1846, vol. ii.) Egmont appears to have written various letters and essays upon moral subjects in the ‘Weekly Miscellany,’ and to have left in manuscript several volumes of biographical collections, which were lent by his grandson, Lord Arden, to Dr. Andrew Kippis, who made use of them in the second edition of the ‘Biographia Britannica’ (Biogr. Brit. 1789, vol. iv. p. viii). These volumes, together with much of Egmont's correspondence and several of his diaries, are in the possession of the present Earl of Egmont (Hist. MSS. Comm. 7th Rep. p. 13, App. pp. 232–49). He was the author of: 1. ‘The Controversy in relation to the Test and Corporation Acts clearly disputed in a Dialogue between a Dissenter and a Member of the Establish'd Church,’ &c., London, 1733, 8vo; anon. 2. ‘An impartial Enquiry into the State and Utility of the Province of Georgia,’ London, 1741, 8vo; anon. This is also attributed to Benjamin Martyn, the secretary of the trustees for establishing the colony of Georgia. 3. ‘Remarks upon a scandalous piece entitled “A brief Account of the Causes that have retarded the Progress of the Colony of Georgia in America,”’ London, 1743, 8vo; anon. The authorship of ‘The Great Importance of a Religious Life,’ written by William Melmoth the elder [q. v.], was erroneously ascribed to Egmont by Horace Walpole.
[Besides the authorities quoted in the text, the following books among others have been consulted: Walpole's Royal and Noble Authors, 1806, v. 294–300; Boswell's Johnson, ed. Hill, iv. 198, v. 449 n.; Brydges's Censura Literaria, 1815, v. 73 n.; G. E. C.'s Complete Peerage, 1890, iii. 244–5; Foster's Peerage, 1883, p. 258; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714, iii. 1146; Official Return of Lists of Members of Parliament, pt. ii. pp. 63, 645, 649; Notes and Queries, 1st ser. x. 129, 334, 2nd ser. viii. 398, 537, 8th ser. v. 147, 187, 254, 432, 433; Watt's Bibl. Brit. 1824; Halkett and Laing's Dict. of Anon. and Pseudon. Literature, 1882–8; Brit. Mus. Cat.]
PERCEVAL, JOHN, second Earl of Egmont (1711–1770), born in Westminster on 24 Feb. 1711, was the eldest son of John Perceval, first earl of Egmont [q. v.], by his wife Catherine, elder daughter of Sir Philip Parker à Morley, bart., of Erwarton, Suffolk. He was privately educated, and in 1731, while under age, was returned to the Irish House of Commons for Dingle Icouch in Kerry, which he continued to represent until his accession to the peerage in 1748. When quite young Perceval ‘dabbled in writing Craftsmen and party papers’ (Walpole, Letters, 1857, ii. 144). After more than one attempt to obtain a seat in the British House of Commons, he was elected for the city of Westminster in December 1741. He spoke for the first time in the house on 21 Jan. 1742, when he supported Pulteney's motion for a select committee of inquiry into the conduct of the war (Parl. Hist. xii. 370–3). In the following March he again insisted upon a strict and searching inquiry into the conduct of Walpole's administration (ib. xii. 470–2, 511–13), and in December he both spoke and voted in favour of the payment of the Hanoverian troops (ib. xii. 1043–51, 1053). In 1743 he published a masterly pamphlet in defence of Bath's political apostasy, entitled ‘Faction detected by the Evidence of Facts’ (Dublin, 1743, 8vo, anon.), which passed through a number of editions, and has been pronounced by Coxe as ‘one of the best political pamphlets ever written’ (Life of Sir Robert Walpole, 1798, i. 703 n.) In January 1744 he supported the rigorous prosecution of the war (Parl. Hist. xiii. 427–62). His unpopularity was so great at Westminster, owing to his desertion of the ‘independents,’ to whom he had owed his election, that Perceval had to seek another seat at the general election in the summer of 1747. Though defeated at the poll at Weobley, he gained the seat on petition in December 1747 through the influence of Henry Pelham. No sooner had he secured his seat in the house than he openly attached himself to the Prince of Wales, who appointed him a lord of the bed-chamber in March 1748. On 1 May following he succeeded his father as second Earl of Egmont in the peerage of Ireland. In the session of 1748–9 Egmont became the most prominent leader of the opposition in the House of Commons, where he ‘made as great a figure as was ever made in so short a time’ (Walpole, Letters, ii. 145). His opposition to the mutiny bill gave rise to Sir Charles Hanbury Williams's epigram:
Why has Lord Egmont 'gainst this bill
So much declaratory skill
So tediously exerted?
The reason's plain: but t'other day
He mutinied himself for pay,
And he has twice deserted.
In May 1749 he effected a coalition between the Jacobites and the prince's party (ib. ii. 153–4). He made a violent attack upon the ministry during the debate on the address on 16 Nov. 1749 (Parl. Hist. xiv. 578–85), and took a very active part in the opposition to Lord Trentham's re-election for Westminster in the following year. He opposed the address at the opening of the session on
