will be tempted to avail himself. This danger we avoid if we logically follow out the principles of the Constitu tion to their consequences. There has been a demise of the crown. At the instant of the demise the next heir became our lawful sovereign. We consider the Princess of Orange as next heir; and we hold that she ought, without any delay, to be proclaimed, what she already is, our queen.

The Whigs replied that it was idle to apply ordinary rules to a country in a state of revolution; that the great question now depending was not to be decided by the saws of pedantic Templars; and that, if it were to be so decided, such saws might be quoted on one side as well as the other. If it was a legal maxim that the throne could. never be vacant, it was also a legal maxim that a living man could have no heir. James was still living. How, then, could the Princess of Orange be his heir? The laws of England had made full provision for the succession when the power of a sovereign and his natural life terminated together, but had made no provision for the very rare cases in which his power terminated before the close of his natural life; and with one of those very rare cases the Convention had now to deal. That James no longer filled the throne both houses had pronounced. Neither common law nor statute law designated any person as entitled to fill the throne between his demise and his decease. It followed that the throne was vacant, and that the houses might invite the Prince of Orange to fill it. That he was not next in order of birth was true; but this was no disadvantage; on the contrary, it was a positive recommendation. Hereditary monarchy was a good political institution, but was by no means more sacred than other good political institutions. Unfortunately, bigoted and servile theologians had turned it into a religious mystery, almost as awful and as incomprehensible as transubstantiation itself. To keep the institution, and yet to get rid of the abject and noxious superstitions with which it had of late years been associated, and which had made it a

I

a

curse instead of a blessing to society, ought to be the first object of English statesmen; and that object would be best attained by slightly deviating for a time from the general rule of descent, and by then returning to it.

The

Many attempts were made to prevent an open breach between the party of the prince and the party of the princess. A great meeting was held at the Earl of Devonshire's house, and the dispute was warm. Halifax was the chief speaker for William, Danby for Mary. Of the mind of Mary Danby knew nothing. She had been some time expected in London, but had been detained in Holland, first by masses of ice which had blocked up the rivers, and, when the thaw came, by strong westerly winds. Had she arrived earlier, the dispute would probably have been at once quieted. Halifax, on the other side, had no authority to say any thing in William's name. prince, true to his promise that he would leave the settlement of the government to the Convention, had maintained an impenetrable reserve, and had not suffered any word, look, or gesture, indicative either of satisfaction or of displeasure, to escape him. One of his countrymen, who had a large share of his confidence, had been invited to the meeting, and was earnestly pressed by the peers to give them some information. He long excused himself. At last he so far yielded to their urgency as to say, "I can only guess at his highness's mind. If you wish to know what I guess, I guess that he would not like to be his wife's gentleman usher; but I know nothing." "I know something now, however," said Danby. "I know enough, and too much." He then departed, and the assembly broke up.*

On the thirty-first of January, the debate which had * Dartmouth's note on Burnet, i., 393. Dartmouth says that it was from Fagel that the Lords extracted the hint. This was a slip of the pen very pardonable in a hasty marginal note; but Dalrymple and others ought not to have copied so palpable a blunder. Fagel died in Holland, on the 5th of December, 1688, when William was at Salisbury and James at Whitehall. The real person was, I suppose, Dykvelt, Bentinck, or Zulestein, most prob ably Dykvelt.

terminated thus in private was publicly renewed in the House of Peers. That day had been fixed for the national thanksgiving. An office had been drawn up for the occasion by several bishops, among whom were Ken and Sprat. It is perfectly free both from the adulation and from the malignity by which such compositions were in that age too often deformed, and sustains, better, perhaps, than any occasional service which has been framed dur ing two centuries, a comparison with that great model of chaste, lofty, and pathetic eloquence, the Book of Common Prayer. The Lords went in the morning to Westminster Abbey. The Commons had desired Burnet to preach before them at Saint Margaret's. He was not likely to fall into the same error which had been committed in the same place on the preceding day. His vigorous and animated discourse doubtless called forth the loud hums of his auditors. It was not only printed by command of the House, but was translated into French for the edification of foreign Protestants. The day closed with the festivities usual on such occasions. The whole town shone brightly with fireworks and bonfires; the roar of guns and the pealing of bells lasted till the night was far spent; but, before the lights were extinct and the streets silent, an event had taken place which threw a damp on the public joy.

The peers had repaired from the Abbey to their house, and had resumed the discussion on the state of the nation. The last words of the resolution of the Commons were taken into consideration, and it soon became clear that the majority were not disposed to assent to those words. To near fifty lords who held that the regal title still belonged to James were now added seven or eight who held that it had already devolved on Mary. The Whigs, finding themselves outnumbered, tried to compromise the dispute. They proposed to omit the words which pronounced the throne vacant, and simply to de

Both the service and Burnet's sermon are still to be found in our great libraries, and will repay the trouble of perusal.

1

It was

clare the prince and princess king and queen.
manifest that such a declaration implied, though it did
not expressly affirm, all that the Tories were unwilling to
concede; for nobody could pretend that William had suc-
ceeded to the regal office by right of birth.
To pass a
resolution acknowledging him as king was therefore an act
of election; and how could there be an election without
a vacancy? The proposition of the Whig lords was re-
jected by fifty-two votes to forty-seven. The question
was then put whether the throne was vacant. The Con-
tents were only forty-one, the Not Contents fifty-five.
Of the minority thirty-six protested.*

During the two following days London was in an un-
quiet and anxious state. The Tories began to hope that
they might be able again to bring forward their favorite
plan of regency with better success. Perhaps the prince
himself, when he found that he had no chance of wearing
the crown, might prefer Sancroft's scheme to Danby's.
It was better, doubtless, to be a king than to be a regent;
but it was better to be a regent than to be a gentleman
usher. On the other side, the lower and fiercer class of
Whigs, the old emissaries of Shaftesbury, the old asso-
ciates of College, began to stir in the city. Crowds as-
sembled in Palace Yard, and held threatening language.
Lord Lovelace, who was suspected of having encouraged
these assemblages, informed the peers that he was charged
with a petition requesting them instantly to declare the
Prince and Princess of Orange king and queen. He was
asked by whom the petition was signed. "There are no
hands to it yet," he answered; "but, when I bring it
here next, there shall be hands enough." This menace
alarmed and disgusted his own party. The leading Whigs
were, in truth, even more anxious than the Tories that
the deliberations of the Convention should be perfectly
free, and that it should not be in the power of any ad-
herent of James to allege that either house had acted un-
der force. A petition, similar to that which had been in-

* Lords' Journals, Jan. 31, 1688.