Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay

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Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay

by Sir George Otto Trevelyan

VOLUME I

PREFACE

TO

THE SECOND EDITION.

WHEN publishing the Second Edition of Lord MACAULAY'S Life and
Letters, I may be permitted to say that no pains were spared in
order that the First Edition should be as complete as possible.
But, in the course of the last nine months, I have come into
possession of a certain quantity of supplementary matter, which
the appearance of the book has elicited from various quarters.
Stray letters have been hunted up. Half-forgotten anecdotes have
been recalled. Floating reminiscences have been reduced to
shape;--in one case, as will be seen from the extracts from Sir
William Stirling Maxwell's letter, by no unskilful hand. I should
have been tempted to draw more largely upon these new resources,
if it had not been for the examples, which literary history only
too copiously affords, of the risk that attends any attempt to
alter the form, or considerably increase the bulk, of a work
which, in its original shape, has had the good fortune not to
displease the public. I have, however, ventured, by a very
sparing selection from sufficiently abundant material, slightly
to enlarge, and, I trust, somewhat to enrich the book.

If this Second Edition is not rigidly correct in word and
substance, I have no valid excuse to offer. Nothing more
pleasantly indicates the wide-spread interest with which Lord
MACAULAY has inspired his readers, both at home and in foreign
countries, than the almost microscopic care with which these
volumes have been studied. It is not too much to say that, in
several instances, a misprint, or a verbal error, has been
brought to my notice by at least five-and-twenty different
persons; and there is hardly a page in the book which has not
afforded occasion for comment or suggestion from some friendly
correspondent. There is no statement of any importance throughout
the two volumes the accuracy of which has been circumstantially
impugned; but some expressions, which have given personal pain or
annoyance, have been softened or removed.

There is another class of criticism to which I have found myself
altogether unable to defer. I have frequently been told by
reviewers that I should "have better consulted MACAULAY'S
reputation," or "done more honour to MACAULAY'S memory," if I had
omitted passages in the letters or diaries which may be said to
bear the trace of intellectual narrowness, or political and
religious intolerance. I cannot but think that strictures, of
this nature imply a serious misconception of the biographer's
duty. It was my business to show my Uncle as he was, and not as
I, or any one else, would have had him. If a faithful picture of
MACAULAY could not have been produced without injury to his
memory, I should have left the task of drawing that picture to
others; but, having once undertaken the work, I had no choice but
to ask myself, with regard to each feature of the portrait, not
whether it was attractive, but whether it was characteristic. We
who had the best opportunity of knowing him have always been
convinced that his character would stand the test of an exact,
and even a minute, delineation; and we humbly believe that our
confidence was not misplaced, and that the reading world has now
extended to the man the approbation which it has long conceded to
his hooks.

G. 0. T.

December 1876.

PREFACE

TO

THE FIRST EDITION,

THIS work has been undertaken principally from a conviction that
it is the performance of a duty which, to the best of my ability,
it is incumbent on me to fulfil. Though even on this ground I
cannot appeal to the forbearance of my readers, I may venture to
refer to a peculiar difficulty which I have experienced in
dealing with Lord MACAULAY'S private papers.

To give to the world compositions not intended for publication
may be no injury to the fame of writers who, by habit, were
careless and hasty workmen; but it is far otherwise in the case
of one who made it a rule for himself to publish nothing which
was not carefully planned, strenuously laboured, and minutely
finished. Now, it is impossible to examine Lord MACAULAY'S
journals and correspondence without being persuaded that the idea
of their being printed, even in part, never was present to his
mind; and I should not feel myself justified in laying them
before the public if it were not that their unlaboured and
spontaneous character adds to their biographical value all, and
perhaps more than all, that it detracts from their literary
merit.

To the heirs and relations of Mr. Thomas Flower Ellis and Mr.
Adam Black, to the Marquis of Lansdowne, to Mr. Macvey Napier,
and to the executors of Dr. Whewell, my thanks are due for
the courtesy with which thhey have placed the different portions
of my Uncle's correspondence at my disposal. Lady Caroline
Lascelles has most kindly permitted me to use as much of
Lord Carlisle's journal as relates to the subject of this work;
and Mr. Charles Cowan, my Uncle's old opponent at Edinburgh, has
sent me a considerable mass of printed matter bearing upon the
elections of 1847 and 1852. The late Sir Edward Ryan, and Mr.
Fitzjames Stephen, spared no pains to inform me with regard to
Lord MACAULAY'S work at Calcutta. His early letters, with much
that relates to the whole course of his life, have been
preserved, studied, and arranged, by the affectionate industry of
his sister, Miss Macaulay; and material of high interest has been
entrusted to my hands by Mr. and the Hon. Mrs. Edward Cropper. I
have been assisted throughout the book by the sympathy, and the
recollections, of my sister Lady Holland, the niece to whose
custody Lord MACAULAY'S papers by inheritance descend.

