26 OCTOBER 1839, Page 9

TRIBUTES TO LORD BROUGHAM 13Y THE DAILY PRESS.

Airougbam Drab.

[From the Morning Chronicle, (At. 22.3

It has been our duty of late to comment with some severity, though not more, we think, than the occasion demanded, on his Lordship's last publication, and on the course of political action which it seemed to forebode. Whatever

expectation or apprehension it might suggest, is now stilled for ever ; and the feelings excited by that work are merged in those which embrace his whole life, character, and political career. In variety of attainment, facility of expression, energy of purpose ; its the grandeur of forensic eloquence ; in the declamation that makes a debater impressive to his audience, and the sarcasm that renders him most formidable to an oppon t tite

untiring continuance of intel- lectual labour-in the fervent championship of many great objects of national philanthropy and improvement-and in that familiar personal acquaintance, so important to the practical statesman, with the modes of thought and feeling that obtain through all the different gradations of society, Lord Brougham stood preiiminent amongst his political compeers. He well earned, by long toil, splendid effort, and gradual ascent, the elevation to which he attained; not that merely of rank and station, but of celebrity and influence. Even before he achieved, and after he was divested of office, no man more surely fixed upon himself the attention of England and of Europe-of the old world and the new. And now, while

0 The extravagant anti erring spirit hies

To his confine" -'there, we devoutly hope, to repose in "the bosom of his Father and his Cod "-we feel rising upon us the recollections of many an arduous and vi- gorous struggle for the right ; for unrestricted commerce ; for the spread of knowledge; for legal anti representative reforms; for the suffering and enslaved African ; for frembm, civil and religious ; for many a political victim marked for sacrifice ; for a persecuted Queen ; and for the poor and ignorant, the .injured and helplessin our own land, and all the world over. Such recollections, in spite of all deductions and exceptions, which sink into disregard now that the great accouut is closed, will endear and enshrine his memory. The Legis- lature-the country at large-all parties, sects, classes-meet feel that a great public loss has been sustained. And on the future annals of our eventful tunes, conspicuous and illustrious will stand the name of Henry Lord Brougham.

[From the Morning Post, Oct. 22.] We must confess to such a stunning of the spirits anal subduing of the heart, -at the news of this frightful termination of Lord Brougham's life, that we fear Ire cannot write about the event as our readers may possibly expect that we should. We arc oppressed with awe at the thought that a vulgar accident of this sort should. have suddenly put out the life of so wonderful a 111all-a man who occupies so large a space in the public view-whose indomitable activity associated hint with almost every matter of public moment. We feel crushed by a sense of dread and of humiliation at the thought that in an instant, and by so ordinary a casualty, that astonishing mind should be, to all earthly ap- pearance and for all earthly purposes, utterly quenched-that mental fire, which burned with so intense a flame, be extinguished for ever. Well as we know that death niust be the lot of all men-of the gifted and the brilliant, the great and the glorious, as well as of the most ordinary man that merely eats and driuks and lives-well as we know this, we cannot at the moment bring this philosophy home to the reason. The eclipse of a great mind darkens as well as saddens the realm of our conceptions.

Lord Brougham was one nf the greatest, and perhaps the most extraordinary-, men of his time. The range of his intelligence was prodigious, the versatility of his mental powers amazing. But that in which he was distinguished above all other men, was in a long-enduring passionate energy. Other men have had far more perseverance-snore cool determination to do that which thee had re- solved upon doing, but no man ever dashed onward and kept hint6s11 for long and long at a fearful and desperate speed, as did Lord Brougham.

As 1111 orator, he in hie time distanced all competitors. There were far more elegant speakers, snore skilful rhetoricians; but in Demostbenic force and Clearness, and in the physical requisites for captivating and conquering a great assembly by the powers of oratory, no man of' his time was equal to Lord Broughatn. Nor was he wanting in skill, though it was not precisely of the rhetorical cast. Even in the most terrific storms of passionate invective there seemed to be an under current of cool reason at work, inventing arguments and suggesting sarcasms. He had imagination to create, wit to combine, and a torrent of language at command, which suited itself to every mood and phase of Intellectual employment.

