Early in the year 1827 was established “the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge,” of which Lord Brougham became, and continues to this day, chairman.  In the original prospectus, issued under his sanction, we find “The object of the Society is strictly limited to what its title imports, namely, the imparting useful information to all classes of the community, particularly to such as are unable to avail themselves of experienced teachers, or may prefer learning by themselves.”  The Society commenced their labours by a set of Treatises, the first or “Preliminary Treatise,” “On the objects, pleasures, and advantages of Science,” being from the pen of Lord Brougham; and in perspicuity and popular interest, this treatise is unrivalled in our times.  His Lordship is also understood, in conjunction with Mr. Charles Bell, to be engaged in illustrating with notes an edition of Paley’s works, to be published by the above Society.

In the preceding outline of the political life of Lord Brougham, we have quoted but few points of his personal character.  This has been so well drawn, and so recently too, that we are induced to adopt the following traits from a contemporary Magazine.[5] The paper whence these are extracted, purports to be a description of the Lord Chancellor’s first levee:—­

“Unfeigned respect for, and a slight personal acquaintance with, the noble person who now holds the seals, led me to attend his last levee.  The practice of receiving the respects of the public on one or two stated occasions is sufficiently ancient, but I have understood was discontinued, or not much observed, in the latter days of Lord Eldon.  It was revived with somewhat greater splendour by Lord Lyndhurst, but still it attracted little public notice.  I incline to think that it was reserved for Brougham to illustrate the ancient custom, by the splendour of those who chose to be dutiful to the Lord Chancellor.  The fashion of going to court is such, that it infers little personal respect to the individual monarch; but the practice of attending the levee of an inferior personage is to be ascribed to the respect which individual eminence commands.  When Lord Brougham announced his levees, it could not be known whether he should receive the homage of the aristocracy, to whom it was not supposed that his lordship’s politics were very amicable.  It was moreover thought that the republican, or, to speak more guardedly, the whig Lord Chancellor would care little for a custom in which there was no manifest utility.  He had declared that the gewgaws of office delighted him not; and I dare say he would fain bring his mind to believe that all ceremonial was idle, perhaps contemptible.  But it is the greatest mistake to suppose that Lord Brougham is inattentive to the ceremonies with which his high place is surrounded.  A careful observer will see clearly that imposing forms are perfectly agreeable to his mind; nobody could ridicule form better, so long as he held no situation which required