You know, of course, that about one hundred and seventy years ago there happened in this country what we have always been accustomed to call a “Glorious Revolution”—a Revolution which had this effect: that it put a bit into the mouth of the monarch, so that he was not able of his own free will to do, and he dared no longer attempt to do, the things which his predecessors had done without fear. But if at the Revolution the monarchy of England was bridled and bitted, at the same time the great territorial families of England were enthroned: and from that period until the year 1831 or 1832—until the time when Birmingham politically became famous,—those territorial families reigned with an almost undisputed sway over the destinies and the industry of the people of these kingdoms.[20] If you turn to the history of England from the period of the Revolution to the present, you will find that an entirely new policy was adopted, and that while we had endeavored in former times to keep ourselves free from European complications, we now began to act upon a system of constant entanglement in the affairs of foreign countries, as if there were neither property nor honors, nor any thing worth striving for, to be acquired in any other field. The language coined and used then has continued to our day. Lord Somers, in writing for William III., speaks of the endless and sanguinary wars of that period as wars “to maintain the liberties of Europe.” There were wars “to support the Protestant interest,” and there were many wars to preserve our old friend “the balance of power.”