When the winter came, Handel produced nothing of importance until January 5, when he brought out _Hercules_, a secular oratorio which he had composed in the summer during intervals when _Belshazzar_ had to be laid aside owing to Jennens' delays. _Belshazzar_ was given on March 27. _Semele, Joseph_, and _Saul_ were revived, but, whatever oratorio was given, the theatre was almost empty, and the season came to a premature end on April 23. Handel was again suffering from some form of illness, and was unable to take any part in the performances, although he was present at them. Lady Shaftesbury describes "the great, though unhappy, Handel, dejected, wan and dark, sitting by, not playing on, the harpsichord," and adds that "his light had been spent in being overplied in music's cause." Hawkins states definitely that Handel became blind in 1751, and this date has been generally accepted; Lady Shaftesbury's letter suggests that he was already blind, or partially so, as early as March 1745, unless the word "light" is to be taken as meaning the light of his reason. This interpretation, in fact, is confirmed by a later letter of Lord Shaftesbury in October, in which he says: "Poor Handel looks something better. I hope he will entirely recover in due time, though he has been a good deal disordered in the head." Another friend of Handel's, William Harris, met him in London, in August, when he seems at first not to have recognised Harris and to have behaved with some oddity; "he talked much of his precarious state of health, yet he looks well enough."
It has generally been stated that in 1745 Handel again became bankrupt, but Barclay Squire pointed out that his name does not occur in the official lists of bankrupts. It must be remembered that, however disastrous his opera or oratorio seasons were, he had always his permanent pension of £600 a year to fall back on, and Hawkins states that this pension, originally granted by Queen Anne and George I, was punctually paid throughout his life.
From the end of August, London was in a panic over the Jacobite rebellion under the Young Pretender, Charles Edward. The Opera remained closed on account of the prejudice against the Papist Italian singers; at the other theatres patriotism expressed itself in appropriate music. Purcell's "Genius of England" was sung at one, Arne's recently composed "Rule, Britannia" at another, and on November 14 a "Chorus Song, set by Mr. Handel for the _Gentlemen Volunteers_ of the City of London," was sung by Mr. Lowe at Drury Lane. The words suggest that the anonymous author was familiar with the Epilogue to Purcell's _King Arthur_; Handel's music is neither in his own style nor in Purcell's, but resembles the poorest sort of English patriotic song of the early eighteenth century. Patriotic poetry was well illustrated by an additional verse for "God Save the King" which was printed in this same month: