In addition to the messages of condolence which I read to the House yesterday I have one or two more from other countries expressing the loss they have sustained in the death of His late Majesty. I have received from the Belgian Ambassador an account of the eloquent tribute paid to His late Majesty in the House of Representatives in Brussels on the 21st January, when the House adjourned as a mark of respect to the memory of His late Majesty.

"To the Speaker of the House of Commons, London:

In the name of the Rumanian Chamber of Deputies I beg your Excellency to be so good as to transmit to His Majesty Edward VIII, King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Emperor of India, and to Her Majesty the Queen Mother, the most respectful expression of the profound sorrow felt by this Assembly as well as by the whole Rumanian people on learning of the death of your august and beloved Sovereign, George V. The Rumanian nation pays homage to the great Sovereign whose sympathy with Rumania was so precious, and whose memory will ever be venerated there."

Signed by the President of the Chamber of Deputies.

Message from the Chamber of Deputies of the Grand Duchy of Luxemberg:

"The Chamber of Deputies associates itself with the great loss sustained by the British Parliament and nation in the death of the illustrious Sovereign who embodied so conspicuously the highest virtues and noble traditions of His people."

Signed by the President.

The House will allow me to send a suitable reply to these messages.

Agreed.

It may be for the convenience of the House if I say that at 20 minutes to 4 I propose to leave the House and proceed to Westminster Hall preceded by the Mace and followed by the Cabinet and the rest of the House. On arrival there I would ask the Cabinet to take up their positions on my left, and the rest of the House on either side of me. After the departure of His Majesty I will turn to the right and proceed towards the North Door followed by the Cabinet and other Members. I will then turn and lead the House walking two abreast past the coffin. I will return to the House, where an opportunity will arise for any Members who have not yet been sworn in to take the Oath.

at the Bar, acquainted the House that he had a Message from His Majesty the King to this House, signed by His Majesty's own hand. And he presented the same to the House, and it was read out by Mr. SPEAKER as followeth, all the Members of the House being uncovered":

"EDWARD R.I.

"I am well assured that the House of Commons deeply mourns the death of My beloved Father. He devoted His life to the service of His people and to the upholding of Constitutional Government. He was ever actuated by His profound sense of duty. I am resolved to follow in the way He has set before me."

It is my duty this afternoon, in accordance with ancient usage, to propose two Motions to the House—Motions which will be put separately, but which, for the convenience of the House will be dealt with as one in the speeches which will be made. As they are not on the Paper, I will read them to the House. The first is: the way and he kept the faith. A great tribute to a great king. He, too, was the father of the first Prince of Wales, and his body was laid in that Abbey from which I have just come having laid to rest a great master of our English tongue, and in which building our new King will be crowned with the appropriate pomp and ceremony next year.

From one Edward to another through the long centuries, until yesterday's Proclamation of King Edward VIII, the evolution of our Constitution has continued, with changes manifold in the usages of Parliament, changes in the nature of the Monarchy, changes even in these last years, but accomplished for the most part without battle, for the most part peacefully and in accordance with the amazing political tradition of our race. The great achievement of the last century, culminating perhaps in the reign of King George V, was the coming to terms of Democracy and of Monarchy and the system under which we live to-day. A system unique in the world was evolved, a system which, in my belief, gives a stability to the body politic that most countries to-day would give all they have to possess. How right Bolingbroke was, in a flash of inspiration two centuries ago, when he remarked that it was far easier to fasten the advantages of a republic on to a monarchy than it was to fasten the advantages of a monarchy on to a republic.

The temporal power of the Crown has diminished through the ages, and yet today the spiritual power of the Crown is not only far greater than it ever was, but greater than any man in vision and in dream could have seen it. It is not only the link that holds together our country; it holds together the whole Empire of English-speaking peoples. It is, I believe, an indissoluble link, and it holds together the myriad peoples of the East in that great Indian Empire. How has this come about? It has come about owing to the character of those who held that great position, the Throne, in the last hundred years—Queen Victoria, King Edward VII and King George V. It throws, as you all know, an infinitely greater responsibility on the Crown than it ever had in old days. The power of the Crown is not to-day the power of force. It is a great moral power, and it must depend on the character and the quality of him who sits upon the Throne. Important as we may think ourselves in our generation who wrestle with the political problems of the country and act as the King's advisers, we are but ephemeral compared with the Monarchy of this country, and the character of him who sits on the Throne to-day has this influence for good or ill not only over that vast portion of the world which is part of the British Empire, but, in these days particularly, over the whole world itself.

