William Grenville, 1st Baron Grenville

William Grenville (circa 1800)

William Wyndham Grenville, 1st Baron Grenville PC PCi FRS (25 October 1759 – 12 January 1834) was a British Pittite Tory politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1806 to 1807, but was a supporter of the Whigs for the duration of the Napoleonic Wars. As prime minister, his most significant achievement was the abolition of the slave trade in 1807. However, his government failed to either make peace with France or to accomplish Catholic emancipation and it was dismissed in the same year.

Quotes

1780s

• He should not do justice to his feelings, if he did not express to the House, and to his hon. friend, the satisfaction he had received from one of the most masterly and eloquent speeches he had ever heard; a speech which could not fail to reflect the greatest lustre upon his hon. friend, and entitled him to the thanks of that House, of the people of England, of all Europe, and of the latest posterity.
  • Speech in the House of Commons on William Wilberforce's speech advocating the abolition of the slave trade (12 May 1789), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXVII. Comprising the Period from the Eighth of May 1789, to the Fifteenth of March 1791 (1816), column 76

1790s

• You can hardly form to yourself an idea of the labour I have gone through; but I am repaid by the maintenance of peace, which is all this country has to desire. We shall now, I hope, for a very long period indeed enjoy this blessing, and cultivate a situation of prosperity unexampled in our history. The state of our commerce, our revenue, and, above all, that of our public funds, is such as to hold out ideas which but a few years ago would indeed have appeared visionary, and which there is now every hope of realizing.
  • Letter (17 August 1791), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 196

• I bless God, that we had the wit to keep ourselves out of the glorious enterprize of the combined armies, and that we were not tempted by the hope of sharing the spoils in the division of France, nor by the prospect of crushing all democratical principles all over the world at one blow.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham during the French Revolutionary Wars (7 November 1792), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 222

• All my ambition is that I may at some time hereafter, when I am freed from all active concern in such a scene as this is, have the inexpressible satisfaction of being able to look back upon it, and to tell myself that I have contributed to keep my own country at least a little longer from sharing in all the evils of every sort that surround us. I am more and more convinced that this can only be done by keeping wholly and entirely aloof, and by watching much at home, but doing very little indeed; endeavouring to nurse up in the country a real determination to stand by the Constitution when it is attacked, as it most infallibly will be if these things go on; and, above all, trying to make the situation of the lower orders among us as good as it can be made. In this view, I have seen with the greatest satisfaction the steps taken in different parts of the country for increasing wages, which I hold to be a point of absolute necessity, and of a hundred times more importance than all that the most doing Government could do in twenty years towards keeping the country quiet. I trust we may again be enabled to contribute to the same object by the repeal of taxes, but of that we cannot yet be sure. Sure I am, at least I think myself so, that these are the best means in our power to delay what perhaps nothing can ultimately avert, if it is decreed that we are again to be plunged into barbarism.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham during the French Revolutionary Wars (7 November 1792), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 223

• The hands of Government must be strengthened if the country is to be saved; but, above all, the work must not be left to the hands of Government, but every man must put his shoulder to it, according to his rank and situation in life, or it will not be done.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (14 November 1792), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 228

• The spirit of the people is evidently rising, and I trust that we shall have energy enough in the country to enable the Government to assert its true situation in Europe, and to maintain its dignity.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (5 December 1792), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 232

• The assertion of the House of Commons, in which their lordships committee had unanimously concurred, was, that they were satisfied there was a design now openly professed and acted upon, which aimed at nothing less than a traitorous conspiracy for the subversion of the established laws and constitution of the kingdom, and to introduce that system of anarchy and confusion which had fatally prevailed in France; and he was sorry to say, that this had not been discouraged, on the contrary it had been encouraged in many instances, and that at a time when we were at war for the maintenance of every thing that was dear to us, and to every civilized nation in the world. From the first moment that those who brought on the revolution in France found themselves strong enough to avow their real principles and designs, their mischievous system commenced, and they began to disturb this and other countries, under the name of reform.
  • Speech in the House of Lords on the Habeas Corpus Suspension Bill (22 May 1794), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXXI. Comprising the Period from the Fourteenth of March 1794, to the Twenty-Second of May 1795 (1818), columns 575-576

• Besides this, their lordships would perceive in these societies a studious imitation of the proceedings of the National Convention: they adopted all their phrases in speaking, and all their forms in transacting business. All this proved, to his mind, that their views were to familiarize the lower classes of the people of this country to these proceedings, in order to prepare them to come to a resolution, for the destruction of all rank, distinction, and order in society: every thing was to be swallowed up in the jacobinical term, citizen.
  • Speech in the House of Lords on the Habeas Corpus Suspension Bill (22 May 1794), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXXI. Comprising the Period from the Fourteenth of March 1794, to the Twenty-Second of May 1795 (1818), columns 577-578

