But he did not suffer either his writings or the enrichment of “Strawberry” with antiquarian treasures to engross the whole of his attention.  For the first thirty years and more of his public life he was a zealous politician.  And it is no slight proof how high was the reputation for sagacity and soundness of judgement which he enjoyed, that in the ministerial difficulties caused by Lord Chatham’s illness, he was consulted by the leaders of more than one section of the Whig party, by Conway, the Duke of Bedford, the Duke of Grafton, Lord Holland, and others; that his advice more than once influenced their determinations; and that he himself drew more than one of the letters which passed between them.  Even the King himself was not ignorant of the weight he had in their counsels, and, on one occasion at least, condescended to avail himself of it for a solution of some of the embarrassments with which their negotiations were beset.

But after a time his attendance in Parliament, which had never been very regular, grew wearisome and distasteful to him.  At the General Election of 1768 he declined to offer himself again as a candidate for Lynn, which he had represented for several years.  And henceforth his mornings were chiefly occupied with literature; the continuation of his Memoirs; discussion of literary subjects with Gibbon, Voltaire, Mason, and others, while his evenings were passed in the society of his friends, a mode of enjoying his time in which he was eminently calculated to shine, since abundant testimony has come down to us from many competent judges of the charm of his conversation; the liveliness of his disposition acting as a most attractive frame to the extent and variety of his information.

Among his distractions were his visits to France, which for some time were frequent.  He had formed a somewhat singular intimacy with a blind old lady, the Marquise du Deffand, a lady whose character in her youth had been something less than doubtful, since she had been one of the Regent Duc d’Orleans’s numerous mistresses; but who had retained in her old age much of the worldly acuteness and lively wit with which she had borne her part in that clever, shameless society.  Her salon was now the resort of many personages of the highest distinction, even of ladies themselves of the most unstained reputation, such as the Duchesse de Choiseul; and the rumours or opinions which he heard in their company enabled him to enrich his letters to his friends at home with comments on the conduct of the French Parliament, of Maupeon, Maurepas, Turgot, and the King himself, which, in many instances, attest the shrewdness with which he estimated the real bearing of the events which were taking place, and anticipated the possible character of some of those which were not unlikely to ensue.