soon obliged to make peace with Mr. Addington,' and to combine, once more, the scattered forces of his party. The reunion was of brief duration; and so wide was the second breach, that on the death of Mr. Pitt, the Addington party were prepared to coalesce with the Whigs.2

office in

This disruption of the Tory party restored the Whigs to office, for a short time,--not The Whigs indeed as an independent party, for which restored to they were far too weak, but united with 1806. the Grenvilles, Lord Sidmouth, and the king's friends. A coalition with the liberal followers of Mr. Pitt would have been the more natural and congenial arrangement :3 but the peculiar relations of Lord Sidmouth to the late administration, the number of his friends, his supposed anxiety for peace,—and his personal influence with the king, suggested the necessity of such an alliance. No single party could stand alone, a coalition was inevitable; and Lord Sidmouth, being estranged personally from Mr. Pitt's followers, was naturally led to associate himself with Lord Grenville and Mr. Fox; while the latter, being himself distasteful to the king, was glad to co-operate with the leader of the king's

French proverb is here verified, "Un bon ami vaut mieux que trois mauvais parents."'-Corr., iv. 309.

He was created Viscount Sidmouth in January, 1805.

2 Lord Holland's Mem., i. 203; Pellew's Life of Lord Sidmouth, ii. 371; Rose's Corr., ii. 368.

3 Lord Holland says: The disunited rump of Mr. Pitt's ministry were no party, whereas Lord Sidmouth's friends, though few, formed a compact body; and if the leaders were inferior in talents to those of other political parties, their subalterns were more respectable than the clerks and secretaries of Mr. Pitt's and Lord Melville's school.' -Mem. of Whig Party, i. 209.

friends. It was a coalition between men as widely opposed in political sentiments and connections as Mr. Fox and Lord North had been three-and-twenty years before: but it escaped the reproaches to which that more celebrated coalition had fallen a victim.

The signal failures of Mr. Pitt's war administration, and the weariness of the nation under constantly increasing taxation, afforded to the Whigs,who had consistently urged a more pacific policy,— an opportunity of recovering some portion of their former influence and popularity. Their brief reign was signalised by the abolition of the slave trade, and other wise and useful measures. But they had not the confidence of the king:2 they failed even to conciliate the Prince of Wales: they mismanaged the elections: they were weakened by the death of Mr. Fox:5 they were unsuccessful in their nego

1 Pellew's Life of Lord Sidmouth, ii. 423.

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2 The king and his household were from the beginning and throughout, hostile to the ministry.'-Lord Holland's Mem., ii. 68.

3 The prince, in a letter to Lord Moira, March 30th, 1807, said: 'From the hour of Fox's death,-that friend, towards whom and in whom my attachment was unbounded,-it is known that my earnest wish was to retire from further concern and interference in public affairs.' At the same time he complained of neglect on the part of the Grenville ministry,-'having been neither consulted nor considered in any one important instance;' and on the fall of that ministry, whom he had generally desired to support, he 'determined to resume his original purpose, sincerely prepared, in his own mind, on the death of poor Fox, to cease to be a party man.' This resolution he communicated to the king.'--Lord Colchester's Diary, ii. 115; Lord Holland's Mem., ii. 68–72, 244.—'In his letters to Earl Grey, immediately after the death of Mr. Fox, there is no trace of such feelings.'-Life and Opinions of Earl Grey, 116.

Lord Holland's Mem., ii. 93.-The king, who throughout his reign had furnished every treasury with 12,000l. to defray election expenses on a dissolution, withheld that unconstitutional assistance from the administration of 1806.'-Ibid., 94.

