Of a narrow understanding, which no culture had enlarged; of an obstinate disposition, which no education, perhaps, could have humanized; of strong feelings in ordinary things, and a resolute attachment to all his own opinions and predilections, George III. possessed much of the firmness of purpose, which, being exhibited by men of contracted mind without any discrimination, and as pertinaciously when they are in the wrong as when they are in the right, lends to their characters an appearance of inflexible consistency, which is often mistaken for greatness of mind, and not seldom received as a substitute for honesty. In all that related to his kingly office he was the slave of deep-rooted selfishness; and no feeling of a kindly nature ever was allowed access to his bosom, whenever his power was concerned, either in its maintenance, or in the manner of exercising it. In other respects, he was a man of amiable disposition, and few princes have been more exemplary in their domestic habits, or in the offices of private friendship. But the instant that his prerogative was concerned, or his bigotry interfered with, or his will thwarted, the most unbending pride, the most bitter animosity, the most calculating coldness of heart, the most unforgiving resentment, took possession of his whole breast, and swayed it by turns. The habits of friendship, the ties of blood, the dictates of conscience, the rules of honesty, were alike forgotten; and the fury of the tyrant, with the resources of a cunning which mental alienation is supposed to whet, were ready to circumvent or to destroy all who interposed an obstacle to the fierceness of unbridled desire. His conduct throughout the American war, and towards the Irish people, has often been cited as illustrative of the dark side

of his public character; and his treatment of his eldest son, whom he hated with a hatred scarcely consistent with the supposition of a sound mind, might seem to illustrate the shadier part of his personal disposition; but it was in truth only another part of his public, his professional conduct; for he had no better reason for this implacable aversion than the jealousy which men have of their successors, and the consciousness that the Prince, who must succeed him, was unlike him, and, being disliked by him, must, during their joint lives, be thrown into the hands of the Whig party, the adversaries he most of all detested and feared.

Although much of the character now portrayed had its origin in natural defect, and part of it in a mind tinged with disease, yet they who had the care of his youth are deeply answerable for the neglect which both added to it many defects, and prevented those of nature from being eradicated or counteracted. His mother, the Dowager Princess, was a woman of neither knowledge, accomplishments, nor abilities; and she confided his education to her friend, now generally believed to have stood in a more tender relation towards her, Lord Bute. The want of instruction of which George III. could complain must have been great indeed; for if any man was little likely to overrate the value of superfluous or extensive information, it was he. Yet a witness, above all suspicion, Sir Herbert Taylor, has recorded that he lamented, while he admitted, his want of education. Can there be a more shameful thing related? Can any parties, in the station of his Royal parent and her favourite, be guilty of a more disgraceful breach of duty than to leave the future monarch of a free and enlightened people without

the instruction which all but the lower classes of his subjects give to their children as a matter of course?

Being not deficient in natural quickness, and the more regularly industrious because of his habitually temperate life, he made himself thoroughly master of all the ordinary details of business; insomuch that the same high authority has ascribed to him a more thorough knowledge of the duties of each several department in the State than any other man ever possessed; and this is the testimony of one both singularly accurate in stating facts, and eminently qualified to form such a comparative estimate by his own intimate acquaintance with official details. We must, however, take care not to overrate the difficulty or the value of this acquirement. Kings have a peculiar interest in ascertaining the bounds of each department's duties and rights. They find protection in keeping each within its own limits. Coming, of necessity, into frequent contact with them all, monarchs can easily master the knowledge of their several prerogatives and functions; so that this becomes like heraldry and etiquette, wherein they are all great proficients, emphatically a a Royal branch of knowledge. No proofs remain, nor has even any assertion been made, that he had any familiarity with the nobler branches of information connected with state affairs; the constitution and privileges of Parliament; the jurisdiction of Courts; the principles, nay, even the details of banking, or of trade generally; the East India or Colonial Affairs of his Empire; the interests of foreign countries; the statistics of his own; all of them kinds of knowledge as certainly worthy of princes as they are generally despised by them. That he was a diligent man of business, punc

tual to his appointments, regular in the distribution of his time, never wanting when his mechanical interposition was required, always ready to continue at work until the affair in hand was despatched, nor ever suffering pleasure or distraction of any kind to interfere with the transaction of the matters belonging to his high station, is as undeniable as that all this might be predicated of one who had the most limited capacity, or the most confined information, and who had little else to recommend him than the strict sense of his official duties, and the resolution to make everything yield to the discharge of them, those duties being much more of the hand than the head.

But it would be a great mistake to imagine that George III.'s ambition was confined within the range of his abilities. He was impressed with a lofty feeling of his prerogative, and a firm determination to maintain, perhaps extend it. At all events, he was resolved not to be a mere name, or a cipher in public affairs; and, whether from a sense of the obligations imposed upon him by his station, or from a desire to enjoy all its powers and privileges, he certainly, while his reason remained entire, but especially during the earlier period of his reign, interfered in the affairs of government more than any prince who ever sat upon the throne of this country since our monarchy was distinctly admitted to be a limited one, and its executive functions were distributed among responsible ministers. The correspondence which he carried on with his confidential servants during the ten most critical years of his life lies before us, and it proves that his attention was ever awake to all the occurrences of the government. Not a step was

taken in foreign, colonial, or domestic affairs, that he did not form his opinion upon it, and exercise his influence over it. The instructions to ambassadors, the orders to governors, the movements of forces, down to the marching of a single battalion in the districts of this country, the appointments to all offices in church and state, not only the giving away of judgeships, bishoprics, regiments, but the subordinate promotions, lay and clerical; all these form the topics of his letters; on all his opinion is pronounced decisively; on all his will is declared peremptorily. In one letter he decides the appointment of a Scotch puisne judge; in another the march of a troop from Buckinghamshire into Yorkshire; in a third the nomination to the Deanery of Worcester; in a fourth he says that, "if Adam, the architect, succeeds Worsley at the Board of Works, he shall think Chambers ill used."*

For the greater affairs of state it is well known how substantially he insisted upon being the King de facto as well as de jure. The American war, the long exclusion of the liberal party, the French Revolution, the Catholic question, are all sad monuments of his real power. Of all his resolutions on these affairs, the desire to retain America in subjection seems to have been his strongest propensity; during the whole contest all his opinions, all his feelings, and all his designs, turned upon what he termed the "preservation of the empire." Nor was his rooted prejudice against both the Whigs and the French

* This was in 1777, in the middle of the most anxious moment of the American contest; the letter immediately preceding relates to the sum of affairs.