The bill passed in the English Parliament by a large majority; but all the eloquence of its defenders, together with the clever maneuvres of Lords Cornwallis and Castlereagh, were not able to induce the Irish Parliament to pass similar resolutions, before the opening of the year 1800. Henry Grattan, long absent from the house, returned in order to oppose the union: "In all that he advances, the minister does not discuss--he predicts," said the Irish orator; "one cannot answer a prophet; all that one can do is not to believe. That which he wishes to buy of you, cannot be sold: it is liberty; in exchange he has nothing to offer you. All that possesses any value you have obtained under a free constitution; if you renounce it you are not only slaves, but madmen." On the 10th of February, 1800, the bill presented by Lord Castlereagh and discussed with the most extreme violence, was finally passed by both houses of the Irish Parliament. On the 2nd of July it received the royal signature. Henceforth the union of Ireland and England was definitive, and useful and efficacious for both countries, notwithstanding the difficulties that it was still to encounter, and the bitterness that it left behind. This union was of the highest importance to the repose of Great Britain. Foreign invasions now ceased. The expedition of General Bonaparte into Egypt diverted his attention from the projected invasion of England. It had led to the great naval battle of _Aboukir_ (August 1st, 1799), where the French Admiral Brueys was killed and the English Admiral Nelson was severely wounded. The French fleet, after a heroic resistance, was conquered, and almost entirely destroyed. Bonaparte found himself shut up in Egypt, while war became again general in Europe. The Congress of Radstadt, intended to regulate the relations of France with the Germanic States, had not been successful, and was officially dissolved in August, 1799: a new coalition against the French Republic was formed, and henceforth England was supported by Austria, Russia, Naples, Portugal and Turkey. Hostilities broke out simultaneously in Switzerland, Italy, and Germany. {384} In this great struggle, sustained by France alone, against the European world, England took, from the commencement, an active and glorious part. An attempt upon Holland, under the direction of the Duke of York and Sir Ralph Abercromby, was unsuccessful. The finances and determined public opinion of Great Britain everywhere sustained the courage of her allies.