84 LORD CHATHAM. Sept. 2?, 



of their condu£t in the great Lord Chatham, but I 

 would be underftood to fay, that if war is to be under- 

 taken by a naval power that has extended commerce, 

 it muft be done fuddenly and violently, and in fuch a 

 way as to obtain a monopoly of the feas and of com- 

 merce during the continuance of the war, to enrich the 

 people, and reconcile them to exceflive taxes, ■which 

 are the neceflary confequences of great undertakings. 



The mofl glaring errors of Lord Chatham, which 

 have hitherto efcaped the obfervation of a filly public, 

 are his having omitted to oppofe the {lamp-a£l: for A- 

 merica when it was firft propofed in the Houfe of Com- 

 mons, during its different ftages of paffing through the 

 Houfe, that he might raife afterwards a higher idea of 

 his political forefight. His having confented to the 

 impofition of the duties on paper, glafs, and other com- 

 modities in America, which being a repetition of the 

 invafion of their petitions of right in the matter of the 

 ftamp-a£t, leflcned his popularity in America, and ex- 

 pofed him to the contempt of every man in Britain who 

 had common difcernment. His overturning the ad- 

 miniftration of Lord Rockingham, who being a trac- 

 table, amiable man, would have eafily yielded to his 

 fuperior pretenfions to be prime miniiler, under the 

 maflc of the feals in the foreign department, and his ri- 

 diculous choice of Lord Camden for a confidential po- 

 litical friend. 



As for his voluntary retirement to the hofpital of in- 

 curables in the year 1766, it was occafioned by the ill 

 ftate of his health, and particularly by a wandering 

 gout, which occafionally affected -his underftanding, 

 and rendered him often unfit for public bufmefs. You 

 have reprefented fonie features of Chatham's charasEter 

 juftly as bearing a refemblance to that of Cromwell ;;. 

 but there was one lefs known that was very obfervable 

 to thofe who had bufmefs of great importance and dan- 

 ger to tranfa(5t with him. Ke could be fluent and ap- 

 parently communicative without faying one wcrd that 



