If, in future ages, a King of England should be one day brought before the awful tribunal of his nation, his defenders will urge in his favour the sacred character of a king, the respect due to the throne, to all crowned heads, to the anointed of the Lord!
But his accusers will have, a right to answer thus :
One of the ancestors of this King, whom you defend, banished a man that was his guest, in time of peace ; afraid to put him to death in the presence of a nation governed by positive laws and by regular and public forms, he caused his victim to be exposed in the most insalubrious point of a rock situated in another hemisphere in the midst of the ocean, where this guest perished after a long agony, a prey to the climate, to want, to insults of every kind ! Yet that guest was also a great sovereign raised to the throne on the shields of thirty-six millions of citizens ; he was master of almost every Capital of Europe, the greatest Kings composed his Court ; he was generous towards all ; he was during twenty years the arbitrator of nations ; his family was allied to every reigning family, even to that of England; he was twice the anointed of the Lord ; twice consecrated by the august ceremonies of religion !!!
