ent; and the evident proof which appeared that France was
no longer to be depended upon, convinced the English government that they
had nothing to hope for from abroad, and that Henry's best resources were
to be found, where in fact they had always been, in the strength and
affection of his own people.

From this choking atmosphere, therefore, we now turn back to England and
the English parliament; and the change is from darkness to light, from
death to life. Here was no wavering, no uncertainty, no smiling faces with
false hearts behind them; but the steady purpose of resolute men, who
slowly, and with ever opening vision, bore the nation forward to the fair
future which was already dawning.

Parliament met at the beginning of February, a few days after the king's
marriage, which, however, still remained a secret. It is, I think, no
slight evidence of the calmness with which the statesmen of the day
proceeded with their work, that in a session so momentous, in a session in
which the decisive blow was to be struck of the most serious revolution
through which the country as yet had passed, they should have first settled
themselves calmly down to transact what was then the ordinary business of
legislation, the struggle with the vital evils of society. The first nine
statutes which were passed in this session were economic acts to protect
the public against the frauds of money-making tradesmen; to provide that
shoes and boots should be made of honest leather; that food should be sold
at fair prices, that merchants should part with their goods at fair
profits; to compel, or as far as the legislature was able to do it, to
compel all classes of persons to be true men; to deal honestly with each
other, in that high Quixotic sense of honesty which requires good subjects
at all times and under all circumstances to consider the interests of the
commonwealth as more important than their own. I have already spoken of
this economic legislation, and I need not dwell now upon details of it;
although under some aspects it may be thought that more which is truly
valuable in English history lies in these unobtrusive statutes than in all
our noisy wars, reformations, and revolutions. The history of this as of
all other nations (or so much of it as there is occasion for any of us to
know), is the history of the battles which it has fought and won with evil;
not with political evil merely, or spiritual evil; but with all
manifestations what