But to say something more determinate on this head, the following reflections will, I hope, show the temper, if not the understanding of a philosopher.
Were we to judge merely by first appearances and by past experience, we must allow that the advantages of a parliamentary title of the house of Hanover are much greater than those of an undisputed hereditary title in the house of Stuart, and that our fathers acted wisely in preferring the former to the latter. So long as the house of Stuart reigned in Britain, which, with some interruption, was above eighty years, the government was kept in a continual fever by the contentions between the privileges of the people and the prerogatives of the crown. If arms were dropped, the noise of disputes continued; or, if these were silenced, jealousy still corroded the heart, and threw the nation into an unnatural ferment and disorder. And while we were thus occupied in domestic contentions, a foreign power, dangerous, if not fatal, to public liberty, erected itself in Europe without any opposition from us, and even sometimes with our assistance.
But during these last sixty years, when a parliamentary establishment has taken place, whatever factions may have prevailed either among the people or in public assemblies, the whole force of our constitution has always fallen to one side, and an uninterrupted harmony has been preserved between our princes and our parliaments. Public liberty, with internal peace and order, has flourished almost without interruption; trade and manufactures and agriculture have increased; the arts and sciences and philosophy have been cultivated. Even religious parties have been necessitated to lay aside their mutual rancour, and the glory of the nation has spread itself all over Europe; while we stand the bulwark against oppression, and the great antagonist of that power which threatens every people with conquest and subjection. So long and so glorious a period no nation almost can boast of; nor is there another instance in the whole history of mankind that so many millions of people have during such a space of time been held together in a manner so free, so rational, and so suitable to the dignity of human nature.