Now the fever hath somewhat subsided which came over the people from
the grave of Sir Robert Peel, there is room for a few observations on
his decease and on its consequences. All public writers, I believe,
have expatiated on his character, comparing him with others who,
within our times, have occupied the same position. My own opinion
has invariably been that he was the wisest of all our statesmen;
and certainly, though he found reason to change his sentiments and
his measures, he changed them honestly, well weighed, always from
conviction, and always for the better. He has been compared, and
seemingly in no spirit of hostility or derision, with a Castlereagh,
a Perceval, an Addington. a Canning. Only one of these is worthy of
notice, namely Canning, whose brilliancy made his shallowness less
visible, and whose graces, of style and elocution threw a vail over
his unsoundness and lubricity. Sir Robert Peel was no satirist or
epigrammatist: he was only a statesman in public life: only a virtuous
and friendly man in private. _Par negotiis, nee supra_. Walpole alone
possessed his talents for business. But neither Peel nor his family
was enriched from the spoils of his country; Walpole spent in building
and pictures more than double the value of his hereditary estate, and
left the quadruple to his descendants.
Dissimilar from Walpole, and from commoner and coarser men who
occupied the same office, Peel forbade that a name which he had
made illustrious should be degraded and stigmatized by any title
of nobility. For he knew that all those titles had their origin and
nomenclature from military services, and belong to military men, like
their epaulets and spurs and chargers. They sound well enough against
the sword and helmet, but strangely in law-courts and cathedrals: but,
reformer as he was, he could not reform all this; he could only keep
clear of it in his own person.