igor of his mind. He was in
Holland when he combined the vast plan of his foreign negotiations. When
he came to open his design to his ministers in England, even the sober
firmness of Somers, the undaunted resolution of Shrewsbury, and the
adventurous spirit of Montagu and Orford were staggered. They were not
yet mounted to the elevation of the king. The cabinet, then the regency,
met on the subject at Tunbridge Wells, the 28th of August, 1698; and
there, Lord Somers holding the pen, after expressing doubts on the state
of the Continent, which they ultimately refer to the king, as best
informed, they give him a most discouraging portrait of the spirit of
this nation. "So far as relates to England," say these ministers, "it
would be want of duty not to give your Majesty this clear account: that
there is _a deadness and want of spirit in the nation universally_, so
as not at all to be disposed to _the thought of entering into a new
war_; and that they seem to be _tired out with taxes_ to a degree beyond
what was discerned, till it appeared upon the occasion of _the late
elections_. This is the truth of the fact, upon which your Majesty will
determine what resolutions are proper to be taken."

His Majesty did determine,--and did take and pursue his resolution. In
all the tottering imbecility of a new government, and with Parliament
totally unmanageable, he persevered. He persevered to expel the fears of
his people by his fortitude, to steady their fickleness by his
constancy, to expand their narrow prudence by his enlarged wisdom, to
sink their factious temper in his public spirit. In spite of his people,
he resolved to make them great and glorious,--to make England, inclined
to shrink into her narrow self, the arbitress of Europe, the tutelary
angel of the human race. In spite of the ministers, who staggered under
the weight that his mind imposed upon theirs, unsupported as they felt
themselves by the popular spirit, he infused into them his own soul, he
renewed in them their ancient heart, he rallied them in the same cause.

It required some time to accomplish this work. The people were first
gained, and, through them, their distracted representatives. Under the
influence of King William, Holland had rejected the allurements of every
seduction, and had resisted the terrors of every menace. With Hannibal
at her gates, she had nobly and magnanimously refused all separate
treaty, or anything which might for a moment appear