THE INTERREGNUM 1

the administration to a council of state under the presidencyof the Prince of Orange. But these extreme opinions weregenerally held in abhorrence. Nineteen twentieths of thenation consisted of persons in whom love of hereditary mo-narchy and love of constitutional freedom were combined,though in different proportions, and who were equally op-posed to the total abolition of the kingly office and to the un-conditional restoration of the King.

But, in the wide interval which separated the bigots whostill clung to the doctrines of Filmer from the enthusiasts whostill dreamed the dreams of Harrington, there was room formany shades of opinion. If we neglect minute sub divisions, weshall find that the great majority of the nation and of the Con-vention was divided into four bodies. Three of these bodiesconsisted of Tories. The Whig party formed the fourth.

The amity of the Whigs and Tories had not survived theperil which had produced it. On several occasions, duringthe Prince’s march from the West, dissension had appearedamong his followers. While the event of his enterprise wasdoubtful, that dissension had, by his skilful management,been easily quieted. But, from the day on which he enteredSaint James’s palace in triumph, such management could nolonger be practised. His victory, by relieving the nationfrom the strong dread of Popish tyranny, had deprived himof half his influence. Old antipathies, which had slept whenBishops were in the Tower, when Jesuits were at the Councilboard, when loyal clergymen were deprived of their bread byscores, when loyal gentlemen were put out of the commissionof the peace by hundreds, were again strong and active. TheRoyalist shuddered at the thought that he was allied with allthat from his youth up he had most hated, with old parlia-mentary Captains who had stormed his country house, with oldparliamentary Commissioners who had sequestrated his estate,with men who had plotted theRyeHouse butchery and headedthe Western rebellion. That beloved Church, too, for whososake he had, after a painful struggle, broken through hisallegiance to the throne, was she really in safety? Or had herescued her from one enemy only that she might be exposed