cause, if real; since, whoever succeeds to Napoleon, should this monarch fall, would be obliged to yield to the national bent, by pursuing projects of ambition.

That a due guarantee would be given to the allies against the absolute power of Napoleon, the formation of a representative government, and every evidence of the ascendant gained by the people in this country, are sufficient to make more than probable. The constitution which he himself has proposed, by putting the purse of the state into the hands of the house of representatives, makes the declaration of war as dependant upon that house as it is upon the English house of commons; but in the alterations which the chamber, when met, will propose, it is doubted whether the declaration of war will be left to the crown; for I see that a pamphlet, addressed to the representatives, earnestly recommends taking away this prerogrative from the sovereign, as well as putting the army into the hands of responsible and national officers.* Those who aver, that Napoleon, seconded by the army, would find means to crush the rising spirit of liberty, and to resume his former power in all its plenitude, know nothing of France, as you have, by this time, seen, nor of the army, which would second no such project. It is possible, as I have said, that the nation, being itself ambitiously inclined, would aggress; but such an inclination would not depend upon Napoleon any more than upon any other limited monarch; therefore the removal of him would not allay the apprehensions of the neighbouring peoples. There are but three methods of removing the fears entertained, or professed to be entertained, by the allies-the deposition of Napoleon-the disarming of the ambition of Napoleon, by converting the despotism of his former throne into a constitutional monarchy-or the entire destruction of the French armies. The first method has been proved to be as unreasonable for the allies to expect, as unproductive of the end they propose; the second plan is looked upon as feasible only in France, for the other powers are either actually blind to the present disposition and moral state of this country, or wilfully shut their to them; and the last the system of extermination, is at once adopted, as the only resource, according to that policy, so popular in England, which has given to the iron argument, the ratio regum, the first instead of the last place in royal dialectics. The force of arms is to drive Napoleon from his throne. Suppose the purpose accomplished, and that only half a million

eyes

The sovereign was never to take the field by the constitution made during the

siege of Paris.

of men have fallen in battle, and fifty times as many been ruined and made wretched. The throne is vacant-the war ceases-and the French choose another sovereign, that is, if the original interpretation of the eighth article be sincere, and acted up to by the conquerors-but is the peace of Europe secured? what guarantee is there against the newly elected sovereign, especially under the supposition of his being absolute, which the allies think must be the case? The annihilation of the army of France, if brought about, will not annihilate the revenge of France, nor, if the above declaration of her integrity be adhered to, her power. The war, therefore, which the allies declare against Napoleon only, supposing that pretext to be believed, leaves in reality no option to France; and as the object which the allies aver as the real motive of this war seems so entirely unattainable by the method proposed to be pursued, there is no other conclusion to be formed, but that the reserves and exceptions hinted at in Lord Clancarty's letter will turn out sufficient excuse for the imposition of any sovereign chosen by the congress, if not for the dismemberment of France. Such of the constitutionalists here, as cannot yet reconcile themselves to Napoleon, pretend to give some credit to the declaration of the allies, that they make war on Napoleon alone, but only, I believe, for the sake of encouraging a whisper that the Emperor will, by abdicating at the Champ de Mai, put the truth of that declaration to the test. It is not easy to foresee what would be the event of such an act; for myself, I believe that, as nothing would so embarrass the allies, so no news would be received with such consternation, though all would end, I suppose, in the advance of the 1,100,000 bayonets into France, in search of Lord Clancarty's reasonable guaran tees.*

The Censor of the next month, No. VI. did require, in as many words, this sacrifice of Napoleon, from himself, not from the nation. The words are remarkable, and may serve to shew the constraint under which the press groaned during the late reign. En 1814. Napoleon si l'on en croit son conseil d'etat, abdique l'empire pour "prevenir une guerre civile, et pour mettre une terme a la guerre etrangere. En "1815, il se ressaisit de l'autorite; sur-le-champ la guerre civile cclute, la France est "menacee de l'invasion de tous les peuples de l'Europe, et cependant il retient la puissance dans ses mains. La patrie lui est elle moins chere cette année que l'annee "derniere, ou une abdication en faveur des Bourbons lui paruit-elle preferable a une "abdication en faveur de son fils ?”*

"In 1814, it was pretended that Napoleon abdicated the empire to prevent civil, and to terminate foreign war. In 1815, he re-usurps authority: immediately civil war is enkindled, France is menaced with the invasion of all the nations of Europe, and nevertheless he continues to retain in his own hands the reins of government! Is his country less dear to him this year than it was the last, or does an abdication in favour of the Bourbons appear to him, preferable to an abdication in favour of his son ?"

LETTER XIV.

Paris, May-.

