[168] He declared, on a famous occasion, that his debt of gratitude to His Majesty was ample, for the many favours he had graciously conferred upon him, which, when he forgot, might his God forget him! Wilkes, who was present, muttered, "God forget you! He will see you d----d first!" while Burke remarked that to escape the memory of the Almighty would be the very best thing Thurlow could hope for. Thurlow's character has been cruelly portrayed in the _Rolliad_ under the heading: "HOW TO MAKE A CHANCELLOR." "Take a man of great abilities, with a heart as black as his countenance. Let him possess a rough inflexibility, without the least tincture of generosity or affection, and be as manly as oaths and ill-manners can make him. He should be a man who should act politically with all parties--hating and deriding every one of the individuals who compose them."[169] [169] Page 430. If the Speaker of the Lords had been expected to conduct himself in a fashion similar to that of the Speaker of the Commons, Thurlow's behaviour on the Woolsack would certainly have given rise to adverse criticism. He was a frank and bitter partisan, and when some opponent had spoken, would step forward on to the floor of the House and, as he himself described it, give his adversary "such a thump in the bread-basket" that he did not easily recover from this verbal onslaught.[170] Thurlow's pet aversion was Lord Loughborough, his successor on the Woolsack. When Loughborough spoke effectively upon some subject opposed by Thurlow, who had not however taken the trouble to study it, the latter could be heard muttering fiercely to himself. "If I was not as lazy as a toad at the bottom of a well," he would say, "I could kick that fellow Loughborough heels over head, any day of the week." And he was probably right, for Lord Loughborough was a notoriously bad lawyer,[171] whereas his rival's sagacity almost refuted Fox's celebrated saying that "Nobody could be as wise as Thurlow _looked_." [170] Twiss's "Life of Eldon," vol. i. p. 214. [171] Lord Ellenborough was once asked by his hostess after dinner to cease conversing with his host--a judge--and to give the ladies some conversation, as he had been talking law long enough. "Madam," he replied, "I beg your pardon; we have not been talking law, or anything like law. We have been talking of one of the decisions of Lord Loughborough."--Campbell's "Lives," vol. vi. p. 251. The amount of work accomplished by a Lord Chancellor depends very largely upon the man himself, as we may see by comparing the two most distinguished Chancellors of their day--Lord Eldon and Lord Brougham.