But it was in the reign of King George V that the greatest and swiftest changes occurred; and he met the challenge of the times without flinching, and he triumphed at a time when a slip of speech even, or of action, might have wrought irreparable damage. Day by day he discharged those duties which thronged upon him, with his will rigorously trained to place the public interest first and last. His own ease and pleasure were never considered. I cannot tell you how it happened, as you all know it did, that the sure instinct of our people gradually discerned that whatever human frailties or limitations might have attached to their King, his sense of duty to his people amounted to genius. He communicated his personality by some indefinable, intangible wave of sympathy and understanding to every one of his subjects, not only at home but throughout the world, and the messages which have poured into London in these last two days from all quarters of the globe, from men of high and low estate of every creed and colour, testify that the world has lost in his passing one to whom the world looked up, and through whose example men have led better lives in the accomplishment of their daily duties, and the duties that they do at home and to their country.

To us, his faithful Commons, there are two things that must be a great consolation to us. One is that this great and humble man knew before his death what his people felt for him, what he never suspected. But he knew it. The other is that he was taken away peacefully. He fell asleep with no pain, no suffering, no apprehensions, at peace with all the world, and it was not given to him to have that last trial that I think he would have found more difficult to bear than any man I know—having to continue his work with a failing body, or possibly with a failing mind. He was taken away from us, delicate it is true, feeling the effects of that last illness, it is true, but with little loss of physical and no loss of mental powers. Those of us whose duty it was to see him frequently have no memory of him but at his best, and his best was something very fine.

Do I need to say a word even to this House of how his power and influence for good were enhanced in a million ways by that rich companionship he shared with the Queen? I said some words in another place on the Queen. I do not wish to say more now, for I feel intensely that her position and her relation with him are something too sacred for us even to comment on in this House. I would merely say that I commend this Resolution, and I assure Her Majesty, in commending it, that every man and woman in this House, as all the rest of the country, feels a personal sympathy with her at this time, something far removed from conventional grief and conventional sorrow.

But our thoughts, while naturally dwelling on the past, must turn to-day to the future, and we offer respectfully from this House those customary congratulations to our new King as he takes his place in the long line following his distinguished ancestors. No two Sovereigns in that long gallery had the same countenance nor served their people in identical fashion. The three Sovereigns to whom I have particularly referred to-day were widely divergent in their gifts which they placed upon the common altar of national service. King Edward VIII in his turn brings to that same altar a personality richly endowed with experience of public affairs, with the fruits of travel, with universal good will. He has the secret of youth in the prime of age. He has a wider and more intimate knowledge of all classes of his subjects, not only at home but throughout the Dominions and India, than any of his predecessors. We cannot foresee what path the course of Empire or the course of history may take in the years before us, but our ancient Constitution has shown itself, in the words of his father, "adaptable to change." That virtue has not left it, and while we remain true to our inheritance and to our character it never will. It is now in a special and unique sense in the keeping of the young King, and we have sworn to serve him and to help him to cherish this great heritage, transmitted and enriched through so many reigns and over so many centuries. Inspired with these memories and endowed as he is, we look forward with confidence and assurance to the new reign, believing that under God's providence he will establish the Throne more firmly than ever on its surest and only foundation, the hearts of his people.

I rise to support, on behalf of the Opposition, the Motions which have been so eloquently moved by the Prime Minister. There is, to-day, no division in this House. We are all united in sorrow at the loss of our great and well-loved Sovereign. We are all animated by the deepest sympathy for the Queen and the Royal Family. But this unity of feeling extends far beyond the bounds of this House. In what we are trying to say here, we wish to express the feelings of the people of this country whose representatives we are. We know that in every home in the country when the sad news of the death of the King was known there was a sense of personal loss. The whole nation is in mourning. All feel that they have lost a friend.

