Page:Hutton, William Holden - Hampton Court (1897).djvu/162

102 But cases such as these, involving grave moral delinquency, do not finally settle the claims of William III. to be considered a national hero. What was his position as a constitutional king? His title was strictly and evidently parliamentary. Hallam goes so far as to speak of his "elective throne." He came to deliver England from despotic rule, and to represent that form of monarchy which the great Whig statesmen approved. He had very definite obligations and a very clear line of action imposed upon him. How did he play his part? No one can accuse Hallam of prejudice against him. "In no period," he says, "under the Stewarts was public discontent and opposition of Parliament more prominent than in the reign of William the Third; and that high-souled prince—[I thank thee, Hallam, for teaching me that phrase]—enjoyed far less of his subjects' affection than Charles the Second. No period of our history, perhaps, is read with less satisfaction than those thirteen years during which he sat on his elective throne."

That the King was in no small measure responsible for this a few instances will show. William had none of the qualities that win affection. His obvious preference for Holland did not atone for "that amount (to quote Mr. Lecky) of aggravated treachery and duplicity seldom surpassed in history which had made the Revolution possible." Among his first ministers were the very men who were believed to be largely concerned in the misgovernment of the Stewarts. If Danby had been so unprincipled as the votes of