Upon matters of political opinion it has been our fate always to differ from Lord. Brougham. Even of late, when others of our party were wholly with him, we felt that we could not be so. But we cannot dwell upon that now. He is gone-torn away by a horrid and violent death, while his mind was yet in its full vigour, and his spirits as elastic and buoyant as ever I We have no feeling now with respect to him but that of grief. The most wonderful genius that belonged to public life is no more, and we, as belonging to the public, are grief-stricken mourners over his untimely grave.

[From the Morning Kerala, Oct. 22.] Should, however, the rumour unfortunately be confirmed, the public will have lost a servant of great and varied talents, as well as of a kindly and.ge- nerous nature. To very many of Lord Brougham's principles and ophooMe we are strongly opposed. In many respects, we deem him to have been an unwise and dangerous councillor; yet we are little disposed to question the honesty of purpose with which he sought to carry his opinions into action. Whatever may have been Lord Brougham's rank as a statesman, few persons, at all events, will deny that his rank as a debater was very high. Few public speakers have acquired a larger measure of reputation. Few of those men who have contributed in times past to the general excitement and gratification, have called forth when they died a stronger sense of privation in the public, thrill Lord Brougham will do should the melancholy rumour now in circula- tion prove true. The death of Lord Brougham will not fail to produce consi- derable effects on the state of parties. True, his Lordship possessed no definite political power. He could boast of no party in Parliament. Yet even in Par- liament he produced, at times, results of no slight moment. He, above all other persons perhaps, has for the last two years contrived to "damage" the present weak and worthless Ministry. Lord Brougham's influence, moreover, over the opinions of the Pro-Educational and Auft.Slaverv parties through- out the country, has never been shaken. " The web " of Lord Brougham's public life has, indeed, " been a mingleul yarn-good and ill together." But his impulses were of an honest kind; and his death will not, in amity quarters, be unattended with deep and. lasting regrets.

[From the Standard, Oct. 22.]

Oar own opinion of Lord Broughton's claim upon the respect and affection of his countrymen has been long known to our readers. '11'e have ever given his Lordship credit for a lofty spirit, a powerful mind, and a good heart-na- tural gifts, the full effect of which was indeed impaired by Isis education in the worst possible school-the school of the cold and conceited Scotch philosophy

of the end tut' the last century-by his Lordship's early entanglement in fierce provincial politics, and by his long-continued connexion with a party the most eminently calculated to looter the vices of such an education and of such an early bias. It is only since the desertion ot' him and of their own professed principles by his party, and the leisure consequent upon a discontinuance of professional labour, have allowed Lord Brougham to give fair play to his dispo- sitions and his understanding, that the public have been able to form a just esti- mate of those virtues and those powers which, " meant for mankind," were too long engaged in an unworthy party service. We say the public ; for all who knew any -thing of Lord Brougham's personal character and personal history, were well aware that whatever appeared most objectionable in his public con- duct was the very contrast of his private practice ; that the most disingenuous and acritnonions debater in the House of Commons was a man of the most simple and kindly conversation in private society ; that he who too often slighted the obligations of honour and generosity in his professed doctrine, formed his own life upon the most honourable model, and indulged in a gene- rous temper beyond what ordinary prudence would Justify; or, to say all in one word, that the chief promoter of the cold-hearted new Poor-law Bill was one who had actually, without a murmur, sacrificed himself to the interests of

his friends and kindred. •

%Enemy RIibt.

[From the Times, October 23.1

Had a man with the attributes of Lord Brougham, and filling his position in the eyes of men, been really destroyed by such an abrupt, and, what we may almost term unworthy casualty, the shock would scarcely have confined itself to the bosoms of his friends. Those political adversaries who deeply censured his eccentricities, or even who looked upon him as an agent and a statesman with the utmost distrust or contempt, would have beets startled by the contem- plation of so largo a mass of living activity and vivacity struck motionless by the mechanical violence of a moment.

