so he
will say a hundred nights." We may depend upon it the ministry whose
power will be lessened by the prince's attention will not be too eager
to get him to attend.

So it is if the prince come young to the throne; but the case is worse
when he comes to it old or middle-aged. He is then unfit to work. He
will then have spent the whole of youth and the first part of manhood
in idleness, and it is unnatural to expect him to labour. A
pleasure-loving lounger in middle life will not begin to work as George
III. worked, or as Prince Albert worked. The only fit material for a
constitutional king is a prince who begins early to reign--who in his
youth is superior to pleasure--who in his youth is willing to
labour--who has by nature a genius for discretion. Such kings are among
God's greatest gifts, but they are also among His rarest.

An ordinary idle king on a constitutional throne will leave no mark on
his time: he will do little good and as little harm; the royal form of
Cabinet government will work in his time pretty much as the unroyal.
The addition of a cypher will not matter though it take precedence of
the significant figures. But corruptio optimi pessima. The most evil
case of the royal form is far worse than the most evil case of the
unroyal. It is easy to imagine, upon a constitutional throne, an active
and meddling fool who always acts when he should not, who never acts
when he should, who warns his Ministers against their judicious
measures, who encourages them in their injudicious measures. It is easy
to imagine that such a king should be the tool of others; that
favourites should guide him; that mistresses should corrupt him; that
the atmosphere of a bad Court should be used to degrade free government.

We have had an awful instance of the dangers of constitutional royalty.
We have had the case of a meddling maniac. During great part of his
life George III.'s reason was half upset by every crisis. Throughout
his life he had an obstinacy akin to that of insanity. He was an
obstinate and an evil influence; he could not be turned from what was
inexpedient; by the aid of his station he turned truer but weaker men
from what was expedient. He gave an excellent moral example to his
contemporaries, but he is an instance of those whose good dies with
them, while their evil lives after them. He prolonged the American War,
perhaps he caused the American War, so we inherit the vestiges of an
American hatred; he forbad