The Life of King Henry the Eight • Paragraph 75
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The reason for this condition of feeling is the combination which the Monarchy has during the past century come to present to the minds of the public. Tradition and history reaching down into the hearts and lives of the people may be considered the basic influence; a general belief in the superiority of British institutions over all others may be stated as a powerful conservative force; while personality and character in the Sovereign may be described as the chief constructive element in this process of increasing loyalty to the Crown. Convenience, custom, love of ceremony, belief in stability and aversion to change, are lesser factors which may be mentioned. The result is that Mr. George W. Smalley, for so many years the American correspondent of the New York _Tribune_ in London, could write recently in the _Century_ the belief of a foreigner and a republican that "England is a very democratic country, but there does not exist in England the vestige of a republican party."