The speeches of Burke, whom Macaulay has described as the greatest man since Milton, are perhaps the most suitable for perusal of any ever delivered in Parliament. They read better than they sounded as delivered; they are rather pamphlets than orations. Burke himself was deficient in many of the qualities of an orator. His voice was harsh and his gestures ungainly. He never consulted the prejudices of his audience. His lapses from good taste were frequent, and among his most splendid passages may be found occasional coarse and vulgar epithets and expressions. Yet so great was his eloquence, so marvellous his oratorical powers, that Byron has included him with Pitt and Fox among the "wondrous three whose words were sparks of immortality." And the florid Dr. Parr can scarcely find words sufficiently eulogistic to sing his praises.[322] [322] "Burke ... By whose sweetness Athens herself would have been soothed, with whose amplitude and exuberance she would have been enraptured, and on whose lips that prolific mother of genius and science would have adored, confessed, the Goddess of Persuasion." Prior's "Burke," p. 484. [Illustration: EDMUND BURKE FROM AN ENGRAVING BY J. WATSON AFTER THE PAINTING BY SIR J. REYNOLDS] In the seventeenth century parliamentary attendance and eloquence were equally poor. Not only did many members speak indifferently; at times there would be long intervals of silence when members did not speak at all. "A pause for two or three minutes," ... "The House sat looking at each other,"[323] are some of the entries in the reports which must strike the modern mind, accustomed to the present House of Commons, as peculiar. Steele described the House of his day as being composed of silent people oppressed by the choice of a great deal to say, and of eloquent people ignorant that what they said was nothing to the purpose.[324] [323] Townsend's "History of the House of Commons," vol. ii. p. 427. [324] Forster's "Biographical Essays," vol. ii. p. 197. It was not until the Georgian age that parliamentary oratory reached its heyday. Then, too, speeches began to lengthen, and by the time Lord North became Prime Minister it was not unusual for a member to address the House for two or three hours on end. Lord Brougham once spoke for six hours on the amendment of the law. Even in Walpole's day occasional prolixity was not unknown. One Hutcheson, member for Hastings, when the Septennial Bill of 1716 was under discussion, made a speech of which the summary fills more than twenty-five pages of the Parliamentary History.[325] Again, when David Hartley, a notorious bore, rose to speak one day, Walpole went home, changed his clothes, rode to Hampstead, returned, changed once more, and came back to the House to find this tiresome member still upon his legs.[326] [325] Vol. vii. pp. 339-367. [326] Pryme's "Recollections," p. 218 n.