I HAVE hitherto regarded the war as far as France is concerned. You may now ask why Napoleon does not make this personal sacrifice, and thus having rescued his country from a dynasty considered by many, whether justly or not, to be no less dangerous than incapable, and having, by convoking a representation really national, and reorganizing her disbanded armies, made her happy at home and respectable abroad, retire from his painful pre-eminence with more glory than Dioclesian, and with a self-devotion not unworthy of Codrus or any ancient name ? To this I answer, that perhaps Napoleon may be as entirely persuaded as you are that his abdication would not preserve the independence or integrity of France. His procla mations and speeches, of course, hold that language, and his friends, together with far the greater part of the constitutionalists, laugh at the protestations of the allies, although they have been as yet restrained, by a wish to go every length to reconcile the English cabinet, from openly asserting that the stipulation relative to the eighth article of the treaty of the 25th of March is nothing but an excuse for aggression, and a lure to loosen the allegiance of France to her new sovereign. Add to this, that the Bourbonists do every thing in their power to bring discredit upon these protestations and our stipulation, by asserting that the natural consequence of the retreat of the Emperor would be the return of the king, and that for this object alone Europe is now at the gates of France. With the conviction, then, that his abdication, though it might put the right and justice of France in a more favourable position, or, rather, render it altogether unquestionable, would give her no other advantage than that which right and justice can bestow on a disputed cause, which is Napoleon may fairly look upon his retreat as a compliance with an unjust demand, productive neither of honour to himself nor utility to France. Without this conviction, the preventing motive must be an egotism and selfishness, of which, to say the truth, he is more than suspected, even by his firmest admirers, and which, combined with a just reliance upon his own abilities and the intrepidity of the French armies, inay induce him to prefer trusting his own destinies and those of his

......

empire to the decision of the sword. He has spilled blood enough, and if in any point of view, since his return, he can be regarded as provoking the war about to ensue, without the adoption of every means, and the sacrifice of every personal feeling, to preserve the peace of France and of Europe, let the hatred of all honest men, now dispersed amongst the sovereigns of congress, be collected into a focus, and fall united upon his - guilty head.

The friends of the ancient social system (I thank Lord C. for the phrase, and must be allowed to use it) in every country in Europe have joined with the honest Metternich, the unprejudiced Hardenberg, the unassuming Razumouski, the virtuous Talleyrand, and our own Clancarty, in the outcry against the return of Napoleon, as an act unprecedented even in the annals of ambition, and arrayed in all the characteristics of atrocitywith more of perfidy, ingratitude, and violence, than is to be allowed even to the obliquity of ambition-a sort of treason against our common nature-a lèse-majesté,* human and divine, such as the parliament of Rouen imputed to Henry IV. These accusations, when considered merely as the terms in which the allies choose to couch their declaration against France, are of little moment. The nations of modern Christendom have always seemed to like the ceremony of being told why they are to be mutually slaughtered and pillaged-the reason does not matter as to weight, or application, or truth, so as it be assigned. Louis XIV, informed his subjects that they were to carry fire and sword into the states of the empire, and that all true and faithful subjects of France would fly to arms, to recover some old furniture belonging to the Duchess of Orleans.

Whether old furniture or old systems are to serve the turn is perfectly indifferent. Certain reasons have always been given in all due form, and though they were as plenty as blackberries, no others are required, or would be offered. But until these days it was not expected that any reasonable man should be the dupe of a mere form, or should imagine that monarchs really considered themselves, and were determined to act, as the patrons and preservers of every religious and moral duty. However, it seems that the awful train of good and just, which form so large a portion of mankind, call for vengeance upon the first man who ever broke a treaty, and have devoted him to punishment, to deter others from the commission of the like unheard of crime, and the invention of new and monstrous infringements upon public right.

* High treason.

The believer in the right divine of certain reigning houses may think, that as every attempt to overthrow the Emperor Napoleon, in the wars formerly waged against France, was justified by the holy end in view, so no breaking of treaties by either of the allied sovereigns can be brought in excuse of a similar conduct in one not born with the privilege of looking upon expediency as right. But an Englishman must see this matter with very different eyes, and, notwithstanding the common forms of hostility justified the government of his country in former times, in refusing to acknowledge the title by which Napoleon held the sovereign power, or, in other words, to call him Emperor instead of Consul of France, yet he cannot for a moment hesitate in allowing the pretensions of that great man to all the rights of sovereigns to have been as full as can be acquired by the founder of any dynasty-a position, by the way, that a diet of the old empire would find it difficult to controvert. The British government were willing to make peace with this Emperor, and had peace been made, would never have dared to insult the liberality, and do a violence to the justice, of their countrymen, by alleging the want of hereditary title as a fair excuse for breaking such a peace upon the first expediency.

An Englishman, therefore, cannot regard the infraction of the treaty of Fontainbleau by Napoleon in any other light than he would the violation of the same or another treaty by any other monarch. The imposition of force has always been thought a sufficient excuse for making and for breaking conditions. A war was never begun without the belligerents on both sides being accused by some and excused by others for want of faith, and no one objected to the efforts made by the sovereigns of Europe to throw off that subjection to which they had solemnly stipulated themselves, by putting their signatures to the Confederation of the Rhine. Every one thought it very natural that the King of Prussia, when reduced to four towns, and to a dependance which made him eye every stranger at his little court at Kæningsberg with fear, lest he should have orders from Napoleon in his pocket to carry him away, should seize the first opportunity of recovering his throne; and every one characterised his desertion of the French, as an honourable effort to rescue himself from an insignificance to which he had been sunk by force alone.

The violation of his engagements with his son-in-law, by the Emperor of Austria, was not called perfidy, but, on the contrary, a glorious sacrifice to public duty. I believe it to have been neither one nor the other, being persuaded that a little better