distinction which confers on its possessor the advantages of a small annuity, a vote for the representative of the university, and free chambers and commons during a period of five years. The successful candidates go through an examination before the provost and senior fellows in the classics: the correctness, therefore, of Goldsmith's assertion, that Burke displayed no superiority in academical exercises while at college, is, at the least, doubtful. History, moral philosophy, the classics, rhetoric, composition, and metaphysics, are reported to have been his favourite studies: to these, however, he did not at all restrict himself; on the contrary, he appears to have adopted the recommendation of his preceptor, Dr. Pelissier, to aim at the acquirement of multiform know

ledge. That he was successful in this pursuit, to a very considerable extent, is shewn by the versatility of powers, and the capacity of discoursing eloquently and correctly on almost every subject that was started in his society, which he displayed in his manhood. Johnson, than whom no man knew Burke better, said of him, on different occasions, "Take up whatever topic you will, Burke is ready to meet you:"-" If he were to go into a stable, and talk to the ostlers for a short time, they would venerate him as the wisest of human beings:"-and "No person of sense ever met him under a gateway to avoid a shower, who did not go away convinced that he was the first man in England."

While a collegian, Burke is described as having been a young man of quiet habits, and of a very unpretending character. No academical irregularity is on record against him, except his joining his fellow collegians to support Brinsley Sheridan, (the father of his future friend, R. B. Sheridan,) then manager of the Dublin theatre, against the rioters of 1746, who nearly destroyed the playhouse. It has been said, that he quitted college without a degree: this, however, is contradicted by his late biographer, Prior, who states, that he commenced A. B. in February, 1747-8, and proceeded A. M. in 1751.

It was intended by his friends, that he should follow the legal profession at the English bar; and his name was accordingly enrolled at the Middle Temple so early as the 24th of April, 1747. In 1750, according to one usually correct writer, but in 1753, as stated by others, he began to keep his terms. His talents soon brought him into notice: and he became acquainted with several individuals of literary eminence, partly by whose persuasion and example, perhaps, or it may be, prompted solely by his own desire to distinguish himself as an author, he contributed many papers to the periodicals of the day. Some biographical writers assert that he was compelled to exercise his literary talents for his support; while others protest that he received a sufficient allowance, from his father, for a young man of his habits to maintain himself with comfort and credit; and that his family were so able and will

ing to supply his wants, as well at this, as at subsequent periods of his life, that he actually received from his relations, at different times, no less a sum than £20,000. His wife, a woman of very amiable character, is said to have declared, that the report of Burke having been dependent on his pen for support, previously to coming into parliament, was a gross untruth. That he did write for the periodicals, and was paid for his productions, is, however, admitted on all hands; but whether he derived the means of subsistence from his literary exertions, or from other sources, is a matter of much uncertainty, and little consequence.

Almost every step in the early part of Burke's life, is involved in doubt, and encumbered with controversy. According to one author, he became a candidate for a Glasgow professorship before his arrival in London: but Dugald Stewart doubts the fact of his ever having aspired to it, while it is asserted, on the authority of Professor Taylor, that Burke decidedly endeavoured, but without success, to procure the chair of the professor of logic, at the university of Glasgow, either in 1752 or 1753.

His first avowed production was the Vindication of Natural Society, a remarkably clever production, published in 1756, in which the author covertly imitated the style and principles of Bolingbroke, with admirable effect. But the burlesque was not sufficiently gross to be generally palpable; Burke's intentions in the pamphlet were consequently mistaken; and many years afterwards, he was attacked for promulgating ideas, which it was his aim, in the work in question, to have held up, by an ironical advocacy, to scorn and detestation.

In the course of the same year he produced his original and ingenious Treatise on the Sublime and Beautiful. He paid dearly for the fame which this work acquired him, by a severe fit of illness; before his complete recovery from which, he went to Bath, where he resided in the house of a talented physician of the name of Nugent, whose daughter, Jane Mary, he afterwards married. In this lady, Burke found such a wife as few men of genius have had the good fortune to

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to Burke, he gratefully says, ought surely to be free with a man of your own making; who has found in you father, brother, friend, every thing!"

On Barry's return, Burke endeavoured to root out the deistical notions which had taken possession of his mind; he afterwards befriended him on every occasion; and, it is stated, we are inclined to think incorrectly, that some portion of the merit, so far as regards conception, is due to him, of Barry's paintings, in the great room of the Society of Arts. Some anecdotes are related of these eminent men, which shew that Burke, on several occasions, kindly conformed to the curious whims of his talented friend; and, it is said, that he once dined with Barry, in the painting-loft of the latter, on beef steaks, which he partly cooked while Barry went to a neighbouring public-house to fetch porter.

Burke, at length, obtained an entry into public life: the Marquis of Rockingham, on being called to the head of the treasury, in 1765, having appointed him his private secretary, and procured his return to parliament as member for Wendover, in Buckinghamshire. Burke now commenced his long and brilliant political career, and the succeeding events of his life, are almost as much matter of history as biography. Previously to his entering parliament, he had, for some time, attended every important discussion in the house of commons. He had also studied political economy; taken lessons in the art of speaking, from Garrick; disciplined himself for debate at the famous Robin Hood society, and was supposed by his friends to be already an accomplished orator. Shortly after the opening of the session, in 1766, he took a prominent part in a debate relative to the affairs of America. For the ability he displayed on this occasion, he obtained the most flattering approbation from Pitt, afterwards Earl of Chatham, whose applause was of itself, in general estimation, a passport to fame. Sir John Hawkins having, at this period, expressed his amazement at Burke's precocious eminence, Johnson said to him, "There is nothing marvellous in it, Sir John; we, who know Burke, feel sure that he will be one of the first men in the country."

