Dr. Burney now was become a member of the Literary Club; in which he
found an association so select, yet so various, that there were few
things, either of business or pleasure, that he ever permitted to
interfere with his attendance. Where, indeed, could taste point out,
or genius furnish, a society to meet his wishes, if that could fail
which had the decided national superiority of Johnson and Burke at its
head? while Banks, Beauclerk, Boswell, Colman, Courtney, Eliot (Earl,)
Fox, Gibbon, Hamilton (Sir William,) Hinchcliffe, Jones, Macartney
(Earl,) Malone, Percy, Reynolds, Scott (Lord Sewel,) Sheridan, Spencer
(Earl,) Windham, and many others of high and acknowledged abilities,
successively entering, marked this assemblage as the pride—not of this
meeting alone, but of the Classical British Empire of the day.
It had been the original intention of Dr. Johnson, when this club,
of which the idea was conceived by Sir Joshua Reynolds, was in
contemplation, to elect amongst its members some one of noted
reputation in every art, science, and profession; to the end that solid
information might elucidate every subject that should be started. This
profound suggestion, nevertheless, was either passed over, or overruled.
It is probable that those, so much the larger portion of mankind, who
love light and desultory discourse, were persuaded they should find
more amusement in wandering about the wilds of fanciful conjecture,
than in submitting to be disciplined by the barriers of systemized
conviction.
Brightly forward at this club came Mr. Windham, of Felbrig, amongst
those whose penetration had long since preceded the public voice in
ranking Dr. Burney as a distinguished Man of Letters. And from the date
of these meetings, their early esteem was augmented into partial, yet
steady regard.
Mr. Windham was a true and first rate gentleman; polite, cultivated,
learned, upright, and noble-minded. To an imagination the most ardent
for whatever could issue from native genius in others, he joined a
charm of manner that gave an interest to whatever he uttered himself;
no matter how light, how slight, how unimportant; that invested it
with weight and pleasure to his auditor: while in his smile there
was a gentleness that singularly qualified an almost fiery animation
in his words. To speak, however, of his instantaneous powers of
pleasing,—though it be conferring on him one of the least common of
Nature’s gifts, as well as one of the fairest,—is insufficient to
characterize the peculiar charm of his address; for it was not simply
the power of pleasing that he possessed—it was rather that of winning.