G.O.T.

March 1876.

LIFE AND LETTERS OF LORD MACAULAY

By

SIR GEORGE OTTO TREVELYAN

CHAPTER I

1800-1818.

Plan and scope of the work--History of the Macaulay family--
Aulay--Kenneth--Johnson and Boswell--John Macaulay and his
children--Zachary Macaulay--His career in the West Indies and in
Africa--His character--Visit of the French squadron to Sierra
Leone--Zachary Macaulay's marriage--Birth of his eldest son--Lord
Macaulay's early years--His childish productions--Mrs. Hannah
More--General Macaulay--Choice of a school--Shelford--Dean
Milner--Macaulay's early letters--Aspenden hall--The boy's habits
and mental endowments--His home--The Clapham set--The boy's
relations with his father--The political ideas amongst which he
was brought up, and their influence on the work of his life.

HE who undertakes to publish the memoirs of a distinguished man
may find a ready apology in the custom of the age. If we measure
the effective demand for biography by the supply, the person
commemorated need possess but a very moderate reputation, and
have played no exceptional part, in order to carry the reader
through many hundred pages of anecdote, dissertation, and
correspondence. To judge from the advertisements of our
circulating libraries, the public curiosity is keen with regard
to some who did nothing worthy of special note, and others who
acted so continuously in the face of the world that, when their
course was run, there was little left for the world to learn about
them. It may, therefore, be taken for granted that a desire
exists to hear something authentic about the life of a man who
has produced works which are universally known, but which bear
little or no indication of the private history and the personal
qualities of the author.

This was in a marked degree the case with Lord Macaulay. His two
famous contemporaries in English literature have, consciously or
unconsciously, told their own story in their books. Those who
could see between the lines in "David Copperfield" were aware
that they had before them a delightful autobiography; and all who
knew how to read Thackeray could trace him in his novels through
every stage in his course, on from the day when as a little boy,
consigned to the care of English relatives and schoolmasters, he
left his mother on the steps of the landing-place at Calcutta.
The dates and names were wanting, but the man was there; while
the most ardent admirers of Macaulay will admit that a minute
study of his literary productions left them, as far as any but an
intellectual knowledge of the writer himself was concerned, very
much as it found them. A consummate master of his craft, he
turned out works which bore the unmistakable marks of the
artificer's hand, but which did not reflect his features. It
would be almost as hard to compose a picture of the author from
the History, the Essays, and the Lays, as to evolve an idea of
Shakespeare from Henry the Fifth and Measure for Measure.

But, besides being a man of letters, Lord Macaulay was a
statesman, a jurist, and a brilliant ornament of society, at a
time when to shine in society was a distinction which a man of
eminence and ability might justly value. In these several
capacities, it will be said, he was known well, and known widely.
But in the first place, as these pages will show, there was one
side of his life (to him, at any rate, the most important,) of
which even the persons with whom he mixed most freely and
confidentially in London drawing-rooms, in the Indian Council
chamber, and in the lobbies and on the benches of the House of
Commons, were only in part aware. And in the next place, those
who have seen his features and heard his voice are few already
and become yearly fewer; while, by a rare fate in literary
annals, the number of those who read his books is still rapidly
increasing. For everyone who sat with him in private company or
at the transaction of public business,--for every ten who have
listened to his oratory in Parliament or from the hustings,--
there must be tens of thousands whose interest in history and
literature he has awakened and informed by his pen, and who would
gladly know what manner of man it was that has done them so great
a service.