• We, in the present instance, should regard the fate of the monarchy of France as a lesson; therefore, though the individuals were insignificant in number, in talents, and in character, that was no reason for not checking their proceedings, for they might soon become dangerous if suffered to proceed.
  • Speech in the House of Lords on the Habeas Corpus Suspension Bill (22 May 1794), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXXI. Comprising the Period from the Fourteenth of March 1794, to the Twenty-Second of May 1795 (1818), column 581

• If we listen to the ideas of peace in the present moment (even supposing it were offered), it can be only because we confess ourselves unable to carry on the war. Such a confession affords but a bad security against the events which must follow, in Flanders, in Holland, and (by a very rapid succession) in this island.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (9 July 1794), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 257

• I have no other view of the contest in which we are engaged, nor ever have had, than that the existence of the two systems of Government is fairly at stake, and in the words of St. Just, whose curious speech I hope you have seen, that it is perfect blindness not to see that in the establishment of the French Republic is included the overthrow of all the other Governments of Europe.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (17 September 1794), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 303

• I can see no grounds, in the state of this country, to hope for such an exception in our favour, and I do verily believe that we must prepare to meet the storm here, and that we must not count upon the continuance of a state of domestic tranquillity which has already lasted so much beyond the period usually allotted to it in the course of human events. I trust that we shall at least meet it with more firmness than our neighbours, but even in order to do this, we ought not to blind ourselves at the moment of its approach. It seems too probable that it is decreed by Providence that a stop should be put (for reasons probably inscrutable to us) to the progress of arts and civilization among us. It is a melancholy reflection to be born to the commencement of such a scene, and to be called to bear a principal share in it, but I trust we may hope that our strength may be proportioned to our trial.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (27 September 1794), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 305

• [There is an] advantage, and even necessity, of uniting at this time in the public service the great bulk of the landed property of the country, and doing away all distinctions of party between those who wish the maintenance of order and tranquillity here.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (30 October 1794), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 320

• The treasonable speeches and writings which had of late been so assiduously disseminated at public meetings, most particularly called for the interference of parliament. As one of the king's servants, indeed, he might say as a member of that House, he felt it an indispensable duty to endeavour to check their flagitious tendency.
  • Speech in the House of Lords introducing the Treasonable Practices Bill (6 November 1795), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXXII. Comprising the Period from the Twenty-Seventh Day of May 1795, to the Second Day of March 1797 (1818), column 245

• He considered the present bill as part of a system for suppressing an evil, that not only threatened the security of the subject, but menaced the very existence of the constitution. The system to overthrow all order had been gradually proceeding for three years. The fact was notorious.
  • Speech in the House of Lords introducing the Seditious Meetings Bill (9 December 1795), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXXII. Comprising the Period from the Twenty-Seventh Day of May 1795, to the Second Day of March 1797 (1818), column 527

• In all periods of our history, instances were to be found of the evils arising from tumultuous assemblies; and experience must show, from the frequency with which they were now held, the absolute necessity for their suppression.
  • Speech in the House of Lords introducing the Seditious Meetings Bill (9 December 1795), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXXII. Comprising the Period from the Twenty-Seventh Day of May 1795, to the Second Day of March 1797 (1818), column 529

• It is a curious speculation in history to see how often the good people of England have played this game over and over again, and how incorrigible they are in it. To desire war without reflection, to be unreasonably elated with success, to be still more unreasonably depressed by difficulties, and to call out for peace with an impatience which makes suitable terms unattainable, are the established maxims and the regular progress of the popular mind in this country. Yet, such as it is, it is worth all the other countries of the world put together, so we must not too much complain of it.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (28 April 1797), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 376

• The task which is now left to us, is no doubt arduous and difficult. It would not be in the least so with a country united, and feeling its own strength: but to contend against dejection, cowardice and disaffection at home, aiding a powerful enemy from without, is not a light or easy matter. It must, however, be tried; for I have no conception that any other use can be made of this event by the Directory, than that of exacting from us concessions, which I trust neither the country nor Parliament will bring themselves to listen to.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (3 May 1797), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 377

• Ireland is our weakest point, and to that our attention must be most directed; for anything else I have very little apprehension.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (20 September 1797), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 383