It has, I think, been given to no previous King to have won such universal affection. No King has ever been able to associate himself so closely with the hopes and fears, with the joys and sorrows of his people. During the Great War, when bereavement visited so many homes, those who had lost their loved ones knew that the King, the Queen and the Royal Family felt with them in their grief. So it was, too, in the days of peace when some tragedy such as a mining disaster plunged the whole community into mourning. To-day it is the Royal Family which receives the sympathy of the Nation. We know from our own experience how little can be done to give comfort, but, in so far as the knowledge that others share their grief can help, the members of the Royal Family are assured that the people of this country and many millions throughout the world feel with them. Especially, to the Queen in her loneliness do our hearts go out.

The responsibility which rests on the shoulders of the ruler of a great nation must always be heavy, even in times of tranquillity, but when a man is called upon to rule, not over one nation but over a commonwealth of nations, not in peace only but during the greatest war in history, not in a period of slow development but when the tide of change is running strongly and old landmarks are being swept away, the burden must be almost intolerable. Yet this was the lot of King George. He reigned during a period of transition. The short reign of his father, as we look back upon it today, seems but a continuance of the Victorian era. The great changes which were to follow could not then be descried. The forces which, for good or evil, were to make a new epoch were only beginning to appear. The next 25 years saw their rapid development. Even without a world War, I think those years must have been years of stress. The advance of science, the spread of education, the progress of ideas of self-government at home and overseas, the pressure of economic forces must have called for difficult readjustments. The world War came and accelerated all these developments. It was a forcing-house of change. The old world passed away and a new one was born.

Two things, I think, were required from the Sovereign of a great State in those conditions. The first was sympathy with new ideas and readiness to accept change and to adapt himself to altered conditions. The second was the power to give to society, bewildered by the rapid progress of events, a rallying-point of stability. These things were found in King George in full measure. They are not common. History affords many instances of rulers who failed, of thrones which were overturned because their occupants stubbornly set themselves against the march of events. King George succeeded where others failed because he was a democrat. He was the supreme exponent of the difficult art of constitutional Kingship. He knew and understood his people and the age in which they lived, and he progressed with them.

Let me note some outstanding examples. Since 1910 there has been a great extension of democracy in this country. The right to vote has been given to practically every man and woman of full age. The franchise now depends on citizenship and not on the ownership of property. The power of the Upper House has been diminished. Such a change elsewhere and at other times, has been resisted by monarchs. King George accepted it as a necessary and just consequence of modern conditions. In the same spirit he accepted the achievement of office by a new party, the members of which were drawn predominantly from the manual workers, an event almost unthinkable only a few decades ago. He agreed to a series of Acts whereby the Dominions attained equality with the mother country. The Irish Free State was created and India was set on the road to self-government. He relinquished his nominal sovereignty, or rather he allowed his nominal sovereignty to be apparently diminished, but by doing so he established his real sovereignty in the hearts of the peoples of the Empire. It is the glory of our Constitution that, under it, great changes effected elsewhere by violence are brought about peaceably owing to its adaptability. All this requires that this same quality should be displayed by the King, and this King George did.

Equally important, I think, has been the power of the King to offer a point of stability in a distracted world. The movements of mass hysteria which have been witnessed elsewhere have passed this country by. One reason has been the presence of a King who commanded the respect and affection of his people, and who was beyond the spirit of faction. There was no need to elevate some individual party leader into a national hero, because the King was there to express the views of his people. King George throughout the long years of the War took his full part in the national effort. His example inspired his people in the struggle. But he was no glorifier of war. He stood always for peace. He sought as soon as the War was ending to do his utmost to heal its wounds and recreate good relations between all nations. No less in the difficult post-War years he shared in the work of reconstruction. He was a real social reformer and took the keenest personal interest in the problems of the day. He recognised the claims of social justice and felt equally the tragedy of unemployment. He shared to the full the life of his people.

What were the qualities which enabled the late King to succeed where others have failed? It seems to me that they were his selflessness and devotion to duty, his kindliness and humanity, his practical wisdom and his courage at all times. The ceremonies which we have witnessed during the last few days carry us back to a time when the functions of a King were very different. The duties of kingship have had to be reinterpreted with the passing years. King George showed an incomparable understanding of what is required of a King in the modern world. It has been a piece of great good fortune, I think, for our generation that just when scientific invention enabled, for the first time, so many of the citizens of the British Commonwealth to hear for themselves the voice of their King, we should have had on the Throne a man who so well understood how to speak to his people, a man who set before the nation ideals of peace and justice and service. We have still in our minds his last Christmas message. We have seen the end of a noble life, a life devoted to the welfare of humanity. In the long roll of British Sovereigns none will, I think, take a higher place than King George.

