CURRAN. 337 and Mr. Egan were passed by unnoticed, and both felt the circumstance with disappointment and chagrin. The reign of the new elèves was, however, but short; for Earl Fitzwilliam, debarred by a majority of the British cabinet who sent him, from fulfilling the promises he was authorised to hold out, demanded his recal: Mr. Grattan and Mr. Ponsonby repassed to the opposition bench, and Mr. Curran never returned to a seat in parliament after the next dissolution, which took place. It has before been stated, that parliament was not the theatre most favourable to the display of his eloquence. The bar was his best field; there his talents had long shone with refulgent light: but there was comparatively little in the forensic arena to excite their full force previous to the point of time at which Lord Fitzwilliam retired. It was during the agitated state of the country which speedily followed, that those opportunities occurred in the govern- ment prosecutions for libels, sedition, and high treason, in which Mr. Curran was usually retained for the accused parties, that his eloquence blazed out with such dazzling splendour, and formed what may be termed the Angustan era of his extraordinary talents. His speeches on those trials have been collected and published in one volume and although confessedly under the disadvantage of im- perfect reports, and defective of his own revision and amendments, still do they present such monuments of his oratorical powers, as if, ever equalled, were certainly never surpassed in the English language, and which, like the classic productions of Greece and Rome, will afford per- manent models worthy the emulation of future orators. The following able criticism on his style and talents, is extracted from the Edinburgh Review, of October 1814. -The wits of Queen Anne's time practised a style cha- racterised by purity, smoothness, and a kind of simple and temperate elegance. Their reasoning was correct and luminous, and their raillery terse and refined; but they never so much as aimed at touching the greater passions, or rising to the loftier graces of composition. Their VOL.
