LAY, 1800-1859

[Illustration: THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY. _From the painting by Sir
F. Grant, National Portrait Gallery_.]

Life.--A prominent figure in the social and political life of
England during the first part of the century was Thomas Babington
Macaulay, a man of brilliant intellectual powers, strict integrity of
character, and enormous capacity for work. He loved England and
gloried in her liberties and her commercial prosperity. He served her
for many years in the House of Commons, and he bent his whole energy
and splendid forensic talent in favor of the Reform Bill of 1832,
which secured greater political liberty for England.

He was not a theorizer, but a practical man of affairs.
Notwithstanding the fact that his political opinions were ready made
for him by the Whig party, his career in the House was never
"inconsistent with rectitude of intention and independence of spirit."
He voted conscientiously for measures, although he personally
sacrificed hundreds of pounds by so doing.

He was a remarkable talker. A single speech of his has been known to
change an entire vote in Parliament. Unlike Coleridge, he did not
indulge in monologue, but showed to finest advantage in debate. His
power of memory was wonderful. He often startled an opponent by
quoting from a given chapter and page of a book. He repeated long
passages from _Paradise Lost_; and it is said he could have restored
it complete, had it all been lost.

His disposition was sweet and his life altogether fortunate. His
biographer says of him: "Descended from Scotch Presbyterians
--ministers many of them--on his father's side, and from
a Quaker family on his mother's, he probably united as many guaranties
of 'good birth,' in the moral sense of the word, as could be found in
these islands at the beginning of the century."

He was born at Rothley Temple, Leicestershire, in 1800. He was
prepared for college at good private schools, and sent to Cambridge
when he was eighteen. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in
1825; but, in the following year, he determined to adopt literature as
a profession, owing to the welcome given to his _Essay on Milton_. As
he had written epics, histories, and metrical romances prior to the
age of ten, his choice of a profession was neither hasty nor
unexpected.

He continued from this time to write for the _Edinburgh Review_, but
literature was not the only field of his activity. He had a seat in
Parliament, and