Biographical Memoir uj Count lliu/i/ouL 33 



him the most marked favor : he made him successively his aid-de- 

 camp, his chamberlain, member of his council of state, and lieuten- 

 ant-general of his armies. He procured for him die decorations of 

 the two orders of Poland, because the statutes of those of Bavaria 

 did not then permit his admission to them. Lastly, in the interval 

 between the deadi of the Emperor Joseph and the coronation of 

 Leopold II., the Elector took advantage of the right which his func 

 tions, as vicar of the empire, gave him, to raise Sir Benjamin to the 

 dignity of Count, by the name of the district of New Hampshire in 

 which he was born. 



- Count Rumford has sometimes been blamed for the importance 

 which he seems to have attached to distinctions, to which his real 

 merit might have rendered him iudilFerent. They who have done 

 so, however have not sufficiently considered this situation. For- 

 merly, a title without birth was of no estimation among us ; but it is 

 not so in England, where the title, as it were, metamorphoses the 

 man, or in Germany, where one seldom receives a great office wit 

 out at the same time, receiving a corresponding title. Count Rui 

 ford, therefore, might think this custom necessary for the niainte 

 ance of a respect which he knew how to render so useful. We ha 

 besides seen, by a recent experiment made on the great scale, ll 

 some not being philosophers enough to refuse titles when chance c 

 fered them and others being apparently too much so to think that 

 ties were worth the trouble of being refused, every body accept* 

 them. We do not therefore condemn Count Rumford for havii 

 done like all the world ; we even pardon beforehand those who m; 

 imitate him in this respect, provided they imitate him in other re«. 

 pects also. 



His new master not only procured honorable distinctions for him, 

 but also confided to him a real and very extensive power, by uniting 

 in his person the administration of war and the direction of the police ; 



soon 



parts of the government. 



Most of those who have been led to power by the course of events, 

 arrive there already misled by public opinion ; they know that they 

 will infallibly be called men of genius, and that they will be celebra- 

 ted in prose and verse, if they succeed in changing in some point die 

 forms of the government, or extending a few leagues the territory in 

 which this government is exercised Is it therefore surprising, that 

 internal commotion- and external frtrs incessantly disturb the repo 



Vol XIX .—No L 5 



