ution.

On the other hand, he laid down with equal perspicuity and force the
legal remedy, and pronounced, that where an unprovided difficulty of
this order arose, the right of meeting it reverted to the nation, acting
by its representatives the two Houses of Parliament, and that, so far as
personal right was in question, the Prince had no more right to assume
the throne than any other individual in the country.

Such is the blindness of party, and passion for power, that Fox, the
great advocate of popular supremacy, was found sustaining, all but in
words, that theory of divine right which had cost James II. his throne,
whose denial formed the keystone of Whig principles, and whose
confirmation would have authorized a despotism.

The decision was finally come to, that the political capacity of the
monarch was constitutionally distinguished from his personal; and that,
as in the case of an infant king, it had been taken for granted that the
royal will had been expressed by the Privy Council, under the Great
Seal; so, in the present instance of royal incapacity, it should also be
expressed by the Privy Council, under the Great Seal. The question of
right now being determined, the Chancellor was directed to affix the
Great Seal to a bill creating the Prince of Wales Regent, with limited
powers.

Those limitations were certainly formidable; and the chief matter of
surprise now is, that the Whigs should have suffered the Regent to
accept the office under such conditions. They prevented him from
creating any peerage, or granting any office in reversion, or giving any
office, pension, or salary, except during the royal pleasure, or
disposing of any part of the royal estate. They took from him also the
whole household, and the care of the King's person, his majesty being
put in charge of the Queen, with power to remove any of the household.
But the whole question has now passed away, and would be unimportant
except for its bearing on the position of Ireland.

In 1789, the zeal of the Irish opposition, and the flexibility of some
members of the Government combining, the Irish Parliament voted the
regency to the Prince without any limitation whatever. This naturally
directed the attention of ministers to the hazard of a collision between
the two Parliaments. The King's fortunate recovery prevented all
collision; but the danger was so apparent if the royal incapacity had
continued, and opinion became so strongly inflamed in I