ninety-nine out of a hundred never bestowing a thought upon the subject tells a volume in regard to mankind, and opens a very extraordinary view of the world, accounting for a great deal of otherways unaccountable matter. I had no enlightened person to give me a lift. I was left to grope my own way, and consequently lost a great deal of two years till at last I made up my own mind, and have never since had an anxious thought upon the subject. I was afterwards much struck with Machiavel's Discourses on Livy, Demosthenes, and by the law of nature more than the law of nations. I attended Blackstone's lectures with great care, and profited considerably by them. I got little or no knowledge of the world, however. I came full of prejudices. My tutor added to those prejudices by connecting me with the anti-Westminsters, who were far from the most fashionable part of the college, and a small minority.
"Dr. Gregory succeeded Dr. Conybeare,[1] and was very kind to me, conversed familiarly and frequently with me, had kept good company, was a gentleman, though not a scholar, and gave me notions of people and things which were afterwards useful to me. I likewise fell into habits with Dr. King, President of St. Mary Hall, a Tory and Jacobite, but a gentleman and an orator. He had a great deal of historical knowledge[2] and of anecdote, having been intimately connected with the heads of the Tory party from the reign of Queen Anne.[3]
"I was likewise much connected during all the time I was at college with Mr. Hamilton Boyle, afterwards Earl of Cork. As to the rest, the college was very low: a proof of it is, that no one who was there in my time has made much figure either as a publick man or man of
- ↑ As Dean of Christ Church.
- ↑ See his Latin orations, and pamphlet against Dr. Gilbert, Bishop of Sarum, afterwards Archbishop of York, whom he styled always "Plumbeus." He had a silver stand-dish with this inscription, "Hoc ex plumbo fit," being purchased by the sale of this pamphlet. See The Toast and Fitzosborne's Letters, written by Mr. Melmoth, his son-in-law, and his character there under the name of Mezentius. (Note by Lord Shelburne.)
- ↑ Dr. King made a complete renunciation of his Jacobite principles on the accession of George III. Blackstone to Shelburne, August 4th, 1761.
