ideas were acquired by the people by slow degrees. Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Virginia, and other States gave emphatic instructions to their delegates in 1774 to 'restore union and harmony between Great Britain and her Colonies,' and the party of independence was thoroughly unpopular down even to the close of the struggle. One of its leading spirits gave emphatic testimony on this point. 'For my own part,' wrote John Adams, 'there was not a moment in the Revolution when I would not have given everything I possessed for a restoration to the state of things before the contest began, provided we could have a sufficient security for its continuance.' This feeling had no small share in misleading George III. on the American question, and in deepening his determination not to let the colonies go--a fact which was brought out for the first time, we believe, by one of the ablest and most judicious of modern historians--Mr. Lecky. He also was the first to show, in a very striking manner, that the American Revolution was practically the work of a small minority, who, as he remarks--and the remark has no slight application to the other revolution now going on in our midst--'succeeded in committing an undecided and fluctuating majority to courses for which they had little love, and leading them step by step to a position from which it was impossible to recede.'[63] Nearly one-half of the Revolutionary army consisted of Irish, who have ever since played so important a part in the politics of the United States.