• The Corresponding Societies in England had been mentioned. What those societies were, he need not remind their lordships: their publications, their meetings, their declarations, were in the memory of every man. A criminal had lately been convicted at Maidstone, of attempting to seduce the troops, and he was found to belong to these societies. A noble lord had told them, that even the United Irishmen would not have proceeded to the lengths they had done, without the encouragement of these societies. In one word, he could distinctly state, that, in every corner of the king's dominions, whatever sedition or treason could be found, whatever incitement to domestic tumult, whatever encouragement to foreign invasion, to these societies it was uniformly to be traced.
  • Speech in the House of Lords (22 March 1798), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXXIII. Comprising the Period from the Third Day of March 1797, to the Thirtieth Day of November, 1798 (1818), column 1350

• We have gone through such scenes as this country has never before known; where we have been wanting in firmness, we have suffered for it; where we have shown courage adequate to the danger, God has borne us through it; and so I trust He will do. At all events, our lives, and honour, and the existence of our country, are staked upon the issue, and nothing but resolution can save us.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (13 June 1798), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1853), p. 400

1800s

• We in truth formed our opinions on the subject together, and I was not more convinced than you were of the soundness of Adam Smith's principles of political economy till Lord Liverpool lured you from our arms into all the mazes of the old system.
  I am confident that provisions, like every other article of commerce, if left to themselves, will and must find their level; and that every attempt to disturb that level by artificial contrivances has a necessary tendency to increase the evil it seeks to remedy.
  • Letter to William Pitt (24 October 1800), quoted in Earl Stanhope, Life of The Right Honourable William Pitt, Volume III (1862), p. 248

• You know, I believe, that it was always my opinion—and I think it is yours—that the Union with Ireland would be a measure extremely incomplete and defective as to some of the most material benefits to be expected from it, unless immediate advantage were taken of it to attach the great body of the Irish Catholics to the measure itself, and to the government as administered under the control of the United Parliament.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (2 February 1801), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. III (1855), p. 128

• He thought the terms fraught with degradation and national humiliation.
  • Speech in the House of Lords against the proposed peace treaty with France (3 November 1801), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXXVI. Comprising the Period from the Twenty-Ninth Day of October, 1801, to the Twelfth Day of August, 1803 (1820), column 164

• We were enfeebled, but not broken down: we were lowered, but not debased. Some of our out-works had been demolished; many of them surrendered to the foe; but the citadel yet remained; and while it was defended by the noble courage of united Britons, it would bid defiance to attack. We should meet with mortifications and disappointments; but we should, he trusted, still preserve our honour, our constitution, and our religion.
  • Speech in the House of Lords against the proposed peace treaty with France (3 November 1801), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXXVI. Comprising the Period from the Twenty-Ninth Day of October, 1801, to the Twelfth Day of August, 1803 (1820), column 171

• As to the state of public affairs, it seems to me that war is inevitable—that war, if it comes, must a little sooner or a little later, place the government in Pitt's hands; and that this ought to be the wish of every man, who thinks it at all material to himself, whether Bonaparte shall or not treat us in twelve months, precisely in the style he has now treated the Swiss.
  • Letter to the Marquess of Buckingham (20 October 1802), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George the Third. From Original Family Documents. Vol. III (1855), p. 214

1810s

• Obedience to the laws was very properly regarded as a principal source of improvement. He admitted that no country could be tranquil or prosperous, where the laws were not generally obeyed; but before they could expect that general obedience, the laws themselves ought to be made equal to all.
  • Speech in the House of Lords (2 April 1816), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England From the Year 1803 to the Present Time, Vol. XXXIII. Comprising the Period from the Seventh Day of March, to the Twenty-Fifth Day of April, 1816 (1816), column 834

• The object of effecting a revolution in this country by inflaming the worst passions of the lowest orders of society has been unremittedly pursued for many years past. During the war its success was in great measure impeded by the large amount of military force then at the disposal of Government, by the extraordinary powers given by Parliament to the Crown, and by the great interest which the mass of our community took, and very justly, in the success of that contest.
  Since the peace the progress of these designs has been manifestly much more rapid. It has indeed been favoured, from time to time, by circumstances of temporary and local distress; but these have not been greater, they may be truly said to have been much less, than had before been frequently experienced without leading to any such results. So great a change as has been shown since the peace in the general temper and conduct of a large proportion of our population, has perhaps rarely occurred in any country. It seems no exaggeration to say, that if the promoters of general confusion can make as much new way in the next three or four years as they have done in the last, we must consider insurrection and civil bloodshed as inevitable; though even then we may hope that their issue would not be doubtful.
  • Letter to Lord Liverpool (12 November 1819), quoted in Charles Duke Yonge, The Life and Administration of Robert Banks, Second Earl of Liverpool, Vol. II (1868), p. 419

