e was constantly
in training for the conflicts of the House of Commons. He was a
distinguished member of the House of Commons at twenty-one. The ability
which he had displayed in the House of Commons made him the most
powerful subject in Europe before he was twenty-five. It would have
been happy for himself and for his country if his elevation had been
deferred. Eight or ten years, during which he would have had leisure and
opportunity for reading and reflection, for foreign travel, for social
intercourse and free exchange of thought on equal terms with a great
variety of companions, would have supplied what, without any fault
on his part, was wanting to his powerful intellect. He had all the
knowledge that he could be expected to have; that is to say, all the
knowledge that a man can acquire while he is a student at Cambridge, and
all the knowledge that a man can acquire when he is First Lord of the
Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer. But the stock of general
information which he brought from college, extraordinary for a boy, was
far inferior to what Fox possessed, and beggarly when compared with the
massy, the splendid, the various treasures laid up in the large mind of
Burke. After Pitt became minister, he had no leisure to learn more than
was necessary for the purposes of the day which was passing over him.
What was necessary for those purposes such a man could learn with little
difficulty. He was surrounded by experienced and able public servants.
He could at any moment command their best assistance. From the stores
which they produced his vigorous mind rapidly collected the materials
for a good parliamentary case; and that was enough. Legislation and
administration were with him secondary matters. To the work of framing
statutes, of negotiating treaties, of organising fleets and armies, of
sending forth expeditions, he gave only the leavings of his time and the
dregs of his fine intellect. The strength and sap of his mind were all
drawn in a different direction. It was when the House of Commons was to
be convinced and persuaded that he put forth all his powers.

Of those powers we must form our estimate chiefly from tradition; for of
all the eminent speakers of the last age Pitt has suffered most from
the reporters. Even while he was still living, critics remarked that
his eloquence could not be preserved, that he must be heard to be
appreciated. They more than once applied to him the sentence in which
Tacit