1801. DANGEROUS ILLNESS OF THE KING. 309 Addington's position at this time was, indeed, somewhat ridiculous. He had vacated the chair, and Sir John Mitford, the Attorney-General, had become his successor. He had taken the Chiltern Hundreds, leaving Mr. Pitt as Chancellor of the Exchequer, to bring forward the Budget. On the 27th of February, when the King's malady had wholly incapacitated him, Addington was returned to the House of Commons and took his seat on the Treasury bench, while Pitt, from a back bench, directed as usual the proceedings of the House, allayed the public anxiety about the state of the King's health, and assured the House that before any public business of import ance was transacted, the state of His Majesty's health should be ascertained. On the 1st and 2nd of March, the King's life was in imminent danger. On the 3rd, his bodily The King's ailment yielded to the strong remedies inquiries. which had been applied. On the 6th, his pulse, which had been at fever-heat, subsided; he talked rationally, asked how long he had been ill, and expressed anxiety lest the public business should have been interrupted by his illness. He inquired about the state of the Ministry, and was satisfied when he learned that Pitt, not having given up the seals of office, had continued at the head of affairs. He was very particular in his inquiries as to any allusions to his illness that had been made in Parliament. Willis told him exactly what had passed. One member alone moved an inquiry into the state of your Majesty's health; and Sheridan, in the handsomest manner, got up and spoke against it, and in the highest terms of your Majesty. On which the King said, 'It is very odd, but ever since that attack of Hadfield's in the play-house, Sheridan has shown a personal attention to me.' He then asked who made the motion, and when he was told Mr. Nicholls, and that it was universally reprobated, he only observed 310 THE KING'S CONVALESCENCE. 6 CH. ILI. From this time 'that he was always an odd man.'* the King made gradual, though irregular progress, towards recovery. On the same day that he held the conversation above referred to, being the 6th of March, he desired Willis to communicate the fact of his convalescence to Mr. Addington, to Lord Eldon, and to Mr. Pitt. With respect to Pitt, he added these words, which appear to have been duly reported to his late minister, Tell him I am now quite well -quite recovered from my illness; but what has he not to answer for, who is the cause of my having been ill at all?'t It appears, that, in consequence of this message, Mr. Pitt caused it to be intimated to His Majesty that he would never, during the King's life, bring forward the Catholic question. The retiring minister made a similar announcement to his friends; upon which the question naturally suggested itself, why should he retire at all, when the only obstacle to his remaining in office, was thus, by his own act, wholly removed? Pitt himself seems to have taken this view of his position, and even to have canvassed the mode of providing for Addington.‡ He could not, with decency, make a direct offer to remain in office; but he spoke of the matter without reserve among his friends, who took measures, with his tacit concurrence, to bring about a result so much to be desired. If Pitt could not move in the matter, it was still less to be expected that the King should put such an affront on the man whom he had summoned from an office of dignity and security, as to reinstate his former minister merely because he had postponed a measure of the first importance, from deference to His Majesty's will. It was obvious that Addington, and Addington alone, could solve the difficulty. A proposal was accordingly * LADY HARCOURT's Diary, MSS. EARL STANHOPE's Life of Pitt, vol. iii. p. 303 1801. PROPOSAL TO ADDINGTON TO RESIGN. 311 made to the expectant minister, that he should withdraw his pretensions in favour of the minister who was not yet out of office, of whom he never pretended to be the rival, and of whom he could hardly fail to consider himself, as every body else considered him, the temporary substitute. But Addington was not prepared for the disappointment of his hopes, when, after an interval of painful suspense, they were on the point of being fulfilled. He listened coldly to the proposal of the half-accredited deputation which had waited on him. He said, that it had not been his wish to quit his former situation; that the late minister had declared his irrevocable determination to resign, and had advised his accepting the Government, as the only thing that could stand between the Crown and ruin. Finally, he referred them to the King, warning them, at the same time, of the effect which their proposal might have on His Majesty's health.