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    Erskine , in this country , and Mr . Grattan , in Ireland , still survive . Mr . Curran is one of those characters which the lover of human nature , and of its intellectual capacities , delights to contemplate . He rose from nothing * . He derived no aid from rank and fortune . He

    ascended by his pwn energies to an eminence , which throws rank and fortune into comparative scorn . Mr . Curran was the great ornament of his time of the Irish bar , and in forensic eloquence has certainly n ^ ver hee n exceeded in modern times . His rfeetori-c was the pure emanation of his spirit , a warming and lighting up of the

    soul , that poured conviction and astonishment on hie hearers . It flashed in his eye , and revelled in the melodious and powerful accents of his voice . His thoughts almost always shaped themselves into imagery , and if his eloquence had any fault , it was that his images were too frequent . But they were at the same time so exquisitely

    beautiful , that he must have been a rigourous critic , that could have determined which of them to part with . His wit was not less exuberant than his imagination ; and it was the peculiarity of Mr . Curran ' s wit , that even when it took the form of a play on words , it acquired dignity from

    the vein of imagery that accompanied it . Every jest was a metaphor . But the great charm and power of Mr . Curran t eloquence lay in its fervour . It was by this that he animated his friends and appalled his enemies ; and the admiration which he thus excited was the child and the brother of

    love . It was impossible that a man whose mind "Was thus constituted , should not be a patriot j and certainly no man , in modern times , ever loved his country more

    passionately than Mr . Curran loved Ireland . The services he sought to render her were coeval with his first appearance before the public , and an earnest desire for her advantage and happiness attended him to his latest breath .

    The same sincere and earnest heart attended Mr . Curran through all his attach . Clients . He was constant and unalterable in his preferences and friendship , public end private . He began his political life in tbe connexion of Mr . Fox , and nev « r swerved from it for a moment . Prosperity -and adversity made no alteration in him . Hf he ever differed from that great man , it was that he sometimes thought his native

    country of Ireland was not sufficiently considered . There was nothing * fickle ov wavering in Mr . Curran t s election of mind . The man , that from an enlightened judgment and a tnre inspiration of feeling * , he £ hose , lie never cooled towards and oeror deserted . Mr . Curran'had hi * foibles and his faults . Which « rf us Iras not ? At this wful mo-

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    ment it becomes us to dwell on his excellencies . And as his life has been illustrious , and will leave a trait of glory behind , this is the part of him that every man of a pure

    mind will choose to contemplate . We may any of us , have his faults : it is his excellencies that we would wish , for the sake of human nature , to excite every man to copy in proportion to his ability to do so . ( Morning Chronicle . J

    It was truly said of him , that no advocate ever made the cause of his client so much his own . He entered into it with as much zeal a 6 if be was pleading for his own life ; and to his credit it mu st he owned , that his rare combination of talent and of zeal was in most instances

    successful . In 1806 Mr . C was appointed Master of the Rolls is Ireland , a situation in which he particularly distinguished himself for clear and correct decisions . He held lhat office until 1815 , when he was succeeded by Six William M'Mahon . — C Day J * . - / S . / 5 * . 4 .

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    Oct . 8 , at his seat a , t Atmmondell ^ the Hob . Henry Erskine , brother to tbe Earl of Buchati and to Lord Erskine . Thus at o » € and the same moment the former great leaders and ornaments of the Scots and Irish bar , have paid the debt of nature . Mr . Henry Evskine was long the Dean of

    Faculty , to which he was raised by his brethren , from their respect for the superiority of his talents , and his uniform maintenance of the dignity and independence of the bar . On the return of the Whigs to office , he was appointed Lord Advocate of Scotland , at the time -when hi « brother was made Lord Chancellor of Great Britain .

    His devotion to the cause of civil and religious liberty , was proved by the sacrifice which he made of tbe titular honours and advantages that would have been g-ladly lavished on him by successive administrations , if he had surrendered his political integrity to their views . He was inflexible oply in his liberal opinions— 'in all the

    relations of private life he was most plaqah \ e and conciliatory . From this honest stubbornness all the influence of the ministerial hostility was exerted against him , and to such a degree of rigour was the malice of the domineering faction carried against him , that for some years , with faculties unimpaired , and even while enjoying * the height of popular confidence

    and admiration , be felt the post of honour , as of repose , to be the private statiou . It was peculiarly honourable to the illustrious family of Bu oh an , that at one and the same tupe , and for many year * , th « two brothers of the Noble Earl should be the unrivalled leaders of the English , and < Scots hai >—« botn equally emiaeot , Bot only for the ai ^ Mir frith <* hick tfe > y maprtained « be pririlege * , * nd guarded tbe li ^ s , tibertics and pro-

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    6 $ 6 Obituary . —Rt . Hon . J . P . Curran . — Hon . Henry Erskine .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Oct. 2, 1817, page 626, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2469/page/54/