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of their government from his attempts to deftroy it, called 

 to the throne another prince of the blood-royal, on whom 

 the crown was fettled by adl of parliament. Henry, thus 

 eftablifhed in power, to the prejudice of an elder branch 

 of the royal family, was generally under the neceflity of 

 paying confiderable deference to the will of his people. 

 But the people were not aware of one efFedt of making 

 the duke of Lancafter their fovereign. Heir of fome of 

 the moft opulent families of the kingdom, he abforbed 

 in his perfon the influence of a great proportion of the 

 peerage, and added it to the weight of the crown. 



The brilliant career of Henry the fifth was fpent in 

 foreign conqueft. His death, the fucceflion of his infant 

 fon, and the condu6l of his brothers, called forth the 

 fpirit of the Englilh government. In many points the 

 true principles of the conftitution are not even now better 

 underftood, tho perhaps more clearly and better exprefled. 

 The duke of Bedford's good fenfe revered and fubmitted 

 to the government of his country ; the duke of Gloucef- 

 ter's ambition ftruggled in vain againft it, and refledlion 

 led him alfo to obedience. 



Henry the fixth, long an infant-king, always weak, 

 and finally fo difordered in his intelle6l that he could not 

 be produced even as the puppet of the fhew, gave way 

 to the afcendency of the houfe of York, which was placed 

 on the throne in the perfon of Edward the 4th ; whofe 

 title, (to which the parliamentary fettlement on Henry 

 the 4th was the only objedion) received the fandlion of 

 a new parliamentary fettlement. 



The extin£lion of feveral noble families during the 

 conteft between the two houfes of York and Lancafter, 

 and the large acceflion of influence derived from the 

 addition of the vaft eflatcs of the York family, and the 

 fucceflions of the feveral great names which it reprefented, 



to 