To gratify that most legitimate wish is the duty of those who
have the means at their command. His lifelike image is indelibly
impressed upon their minds, (for how could it be otherwise with
any who had enjoyed so close relations with such a man?) although
the skill which can reproduce that image before the general eye
may well be wanting. But his own letters will supply the
deficiencies of the biographer. Never did any one leave behind
him more copious materials for enabling others to put together a
narrative which might be the history, not indeed of his times,
but of the man himself. For in the first place he so soon showed
promise of being one who would give those among whom his early
years were passed reason to be proud, and still more certain
assurance that he would never afford them cause for shame, that
what he wrote was preserved with a care very seldom bestowed on
childish compositions; and the value set upon his letters by
those with whom he corresponded naturally enough increased as
years went on. And in the next place he was by nature so
incapable of affectation or concealment that he could not write
otherwise than as he felt, and, to one person at least, could
never refrain from writing all that he felt; so that we may read
in his letters, as in a clear mirror, his opinions and
inclinations, his hopes and affections, at every succeeding
period of his existence. Such letters could never have been
submitted to an editor not connected with both correspondents by
the strongest ties; and even one who stands in that position must
often be sorely puzzled as to what he has the heart to publish
and the right to withhold.

I am conscious that a near relative has peculiar temptations
towards that partiality of the biographer which Lord Macaulay
himself so often and so cordially denounced; and the danger is
greater in the case of one whose knowledge of him coincided with
his later years; for it would not be easy to find a nature which
gained more by time than his, and lost less. But believing, as I
do, (to use his own words,) that "if he were now living he would
have sufficient judgment and sufficient greatness of mind" to
wish to be shown as himself, I will suppress no trait in his
disposition, or incident in his career, which might provoke blame
or question. Such in all points as he was, the world, which has
been so indulgent to him, has a right to know him; and those who
best love him do not fear the consequences of freely submitting
his character and his actions to the public verdict.

The most devout believers in the doctrine of the transmission of
family qualities will be content with tracing back descent
through four generations; and all favourable hereditary
influences, both intellectual and moral, are assured by a
genealogy which derives from a Scotch Manse. In the first decade
of the eighteenth century Aulay Macaulay, the great-grandfather
of the historian, was minister of Tiree and Coll; where he was
"grievously annoyed by a decreet obtained after instance of the
Laird of Ardchattan, taking away his stipend." The Duchess of
Argyll of the day appears to have done her best to see him
righted; "but his health being much impaired, and there being no
church or meeting-house, he was exposed to the violence of the
weather at all seasons; and having no manse or plebe, and no fund
for communion elements, and no mortification for schools or any
pious purpose in either of the islands, and the air being
unwholesome, he was dissatisfied;" and so, to the great regret of
the parishioners whom he was leaving behind, he migrated to
Harris, where he discharged the clerical duties for nearly half a
century.

Aulay was the father of fourteen children, of whom one, Kenneth,
the minister of Ardnamurchan, still occupies a very humble niche
in the temple of literature. He wrote a History of St. Kilda
which happened to fall into the hands of Dr. Johnson, who spoke
of it more than once with favour. His reason for liking the book
is characteristic enough. Mr. Macaulay had recorded the belief
prevalent in St. Kilda that, as soon as the factor landed on the
island, all the inhabitants had an attack which from the account
appears to have partaken of the nature both of influenza and
bronchitis. This touched the superstitious vein in Johnson, who
praised him for his "magnanimity" in venturing to chronicle so
questionable a phenomenon; the more so because,--said the
Doctor,--"Macaulay set out with a prejudice against prejudice,
and wanted to be a smart modern thinker." To a reader of our day
the History of St. Kilda appears to be innocent of any trace of
such pretension; unless it be that the author speaks slightingly
of second-sight, a subject for which Johnson always had a strong
hankering. In 1773 Johnson paid a visit to Mr. Macaulay, who by
that time had removed to Calder, and began the interview by
congratulating him on having produced "a very pretty piece of
topography,"--a compliment which did not seem to the taste of the
author. The conversation turned upon rather delicate subjects,
and, before many hours had passed, the guest had said to the host
one of the very rudest things recorded by Boswell! Later on in
the same evening he atoned for his incivility by giving one of
the boys of the house a pocket Sallust, and promising to procure
him a servitorship at Oxford. Subsequently Johnson pronounced
that Mr. Macaulay was not competent to have written the book that
went by his name; a decision which, to those who happen to have
read the work, will give a very poor notion of my ancestor's
abilities.

