Memoirs of the Political and Private Life of James Caulfield, Earl of Charlemont, Knight of St. Patrick, &c. &c. &c, Volume 1

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T. Cadell, 1812
 

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Page 207 - To abstract the mind from all local emotion would be impossible if it were endeavoured, and would be foolish if it were possible. Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses ; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings.
Page 15 - Nature, I believe, never formed any man more unlike his real character than David Hume. The powers of phisiognorny were baffled by his countenance; neither could the most skilful, in that science, pretend to discover the smallest trace of the faculties of his mind, in the unmeaning features of his visage. His face was broad and fat, his mouth wide, and without any other expression than that of imbecility. His eyes vacant and spiritless, and the corpulence of his whole person was far better fitted...
Page 234 - And yet no lady's toilette was complete without Hume's attendance. At the opera, his broad, unmeaning face was usually seen entre deux tolis minois. The ladies in France give the ton, and the ton was deism...
Page 232 - The objections," answered he, " are not without weight ; but error never can produce good, and truth ought to take place of all considerations." He never failed in the midst of any controversy to give its due praise to every thing tolerable that was either said or written against him. One day that he visited me in London, he came into my room laughing, and apparently well pleased. " What has put you into this good humour, Hume?" said I.—" Why, man," replied he, " I have just now had the best thing...
Page 70 - Union between that country and England. 'Were I an Irishman', said he, 'I should certainly wish for it; and, as a general lover of liberty, I sincerely desire it; and for this plain reason, that an inferior country, connected with one much her superior in force, can never be certain of the permanent enjoyment of constitutional freedom, unless she has, by her representatives, a proportional share in the legislature of the superior kingdom.
Page 235 - How my friend Hume was able to endure the encounter of these French female Titans I know not. In England, either his philosophic pride, or his conviction that infidelity was illsuited to women, made him perfectly averse from the initiation of ladies into the mysteries of his doctrine.
Page 346 - You see what noble ambition will make a man attempt. That den is not yet opened, consequently I have not been there; so, for the present I am clear upon that score. I suppose your confounded Irish politics take up your whole attention at present. If they could but have obtained the absentee tax, the Irish parliament would have been perfect.
Page 371 - The business now advanced. The declaration of the minister; the example of such men as Savile, and Dunning; the spirit displayed in the British Parliament; were not without their influence here. On May 27th, 1778, Mr. Gardiner,* a young gentleman of * Afterwards Lord Montjoy. accomplished mind, and large possessions, moved for leave to bring in heads of a bill for the relief of the Roman Catholics, which was granted, though, as might be expected, the circumstances of the two countries being totally...
Page 273 - It was sustained by great ingenuity, great rapidity of intellect, luminous and piercing satire; in refinement abundant, in simplicity sterile. The classical allusions of this orator, for he was most truly one, were so apposite, they followed each other in such bright and varied succession, and, at times, spread such an unexpected and triumphant blaze around his subject, that all persons, who were in the least tinged with literature, could never be tired of listening to him.
Page 233 - You put me in mind,' said an honest fellow in the company, whose name I did not know, ' of an acquaintance of mine, a notary public, who, having been condemned to be hanged for forger}', lamented the hardship of his case ; that, after having written many thousand inoffensive sheets, he should be hanged for one line.

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