the hollowness of man and rottenness of the world!--surely this is
enough: surely we may hope that a pardon followed. But now let us view
thee in thy upward flight the genius, the wit, the monarch of mind.

This great man, this wonderful genius, this eloquent senator, this most
applauded dramatist was--hear it, oh, ye boys! and fling it triumphantly
in the faces of your pedagogues--Sheridan, at your age, was a dunce!
This was the more extraordinary, inasmuch as his father, mother, and
grandfather were all celebrated for their quick mental powers. The last,
in fact, Dr. Sheridan, was a successful and eminent schoolmaster, the
intimate friend of Dean Swift, and an author. He was an Irish man and a
wit, and would seem to have been a Jacobite to boot, for he was deprived
of a chaplaincy he held under Government, for preaching, on King
George's birthday, a sermon having for its text 'Sufficient for the day
is the evil thereof.'

Sheridan's mother, again--an eccentric, extraordinary woman--wrote
novels and plays; among the latter 'The Discovery,' which Garrick said
was 'one of the best comedies he ever read;' and Sheridan's father, Tom
Sheridan, was famous, in connection with the stage where he was so long
the rival of David Garrick.

Born of such parents, in September, 1751, Richard Brinsley Sheridan was
sent in due course to Harrow, where that famous old pedant, Dr. Parr,
was at that time one of the masters. The Doctor has himself described
the lazy boy, in whose face he discovered the latent genius, and whom he
attempted to inspire with a love of Greek verbs and Latin verses, by
making him ashamed of his ignorance. But Richard preferred English
verses and no verbs, and the Doctor failed. He did not, even at that
period, cultivate elocution, of which his father was so good a master;