There is, however, no doubt of its having existed, and there seems to have been, even through those troubled years, an inborn spirit of loyalty to the Crown as being the symbol of the State and of public order. Its wearer might make mistakes and be personally unpopular, but he represented the nation as a whole and must consequently be respected. This powerful feeling has often in English history made the bravest and strongest submit to slights from their Sovereign, and has won the most disinterested devotion and energetic action from men who have never even seen the Monarch in whose personal character there was sometimes little to evoke or deserve such faith and sacrifice. For ages this loyalty had been the preservative of society in England, and it is still indispensable to the tranquility and permanence of a state, whether given in its full degree to the Sovereign of Great Britain, or in a more divided sense to the elective and partisan head of a modern republic. In the time of the Georges, as well as in the middle ages and at the present moment, loyalty was and is a sincere and honest patriotism, refining the instincts and elevating the actions of those who were willing to waive self-interest on any given occasion in order to guard what they believed to be the true basis of national stability and order. Certainly, a Monarchy which could survive the wars and European revolutions, the internal discontents and personal deficiencies, of the period which commenced with the reign of George I. and closed with that of William IV., must have possessed some inherent strength greater than may be gathered from many of the superficial works which pass for history. But, whatever that influence was, it does not appear to have been personal. With the close of the reign of Queen Anne the brilliant _prestige_ of personal authority and power wielded by the Sovereign had passed quietly away and, up to the death of William IV. and the accession of Victoria, had not been replaced by the personal influence of a constitutional ruler. PRESENT POSITION OF THE MONARCHY