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Works of Lord Chesterfield
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General SummaryThe fourth earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) was a nobleman who achieved success both as a diplomat and an administrator, as an orator in the House of Lords, as an essayist, and as a wit. "His desirable lot" in what Voltaire, writing to him, called the "great lottery" of life included the posts of ambassador to Holland, lord lieutenant of Ireland, and privy councilor. His fame is now kept alive chiefly by his Letters to his only and dearly beloved son, upon whose education for a public career he lavished unremitting care. This correspondence began when the son was still a child and continued for about thirty years, until shortly before the latter’s premature death. Lord Chesterfield did not write the Letters for publication, but they were given to the world by his widow in 1774. They are a classic of English literature, the composition of one who was in every sense a man of the beau monde. Their author had known a great many people of prominence: he numbered Pope, Swift, Bolingbroke, Marlborough, Pitt, Montesquieu, and Voltaire among his friends; and his travels and correspondence kept him in touch with the changing phases of European society and politics. The Letters number over four hundred. Those here quoted were written between 1748 and 1766.
CHAPTER VIII
Letters of an English Nobleman1
39. The Duke of Marlborough2
Of all the men that ever I knew in my life (and I knew him
extremely well), the late duke of Marlborough3 possessed the
graces in the highest degree, not to say engrossed them; and
indeed he got the most by them; for I will venture (contrary
to the custom of profound historians, who always assign deep
causes for great events), to ascribe the better half of the duke
of Marlborough’s greatness and riches to those graces. He was
eminently illiterate; wrote bad English and spelled it still
worse. He had no share of what is commonly called parts;
that is, he had no brightness, nothing shining in his genius. He
had, most undoubtedly, an excellent good plain understanding,
with sound judgment. But these alone would probably have
raised him but something higher than they found him; which
was page to King James the Second’s queen. There the Graces
protected and promoted him; for, while he was an ensign of the
Guards, the duchess of Cleveland,1 . . . struck by those very
graces, gave him five thousand pounds, with which he immediately
bought an annuity for his life, of five hundred pounds
a year, of my grandfather, Halifax; which was the foundation
of his subsequent fortune. His figure was beautiful; but his
manner was irresistible, by either man or woman. It was by
this engaging, graceful manner that he was enabled, during all
his wars, to connect the various and jarring powers of the Grand
Alliance, and to carry them on to the main object of the war,
notwithstanding their private and separate views, jealousies,
and wrongheadednesses. Whatever court he went to (and he
was often obliged to go himself to some restive and refractory
ones), he as constantly prevailed, and brought them in to his
measures. Heinsius, a venerable old minister, grown gray in
business, and who had governed the republic of the United
Provinces2 for more than forty years, was absolutely governed
by the duke of Marlborough, as that republic feels to this day.
He was always cool; and nobody ever observed the least variation
in his countenance: he could refuse more gracefully than
other people could grant; and those who went away from him
the most dissatisfied as to the substances of their business were
yet personally charmed with him, and, in some degree, comforted
by his manner. With all his gentleness and gracefulness,
no man living was more conscious of his situation, nor maintained
his dignity better.
1 . New York, 1863. Harper and Brothers.
2 , pp. 230–231.
3 Marlborough died in 1722. This letter was written in 1748.
1 A favorite of Charles II.
2 The Dutch Netherlands.
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Chicago: "The Duke of Marlborough," Works of Lord Chesterfield in Readings in Modern European History, ed. Webster, Hutton (Boston: D.C. Heath, 1926), 71–72. Original Sources, accessed April 23, 2024, http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=PX1SZBVV3ISAK37.
MLA: . "The Duke of Marlborough." Works of Lord Chesterfield, in Readings in Modern European History, edited by Webster, Hutton, Boston, D.C. Heath, 1926, pp. 71–72. Original Sources. 23 Apr. 2024. http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=PX1SZBVV3ISAK37.
Harvard: , 'The Duke of Marlborough' in Works of Lord Chesterfield. cited in 1926, Readings in Modern European History, ed. , D.C. Heath, Boston, pp.71–72. Original Sources, retrieved 23 April 2024, from http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=PX1SZBVV3ISAK37.
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