Mirabeau, partly by a pamphlet on the Rights and Duties of Juries, which Romilly had published during the proceedings against the Dean of St. Asaph's, and by the desire of making acquaintance with Romilly's friend Dumont, at that time the pastor of a Protestant church at St. Petersburg, whom he intended to engage to come to England to undertake the education of his younger son Henry, "wishing to attempt a new line of education with him."[1]
"I was received by Lord Lansdowne," says Romilly, "in the most flattering manner. From that time he anxiously cultivated my acquaintance and my friendship; and to that friendship I owe, that I ever knew the affectionate wife who has been the author of all my happiness."[2] The friendship thus formed was still further increased by the answer written by Romilly to Madan's Thoughts on Executive Justice; the author of which, starting from the maxim that the certainty of punishment is more efficacious than its severity, went on to advocate the propriety of rigidly enforcing the whole penal code of England, in every instance and in all its barbarity. Mirabeau relates that Lord Lansdowne told him that he wished convicted criminals could be examined with a view to a philosophical study of their characters. "We govern men," he said, "and we do not know them; we do not even endeavour to know them."[3] Lord Lansdowne wished to bring Romilly into Parliament, and spoke of him to Morellet as the successor of Dunning in his confidence.[4]
Of Mirabeau while at Bowood, Romilly has preserved a curious anecdote. "He was fond," he says, "of bitter controversies in conversation with celebrated men. He wrote me a letter while I was on circuit in 1785, in which he gave me a very detailed account of a dispute which he supposed himself to have had with Gibbon, the historian, at Lord Lansdowne's table, in which he expressed himself
- ↑ Lord Lansdowne to Morellet, May 22nd, 1785.
- ↑ Life of Romilly, i. 85. As to the proceedings against the Dean of St. Asaph's, see infra, p. 379.
- ↑ Life of Romilly, i. 315.
- ↑ Ibid. i. 87, 320. Lord Lansdowne to Morellet, 1789.
