To me it seems that the royal principle in England is threatened, not with sudden and violent extinction, but with death by decay. I do not expect any change of any kind to-morrow or the day after, or even the week after next. I do not care to dogmatize, or predict, or make guesses of any kind. I quite agree with my friend Professor Thorold Rogers, that an uninspired prophet is a fool. But I contend that as the evident signs of the times now show themselves, the monarchical principle in England does seem to be decaying; that the national faith which bore it up is sorely shaken and almost gone, and that some of the political props which most nearly supported it are already being cut away. There may, indeed, be some hidden virtue in the principle, which shall develop itself unexpectedly in the hour of danger, and give to the institution that seemed moribund a new and splendid vitality. Such a phenomenon has been manifested in the case of more than one institution that seemed on the verge of ruin--it may be the fortunate destiny of British royalty. But unless in the sudden and timely development of some such occult and unlooked-for virtue, I do not see what is to preserve the monarchical principle in England through the trials of the future. Let it be remembered, too, that the one great plea hitherto always made in England for monarchy, is that it alone will work on a large scale. "We admit," it was said, "that your republican theory looks better and admits of more logical argument in its favor. But we are practical men, and we find that our system, with all its theoretical disadvantages, will work and stand a strain; and your republican theory, with all its apparent advantages in logic, is not suited for this rough world. Our machinery will stand the hardest trial; yours never did and never will. Don't tell us about Switzerland. Switzerland is a little country. Kept out of the stress and danger of European commotions, and protected by a guarantee of the great powers, any constitution ought to work under such advantages. But a great independent republic never did last; never did stand a sudden strain, and never will." So people thought and argued in England--even very intelligent people, until at last it became one of the British Philistine's articles of faith, that the republican principle never will work on a large scale. When Sir John Ramsden declared in the House of Commons at the beginning of the American civil war, that the republican bubble had burst, and all Philistinism in Britain applauded the declaration, the plaudits were given not so much because of any settled dislike Philistinism had to the United States, as because Philistinism beheld what it believed to be a providential testimony to its own wisdom and foresight. Since then Philistinism has found that after all republicanism is able to bear a strain as great as monarchy has ever yet borne, and can come out of the trial unharmed and victorious.