The Balance of Power. . .

This is the second (and less serious) of two prints arising from the debate in the House of Commons over what was then called the Russian Armament, the proposal to preserve a favorable balance of power for Britain by threatening war with Russia.

As the instruction in the subtitle, "vide Sherridan's Speech," suggests, the impetus and visual metaphors for this print come from a speech by Richard Brinsley Sheridan in which he deplores Prime Minister William Pitt's arrogance in thinking he can maintain peace by unilaterally determining the proper balance of power between countries and empires. In his part of the debate, Sheridan remarked

. . .let us call it anything but a system of peace; let us say it is a system of ambition, of vain glory, to see the offspring of the immortal Chatham, intriguing in all the courts of Europe, and setting himself up as the great posture-master of the balance of power, as possessing an exclusive right to be the umpire of all, and to weigh out in patent scales of his own, the quantity of dominion that each power shall possess.

The Balance of Power. . .

The Balance of Power. . . [April 21, 1791]
© Trustees of the British Museum

Picking up on the terms of Sheridan's speech, Gillray shows Pitt as a self-satisfied "posture-master" (acrobat) balancing on a tightrope. But he is also the fulcrum of a scale, weighing the "quantity of dominion" that the Ottoman and Russian empires shall possess. And in spite of his haughty assertion that he cannot be moved or bribed by either party, that his "Pole will always remain level," it is clear that the balance is inclining to Britain's ally, the Ottoman Turk.

But as the Victorians knew when they placed this print among the forty-five suppressed plates in the Bohn Edition of Gillray's works, any political commentary in the print is overwhelmed by its visual and verbal suggestiveness. It begins with the location of Pitt's "Pole" in Catherine's anatomy. It continues with the pun involved when the Turk asks Pitt to "help me to make another push." And of course, it plays upon the reputation of Catherine for sexual voracity and Pitt for sexual indifference. So it is perfectly appropriate for Catherine to call out Pitt as Billy the Flat and the Turk as "you circumcised dog."

This personal (as opposed to political) satire is extended to the dwarfish figure of Sheridan who (famously impecunious) can only look up and wish that he could be where Pitt is, and fill his pockets with cash. From that point of view, The Balance of Power can also describe the relative positions of Pitt and Sheridan. And the result is all in Pitt's favor.

Sources and Reading

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