he is the most scientific of conservative
thinkers, and there is not one in whom the doctrine that prefers the
ship to the crew can be so profitably studied.

In his scruple to do justice to conservative doctrine Mr. Bryce extracts
a passage from a letter of Canning to Croker which, by itself, does not
adequately represent that minister's views. "Am I to understand, then,
that you consider the king as completely in the hands of the Tory
aristocracy as his father, or rather as George II. was in the hands of
the Whigs? If so, George III. reigned, and Mr. Pitt (both father and
son) administered the government, in vain. I have a better opinion of
the real vigour of the crown when it chooses to put forth its own
strength, and I am not without some reliance on the body of the people."
The finest mind reared by many generations of English conservatism was
not always so faithful to monarchical traditions, and in addressing the
incessant polemist of Toryism Canning made himself out a trifle better
than he really was. His intercourse with Marcellus in 1823 exhibits a
diluted orthodoxy: "Le systeme britannique n'est que le butin des
longues victoires remportees par les sujets contre le monarque.
Oubliez-vous que les rois ne doivent pas donner des institutions, mais
que les institutions seules doivent donner des rois?... Connaissez-vous
un roi qui merite d'etre libre, dans le sens implicite du mot?... Et
George IV., croyez-vous que je serais son ministre, s'il avait ete libre
de choisir?... Quand un roi denie au peuple les institutions dont le
peuple a besoin, quel est le procede de l'Angleterre? Elle expulse ce
roi, et met a sa place un roi d'une famille alliee sans doute, mais qui
se trouve ainsi, non plus un fils de la royaute, confiant dans le droit
de ses ancetres, mais le fils des institutions nationales, tirant tous
ses droits de cette seule origine.... Le gouvernement representatif est
encore bon a une chose que sa majeste a oubliee. Il fait que des
ministres essuient sans repliquer les epigrammes d'un roi qui cherche a
se venger ainsi de son impuissance."

Mr. Bryce's work has received a hearty welcome in its proper hemisphere,
and I know not that any critic has doubted whether the pious founder,
with the dogma of unbroken continuity, strikes the just note or covers
all the ground. At another angle, the origin of the greatest power and
the grandest polity in the annals of mankind emits a different ray. It
was a favourite