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In The Fate of Eloquence in the Age of Hume, Adam Potkay studies a ‘Tension between anostalgia for ancient eloquence and an emerging discourse of polite style’ that he sees as defining‘both the literary and political discourses of mid-eighteenth century Britain’ (1). Although Potkay’sstudy pre-dates the period I focus on here by half a century, his attention to that ‘tension’ is alsorelevant to the matter of my argument here. Potkay traces how the rise of the New Whigs led to a lossof the traditional classical values espoused by the Old Whigs and also by the Country party, and hemakes the point that: 27In keeping with an assumption at least as old as Quintilian, the Country writers equateeloquence with ‘virtue’, steadfastly maintaining that only the good citizen could be a goodspeaker. By virtue they mean the classical political virtues: courage, magnanimity, love ofjustice, civic participation, and, above all, a preference for the public above any merelyprivate good. (3)Quintilian acknowledged Cicero to be the master of classical rhetoric; a greater speaker even thanDemosthenes, and he was still held in high regard by eighteenth-century intellectuals. But as thecentury progressed, his style was deemed too passionate for use in polite society, and eighteenthcenturyetiquette demanded a better-mannered form of expression. Potkay discusses how, by themiddle of the century, the exaggerated focus on classical values and virtue that had characterised theage of Walpole, had been re-defined in the age of Hume. And by the end of the century, those whoindulged in the ‘excesses’ of vehement Ciceronian style tended to be politicians, of whom EdmundBurke was exemplary in his use of eloquence, to dramatic effect, in his own oratory. 28 At the otherend of the political spectrum there were also speakers like John Thelwall, whose radical republicanrhetoric was truer to the Socratic principles that informed Cicero’s oratorical voice. Wordsworth wascloser to Thelwall than Burke in upholding ‘the classical political virtues’, and was visited by thelatter in 1797.In March 1798 Wordsworth made a point of noting that he was especially concerned to write‘with eloquence’ as he was developing the dramatically different style of poetry that he produced inthe original draft of ‘The Ruined Cottage’. In a letter to James Tobin he excitedly relates that heconsidered his recent work to be suitable material for a planned epic. The letter is well known becauseit contains Wordsworth’s first reference to the plan for ‘The Recluse’:I have written 1300 lines of a poem in which I contrive to convey most of the knowledge ofwhich I am possessed. My object is to give pictures of Nature, Man, and Society. Indeed Iknow not anything which will not come within the scope of my plan. (EY 212)These lines are often quoted by critics preoccupied with how well Wordsworth is managing to followColeridge’s suggestions that he write an epic. Their focus on evidence that Wordsworth has actuallystarted the proposed ‘Recluse’, causes them to overlook other more important comments in the letter.27 Potkay’s study elaborates on the work of J. G. A. Pocock’s influential treatment of the history of this period inThe Machiavellian Moment.28 And he was much criticised for it by those who responded to him, especially Thomas Paine.33