affix the Great Seal to blank paper, an act which would have caused a frenzy of denunciation from every historian if it had happened under Charles I. or James II., or had been performed by any other than the orthodox Whig Somers. As it is, some people seem disposed to accept Hallam's ludicrous excuse for the King, that he was influenced "by a deep sense of the unworthiness of mankind."
Certainly the refusal of the royal assent to the "Place Bills," and to the bill for securing the independence of the judges as regards the Crown, though they may be explained by a deep sense of the unworthiness of human nature when not seated upon an elective throne, are equally irreconcilable with Revolution theories. Here the man who has been elevated to the throne on the distinct understanding that he is to accommodate himself to that idea of royalty which recognises the legislative supremacy of Parliament, appears as using the power which has been conferred upon him in defiance of the compact under which it was conferred.
As we contemplate the portrait in which Kneller has striven to immortalise William as a hero, the words of Hallam rise to our minds:—"Mistaken in some points of his domestic policy, unsuited by some failings of his character for the English nation, it is still to his superiority in virtue and energy over all her own natives in that age that England is indebted for her honour and liberty." The words rise to our minds, but they rise only to be condemned. William
