an houses. In politics they were diametrically
opposed to each other. Harcourt had seen the Revolution with disgust,
had not chosen to sit in the Convention, had with difficulty reconciled
his conscience to the oaths, and had tardily and unwillingly signed the
Association. Cowper had been in arms for the Prince of Orange and a free
Parliament, and had, in the short and tumultuary campaign which preceded
the flight of James, distinguished himself by intelligence and courage.
Since Somers had been removed to the Woolsack, the law officers of the
Crown had not made a very distinguished figure in the Lower House, or
indeed any where else; and their deficiencies had been more than once
supplied by Cowper. His skill had, at the trial of Parkyns, recovered
the verdict which the mismanagement of the Solicitor General had, for a
moment, put in jeopardy. He had been chosen member for Hertford at
the general election of 1695, and had scarcely taken his seat when he
attained a high place among parliamentary speakers. Chesterfield many
years later, in one of his letters to his son, described Cowper as an
orator who never spoke without applause, but who reasoned feebly, and
who owed the influence which he long exercised over great assemblies to
the singular charm of his style, his voice and his action. Chesterfield
was, beyond all doubt, intellectually qualified to form a correct
judgment on such a subject. But it must be remembered that the object of
his letters was to exalt good taste and politeness in opposition to much
higher qualities. He therefore constantly and systematically attributed
the success of the most eminent persons of his age to their superiority,
not in solid abilities and acquirements, but in superficial graces of
diction and manner. He represented even Marlborough as a man of very
ordinary capacity, who, solely because he was extremely well bred and
well spoken, had risen from poverty and obscurity to the height of power
and glory. It may confidently be pronounced that both to Marlborough and
to Cowper Chesterfield was unjust. The general who saved the Empire and
conquered the Low Countries was assuredly something more than a fine
gentleman; and the judge who presided during nine years in the Court of
Chancery with the approbation of all parties must have been something
more than a fine declaimer.

Whoever attentively and impartially studies the report of the debates
will be of opinion that, on many points which w