Happily, his own candour turns our hostility from himself against his defenders.

It was only in wayward and bitter remarks that he misrepresented Lady Byron.

He would have defended himself irresistibly if Mr.Moore had left only his acknowledging passages.

But Mr.Moore has produced a "Life" of him which reflects blame on Lady Byron so dexterously, that "more is meant than meets the ear." The almost universal impression produced by his book is, that Lady Byron must be a precise and a wan, unwarming spirit, a blue-stocking of chilblained learning, a piece of insensitive goodness.
'Who that knows Lady Byron will not pronounce her to be everything the reverse?
Will it be believed that this person, so unsuitably matched to her moody lord, has written verses that would do no discredit to Byron himself; that her sensitiveness is surpassed and bounded only by her good sense; and that she is '"Blest with a temper, whose unclouded ray Can make to-morrow cheerful as to-day"?
'She brought to Lord Byron beauty, manners, fortune, meekness, romantic affection, and everything that ought to have made her to the most transcendent man of genius--had he been what he should have been--his pride and his idol.

I speak not of Lady Byron in the commonplace manner of attesting character: I appeal to the gifted Mrs.
Siddons and Joanna Baillie, to Lady Charlemont, and to other ornaments of their sex, whether I am exaggerating in the least when I say, that, in their whole lives, they have seen few beings so intellectual and well-tempered as Lady Byron.
'I wish to be as ingenuous as possible in speaking of her.