is
rival, Newton, was as good a Whig as himself, and indeed a much better
one. It was characteristic of his mind ever to impute the broad
divisions of opinion among men to ignorance or incapacity to
understand each other. With a more scientific method, he thought that
many disputes could be settled, and many adversaries reconciled. For
many years it was his favourite occupation to show that there was no
real cause for a breach at the Reformation, and that people called
themselves Protestants not knowing what was really meant by Catholic.
He assured the Catholics that the Confession of Augsburg, rightly
understood, was sound Catholicism; and he assured the Lutherans that
there was nothing in the Council of Trent with which they were forced,
in consistency, to quarrel. With the same maxim, that men are
generally right in what they affirm, and wrong in what they deny, he
taught that Whig and Tory are alike necessary portions of truth, that
they complete each other, that they need each other, that a true
philosophy of politics includes the two. He also said that the past
is a law for the future, and that the will of Providence consecrates
those things which are permitted to succeed and to endure. This is
pure conservatism. The Whig seeks that which ought to be elsewhere
than in that which is. His standing purpose is to effect change, for
the past is essentially Tory.

The influence of the most enlightened German on the new German dynasty
was not favourable to party government, and would have combined better
with the system of William III. They consulted an enlightened
Englishman, and Lord Cowper drew up an important political paper,
showing that the king ought to depend on the Whigs. Moreover,
Bolingbroke, at the last moment, by his Stuart intrigue, compelled
George I to come in as the nominee of a party. To Bolingbroke's
intrigues the House of Hanover owed that which it most needed, the
prestige of victory. He had found comfort in the reflection that,
although it might be impossible to prevent the heralds from
proclaiming the new monarchy, the new monarch would soon make himself
odious, and would be more easy to expel than to exclude. The mass of
the people was Tory, and the majority of Tories were Jacobites. There
was the assured co-operation of the sects discontented with the Union,
and a part of the very small army would be held fast by the sullen
anger of the Irish.

Lewis XIV, weary and inert, would n