han we are is a
species of perverted vanity the most disgusting, and a very bad
compliment to the judgment, the morals or the taste of our
acquaintance. Yet, with all his splendid genius, this sort of
vanity certainly distinguished Lord Byron, and that among many
other things proves how deeply a man may be read in human nature,
what an insight he may acquire into the springs of action and
feeling, and yet how incapable he may be of making any practical
application of the knowledge he has acquired and the result of
which he can faithfully delineate. He gives a list of the books
he had read at eighteen which appears incredible, particularly as
he says that he was always idle, and eight years after Scott says
he did not appear well read either in poetry or history. Swift
says 'some men know books as others do Lords--learn their titles,
and then boast of their acquaintance with them,' and so perhaps
at eighteen he knew by name the books he mentions; indeed, the
list contains Hooker, Bacon, Locke, Hobbes, Berkeley, &c. It
sounds rather improbable; but his letters contain allusions to
every sort of literature, and certainly indicate considerable
information. 'Dans le pays des aveugles les borgnes sont rois,'
and Sir Walter Scott might think a man half read who knows all
that is contained in the brains of White's, Brookes', and
Boodle's, and the greater part of the two Houses of Parliament.
But the more one reads and hears of great men the more reconciled
one becomes to one's own mediocrity.

Say thou, whose thoughts at nothingness repine,
Shall Byron's fame with Byron's fate be thine?

Who would not prefer any obscurity before such splendid misery as
was the lot of that extraordinary man? Even Moore is not happy.
One thinks how one should like to be envied, and admired, and
applauded, but after all such men suffer more than we know or
they will confess, and their celebrity is dearly purchased.

Se di ciascun l'interno affanno
Si leggesse in fronte scritto,
Quanti guai ch'invidia fanno
Ci farebbe pieta.

One word more about Byron and I have done. I was much struck by
the coincidence of style between his letters and his journal, and
that appears to me a proof of the reality and nature which
prevailed in both.

[Page Head: WEAKNESS OF THE GOVERNMENT]

February 5th, 1830 {p.275}

Parliament met yesterday; there was a brisk debate a