“Now we who know Burke,” announced Dr. Johnson, “know that he will be one of the first men in the country.” Burke promptly fulfilled the prediction. He made a speech before he had been in the House two weeks; a speech that made him at once a marked man. His health was now firmly established; he had a commanding physique; his figure was tall and muscular, and his bearing full of a dignity which had a touch almost of haughtiness in it. Although his action was angular and awkward, his extraordinary richness and fluency of utterance drew the attention away from what he was doing to what he was saying. His voice was harsh, and did not harmonize with the melodious measures in which his words poured forth; but it was of unusual compass, and carried in it a sense of confidence and power. His utterance was too rapid, his thought bore him too impulsively forward, but the pregnant matter he spoke “filled the town with wonder.” The House was excited by new sensations. Members were astonished to recognize a broad philosophy of politics running through this ardent man’s speeches. They felt the refreshment of the wide outlook he gave them, and were conscious of catching glimpses of excellent matter for reflection at every turn of his hurrying thought. They wearied of it, indeed, after a while: the pace was too hard for most of his hearers, and they finally gave over following him when the novelty and first excitement of the exercise had worn off. He too easily lost sight of his audience in his search for principles, and they resented his neglect of them, his indifference to their tastes. They felt his lofty style of reasoning as a sort of rebuke, and deemed his discursive wisdom out of place amidst their own thoughts of imperative personal and party interest. He had, before very long, to accustom himself, therefore, to speak to an empty House and subsequent generations. His opponents never, indeed, managed to feel quite easy under his attacks: his arrows sought out their weak places to the quick, and they winced even when they coughed or seemed indifferent; but they comforted themselves with the thought that the orator was also tedious and irritating to his own friends, teasing them too with keen rebukes and vexatious admonitions. The high and wise sort of speaking must always cause uneasiness in a political assembly. The more equal and balanced it is, the more must both parties be threatened with reproof.