We offer our loyal service and congratulations to King Edward VIII, who, as Prince of Wales, has endeared himself to all hearts. He is continuing in a higher sphere and with greater responsibilities the work which he has been doing so well for this country. Like the late King, he showed sympathy with and knowledge of all classes of his subjects both at home and overseas. He has earned the affection and confidence of all. We know that he will bring to the service of the nation the same great qualities of the mind and heart which his father displayed. May he be spared the same anxieties. The wish of us all is that his reign may be long, prosperous and peaceful.

I rise to support the Motions and to associate my hon. and right hon. Friends and myself with the moving and eloquent speeches in which the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition have expressed the feelings of the House on this melancholy occasion. The King whom we mourn succeeded to a Throne which was already secure in the loyalty, the affection and the reverence of the British people. The Throne is no less secure to-day, but during a period in which all the institutions of this country and the Empire have been subjected by war and by processes of rapid change to trials and stresses of almost unexampled severity, he strengthened its hold upon the imagination of the peoples of the British Commonwealth and established is ever more firmly in the hearts of his Subjects. To his people of all races, creeds and languages the King spoke in person as a father to his family, and it is as a father, wise, loving and dutiful, working for the welfare of his family that we mourn him now, and that he will live in our memories hereafter.

But in the midst of our public grief, tempered as it is with gratitude for a life of kingly service and for a shining example of private virtue, we cannot forget the still more poignant and intimate sorrow of those who were nearest to His Majesty, and our hearts go out in true and humble sympathy to our new Sovereign and to the gracious Queen who shared so fully the trials and the achievements of a glorious reign. And with our condolences to the new Sovereign, there go fittingly our congratulations upon his auspicious accession to the Throne. Both our natural duty and our loyalty to the memory of the late King alike impel us to rally round his son and to offer in full measure our allegiance and devotion to His Majesty King Edward VIII.

When the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister referred to the distinguished and ungrudging services which His Majesty has already rendered to this country and his Empire, conviction must have been borne in upon the House that perhaps never in our history has a Prince ascended the Throne so fully equipped to bear the glorious burden of sovereignty. We remember also with what zeal he has followed the lead of his august father in his concern for the welfare of the poorest of his people and of the victims of war, economic depression, and unemployment. He has both earnestly commended to others and constantly practised himself the ideals of social service and fellowship. The Gracious Message which he has sent to us to-day is eloquent, in its simplicity and directness, of the sincerity of his feelings and of his loyalty to the noble traditions of his family. So it is our confident hope, as it is also our fervent prayer, that the reign which is now beginning will be long and prosperous and add yet another honourable chapter to the chronicles of an illustrious House.

Question,

"That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty to convey to His Majesty the deep sympathy felt by this House in the grievous affliction which He has sustained by the death of the late King, His Majesty's Father, of Blessed and Glorious memory:

To assure His Majesty that the example of unselfish public service which our late Sovereign displayed and His untiring endeavours for the welfare of all His people, will ever be held in affectionate and grateful remembrance:

To express to His Majesty our loyal devotion to His Royal Person and our firm conviction that under the blessing of Divine Providence He will, throughout His Reign, promote the happiness and protect the liberties of all His people,"

put, and agreed to,

Address to be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of His Majesty's Household.

Resolved,

"That a Message of condolence be sent to Her Majesty tendering to Her the deep sympathy of this House in Her bereavement and assuring Her that this House shares Her sorrow in the irreparable loss which the nation has sustained and that all its Members will ever hold in their hearts towards Her Majesty the deepest feelings of reverence and affection."—[ The Prime Minister. ]

:I beg to move,

"That Sir Francis Acland, Viscountess Astor, Mr. James Brown, Lord Hugh Cecil, Sir William Jenkins, Mr. Lambert, and Earl Winterton do wait upon Her Majesty with the said Message."

Question put, and agreed to.

Sitting suspended at Ten Minutes before Three o'Clock until Half after Three o'Clock.

Then the House proceeded to West minster Hall in order to attend the lying-in-state of His late Majesty; and, having returned—