Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 9.djvu/530

FOX thwarted by the action of attached friends, who procured his election for the Kirkwall burghs. The validity of this election was challenged, but without result, and Fox was able to make that impassioned and masterly protest in the House of Commons against the shameful treatment to which he had been subjected, which is known as his speech on the Westminster scrutiny, and which ranks among the best speeches ever delivered in parliament. The scrutiny went on for a year, till even Pitt s docile majority resented the further continuance of the uncon stitutional farce, and voted that it should end. In con sequence of this Fox took his seat as member for West minster, brought an action against the high bailiff, who had conducted himself in the affair as a tool of the min istry, and recovered 2000 damages, which he distributed among the Westminster charities. The remainder of Fox s parliamentary career is more remarkable for eloquent speeches than for stirring personal incident. His criticism of Pitt s measures was always shrewd and vigorous, though not invariably just. He blundered most seriously in denouncing the commercial treaty with France, a scheme of far-seeing policy and admirable patriotism. When this subject was debated he gape utterance to a phrase which, like the utterances of many other notable men, has been repeated to his discredit by persons who, purposely or inadvertently, dissociate it from the context, and withhold the qualifying clauses. Having said that " France was the natural political enemy of Great Britain," he was re proached for calling the French the natural enemies of the English. What he meant to convey was, not that enmity necessarily existed between the English and the French, but that the policy of France, as directed by the house of Bourbon, was irreconcilably opposed to the interests of England, a proposition which was really incontrovertible. His liking for the French people was extreme, and this was openly displayed so soon as they had emancipated themselves from a rule which they detested, and which rendered them the disturbers of the world. Then he avowed his conviction that the new form of government in France "would render her a better neigh bour, and less disposed to hostility, than when she was subject to the cabal and intrigues of ambitious and inter ested statemen." Again, it is forgotten or concealed by those persons who have censured Fox on account of his objection to this treaty, " that he earnestly recommended, instead of the present treaty, a more intimate connexion with the United States of America, such an intercourse for Britain that could be devised, and was entirely con sistent with her true political interests, and such an inter course he had the best reasons for believing America was both willing and eager to enter into upon fair and equitable terms." Indeed, Washington was anxious to con clude a commercial treaty with Great Britain, but Pitt dis countenanced the notion. It was wise in Fox to urge this as most desirable, yet he would have shown still greater wisdom in aiding to the utmost the project for increasing commercial intercourse with France also. On other ques tions he displayed genuine liberality of sentiment and the highest statesmanship. He declared emphatically against the slave trade at a time when Pitt took credit for deliver ing no opinion in favour or in disapproval of the traffic in negroes. He repeatedly moved for the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, and he advocated a thorough-going scheme of parliamentary reform. He was one of the managers when Warren Hastings was impeached by the Commons of England of high crimes and misdemeanours ; he had mastered the subject, spoke on it in a more business like, though less rhetorical and sensational style than Burke and Sheridan, while his judgment was accepted as conclu sive when his brother managers differed in opinion. His health being impaired, he went to the Continent in 1788 for relaxation and change, revisiting Switzerland and Italy. He spent a short time with Gibbon at Lausanne. The luminous historian has chronicled the pleasure which he reaped from this visit of the illustrious statesman; how they conversed without ceasing from morning to night, adding, " we had little politics ; though Fox gave me in a few words such a character of Pitt as one great man should give of another his rival ; much of books, from my own, on which he flattered me very pleasantly, to Homer and the Arabian Nights; much about the country, my garden (which he understands far better than I do) ; and upon the whole I think he envies me, and would do so were he a minister." At Bologna, in November 1788, he re ceived an urgent summons to return home, owing to the meeting of parliament on the 20th of that month having been rendered necessary on account of the king s sudden and serious illness. While journeying to England he heard a report that George III. was dead, being the truth that the monarch had been suddenly bereft of his reason. Travelling with all the speed possible in those days, Pox arrived in London on the ninth day after leaving Bologna. He had gone abroad for his health; the journey back nearly killed him. Wraxali says that Fox s appearance when he entered the House of Commons on the 4th of December, " excited a great and general sensation. I never saw him, either previously or subsequently, exhibit so broken and shattered an aspect. His body seemed to be emaciated, his counte nance sallow and sickly, his eyes swollen ; while his stock ings hung upon his legs, and he rather dragged himself along, than walked up the floor to take his seat." Both Pitt and he made mistakes during the debates on the regency, both thinking less of what was best to be done in the circumstances than about the most suitable course to pursue for the purpose of securing the supremacy of their respective parties. Pitt dreaded the loss of office should the Prince of Wales become regent, with full power to con duct the government; Fox was confident that, if the prince exercised the royal prerogatives, a Whig adminis tration would be constituted. The unexpected recovery of the king put an end alike to hopes of promotion and fears of dismissal ; but the record of blunders which can not be excused, and of aspirations which were wanting in patriotism, remained to sully the fame of Tory and Whig leaders. The divergence of opinion between the Whig and Tory parties, and among the members of the Whig party, grew wider and more deplorable when the French Revolution agitated Europe and terrified many Englishmen. An outcry was raised against French prin ciples, and against those persons who held that the surest way to avert danger to England was to remote all reason able grounds for popular dissatisfaction. The mob of Bir mingham, frenzied with panic and overflowing in loyalty, pillaged the houses of Dr Priestley and other Nonconfor mists, in order to testify attachment to " church and king," a cry which Dr Parr characterized as the toast of Jacobites and the yell of incendiaries, meaning, " a church without the gospel, and a king above the laws." Handbills cir culated in the neighbourhood where Fox dwelt contained the threat, " Destruction to Fox and his Jacobice crew." He expressed in the House of Commons his foreboding that his own dwelling might be dealt with in the same way as Dr Priestley s, yet he persevered in upholding free dom of speech and of the press when the ministry carried the Traitorous Correspondence Act, the Seditious Prac tices Act, and the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act. He too suffered for his attachment to liberal principles. For proposing as a toast at the Whig club, "the sover eignty of the people of Great Britain," his name was ex punged by the king from the list of privy councillors, at