scheme proved that those who proposed it knew nothing of the nature of the evil with which they pretended to deal.  The real cause of the prevalence of corruption and faction was that a House of Commons, not accountable to the people, was more powerful than the King.  Bolingbroke’s remedy could be applied only by a King more powerful than the House of Commons.  How was the patriot Prince to govern in defiance of the body without whose consent he could not equip a sloop, keep a battalion under arms, send an embassy, or defray even the charges of his own household?  Was he to dissolve the Parliament?  And what was he likely to gain by appealing to Sudbury and Old Sarum against the venality of their representatives?  Was he to send out privy seals?  Was he to levy ship-money?  If so, this boasted reform must commence in all probability by civil war, and, if consummated, must be consummated by the establishment of absolute monarchy.  Or was the patriot King to carry the House of Commons with him in his upright designs?  By what means?  Interdicting himself from the use of corrupt influence, what motive was he to address to the Dodingtons and Winningtons?  Was cupidity, strengthened by habit, to be laid asleep by a few fine sentences about virtue and union?

Absurd as this theory was, it had many admirers, particularly among men of letters.  It was now to be reduced to practice; and the result was, as any man of sagacity must have foreseen, the most piteous and ridiculous of failures.

On the very day of the young King’s accession, appeared some signs which indicated the approach of a great change.  The speech which he made to his Council was not submitted to the Cabinet.  It was drawn up by Bute, and contained some expressions which might be construed into reflections on the conduct of affairs during the late reign.  Pitt remonstrated, and begged that these expressions might be softened down in the printed copy; but it was not till after some hours of altercation that Bute yielded; and even after Bute had yielded, the King affected to hold out till the following afternoon.  On the same day on which this singular contest took place, Bute was not only sworn of the Privy Council, but introduced into the Cabinet.

Soon after this Lord Holdernesse, one of the Secretaries of State, in pursuance of a plan concerted with the Court, resigned the seals.  Bute was instantly appointed to the vacant place.

A general election speedily followed, and the new Secretary entered Parliament in the only way in which he then could enter it, as one of the sixteen representative peers of Scotland. [In the reign of Anne, the House of Lords had resolved that, under the 23rd article of Union, no Scotch peer could be created a peer of Great Britain.  This resolution was not annulled till the year 1782.]