OCR Text |
Show Charles Sumner had a great fondness for the society and friendship of titled and famous people. In his case this was a natural and pardonable ambition. It is believed of Moore that he adored aristocrats mainly because his own birth had been humble, and because his genius had enabled him to pass the jealous barriers that protect the great. In Moore the feeling was like a feminine vanity; in Sumner it was a lofty pride. For Sumner was conscious of his power and had early proposed to himself a career or eminence - although whether it was to be in law, letters or in public affairs was not determined - and he cultivated with tact and with diligence the correspondence of leading Englishmen. As time went by, his friends, the great lawyers, were promoted to the bench, the politicians came into power as Her Majesty's Secretaries or were raised to the peerage, the great clergymen became bishops, and his relations were established with the men who were dominant in every field of distinction. Sumner deserved the friendships he had gained, for, besides having noble traits of character and solid abilities, he had been a hard student and had accomplished many things. He could scarcely say with Lord Bacon, "I have taken all knowledge to be my province," but he was a fair classical and a good English scholar, a well read lawyer, especially familiar with public law and with the history and ethics of legislation, and he possessed an intimate knowledge of modern history and of the secret springs of European politics that was shared by few men. The statesman, like the chess player, mostly study his adversary's game as well as his own; and Sumner, while Senator and chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, was constantly informed of expected moves as well as of the current events of the phases of opinion abroad. Often it happened, as Mr. Whipple relates in his charming essay, that a question prompted by him was put by some friend in the House of Commons, and upon that was founded some important motion in our Legislature. It is not to be supposed that he was always wise, but none of his rivals in the Senate had the advantage of knowing, as he did, the policy and movements of opponents. -- Francis ?. Underwood. |