Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/71

Rh Burmann (1731) and &quot;Warnsdorf (1780) in the Poctce Latini Minorca, and by Weber in the Corpus Poctarum Latinorum. The most recent editions are those of Stern (1832) and Haupt (1838). A rendering into English verse was published by Christopher Wase in 1654; there is also a German translation by Perlet (1826).

 GRATTAN, (1746-1820), Irish statesman and orator, was born 3d July 1746. His father, a Protestant, was for many years recorder of the city of Dublin, and from 1761 to 1766 its representative in the Irish parliament ; and his mother was a daughter of Thomas Marlay, chief justice of Ireland. Both at school and at Trinity College, Dublin, which he entered in 1763, young Grattan greatly distinguished himself, especially in the study of the classics; and several well-authenticated anecdotes indicate also that the more prominent moral characteristics displayed in his public career had begun to assert their strength at a very early period. While still attending the university he discarded the Tory principles of his father, who, dying in 1766 before his irritation had time to moderate, testified his resentment by depriving him of the paternal mansion, and of all property not secured by settlement. Having in herited, however, a small inalienable patrimony he resolved to study for the bar, and in 1767 he entered the Middle Temple, London. He was called to the Irish bar in 1772, but never obtained a large practice ; and indeed from the time that he left the university he seems to have concen trated his attention chiefly on politics and the study of popular oratory. He early acquired a passionate admira tion of the great orators of Greece and Rome, and while in London he spent the most of his evenings in the galleries of the House of Commons or at the bar of the Lords, anxious to profit by every opportunity of obtaining an insight into the art of eloquence, his enthusiasm for which had received additional stimulus from the genius of Lord Chatham. Of the eloquence of Chatham he has given a detailed and graphic description in one of his letters, and he also wrote an admirable portraiture of his character, which was inserted as a note in the political publication Barataria conducted by Sir Hercules Langrishe. The knowledge obtained from the study of the best specimens of ancient and modern oratory, and that gained from wit nessing the debates in the English parliament, Grattan began sedulously to apply to the purposes of his own dis cipline. By the constant practice of recitation to imaginary audiences, and by taking part frequently in private theatri cals, he succeeded in overcoming to a remarkable extent his great physical defects, so as to acquire a clear and rounded articulation, an emphasis in some respects admir ably consonant with his meaning, and a certain ease in a style of elocution which was effective partly by reason of its very singularity. At the same time, by practising the habit of writing out the principal passages of his speeches, and subjecting them to a constant mental revision, he attained to the possession of a diction which for clearness, epigrammatic vigour, polished beauty of phrase, and the power of illuminating a whole subject by sudden flashes of meaning conveyed in a single sentence, is unsurpassed in modern oratory. He was equally diligent also in per fecting his political knowledge by a careful study of the history and political constitution both of ancient and modern nations ; and the minor accomplishment of pro ficiency as a pistol shot, at that time essential to every Irish politician who would be prepared for all emergencies, was cultivated by him with the same dogged perseverance which he displayed in other matters. When therefore, under the auspices of Lord Charlemont, Grattan in 1775 entered the Irish parliament, he had already all his powers under full command, and had so trained and disciplined his natural genius that it was able to exert its influence with untrammelled freedom. The period at which he began public life was one of the most critical in his country s history ; and it is within the limits of strict truth to affirm that he inaugurated a new era in her political condition, and that, whether for good or for evil, and whether by the direct success of his efforts or by the modifying or opposing influences they called into exercise, he has had a greater share than any other indi vidual in determining her present relation to the United Kingdom. Through the writings of Molyneux and Swift, the beginnings of a true national sentiment had been pre viously awakened; and the first step in the path of constitu tional reform had been taken, when by the advocacy of Flood the Octennial Bill of 1768 was passed, which limited the duration of parliaments to eight years, instead of as formerly making their continuance depend upon the life of the sovereign; but Flood himself whose friendship and influence were a powerful element in determining Grattan to adopt a political career had, like less formid able agitators, succumbed to the intrigues of the &quot; castle,&quot; and, although possessed of a private fortune which placed him beyond the suspicion of being governed chiefly by mer cenary considerations, had consented to hamper his political action by accepting a sinecure office ; and it seemed as if the germs of a better future had already begun to rot in a soil of such political corruption. The difficulty of the task which Grattan had set before him was also increased by a peculiarity in the case of Ireland which requires to be em phasized. Her political constitution, and, with the excep tion of the restrictions which paralysed her trade, the laws which were inflicting upon her such moral and physical misery, did not nominally differ to any great extent from those of the country by which she was in reality governed. She possessed intact her separate nationality ; she was blessed with the boon of a national parliament ; she had a legal administration of her own, including the right of trial by jury ; and she enjoyed something resembling the privi leges of municipal government. She possessed these things, however, scarcely more than in form ; and she possessed them in such a form that, instead of being the guarantees of her liberty, they increased her sense of bondage, and directly fostered discontent and chronic mutiny. Though the Test Act and the penal laws were actually enforced with less rigour than in England, yet from the numbers who came within their sweep their disastrous influence was incal culably increased. They excluded four-fifths of her other wise eligible population from the jury box and from muni cipal and parliamentary suffrage ; they had produced con fiscations on almost a national scale with all the evils con sequent on absenteeism ; and from their operation there had resulted an ignorance, a poverty, a violation of the rights of conscience, not confined to a few thousands, helplessly dispersed throughout the kingdom, but afflicting the great mass of the people, and both by their direct and their reflex action poisoning the springs of the whole national life. Her judges besides were liable to dismissal at pleasure, and her parliament had no independent authority, and by its very constitution was subject to corrupt influences far exceeding those in operation in the English parliament, and such as virtually to deprive it of independence of vote, almost as completely as it had been deprived of the power of legislation. Still that parliament constituted a kind of centre for political discussion and for the propagation and diffusion of political ideas, and it was by means of it that Grattan and his associates determined to work out the political and social regeneration of their country. Almost as soon as he entered parliament, Grattan became the acknowledged leader of the opposition, not only from the influence exerted by his oratory within the House, but from its power to kindle the enthusiasm of the people, and to create out of the chaos of shapeless and discordant elements the united sympathy and purpose of a true 