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ing inscription on her tomb in the church of Hagley was also a tribute of his ardent love. It paints a woman of fashion as she ought to be. It delineates a character, which must be admired and loved wherever it is known. Happy the wife who deserves it: happy, thrice happy, the husband who can apply it to the partner of his life! Made to engage all hearts, and charm all eyes;

Though meek, magnanimous; though witty, wise:
Polite, as all her life in courts had been;

Yet good, as she the world had never seen;
The noble fire of an exalted mind,

With gentlest female tenderness combin'd;
Her speech was the melodious voice of Love,
Her song the warbling of the vernal grove;
Her eloquence was sweeter than her song,
Soft as her heart, and as her reason strong;
Her form each beauty of her mind express'd,
Her mind was virtue by the Graces dress'd.

Two years before this lamented separation, Mr. Lyttel ton had been appointed one of the lords of the treasury; and, inspired with the flame of genius himself, he no sooner possessed the power, than he became the patron of genius in others. Fielding, Thomson, Mallet, Young, Hammond, West, and Pope, either tasted his bounty, or were honoured by his countenance. His generous regard to Thomson did not die with the object of it. He revised his orphan tragedy of Coriolanus for the benefit of the deceased poet's relations; and wrote such an affecting prologue, that the celcbrated Quin burst into tears as he recited it, while the audience melted into sympathetic feeling with the actor.

But though Lyttelton had now become a public man and a patron, he did not suffer the avocations of business, or the increase of favour, to lure him from more serious concerns. In the sprightliness of his juvenile confidence, in the vanity of conceit and affectation, he had been led away by doubts respecting the authenticity of Revelation; he felt the pangs of uncertainty on such a momentous

subject; he diligently applied himself to search the Scriptures;" and, in the result, their internal evidence afforded to his honest and unprejudiced mind a firm conviction of their truth.

'Being anxious to remove from others that veil which had dimmed his own prospects, he published, soon after the death of his lady, "Observations on the Conversion and Apostleship of St. Paul." The incidents attending this part of Scripture history had appeared so striking, as to effect his entire conversion to the belief of Christianity; and infidelity itself has never been able to fabricate even a specious reply to his judicious and able defence of our holy religion. It had the happiest effect on the times in which it was produced; and as often as it is read with seriousness and candour, it will either convince or confound the sceptic.

Notwithstanding the violence of Lyttelton's grief for the loss of his lady, he judged it expedient to enter again into the state of matrimony; and he fixed on a daughter of sir Robert Rich. In the heart that has once loved tenderly and truly, perhaps the whole enthusiasm of affection can never be a second time renewed; and wedlock, even when contracted under the happiest omens, is so much influenced by minute circumstances, by temper, habit, and a congenial or contradictory disposition, that it need not be wondered at if his second union did not produce all the felicity which he had once tasted, and which he fondly hoped again to enjoy.

In 1751, on his father's death, he succeeded to the ba ronetage, and the family estate at Hagley. The latter he did not augment, but was careful to adorn: and by his judicious and elegant taste he made it one of the most delightful spots in the kingdom.

By a diligent discharge of his parliamentary duty, and of eloquence which commanded attention, he y rose to some of the highest offices of the state.

When a violent clamour was raised against the bill which had been passed for the naturalization of the Jews, Lyttelton made a speech in favour of its repeal, which for elegance and spirit, propriety of sentiment, and soundness of principle, may be thought a rival to the purest models of antiquity, and certainly equals any thing that modern times have produced.

After reprobating the arguments which had been urged against the existing bill, he considered its probable effects in the present temper of the nation; ably discriminated between steadiness in essentials, and a compliance with harmless though perhaps mistaken opinions; and gave unanswerable reasons for the simple repeal of the act, beyond which he thought all concession to popular clamour would be weak and dangerous in the extreme. "It would open," said the animated orator, "a door to the wildest enthusiasm, and the most mischievous attacks of political disaffection working on that enthusiasm. If you encourage and authorize it to fall on the synagogue, it will go from thence to the meeting-houses, and in the end to the palace. The more zealous we are to support Christianity, the more vigilant should we be in maintaining toleration. If we bring back persecution, we bring back the antichristian spirit of popery: and when the spirit is here, the whole system will soon follow. Toleration is the basis of all public quiet. It is a character of freedom given to the mind, more valuable, I think, than that which secures our persons and estates. Indeed they are inseparably connected together; for where the mind is not free, where the conscience is enthralled, there is no freedom."

Such distinguished abilities, accompanied by the best virtues of the heart, might be supposed to have perpetuated the political influence of Lyttelton: but literature engrossed most of his attention; and he was more anxious to discover moral truth, than to guard against political intrigue. At intervals he favoured the world with his

celebrated "Dialogues of the Dead," and his elaborate "History of Henry the Second;" thus dividing his time between the duties of his public functions, the pursuits of elegant literature, and the society of the learned and the great: till a change of ministry taking place in the year 1757, he was raised to a peerage, and retired from the agitation of state affairs. From that period lord Lyttelton was only known as a statesman by occasional speeches in his parliamentary capacity: he lived chiefly at his beautiful seat at Hagley, endeared to his neighbours and to mankind by the exercise of every humane quality, and the practice of every virtue.

Lord Lyttelton had never an athletic appearance; his frame was slender, and his face meagre and pale. Yet he reached the sixty-fourth year of his age, exempt from much bodily infirmity; when he was seized with his last illness, and resigned his breath with the hope and confidence of immortality. A little before his decease, when all hopes of life were extinguished, he thus addressed himself to the physician: "Doctor, you shall be my con fessor. When I first set out in the world, I had friends who endeavoured to shake my belief in the Christian religion. I saw difficulties which staggered me; but I kept my mind open to conviction. The evidences and doctrines of Christianity, studied with attention, made me a most firm believer of its truth. I have made it the rule of my life, and it is now the ground of my hopes.--In politics and public life, I have made the public good the rule of my conduct. I never gave counsels which I did not think the best at the time. I have seen that I was sometimes in the wrong; but I did not err designedly. I have endeavoured, in private life, to do all the good in my power; and never for a moment could indulge ma hcious or unjust designs upon any person whatsoever."

When the last moment approached, he gave his daughter lady Valentia and her husband, who came to see him,

his solemn benediction: adding, "Be good, be virtuous, my lord; you must come to this." In short, his dying scene was the best comment on a well-spent life; it evinced unaffected magnanimity, pious resignation, and Christian hope. To the last, his understanding was unimpaired; his closing hour exhibiting the brightest pattern of the Christian's triumph over death. Whoever copies this virtuous and amiable example, can with well-founded hope exclaim, "Oh, may my last end be like his!"

WILLIAM PITT,

EARL OF CHATHAM.

Born 1707.-Died 1778.

From 5th Q. Anne, to 18th Geo. III.

"I DID not intend to make a public declaration of the respect I bear lord Chatham; but I am called upon to deliver my opinion, and even the pen of Junius shall contribute to reward him. Recorded honours shall gather round his monument, and thicken over him.

It is a

solid fabric, and will support the laurels that adorn it.---I am not conversant with the language of panegyric. These praises are extorted from me; but they will wear well, as they have been dearly earned."

Such was the elegant eulogy paid by the celebrated JUNIUS to the earl of Chatham, before the curtain had dropped on the statesman's labours, and his part in the drama was completed. But firmness and consistency were his lordship's characteristics; and from his prior life, the above able and penetrating writer might well predict that the close would be in unison with it.

William Pitt, who filled such a wide and honourable space in the public eye, whose glories are still fresh in the memory of his countrymen and of Europe, and whose well-earned fame will endure as long as the nation which

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