Yet Sheridan did not prize his lovely wife as he should have done, when he had once obtained her.  Again he had struck boldly into the drama, and in four years had achieved that fame as a play-writer to which even Johnson could testify so handsomely.  He now quitted this, and with the same innate power—­the same consciousness of success—­the same readiness of genius—­took a higher, far more brilliant flight than ever.  Yet had he garrisoned the forts he captured, he would have been a better, happier, and more prosperous man.  Had he been true to the Maid of Bath, his character would not have degenerated as it did.  Had he kept up his connection with the drama, he would not have lost so largely by his speculation in Drury Lane.  His genius became his temptation, and he hurried on to triumph and to fall.

Public praise is a syren which the young sailor through life cannot resist.  Political life is a fine aim, even when its seeker starts without a shred of real patriotism to conceal his personal ambition.  No young man of any character can think, without a thrill of rapture, on the glory of having his name—­now obscure—­written in capitals on the page of his country’s history.  A true patriot cares nothing for fame; a really great man is content to die nameless, if his acts may but survive him.  Sheridan was not really great, and it may be doubted if he had any sincerity in his political views.  But the period favoured the rise of young men of genius.  In former reigns a man could have little hope of political influence without being first a courtier; but by this time liberalism had made giant strides.  The leaven of revolutionary ideas, which had leavened the whole lump in France, was still working quietly and less passionately in this country, and being less repressed, displayed itself in the last quarter of the eighteenth century in the form of a strong and brilliant opposition.  It was to this that the young men of ambition attached themselves, rallying under the standard of Charles James Fox, since it was there only that their talents were sufficient to recommend them.

To this party, Sheridan, laughing in his sleeve at the extravagance of their demands—­so that when they clamoured for a ’parliament once a year, or oftener if need be,’ he pronounced himself an ‘Oftener-if-need-be’ man—­was introduced, when his fame as a literary man had brought him into contact with some of its hangers on.  Fox, after his first interview with him, affirmed that he had always thought Hare and Charles Townsend the wittiest men he had ever met, but that Sheridan surpassed them both; and Sheridan was equally pleased with ’the Man of the People.’