Yet with those tranquil and retired pursuits, I still took my share in the activity of public life. I was still minister, and bore my part in the discussions of the legislature. But the great questions which had once sounded in my ear, like the call to battle in the ear of the warrior, had passed away. The minds that "rode in the whirlwind, and ruled the storm," had vanished with the storm. The surge had gone down; and neither the dangers of my earlier day, nor the powers which were summoned to resist them, were to be found in the living generation. Yet, let it not be thought that I regard the mind of England as exhausted, or even as exhaustible. The only distinction between the periods is, that one gave the impulse, and that the other only continues it. When peril comes again, we shall again see the development of power. We might as well doubt the existence of lightning, because the day is serene, the sun shining, and no cloud rolls across the heaven. But when the balance of the elements demands to be restored, we shall again be dazzled by the flash, and awed by the thunder. But time has taught me additional lessons. I have learned to see a hand, in all its clouds, which guides man and kingdoms with more than human power. In these remembrances, I have spoken but little of religion. It belongs to the chamber more than to the council; and it is less honoured than humiliated by being brought idly before men. But by that light I have been able to see, where subtler minds have been blind. The man may be bewildered by the glare of the torch in his hand, who would have found his way by trusting to the milder lustre of the stars. In the great war of our time, the greatest since the fall of the Roman empire--the war of the French Revolution--I think, that I can trace a divine protection, distinctly given to England as the champion of justice, honour, and religion. I offer but the outline of this view; but to me the proof is demonstrative.--In every instance in which France aimed an especial blow at England, that blow was retorted by an especial retribution; while her assaults on the continental kingdoms were made with triumphant impunity. I give the examples.--The French expedition to Egypt was formed with the express object of breaking down the influence of England in the East, and ultimately subverting her Indian empire--that expedition was the _first_ which tarnished the military renown of the Republic, cost her a fleet, and lost her an army. Of the army which Napoleon led to Egypt, not a battalion returned to Europe but as the prisoners of England! The French invasion of Spain was a blow aimed _expressly_ at England. Its object was the invasion of England--the Spanish war broke down the military renown of the Empire, and was pronounced by Napoleon to be the origin of his ruin!