en and brilliant satire. It was remarked as
extraordinary that Brydges brought forward and defended his motion
merely as the assertion of an abstract truth, and avoided all mention
of the Chancellor. It seemed still more extraordinary that Howe, whose
whole eloquence consisted in cutting personalities, named nobody on this
occasion, and contented himself with declaiming in general terms against
corruption and profusion. It was plain that the enemies of Somers were
at once urged forward by hatred and kept back by fear. They knew
that they could not carry a resolution directly condemning him. They,
therefore, cunningly brought forward a mere speculative proposition
which many members might be willing to affirm without scrutinising it
severely. But, as soon as the major premise had been admitted, the minor
would be without difficulty established; and it would be impossible to
avoid coming to the conclusion that Somers had violated his trust. Such
tactics, however, have very seldom succeeded in English parliaments;
for a little good sense and a little straightforwardness are quite
sufficient to confound them. A sturdy Whig member, Sir Rowland Gwyn,
disconcerted the whole scheme of operations. "Why this reserve?" he
said, "Everybody knows your meaning. Everybody sees that you have not
the courage to name the great man whom you are trying to destroy." "That
is false," cried Brydges; and a stormy altercation followed. It soon
appeared that innocence would again triumph. The two parties seemed to
have exchanged characters for one day. The friends of the government,
who in the Parliament were generally humble and timorous, took a high
tone, and spoke as it becomes men to speak who are defending persecuted
genius and virtue. The malecontents, generally so insolent and
turbulent, seemed to be completely cowed. They abased themselves so
low as to protest, what no human being could believe, that they had no
intention of attacking the Chancellor, and had framed their resolution
without any view to him. Howe, from whose lips scarcely any thing ever
dropped but gall and poison, went so far as to say: "My Lord Somers is
a man of eminent merit, of merit so eminent that, if he had made a slip,
we might well overlook it." At a late hour the question was put; and the
motion was rejected by a majority of fifty in a house of four hundred
and nineteen members. It was long since there had been so large an
attendance at a division.

The ignomini