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principle had not yet been set up as a part of our constitutional system that the sovereign was bound to submit his own will and pleasure to the advice of his ministers. It would have been quite in accordance with recognized precedents since the House of Hanover came to the throne if the King were to proclaim his determination to act upon his own judgment and let his ministers either put up with his decision or resign their offices. For some time, indeed, it appeared as if the King was likely to assert his prerogative, according to the old fashion. The disagreeable and almost hazardous task of endeavoring to persuade the King into compliance with the desire of his Ministry was entrusted to Lord Brougham, who was supposed, as Lord Chancellor, to be keeper of the sovereign's conscience. Brougham was not a man who could be described as gifted with the bland powers of persuasion, but at all events he did not want courage for the task he had to undertake. William appears at first to have refused flatly his consent to the wishes of the Ministry, to have blustered a good deal in his usual unkingly, not to say ungainly, fashion, and to have replied to Brougham's intimation that the ministers might have to resign, with words to the effect that ministers, if they liked, might resign and be--ministers no more. The King, however, was at last prevailed upon to give his assent, but then a fresh trouble arose when he found that Lord Grey and Lord Brougham, presuming on his ultimate compliance, had already taken steps to make preparations for the ceremonials preceding dissolution. As the {152} Ministry thought it necessary that there should be no delay whatever in the steps required to dissolve Parliament, a message had been sent in order that the Life Guards should be ready, according to the usual custom when the King went to Westminster for such a purpose. William found in this act on the part of the Ministry a new reason for an outburst of wrath. He stormed at Brougham; he declared that it was an act of high-treason to call out the Life Guards without the express authority of the King, and he raged in a manner which seemed to imply that only the mercy of the sovereign could save Grey and Brougham from the axe on Tower Hill. [Sidenote: 1831--The second Reform Bill] Perhaps it was fortunate on the whole for the peaceful settlement of the controversy that the King should have found this new and unexpected stimulant to his
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