studies, though often interrupted by illness, were prosecuted
with extraordinary success. He was sent, towards the close
of the year 1773, to Pembroke Hall, in the university of Cambridge.
The governor to whom the direction of William's
academical life was confided was a bachelor of arts named
Pretyman,[1]
who had been senior wrangler in the preceding
year, and, who though not a man of prepossessing appearance
or brilliant parts, was eminently acute and laborious, a sound
scholar, and an excellent geometrician. A close and lasting
friendship sprang up between the pair. The disciple was able,
before he completed his twenty-eighth year, to make his preceptor
bishop of Lincoln and dean of St Paul's; and the preceptor
showed his gratitude by writing a life of the disciple, which
enjoys the distinction of being the worst biographical work of
its size in the world. Pitt, till he graduated, had scarcely one
acquaintance, attended chapel regularly morning and evening,
dined every day in hall, and never went to a single evening
party. At seventeen he was admitted, after the fashion of those
times, by right of birth, without any examination, to the degree
of master of arts. But he continued during some years to
reside at college, and to apply himself vigorously, under
Pretyman's direction, to the studies of the place, while mixing
freely in the best academic society.
The stock of learning which Pitt laid in during this part of his life was certainly very extraordinary. The work in which he took the greatest delight was Newton's Principia. His liking for mathematics, indeed, amounted to a passion, which, in the opinion of his instructors, themselves distinguished mathematicians, required to be checked rather than encouraged. Nor was the youth's proficiency in classical learning less remarkable. In one respect, indeed, he appeared to disadvantage when compared with even second-rate and third-rate men from public schools. He had never, while under Wilson's care, been in the habit of composing in the ancient languages; and he therefore never acquired the knack of versification. It would have been utterly out of his power to produce such charming elegiac lines as those in which Wellesley bade farewell to Eton, or such Virgilian hexameters as those in which Canning described the pilgrimage to Mecca. But it may be doubted whether any scholar has ever, at twenty, had a more solid and profound knowledge of the two great tongues of the old civilized world. He had set his heart on being intimately acquainted with all the extant poetry of Greece, and was not satisfied till he had mastered Lycophron's Cassandra.
To modern literature Pitt paid comparatively little attention. He knew no living language except French; and French he knew very imperfectly. With a few of the best English writers he was intimate, particularly with Shakespeare and Milton. The debate in Pandemonium was, as it well deserved to be, one of his favourite passages; and his early friends used to talk, long after his death, of the just emphasis and the melodious cadence with which they had heard him recite the incomparable speech of Belial, He had indeed been carefully trained from infancy in the art of managing his voice, a voice naturally clear and deep-toned. At a later period the wits of Brookes's, irritated by observing, night after night, how powerfully Pitt's sonorous elocution fascinated the rows of country gentlemen, reproached him with having been “taught by his dad on a stool”.
His education, indeed, was well adapted to form a great parliamentary speaker. The classical studies of Pitt had the effect of enriching his English vocabulary, and of making him wonderfully expert in the art of constructing correct English sentences. His practice was to look over a page or two of a Greek or Latin author, to make himself master of the meaning, and then to read the passage straight forward into his own language. This practice, begun under his first teacher Wilson, was continued under Pretyman. Of all the remains of antiquity, the orations were those on which he bestowed the most minute examination. His favourite employment was to compare harangues on opposite sides of the same question, to analyse them, and to observe which of the arguments of the first speaker were refuted by the second, which were evaded, and which were left untouched. Nor was it only in books that he at this time studied the art of parliamentary fencing. When he was at home he had frequent opportunities of hearing important debates at Westminster; and he heard them, not only with interest and enjoyment, but with close scientific attention. On one of these occasions Pitt, a youth whose abilities were as yet known only to his own family and to a small knot of college friends, was introduced on the steps of the throne in the House of Lords to Fox, his senior by eleven years, who was already the greatest debater, and one of the greatest orators, that had appeared in England. Fox used afterwards to relate that, as the discussion proceeded, Pitt repeatedly turned to him, and said, “But surely, Mr Fox, that might be met thus,” or “Yes; but he lays himself open to this retort.” What the particular criticisms were Fox had forgotten; but he said that he was much struck at the time by the precocity of a lad who, through the whole sitting, seemed to be thinking only how all the speeches on both sides could be answered.
He had not quite completed his nineteenth year when, on the 7th of April 1778, he attended his father to Westminster. A great debate was expected. It was known that France had recognized the independence of the United States. The duke of Richmond was about to declare his opinion that all thought of subjugating those states ought to be relinquished. Chatham had always maintained that the resistance of the colonies to the mother country was justifiable. But he conceived, very erroneously, that on the day on which their independence should be acknowledged the greatness of England would be at an end. Though sinking under the weight of years and infirmities, he determined, in spite of the entreaties of his family, to be in his place. His son supported him to a seat. The excitement and exertion were too much for the old man. In the very act of addressing the peers, he fell back in convulsions. A few weeks later his corpse was borne, with gloomy pomp, from the Painted Chamber to the Abbey. The favourite child and namesake of the deceased statesman followed the coffin as chief mourner, and saw it deposited in the transept where his own was destined to lie. His elder brother, now earl of Chatham, had means sufficient, and barely sufficient, to support the dignity of the peerage. The other members of the family were poorly provided for. William had little more than £300 a year. It was necessary for him to follow a profession. He had already begun to “eat his terms.” In the spring of 1780 he came of age. He then quitted Cambridge, was called to the bar, took chambers in Lincoln's Inn, and joined the western circuit. In the autumn of that year a general election took place; and he offered himself as a candidate for the university; but he was at the bottom of the poll. He was, however, at the request of an hereditary friend, the duke of Rutland, brought into parliament by Sir James Lowther for the borough of Appleby.
The dangers of the country were at that time such as might well have disturbed even a constant mind. Army after army Parliament, 1780. had been sent in vain against the rebellious colonists of North America. Meanwhile the house of Bourbon, humbled to the dust a few years before by the genius and vigour of Chatham, had seized the opportunity of revenge. France and Spain had united against England, and had recently been joined by Holland. The command of the Mediterranean had been for a time lost. The British flag had been scarcely able to maintain itself in the British Channel. The northern powers professed neutrality; but their neutrality had a menacing aspect. In the East, Hyder Ali had descended on the Carnatic, had destroyed the little army of Baillie, and had spread terror even to the ramparts of Fort St George. The discontents of Ireland threatened nothing less than civil war. In England
the authority of Lord North'r government had sunk to the
- ↑ George Pretyman (1750-1827) was senior wrangler in 1772. In 1803, on falling heir to a large estate, he assumed the name of Tomline. From Lincoln, to which see he had been elevated in 1787, he was translated to Winchester in 1820. Tomline, to whom Pitt when dying had bequeathed his papers, published his Memoirs of the Life of William Pitt (down to the close of 1792) in 1821 (3 vols. 8vo).
