It was soon announced by authority that, before the beginning of summer, two hundred and twenty thousand men would be in the field against France.7 The contingent which each of the allied powers was to furnish was made known.  Matters about which it would have been inexpedient to put forth any declaration were privately discussed by the King of England with his allies.  On this occasion, as on every other important occasion during his reign, he was his own minister for foreign affairs.  It was necessary for the sake of form that he should be attended by a Secretary of State; and Nottingham had therefore followed him to Holland.  But Nottingham, though, in matters concerning the internal government of England, he enjoyed a large share of his master’s confidence, knew little more about the business of the Congress than what he saw in the Gazettes.

This mode of transacting business would now be thought most unconstitutional; and many writers, applying the standard of their own age to the transactions of a former age, have severely blamed William for acting without the advice of his ministers, and his ministers for submitting to be kept in ignorance of transactions which deeply concerned the honour of the Crown and the welfare of the nation.  Yet surely the presumption is that what the most honest and honourable men of both parties, Nottingham, for example, among the Tories, and Somers among the Whigs, not only did, but avowed, cannot have been altogether inexcusable; and a very sufficient excuse will without difficulty be found.

The doctrine that the Sovereign is not responsible is doubtless as old as any part of our constitution.  The doctrine that his ministers are responsible is also of immemorial antiquity.  That where there is no responsibility there can be no trustworthy security against maladministration, is a doctrine which, in our age and country, few people will be inclined to dispute.  From these three propositions it plainly follows that the administration is likely to be best conducted when the Sovereign performs no public act without the concurrence and instrumentality of a minister.  This argument is perfectly sound.  But we must remember that arguments are constructed in one way, and governments in another.  In logic, none but an idiot admits the premises and denies the legitimate conclusion.  But in practice, we see that great and enlightened communities often persist, generation after generation, in asserting principles, and refusing to act upon those principles.  It may be doubted whether any real polity that ever existed has exactly corresponded to the pure idea of that polity.  According to the pure idea of constitutional royalty, the prince reigns and does not govern; and constitutional royalty, as it now exists in England, comes nearer than in any other country to the pure idea.  Yet it would be a great error to imagine that our princes merely reign and never govern.  In the seventeenth century, both Whigs and Tories thought it, not only the right, but the duty, of the first magistrate to govern.  All parties agreed in blaming Charles the Second for not being his own Prime Minister; all parties agreed in praising James for being his own Lord High Admiral; and all parties thought it natural and reasonable that William should be his own Foreign Secretary.