* This answer was, of course, conclusive; and Pitt, seeing that the matter could not with propriety be carried any further, desired that it might be dropped. He immediately announced his intention of supporting the new Ministry, and his wish that his friends would follow his example. Pitt's conduct throughout this transaction is open to grave observation. His readiness in March to make the most ample concession to the King's prejudice, or infirmity, upon a point to which, in February, he attached paramount importance, is not explained by any disclosures which have yet seen the light. Nothing had happened in this short interval to justify so great a change in Mr. Pitt's conduct. The King's illness was a circumstance wholly irrelevant. In February, when the King was well, Mr. Pitt announced his deliberate determination to resign, unless he was permitted to bring forward the * PELLEW's Life of Lord Sidmouth, quoting Mr. Abbot's Diary. 312 PITT'S TERGIVERSATION CE. CLI Catholic question, with His Majesty's 'full concurrence, and with the whole weight of Government.’* He did resign, in consequence of this permission having been withheld; his successor was named; and the new Cabinet was in the course of formation when the King fell ill. But, in three weeks the King was well again—as well, at least, so far as his mind was affected, as he had been in February, or at any time since 1789. Yet Mr. Pitt was now ready to give up absolutely, and for ever, the Catholic question; and proposed to annul arrangements which had been made in consequence of his own act, and with his entire approval. Nothing had happened to diminish the force of the Catholic claims. What then was Pitt's position with regard to the Catholic question? It has already been shown that, in the autumn of 1799, the Irish minister was authorised to solicit' every support the Catholics could afford, to the great measure of the Legislative Union; that the Cabinet was favourable to these pretensions; and that, if no assurance was distinctly given them, in the event of the Union being accomplished, of these objects being submitted with the countenance of the Government to the United Parliament, it was only from the consideration that a positive pledge might offend the Protestants. Yet Mr. Pitt seems to have been of opinion, that this engagement, of which he had received the full benefit, was satisfied, so far as he was concerned, by the formal resignation of his office when the King refused to sanction the promised measure; and that he was at liberty to resume office the next day, with or without his colleagues, and upon a positive pledge, to renounce the policy which he had, only a few short weeks before, declared to his Sovereign, to be dictated by his unalterable * Letter to the King, 31st January. † Lord Castlereagh's letter to Mr. Pitt, 1st January, 1800. E.1801. ABOUT THE CATHOLIC CLAIMS. 313 sense of public duty.'* If such conduct as this is to ebe justified, on the ground that Mr. Pitt was under is no express compact with the Catholics, I know not what species of engagement is binding upon public WE men. A minister cannot make a contract like a broker; and his performance should be judged with candour and liberality. But when he seeks to avail himself of a colourable pretext, to get rid of an obligation, of which all the benefit has been received, and the burden only remains, it is difficult to understand how his conduct can be reconciled with morality and good faith. Had Pitt adhered to his resignation, he might, at some future period, have resumed office unembarrassed by the Catholic question. He had not undertaken to bring forward the question at any particular time. The Catholics were not inpatient. Relying on the sincerity of their powerful friend, to whose word they had given implicit confidence, they left it to him to choose the opportunity, the means, and even the terms, of their emancipation. If it had been found in 1804, that the difficulty which had disappointed their hopes in 1801, was still in existence, and undiminished; that the attempt to advance their claims at that time, would cause a regency, if not a demise of the Crown; that the country had become decidedly adverse to them; in a word, that no minister, however powerful, could hope to urge the question forward with a chance of success; the Catholics were not so perverse as to expect that their friends should stay out, and that their enemies should be kept in, by a useless perseverance in an untimely policy. Whatever might have been the prospects of the Catholic question in 1801, if the King had not interposed an obstacle, it is certain that it could not have been carried in 1804; and, therefore, Pitt might have returned to office in * Letter to the King, 3rd February.-EARL STANHOPE'S Life of Pitt, App. xxx. |