rston was
one of the younger members of the administration.

The times were troublous. Lord Liverpool's long tenure of office had
been marked, so far as foreign affairs were concerned, by a resolute
hostility to every policy and all movements which tended in a
revolutionary direction, and to Lord Liverpool and his closest
colleagues the whole principle of popular liberty was merely the
principle of revolution. In home affairs Lord Liverpool had always
identified himself with systems of political repression, systems which
were established on the theory that whenever there was any talk of
popular grievance the only wise and just course was to put in prison
the men from whose mouths such talk came forth. On financial questions
Lord Liverpool appears to have entertained some enlightened views,
views that were certainly in advance of the political economy professed
by most of his colleagues, but where distinctly political controversy
came up he may be taken as a fair illustration of the old-fashioned
Tory statesmanship. Eldon, the Lord Chancellor, had a great deal of
shrewdness in his mental constitution, a shrewdness which very often
took the form of selfishness; and although he exhibited himself for the
most part as a genuine Tory, one is inclined to doubt whether he did
not now and then indulge in a secret chuckle at the expense of those
among his colleagues who really believed that the principles of
old-fashioned Toryism were the only sound principles of government.

The first business of State into which the new sovereign threw his
whole heart and soul was the endeavor to solemnize the opening of his
reign by obtaining a divorce from his wife. He went to work at once
with the set purpose of inducing his ministers to lend him their aid in
the {4} attainment of this great object. Lord Eldon was more
especially in his confidence, and with him George had many private
interviews and much exchange of letters on the subject which then
engrossed his attention. He accomplished his object so far that it was
arranged to leave the name of his wife out of the Royal Liturgy. But
even to set on foot the formal proceedings for a divorce proved a much
more difficult piece of business. Pliant as the ministers were,
inclined to be abject as some of them were in their anxiety to please
their royal master, yet the men with whom George especially consulted
could not shrink from impressing on his notice some of the obstacles
which