circle of advisors was the object of repeated attacks, and
the name "cabinet" (arising from the king's habit of receiving the
members in a small private room, or cabinet, in the royal palace) was
applied at first as a term of reproach. The device met, however, a
genuine need, and by 1689 its perpetuation was assured. The larger (p. 038)
Privy Council was continued in existence, and it exists to-day; but
its powers became long ago merely nominal.[40]

[Footnote 40: H. W. V. Temperley, The Inner and
Outer Cabinet and the Privy Council, 1679-1683, in
_English Historical Review_, Oct., 1912.]

*37. Principles of Cabinet Government Established.*--Under William III.
the cabinet took on rapidly the character which it bears to-day.
Failing in the attempt to govern with a cabinet including both Whigs
and Tories, William, in 1693-1696, gathered about himself a body of
advisers composed exclusively of Whigs, and the principle speedily
became established for all time that a cabinet group must be made up
of men who in respect to all important matters of state are in
substantial agreement. Before the close of the eighteenth century
there had been fixed definitely the conception of the cabinet as a
body necessarily consisting (a) of members of Parliament (b) of the
same political views (c) chosen from the party possessing a majority
in the House of Commons (d) prosecuting a concerted policy (e) under a
common responsibility to be signified by collective resignation in the
event of parliamentary censure, and (f) acknowledging a common
subordination to one chief minister.[41] During the eighteenth-century
era of royal weakness the cabinet acquired a measure of independence
by which it was enabled to become, for all practical purposes, the
ruling authority of the realm; and, under the limitation of strict
accountability to the House of Commons, it fulfills substantially that
function to-day. Its members, as will appear, are at the same time the
heads of the principal executive departments, the leaders in the
legislative chambers, and the authors of very nearly the whole of
governmental policy and conduct.[42]

[Footnote 41: H. D. Traill, Central Government
(London, 1881), 24-25.]

[Footnote 42: On the rise of the cabinet see, in
addition to the general histories, M. T. Blauvelt,
The D