Page:Sketches of the life and character of Patrick Henry.djvu/428

 404 SKETCHES OP THE

rigidly honest, but one of the kindest, gentlest, and most indulgent of human beings.

While we are on this ungrateful subject of moral imperfection, the fidelity of history requires us to notice another charge against Mr. Henry. His passion for fame is said to have been too strong; he was accused of a wish to monopolize the public favour; and under the influence of this desire, to have felt no gratification in the rising fame of certain conspicuous characters; to have indulged himself in invidious and unmerited re- marks upon them, and to have been at the bottom of a cabal, against one of the most eminent. If these things were so — alas! poor human nature! It is certain that these charges are very inconsistent with his general character. So far from being naturally envious, and disposed to keep back modest merit, one of the finest traits in his character, was the parental tenderness with which he took by the hand every young man of merit, covered him with his aegis in the legislature, and led him forward at the bar. In relation to his first great rival in eloquence, Richard Henry Lee, he not only did ample justice to him on every occasion, in public, but defended his fame in private, with all the zeal of a brother; as is demonsti^ated by an original correspond- ence between those two eminent men, now in the hands of the author. Of colonel Innis, his next great rival, he entertained, and uniformly expressed, the most exalted opinion; and in the convention of 1788, as will be remembered, paid a comphment to his eloquence, at once so splendid, so happy, and so just, that it will live for ever. The debates of that convention, abound with the most unequivocal and ardent declarations of his re- spect, for the talents and virtues of the other eminent gentlemen who were arrayed against him — Mr. Madi-

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