After a remarkably brief reign, the Rockingham party retired from office: on which occasion Burke drew up a sort of manifesto, entitled, A Short Account of a late Short Administration. About this time he purchased a villa near Beaconsfield, for which he gave a sum exceeding £20,000. How he acquired so large an amount is exceedingly doubtful. While one set of his biographers assert that the money in question was nominally a loan, but in reality a gift, from his munificent friend, Lord Rockingham, it is contended by others, that a part only of the amount was advanced by his patron, a considerable portion of it being cash which he received under the wills of his father and elder brother. His old friend Johnson, frequently visited him at Beaconsfield; and one day, after wandering over the grounds for some time, exclaimed, in an animated manner,

"Non equidem invideo, miror magis!" Burke soon took a leading part in the principal debates in the house of commons. He signalized himself as a decided enemy to all the obnoxious measures of government against the American colonies; as a champion for the liberty of the subject; and as a powerful advocate for religious toleration. In 1774, he was unexpectedly invited to become a candidate for Bristol, and obtained his return, free of expense. At the conclusion of one of his brilliant harangues from the hustings, during this election, a rival candidate, who was an American merchant, instead of making a speech in his turn, exclaimed with great emphasis, "Gentlemen, I say ditto to Mr. Burke." In his address of thanks at the termination of the contest, Burke boldly told his constituents that he intended to vote in parliament according to the dictates of his own conscience, and not in blind obedience to the instructions of those who sent him there. "Your representative," said he, "owes you not only his industry, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion."

The affairs of America for some time almost entirely engrossed his attention: one of his numerous speeches in favour of conciliating the colonies, Mr. Fox, nearly twenty years afterwards, recom

mended the members of the house of commons to read by day, and meditate upon by night; to peruse and study it again and again, until it was firmly imprinted on their minds, and impressed on their hearts. During one of the debates on this important subject, Hartley, the member for Hull, after having driven four-fifths of a very full house from the benches, by an unusually dull speech, at length, requested that the riot act might be read, for the purpose of elucidating one of his propositions. Burke, who was impatient to address the house himself, immediately started up and exclaimed, "The riot act! my dearest friend, why in the name of every thing sacred, have the riot act read? The mob, you see, is already dispersed!" Peals of laughter followed the utterance of this comic appeal, which Lord North frequently declared to be one of the happiest instances of wit he ever heard.*

Burke was equally felicitous in many other expressions which, as on this occasion, were elicited by the circumstances of the moment. While Lord North was at the head of public affairs, Burke, during a conversation relative to the Scotch anti-popish mob, thought proper to censure the supineness of government with great severity: in the midst of his speech, he suddenly perceived that the premier had fallen into a profound nap; and directing the attention of the house to the circumstance, he observed, "Government, it is to be hoped, is not defunct, but drowsy. Brother Lazarus," continued he, pointing to Lord North, "is not dead, he only sleepeth!" On another occasion, having supported a strong recommendation to economy in the public expenditure, by the apothegm, "Magnum

Of this incorrigible proser (Hartley) it is related, that one afternoon, Jenkinson, the first Lord Liverpool, left the house when the member for Hull rose to speak, and presuming that the honourable gentleman would, as usual, deliver a very long dull speech, he walked home, mounted his horse and rode to his country house, where he dined; and after strolling for some time about his grounds, returned at a gentle pace to town. On his arrival at home, he sent a messenger to the house, to ascertain what had been done, and how soon the division might be expected to take place. The reply he received was, that Mr. Hartley had not yet done speaking; and when Jenkinson, at length, thought it advisable, in order to be in time for voting, to go down to Westminster, he found the long-winded orator still on his legs!

vectigal est parsimonia," somebody reminded him, in a low tone, that he had used a false quantity in the word vectigal, having pronounced it vectigal, instead of vectigal. The orator instantly took advantage of his own mistake: "I have just received a hint," said he, "that I committed an error of quantity in my quotation; I rejoice at the circumstance, as it affords me an opportunity of repeating, with ten-fold emphasis and energy, the immortal adage of the Romans, magnum vectigal est parsimonia!"""

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During the dreadful riots of 1780, which were occasioned by the zeal of certain associations, whose object was to oppose the granting of any indulgences to Catholics, Burke, who had been one of the leading advocates of the latter in parliament, was caricatured as a friar, in the act of trimming the fires of Smithfield. He was nicknamed Neddy St. Omers, denounced as a jesuit in disguise, and repeatedly threatened with the vengeance of the fanatical rioters. It appears, however, from one of his own letters, that he one day had the courage to venture among a portion of the mob, not merely without any attempt at disguising himself, but openly avowing who he was. Some of the rioters, he states, were malignant; but he found friends among them, and suffered no injury. disturbances were, at length, terminated, and several of the ringleaders taken, convicted, and sentenced to death. At this time, Burke wrote to the chief persons in power, entreating them to use their influence in saving as many of the misguided wretches from execution as possible. These letters do equal honour to his philosophy and his feelings on no other occasion, perhaps, did it fall to his lot to exhibit his wisdom and humanity in so splendid a light. To Sir Grey Cooper he wrote as follows:-" For God's sake, entreat Lord North to take a view of the sum total of the deaths, before any are ordered for execution; for, by not doing something of this kind, people are decoyed in detail into severities they never would have dreamed of, if they had had the whole in their view at once. The scene in Surrey would have affected the hardest heart that ever was in human

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