In the
commencement of that period, we may see, if not the setting, at any
rate the declension of that system of personal rule which had existed
under previous sovereigns, and which, after a brief and spasmodic
revival in the time of George the Third, has now sunk, let us hope,
into the limbo of forgotten things. The latter part of that 100 years
saw the dawn of that system of free government which has grown and
flourished, and which, if the men of the present day be the worthy
descendants of Eliott and Pym, and Hampden and Milton, will go on
growing as long as this realm lasts. Within that time, one of the
strangest phenomena which I think I may say any nation has ever
manifested arose to its height and fell--I mean that strange and
altogether marvellous phenomenon, English Puritanism. Within that
time, England had to show statesmen like Burleigh, Strafford, and
Cromwell--I mean men who were real statesmen, and not intriguers,
seeking to make a reputation at the expense of the nation. In the
course of that time, the nation had begun to throw off those swarms of
hardy colonists which, to the benefit of the world--and as I fancy, in
the long run, to the benefit of England herself--have now become the
United States of America; and, during the same epoch, the first
foundations were laid of that Indian Empire which, it may be, future
generations will not look upon as so happy a product of English
enterprise and ingenuity.
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