Should Lord Brougham have even sunk under the more ordinary visitations of disease and suffering by which Gull's creatures are for the most part removed. from earth, the political world must have noted down, and for some time, though perhaps not long remembered, the dieappearauce of one of its busiest and most stirri»g members. Our contemporaries have made the late inhuman falsehood (whether a writteir forgery or a verbal misrepresentation, it matters little) the text for laboured commentaries on the learned lord's proceedings, his life, and public character. To expatiate at length upon such topics would require an exercise of pen or speeds ahnost as cmnbrons as his Lordship's own productions. He has been for it period equal to that of an entire generation, time most voluminous of writers, the most voluble of debaters, and of actors, if not the most efficient and success- ful, at any rate the most restless and indefatigable. Had he abstained from writing, speaking, amid attempting, nine-tenths of that with which he has loaded the name of Brougham, he might have accomplished. in each department whereon his multifarious efforts were in a great measure wasted, a success its signal as hi.: faihlreS have been notorious and, memorable, and have enrobed Wins& with a graceful and flowing reputation-not cute com- posed cif shreds and patches, here exposing his nakedness and there oppressing him with a grievous and unwholesome weight. There is scarcely it subject on which Lord Broughasn has not put himself forward as the author of one or more pahlications-hietory, theology, meta- physics, mathematics, political economy, literary criticism, biographical cri- ticism, constitutional dissertation, party controversy without end.

" °nine vere scribendi genus tetigit. ' Alas: we are unable to add, " nullunt

quod tetigit non f ornacit. " In thet, there is no one general topic discussed by Lord Brougham with regard to which he has contributed either substance or beauty to the thoughts which preceding writers had expended on it. Where any radiance appears to loast from him, it is but a stream of sparkles front a; firework; there is neither steady light nor animating warmth. For discoveries in science, moral or physical, none who know or study. this itinerant would ever dream of searching in any of his numerous productions. For fresh and racy. illustrations of the nature or character of man, even where nought but illus- tration of same truth previously recognized and acquiesced in might be neetlfut, we must refer elsewhere than to the declamatory effusions of Lord Brougham, whose faculty is that of niece expression. To him the creative is not eiven. He is an advocate, and nothing more-an advocate who gains attention without inspiring any deep or enduring interest-an advocate who entertains his au- dience, who strives to cut away objections or obstructions by the edge of sar- casm, not by the force of reason-au advocate who can he vehement but never earnest, who exhibits heat of temper but not of passion, and could as rarely win the sympathy of jurors as he could the sober sanction of the Judge.

Lord Brougham has been in a perpetual whirlpool, created by the velocity of his owmr movement round his own centre. Nothing, however, has beesa sucked into the vortex thus formed by him but the weakest, craziest, and most diminutive craft that floated. Forms man of Lord Brougham's untiring restless-

mess and noise and tumult, like unto the rushing of mighty waters, no man has ever failed so palpably in the accomplishment of any one decided effect, beyond that of deafening the world and keeping people alive to the circumstance that there was within their hearing an indefatigable and incessant paper-mill. In- stead of being able to make himself a standard on which men's hopes aud con- fidence should be fixed, and round which, in times of danger and perplexity, they should rally, this being of various vivacity and bustle has been compelled to stand, or rather to pirouette, alone—not because people have felt no Inuit of leaders, for never was there a period when superintending wisdom was acknow- ledged to be so inestimable, or a mind framed for the government of other rinds would have commanded such submissive and devout obedience ; but be- cause, after long experiment, men have found that Lord Brougham has the gift of speech, but not of action—because they cannot rely upon his fickle and wayward spirit—because his coNieration is precarious, his spirit of intrigue incorri,gilde, his ambition wild and indefinite, his absence of fixed principle and steadfast purpose as conspicuous as it is terrible both to followers and to colleagues. In society, as one of the most agreeable, amusing, witty, kindly, and con- vivial of associates, there is no individual capable of filling the space which would have been left void by Lord Brougham's untimely exit. There are a multitude ef friends who loved him for what he was and is, as there are of ob- servers who have admired him for what he might have been. But solid post in the great political world he has nooc—followers he has none; reasonable pros- pects of influence or power, or gratified ambition, he has none. There is no party, whether 44 Movement" or Conservative, that would venture to employ him otherwise than as a transient ally ; as a partner, or a colleague, never. Setting aside all affectionate or private feelings, those members of both parties who are best acquainted with Lord Brougham, and have tried him, would, after a little while, have felt his removal a lightening of many cares and a re- lease from many imminent embarrassments. For it is by impulses of temper or of pique, more of a selfish than even a capricious nature, and abstracted from all broad or distant considerations of national or general good, that the course of this impetuous and in some respects formidable adventurer on the scenes of public life has hitherto been shaped and directed.

:Fr.:,ot the San, Oct. 22.]

