"I doubt he asked for forgiveness; madmen rarely do," Hermione pointed out. "I have no children, so I can't begin to imagine what the fear of losing one might be like. Would becoming a Grey Warden have been a bad thing? I've never heard of it before."

His question surprised her, and she looked at him with a polite, albeit vaguely bemused, smile. "Of course. Who better to supervise the magical community than witches and wizards themselves? Our Minister will, of course, make the occasional visit to the Muggle Prime Minister - that is, the representative of the non-magical government - if a situation calls for it, since it's only fair that the Prime Minister is kept abreast of anything that might have an impact on his own government, but otherwise, most of us live secretly among Muggles while following our own laws that were designed to keep everyone safe and happy. It's not perfect, but it's worked well enough for hundreds of years."