The House of Hanover reigned without further contest. The Stuarts had disappeared, borne forever by their misdeeds and misfortunes far from the throne of their ancestors, and the young King George III. peaceably succeeded his grandfather. Europe now, as well as England, understood the importance of the change which had just been accomplished. William III., called to the throne by the English nation, had delivered it from an odious yoke and had assured to it its religious and political liberties. He had constantly remained a foreigner in the England which he served gloriously and effectively without loving it. George I. and George II. were Germans, elevated to the throne by the national will, which was strong and wise, without sympathy and without pleasure. They had remained Germans in manners and in speech. England had grown under their rule; her institutions were strengthened and developed. At the death of George II., thanks to the illustrious man who, as an absolute master, had governed her in freedom, she had become the arbiter of Europe, predominant in America as well as in Asia. However, the English people's loyalty of feeling had never been satisfied since the downfall of the Stuarts, and the most obstinate of the Whigs, although passionately opposed to all the attempts of the Jacobite restoration, yet excused, in the depths of their heart, those who had sacrificed all to their attachment towards the hereditary monarch. {256} George III. was at last reigning, loved and respected beforehand, and the painful trials of his life and his long reign never caused him to lose the confidence and sympathy of his people. It was the feeling of the whole nation as well as his own that the young monarch expressed when he spontaneously said, in his first speech from the throne: "Born and brought up in this country, I glory in the name of Englishman, and it will be the pleasure of my life to give happiness to a people whose fidelity and attachment to myself I regard as the security and lasting honor of my throne." New counsels already began to spread, less violent against France than those of Mr. Pitt. The young king had cordially received his grandfather's ministers, asking them to continue in their duties under him; but he had also admitted Lord Bute to the Privy Council, and the favorite's intrigues already came in contact with those of the Duke of Newcastle. Some weeks later, at the moment of the dissolution of Parliament, Bute succeeded Lord Holderness as secretary of state. Pitt, it is said, was not consulted.