5 Lord Holland says: 'Had Lord Grenville, in the new arrangements (after Mr. Fox's death), sought for strength in the opposite

tiations for peace; and fell easily before the king's displeasure, and the intrigues of their opponents.2

reinstated,

It was now evident that the party which Mr. Pitt had raised to such greatness, was not to be The Tories cast down by his death. It had been dis- 1807. organised by the loss of its eminent leader, and by the estrangement of his immediate followers from Lord Sidmouth and the king's friends. It possessed no statesman of commanding talents to inspire its disheartened members with confidence; and there were jealousies and rivalries among its ablest statesmen. But the king was its active and vigilant patron, and aided it with all the influence of the crown; while the war-cries of The church in danger,' and 'No popery,' were sufficient to rally all the forces of the party. Even those ministers who favoured the Catholic claims were content to profit by the appeals of Mr. Perceval and his friends to the fanaticism of the people. Such appeals had, on other occasions, been a favourite device of the Tories. They had even assumed the Church to be in danger on the accession of George I., as a pretence for inviting a popish pretender to the throne. Mr. Pitt had fallen before the same prejudice in 1801; and

party,—had he consulted the wishes of the court, rather than his own principles and consistency, he would have conciliated the king, fixed himself permanently in office, and divested every party in the state of the means of annoying him in Parliament.'-Mem. of Whig Party, ii. 50.

1 Ann. Reg., 1806, ch. ix., stated by Lord Holland to have been written by Mr. Allen; Parl. Papers relating to the negotiation with France, 1806; Hans. Deb., 1st Ser., viii. 305, Jan. 5, 1807, &c.; Life and Opinions of Earl Grey, 126–138.

2 Supra, Vol. I. 105, et seq.

3 King's Speech, 1715, Parl. Hist., vii. 222; Romilly's Life, ii. 192.

in 1807, the Duke of Portland and Mr. Perceval proved its efficacy in restoring strength and union to their party.

Even the Dissenters, swayed by their intolerant sentiments against the Catholics, often preferred the Court and High-church candidates to the friends of religious liberty. Nor did the Whigs generally gain popular support: the crown and the great Tory nobles prevailed against them in the counties, and more democratic candidates found favour in the populous towns.1

in opposi

tion, 18071811.

The Whigs were again routed: but they had The Whigs gained strength, as an opposition, by their brief restoration to power. They were no longer a proscribed party, without hope of royal favour and public confidence. If not yet formidable in divisions against the government, their opinions were received with tolerance; and much popular support, hitherto latent, was gradually disclosed. This was especially apparent in Scotland. The impeachment of Lord Melville, the idol of the Scottish Tories, had been a severe blow to that party; and the unwonted spectacle of their opponents actually wielding, once more, the power and patronage of the state, convinced them,'-to use the words of Lord Cockburn,- that they were not absolutely immortal.'2 Their political power, indeed, was not materially diminished: but their spirit was tempered, and they learned to respect, with decent moderation, the rights of the minority. 1 Lord Holland's Mem., ii. 227-230.

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2 Lord Cockburn's Mem., 215, 229.

Lord Melville was replaced in the administration of the affairs of Scotland by his son, Mr. Robert Dundas, who, with less talents than his father, brought to the office of leader of a dominant party much good sense and moderation.'

Younger men of the Whig party were now rising into notice, in literature and at the Scottish bar. Brougham, Francis Horner, Jeffrey, Sydney Smith, Cockburn, and Murray were destined to play a conspicuous part in the politics and literature of their age; and were already beginning to exercise an important influence upon the hopes and interests of their party. Among their most signal services was the establishment of the Edinburgh Review,2-a journal distinguished for the combination of the highest literary merit, with enlarged views of political philosophy far in advance of its age,—and an earnest but temperate zeal for public liberty, which had been nearly trodden out of the literature of the country.3

The Whigs had become, once more, a great and powerful party. Abandoned a few years before by many men of the highest rank and influence, they had gradually recovered the principal Whig families. They were represented by several statesmen of commanding talents; and their numbers had been largely recruited since 1793. But they were not well led or organised; and were without concert and discipline. When Lord Howick was removed to the House of

1 Lord Cockburn's Mem., 229, 230.

2 The first number of this journal was published in October, 1802. Cockburn's Mem. of Jeffrey, i. 286; Lady Holland's Life of Sydney Smith, i. 59, et seq.; Cockburn's Mem., 166; Lord Brougham's Autobiography, i. 245-270.