Thank God, Lord Broughem still lives! The report of his death turns out, as we hoped, to be unfounded.; end we may now congratulate our countrymen on their still possessing one of the most comprehensive intellects that ever graced its literature. and one of the noblest hearts that ever beat high in the cause of freedom. We knew not that we ever penned a sentence with more genuine satisfaction than this. A load seems taken off our mind—we breathe more freely, and bend in devout gratitude to Providence for preserving that life so dear to us all. At en early hour this morning, having previously distrusted the Tape rinnours of his death, we instituted the most active in- quiries, and learned, on the authority of' a private letter, not only that his Lord- Ship received no injury from the overthrow of the carriage, Mick by the by, teas not a 1ar«1 one, tut Ms own,) but that he actually walked upwards of thirteen miles after the accident ! Thank God, we again say, for this providen- tial escape ! Freedom, ishilosophy, science—all that tends to elevate, purify, and ennoble the human character ; all that tends to make us good men ana good citizens, and to raise us in the scale of thinking beings ; all this is the better for Lord Brougham's fortunate escape from death. While he lives, freedom still possesses a "tower of strength ;" for he is the last of a race of Titans, whose unrivalled energies have never yet been exerted but for the advancement of the best interests of humanity.

tFr in the Courier, Oct. 22.1 Comparing this praise of Lord Brougham deceased with the virulent vitupe- ration of Lord 13rueeham living, we cannot but be struck with the vast dither- ewe in the party estimation of a political antagonist alive and dead. Happily, however, we trust, for his country and for himself, the terrible antagonist of the feeble and totter:ng Ministry still hives; "whatever expectation or appre- hension" his Lordship excited in the minds of Ministers and their adherents, is not yet "stilled kir ever." We can just imagine the possibility that there are some in the world who would not grieve exceedingly if it was. The spirit of party which could rejoice in the anticipation that the opposition to the late government of Sir Robert Peel " was Lill __mg -LID," would not he very scrupu- lous in its gladness if other inconvenient personages were removed from the toils and cares of this political world. Altogether there is somethiug very in- structive, and, apart from the aceident itself, very amusing in the affair. His Lord- ship hitnsclf canmt hut be pleased uith the result of the post mortem examina- tion which tlie riwoniete has made of the defunct statesman. his Lordship's friends will he 1:1,,,,e(1. to find that it was unnecessary. The public will be pleased that the great orator of modern times still exists to justify the expres- sion of Sir Samuel Hominy, that "there is no fun out of oppesition." In short, everybody will be pleased, not excepting the Morning Chronicle, who Mat he particularly pleased to find that it has lavished all its admirable en- comiums on an antagbbist who k likely to take his place in the House of Lords next sevsion. instead of being comfortably deposited in. Westminster Abbey ; and that it bro. had the opportunity of discovering in the deceased statesman various lirilllant and useful qualities which it was unable to perceive in the living politician.

:Fr..111 the .11-eoin2 Chr-ni,le, Oct. 25.—Secovi Notice.]

'ally DID TOE DIE?

TERSES PROPOSED TO BE INTRODUCED IN rile NEXT REPRESENTATION OP TII1T POPULAR FARCE.

Oh! whir did mu die, Lord Brougham, Lord Brougham,

At thi. iime 4 all others, Lord Broindatin, Lord Brougham! When hut just to sustain a new part you had learned, And you revelled in praise which you once would have spurned; When Time of its terrors had Obloquy shorn, And you grew sleek and fat upon Royalty's scorn ;

When, too, pleasure the path of your downfal had smoothed, 'When enlivened by rakes, anil by dowagers soothed ;

Oh ! why did you die ?

But why dii you nf,t die, Lord Brougham, Lord Brougham, Some five !.tiromers apa, Lord Brougham, Lord Brougham ! When our pith it ike-ei streight, and your honour was bright,

And the pirit of nations rejoiced in your sight ; When depot v. ith fear at your eloquence shook,

And you'd not been rqoined to bespatter the Duke ;

Ere for Tory applau ;on haul bartered your fame, or your country bed rol,beil of anotbtr great name; Why didn't you rile?

But now choose your own time, Lord Brougham, Lord Brougham;

You may die when you please, Lord Brougham, Lord Brougham ; For your life mow belongs to its holder alone, And Lord Brougham may do what he likes with his Come the blow when it may, we have learnt to support The sharp pang that has once been inflicted in sport ; And the day shall by unheeded pass by, or the ready tear drop from Montgomery's eye, When you really do die, Mien you really do die.