The eldest son of old Aulay, and the grandfather of Lord
Macaulay, was John, born in the year 1720. He was minister
successively of Barra, South Uist, Lismore, and Inverary; the
last appointment being a proof of the interest which the family
of Argyll continued to take in the fortunes of the Macaulays. He,
likewise, during the famous tour in the Hebrides, came across the
path of Boswell, who mentions him in an exquisitely absurd
paragraph, the first of those in which is described the visit to
Inverary Castle. ["Monday, Oct. 25.--My acquaintance, the Rev.
Mr. John M'Aulay, one of the ministers of Inverary, and brother
to our good friend at Calder, came to us this morning, and
accompanied us to the castle, where I presented Dr. Johnson to
the Duke of Argyll. We were shown through the house; and I never
shall forget the impression made upon my fancy by some of the
ladies' maids tripping about in neat morning dresses. After
seeing for a long time little but rusticity, their lively manner,
and gay inciting appearance, pleased me so much, that I thought
for a moment I could have been a knight-errant for them."] Mr.
Macaulay afterwards passed the evening with the travellers at
their inn, and provoked Johnson into what Boswell calls warmth,
and anyone else would call brutality, by the very proper remark
that he had no notion of people being in earnest in good
professions if their practice belied them. When we think what
well-known ground this was to Lord Macaulay, it is impossible to
suppress a wish that the great talker had been at hand to avenge
his grandfather and grand-uncle. Next morning "Mr. Macaulay
breakfasted with us, nothing hurt or dismayed by his last night's
correction. Being a man of good sense he had a just admiration of
Dr. Johnson." He was rewarded by seeing Johnson at his very best,
and hearing him declaim some of the finest lines that ever were
written in a manner worthy of his subject.

There is a tradition that, in his younger days, the minister of
Inverary proved his Whiggism by giving information to the
authorities which almost led to the capture of the young
Pretender. It is perhaps a matter of congratulation that this
item was not added to the heavy account that the Stuarts have
against the Macaulay family. John Macaulay enjoyed a high
reputation as a preacher, and was especially renowned for his
fluency. In 1774 he removed to Cardross in Dumbartonshire, where,
on the bank of the noble estuary of the Clyde, he spent the last
fifteen years of a useful and honoured life. He was twice
married. His first wife died at the birth of his first child.
Eight years afterwards, in 1757, he espoused Margaret, daughter
of Colin Campbell of Inveresragan, who survived him by a single
year. By her he had the patriarchal number of twelve children,
whom he brought up on the old Scotch system,--common to the
households of minister, man of business, farmer, and peasant
alike,--on fine air, simple diet, and a solid training in
knowledge human and divine. Two generations after, Mr. Carlyle,
during a visit to the late Lord Ashburton at the Grange, caught
sight of Macaulay's face in unwonted repose, as he was turning
over the pages of a book. "I noticed," said he, "the homely Norse
features that you find everywhere in the Western Isles, and I
thought to myself 'Well! Anyone can see that you are an honest
good sort of fellow, made out of oatmeal.'"

Several of John Macaulay's children obtained position in the
world. Aulay, the eldest by his second wife, became a clergyman
of the Church of England. His reputation as a scholar and
antiquary stood high, and in the capacity of a private tutor he
became known even in royal circles. He published pamphlets and
treatises, the list of which it is not worth while to record, and
meditated several large works that perhaps never got much beyond
a title. Of all his undertakings the one best deserving
commemoration in these pages was a tour that he made into
Scotland in company with Mr. Thomas Babington, the owner of
Rothley Temple in Leicestershire, in the course of which the
travellers paid a visit to the manse at Cardross. Mr. Babington
fell in love with one of the daughters of the house, Miss Jean
Macaulay, and married her in 1787. Nine years afterwards he had
an opportunity of presenting his brother-in-law Aulay Macaulay
with the very pleasant living of Rothley.

Alexander, another son of John Macaulay, succeeded his father as
minister of Cardross. Colin went into the Indian army, and died a
general. He followed the example of the more ambitious among his
brother officers, and exchanged military for civil duties. In
1799 he acted as secretary to a political and diplomatic
Commission which accompanied the force that marched under General
Harris against Seringapatam. The leading Commissioner was Colonel
Wellesley, and to the end of General Macaulay's life the great
Duke corresponded with him on terms of intimacy, and (so the
family flattered themselves) even of friendship. Soon after the
commencement of the century Colin Macaulay was appointed Resident
at the important native state of Travancore. While on this
employment he happened to light upon a valuable collection of
books, and rapidly made himself master of the principal European
languages, which he spoke and wrote with a facility surprising in
one who had acquired them within a few leagues of Cape Comorin.

