I knew, too, that though my friends, when joined to Lord Bute, might temporize, might be corrupted, or might not be able to obstruct Lord Bute’s views, Grenville and the Bedfords, if once fixed in Opposition, would not be tame and impotent, as we had been. No truth is more certain to me than this; _though an Administration ought to be composed of virtuous men, it is by no means desirable that an Opposition should be so_. It is so seldom that there are good measures to obstruct, that the mischief done by opposition is small in proportion. It must be remembered, too, that opposition obstructs rather than prevents; and the difficulty on opponents is the greater, if the measures are good; salutary councils making their own way at last, after fascination has vented its poison. But the bad measures of powerful men can only be combated with efficacy by a determined party, equally able to expose their evil tendency, and prompt to venture on any arts to defeat them. Good men weep over their country when they should defend it. Cassius killed the tyrant; Cato, himself. If Lord Bute was again to be Minister, I wished to see Grenville and Sandwich patriots. The Ministers having struggled in vain, and being reduced at last to support what they could so ill digest, the King, on the 24th of April, went to the House of Lords, and sending for the Commons, recommended to both Houses to provide a bill of Regency[93] on the plan of the last, but with this singular and material difference, that his Majesty demanded to be invested with the power of appointing, from time to time, by instruments in writing under his sign manual, either the Queen, or any other person of his Royal Family residing in Great Britain, to be the guardian of his successor, and Regent of these kingdoms, until such successor should attain the age of eighteen years. Thus had the Junto flattered themselves that the transient and loose mention of the Queen’s name would stifle all murmurs, on the supposition that even so vague a designation would make men presume that no other person could be preferred to her Majesty, after a specification that marked her as proper for the trust.