Page:Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America.djvu/34

xxvi Reflections on the Revolution in France was issued. His friends had long waited its appearance, and were not wholly surprised at the position taken. What did surprise them was the eagerness with which the people seized upon the book, and its effect upon them. The Tories, with the king, applauded long and loud; the Whigs were disappointed, for Burke condemned the Revolution unreservedly, and with a bitterness out of all proportion to the cause of his anxiety and fear. As the Revolution progressed, he grew fiercer in his denunciation. He broke with his lifelong associates, and declared that no one who sympathized with the work of the Assembly could be his friend. His other writings on the Revolution were in a still more violent strain, and it is hard to think of them as coming from the author of the Speech on Conciliation.

Three years before his death, at the conclusion of the trial of Warren Hastings, Burke's last term in Parliament expired. He did not wish office again and withdrew to his estate. Through the influence of friends, and because of his eminent services, it was proposed to make him peer, with the title of Lord Beaconsfield. But the death of his son prevented, and a pension of twenty−five hundred pounds a year was given instead. It was a signal for his enemies, and during his last