Memoirs of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, and of the Court of Queen Anne Vol. 1 (of 2)Thomson, A. T., Mrs.
History
Memoirs of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, and of the Court of Queen Anne Vol. 1 (of 2)
Thomson, A. T., Mrs.
Great Britain -- Court and courtiers -- Biography; Marlborough, Sarah Jennings Churchill, Duchess of, 1660-1744
Collins’s Baronage, vol. i. p. 110.
Footnote 401:
In a poem, entitled “An Allusion to the Bishop of Cambray’s Supplement
to Homer.”
Footnote 402:
Collins’s Baronage, vol. i. p. 118.
Footnote 403:
Dalrymple, b. x. p. 130.
Footnote 404:
Cunningham, b. ii. p. 259.
Footnote 405:
See Cunningham.
Footnote 406:
His infamous example was renewed in that singular, gifted, and most
profligate nobleman, his son, Philip Duke of Wharton. Modern times
scarcely furnish a parallel to the character of this peer.
“Like Buckingham and Rochester,” says one who understood him well, “he
comforted all the grave and dull, by throwing away the brightest
profusion of parts on witty fooleries, which may mix graces with a
great character, but can never compose one. If Julius Cæsar had only
rioted with citizens, he had never been the emperor of the world.” The
courage of this bad, wild, singular man was not equal to his
assurance. Abuse sometimes displays cowardice; it is the cool and
temperate who are usually courageous. Lord Wharton, with the levity of
a man who really loved nothing but pleasure, and really prized nothing
but self-interest, could jest at his own want of heroism. When seized
by the guard in St. James’s Park for singing the Jacobite air, “The
King shall have his Own again,” as he has himself recorded in his
ballad,
“The duke he drew out half his sword,
The guard drew out the rest.”
The worst attribute of Philip Duke of Wharton, as a citizen of the
world, was his indifference to reputation. Men of pleasure are not
generally indifferent to a character for honour and consistency; but
Lord Wharton cared merely for ephemeral applause. Attached, in
reality, to no party, and having no actual motives but those of
expediency, there was not the slightest dependence to be placed upon
those visionary things, his opinions, beyond the moment when he was
haranguing a popular assembly, or debating in the House of Lords. It
is well known that at a later period, in 1723, upon the third reading
of a Bill of Pains and Penalties against Atterbury Bishop of
Rochester, Lord Wharton accomplished a brilliant display by a most
dishonourable artifice. He went to Chelsea, where the minister
resided, and professing his resolution to effect a reconciliation with
the court by speaking against the Bishop, requested some suggestions
upon the case. Thus enticed, the minister went over the whole argument
with his lordship. Wharton returned to town, passed the night in
drinking, (his libraries being, as Horace Walpole observes, made
taverns,) went to the House of Lords, without going to bed, and made a
most eloquent speech in favour of the Bishop, showing all the weak
points of the arguments which he had thus surmounted, in the most able
and masterly manner.
Footnote 407:
Horace Walpole’s Reminiscences.
Footnote 408:
Boyer, p. 14.
Footnote 409:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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