nd
himself to the real character of the struggle. The question, as he felt,
was not merely one of peace or war, it was whether the new force of
opinion which had borne him into office and kept him there was to govern
England or no. It was this which made him stake all on the decision of
the Cabinet. "If I cannot in this instance prevail," he ended his
appeal, "this shall be the last time I will sit in the Council. Called
to office by the voice of the people, to whom I conceive myself
accountable for my conduct, I will not remain in a situation which
renders me responsible for measures I am no longer allowed to guide."
His proposals were rejected; and the resignation of his post, which
followed in October 1761, changed the face of European affairs.

[Sidenote: George breaks with the Whigs.]

"Pitt disgraced!" wrote a French philosopher, "it is worth two victories
to us!" Frederick on the other hand was almost driven to despair. But
George saw in the removal of his powerful minister an opening for the
realization of his long-cherished plans. The Whigs had looked on Pitt's
retirement as the restoration of their rule, unbroken by the popular
forces to which it had been driven during his ministry to bow. His
declaration that he had been "called to office by the voice of the
people, to whom I conceive myself accountable," had been met with
indignant scorn by his fellow-ministers. "When the gentleman talks of
being responsible to the people," retorted Lord Granville, the Lord
Carteret of earlier days, "he talks the language of the House of
Commons, and forgets that at this board he is only responsible to the
King." But his appeal was heard by the people at large. When the
dismissed statesman went to Guildhall the Londoners hung on his
carriage-wheels, hugged his footmen, and even kissed his horses. Their
break with Pitt was in fact the death-blow of the Whigs. In betraying
him to the king they had only put themselves in George's power; and so
great was the unpopularity of the ministry that the king was able to
deliver his longed-for stroke at a party that he hated even more than
Pitt. Newcastle found he had freed himself from the great statesman only
to be driven from office by a series of studied mortifications from his
young master; and the more powerful of his Whig colleagues followed him
into retirement. George saw himself triumphant over the two great
forces which had hampered the free action of the Crown, "the power whi