plished his scheme
of administration, he was no longer a minister.

When his face was hid but for a moment, his whole system was on a wide
sea without chart or compass. The gentlemen, his particular friends,
who, with the names of various departments of ministry, were admitted to
seem as if they acted a part under him, with a modesty that becomes all
men, and with a confidence in him which was justified even in its
extravagance by his superior abilities, had never in any instance
presumed upon any opinion of their own. Deprived of his guiding
influence, they were whirled about, the sport of every gust, and easily
driven into any port; and as those who joined with them in manning the
vessel were the most directly opposite to his opinions, measures, and
character, and far the most artful and most powerful of the set, they
easily prevailed, so as to seize upon the vacant, unoccupied, and
derelict minds of his friends, and instantly they turned the vessel
wholly out of the course of his policy. As if it were to insult as well
as to betray him, even long before the close of the first session of his
administration, when everything was publicly transacted, and with great
parade, in his name, they made an act declaring it highly just and
expedient to raise a revenue in America. For even then, Sir, even before
this splendid orb was entirely set, and while the western horizon was in
a blaze with his descending glory, on the opposite quarter of the
heavens arose another luminary, and for his hour became lord of the
ascendant.

This light, too, is passed and set forever. You understand, to be sure,
that I speak of Charles Townshend, officially the reproducer of this
fatal scheme, whom I cannot even now remember without some degree of
sensibility. In truth, Sir, he was the delight and ornament of this
House, and the charm of every private society which he honored with his
presence. Perhaps there never arose in this country, nor in any country,
a man of a more pointed and finished wit, and (where his passions were
not concerned) of a more refined, exquisite, and penetrating judgment.
If he had not so great a stock as some have had, who flourished
formerly, of knowledge long treasured up, he knew, better by far than
any man I ever was acquainted with, how to bring together within a short
time all that was necessary to establish, to illustrate, and to decorate
that side of the question he supported. He stated his matter skilfully
and