• The final resolution must be now taken, either to stop the evil here, or to acquiesce in its progress until it actually brings us to insurrection and civil war.
  • Letter to Lord Liverpool (12 November 1819), quoted in Charles Duke Yonge, The Life and Administration of Robert Banks, Second Earl of Liverpool, Vol. II (1868), p. 421

1820s

• As one of those who had always been favourable to the concession of the Catholic claims, he answered, that, from passing this bill, the greatest of all benefits would accrue—the benefit of doing justice.
  • Speech in the House of Lords in favour of the Duke of Portland's Roman Catholic Peers Bill (21 June 1822), quoted in The Parliamentary Debates...Vol. VII. Comprising the Period from the Twenty-Fourth Day of April, to the Sixth Day of August, 1822 (1825), column 1251

• I cannot forbear writing one line to congratulate you and myself on the account which I have just now received, that the Bill for repealing the Roman Catholic disabilities is actually a part of the law of the land. I may now say that I have not lived in vain.
  • Letter to the Duke of Buckingham (14 April 1829), quoted in The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820–1830. From Original Family Documents. Vol. II (1859), p. 394

Quotes about Lord Grenville

• The uncommon diligence which Mr. W. Grenville has continued to apply to his studies ever since he was settled here does him no small honour, and his pains are not lost. I have the happiness to see frequent proofs of the improvement he makes by them...they contain marks of various and well directed reading, of an habit of elegant observation &, which is more to the purpose than all the rest, of a good heart. His progress in the mathematical lecture is really astonishing, and if your lordship has any turn for that sort of study, you may be convinced of it by a continued dissertation in the way of analysis which he has written on the six first books of Euclid that would have done credit to a profess'd mathematician in the last age... From such a setting out one may without partiality expect more than common attainments.
  • Lewis Bagot to Lord Temple (8 April 1778), quoted in Peter Jupp, Lord Grenville, 1759–1834 (1985), p. 13

• From a party point of view Grenville's career, taken as a whole, was inconsistent. This inconsistency of political conduct was due to his inbred alarm at the spread of revolutionary principles abroad, and his belief in the efficacy of repressive measures at home. It should, however, always be remembered, when Grenville's consistency is called in question, that he twice gave up office rather than sacrifice his principles on the subject of catholic emancipation, and that his views on that question practically excluded him from office during the rest of his political life.
  • George Fisher Russell Barker, 'Grenville, William Wyndham', Dictionary of National Biography, Volume XXIII. Gray—Haighton, eds. Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee (1890), p. 138

• [T]he great staple of his discourse was argument, and this, as well as his statement, was clear and impressive, and, I may say, authoritative. His declamation was powerful, and his attacks hard to be borne. The industry with which he mastered a subject previously unknown to him, may be judged from his making a clear and impressive speech upon the change proposed in 1807 in the Court of Session; and no lawyer could detect a slip on any of the points of Scotch law which he had to handle.
  • Henry Brougham, The Life and Times of Henry Lord Brougham Written By Himself, Vol. III (1871), pp. 488-489

• In the House of Lords, Lord Grenville moved the resolutions upon the Union with Ireland in a speech of four hours; putting the arguments on strong grounds of detailed political necessity.
  • Lord Colchester, diary entry (19 March 1799), quoted in The Diary and Correspondence of Charles Abbot, Lord Colchester, Speaker of the House of Commons 1802–1817, Vol. I, ed. Charles, Lord Colchester (1861), p. 175

• Sheridan said upon this occasion that he had known many men knocked their heads against a wall, but he had never before heard of any man who collected the bricks and built the very wall with an intention to knock out his own brains against it.
  • Lord Colchester, diary entry (21 March 1807), quoted in The Diary and Correspondence of Charles Abbot, Lord Colchester, Speaker of the House of Commons 1802–1817, Vol. II, ed. Charles, Lord Colchester (1861), p. 109

• For strength of reasoning, for the enlarged views of a great statesman, for dignity of manner, and force of eloquence, Lord Grenville's was one of the best speeches that I have ever heard delivered in Parliament.
  • Samuel Romilly, diary entry on Grenville's speech in favour of the Bill to repeal the Act of King William, which made the offence of stealing privately in shops to the amount of five shillings a capital shoplifting offence (2 April 1813), quoted in Memoirs of the Life of Sir Samuel Romilly, Written By Himself; With A Selection From His Correspondence, Vol. III (1840), p. 95

• [I am struck by his] great attention, clearness and precision.
  • Lord Townshend to Lord Temple (30 November 1782), quoted in Peter Jupp, Lord Grenville, 1759–1834 (1985), p. 28