There was another son of John Macaulay, who in force and
elevation of character stood out among his brothers, and who was
destined to make for himself no ordinary career. The path which
Zachary Macaulay chose to tread did not lead to wealth, or
worldly success, or indeed to much worldly happiness. Born in
1768, he was sent out at the age of sixteen by a Scotch house of
business as bookkeeper to an estate in Jamaica, of which he soon
rose to be sole manager. His position brought him into the
closest possible contact with negro slavery. His mind was not
prepossessed against the system of society which he found in the
West Indies. His personal interests spoke strongly in its favour,
while his father, whom he justly respected, could see nothing to
condemn in an institution recognised by Scripture. Indeed, the
religious world still allowed the maintenance of slavery to
continue an open question. John Newton, the real founder of that
school in the Church of England of which in after years Zachary
Macaulay was a devoted member, contrived to reconcile the
business of a slave trader with the duties of a Christian, and to
the end of his days gave scandal to some of his disciples, (who
by that time were one and all sworn abolitionists,) by his
supposed reluctance to see that there could be no fellowship
between light and such darkness.

But Zachary Macaulay had eyes of his own to look about him, a
clear head for forming a judgment on what he saw, and a
conscience which would not permit him to live otherwise than in
obedience to its mandates. The young Scotchman's innate respect
for his fellows, and his appreciation of all that instruction and
religion can do for men, was shocked at the sight of a population
deliberately kept ignorant and heathen. His kind heart was
wounded by cruelties practised at the will and pleasure of a
thousand petty despots. He had read his Bible too literally to
acquiesce easily in a state of matters under which human beings
were bred and raised like a stock of cattle, while outraged
morality was revenged on the governing race by the shameless
licentiousness which is the inevitable accompaniment of slavery.
He was well aware that these evils, so far from being superficial
or remediable, were essential to the very existence of a social
fabric constituted like that within which he lived. It was not
for nothing that he had been behind the scenes in that tragedy of
crime and misery. His philanthropy was not learned by the royal
road of tracts, and platform speeches, and monthly magazines.
What he knew he had spelt out for himself with no teacher except
the aspect of human suffering, and degradation, and sin.

He was not one of those to whom conviction comes in a day; and,
when convinced, he did nothing sudden. Little more than a boy in
age, singularly modest, and constitutionally averse to any course
that appeared pretentious or theatrical, he began by a sincere
attempt to make the best of his calling. For some years he
contented himself with doing what he could, (so he writes to a
friend,) "to alleviate the hardships of a considerable number of
my fellow-creatures, and to render the bitter cup of servitude as
palatable as possible." But by the time he was four-and-twenty he
became tired of trying to find a compromise between right and
wrong, and, refusing really great offers from the people with
whom he was connected, he threw up his position, and returned to
his native country. This step was taken against the wishes of his
father, who was not prepared for the construction which his son
put upon the paternal precept that a man should make his practice
square with his professions.

But Zachary Macaulay soon had more congenial work to do. The
young West Indian overseer was not alone in his scruples. Already
for some time past a conviction had been abroad that individual
citizens could not divest themselves of their share in the
responsibility in which the nation was involved by the existence
of slavery in our colonies. Already there had been formed the
nucleus of the most disinterested, and perhaps the most
successful, popular movement which history records. The question
of the slave trade was well before Parliament and the country.
Ten years had passed since the freedom of all whose feet touched
the soil of our island had been vindicated before the courts at
Westminster, and not a few negroes had become their own masters
as a consequence of that memorable decision. The patrons of the
race were somewhat embarrassed by having these expatriated
freedmen on their hands; an opinion prevailed that the traffic in
human lives could never be efficiently checked until Africa had
obtained the rudiments of civilisation; and, after long
discussion, a scheme was matured for the colonisation of Sierra
Leone by liberated slaves. A company was organised, with a
charter from the Crown, and a board which included the names of
Granville Sharpe and Wilberforce. A large capital was speedily
subscribed, and the Chair was accepted by Mr. Henry Thornton, a
leading City banker and a member of Parliament, whose determined
opposition to cruelty and oppression in every form was such as
might be expected in one who had inherited from his father the
friendship of the poet Cowper. Mr. Thornton heard Macaulay's
story from Thomas Babington, with whom he lived on terms of close
intimacy and political alliance. The Board, by the advice of its
Chairman, passed a resolution appointing the young man Second
Member in the Sierra Leone Council, and early in the year 1793 he
sailed for Africa, where soon after his arrival he succeeded to
the position and duties of Governor.

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