Napoleon III. can solve the problem,' and make France powerful enough to defy a confederacy, he has but to divide, in order to tyrannize over Europe. An apology which has been made for the great military, and more especially the great naval, preparations of France-that they indicate no new or Napoleonic idea, but are simply the realization of plans conceived under a former government-may be well founded. But then the question recurs are these preparations necessary, or are they not? Does France really need 'millions of armed men,' or does she not? If she does, what conclusions must we form respecting the character of the age, and the theory of the extinction of the military element in modern Europe? Shall we say that it is an economical, industrious, and pacific age, or one of restlessness, danger, alarm and war? On the other hand, if there is nothing in surrounding Europe to justify the armaments of France, what must we think of the deliberate schemes of the French Government and the probabilities of peace? There is, too, another consideration—namely, that whatever be the reason and meaning of these facts, they are facts which must be accepted with their natural consequences. You cannot pile barrels of gunpowder round your neighbour's house without danger of a spark falling from your own chimney or his, or from the torch of some fool or incendiary. In the presence then of these phenomena, indicating what they do of the reciprocal relations and attitude of the most civilized states, can we say that the political aspect of the world and the condition of international morality would be unaptly described in the language applied to them two hundred years ago by Hobbes: Every nation has a right to do what it pleases to other commonwealths. And withal they live in the condition of perpetual war, with their frontiers armed and cannons planted against their neighbours round about?'

There are, notwithstanding, sanguine politicians, who look upon these things as transitional and well-nigh past, who view the darkest prospects of the hour as the passing clouds of the morning of peace, and the immediate heralds of that day when nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. Of the advent of that period not one doubt is meant to be suggested here. But the measures of time which

history and philosophy put into our hands are different from those which the statesman must employ. An age is but as a day to the eye to which the condition of the globe when it was first trodden by savage men is present. But those whose vision is confined to the fleeting moments so important to themselves, that cover their own lifetime and that of their children, will deem the reign of peace far distant if removed to a third generation.

What, then, is the interpretation of the signs of the times on which a practical people should fix its scrutiny? To this question, the question of the age-whether it means peace or war—it is believed that the preceding pages supply a partial answer, which we have not here room to make more full and definite; or it could be shown that the form and spirit of the age, the imperfection of the mechanism for the adjustment of international rights, the ill organization of continental polities, the impending repartition of Europe, and the aspect of remoter portions of the globe compose a political horizon charged with the elements of war.

UNIVERSITY

CALIFORNIA

VII.

THE FUTUREOF EUROPE FORETOLD IN HISTORY.*

(Macmillan's Magazine, September, 1860.)

THE events of the last year and a half, and the character of the agitation over many parts of the continent, must have banished from the most conservative and peaceable minds in this country all confidence in the stability of the present political and territorial divisions of Europe. Whatever there may be in the numerous omens of departure from the status quo to alarm or to interest Englishmen, there is at least no occasion for surprise at the prospect. Europe is not now for the first time occupied about the removal of ancient landmarks. Its history is a chronicle of continual repartitions of its territory. Experience therefore would warrant no other expectation than that of further rearrangements, but it may not be so obvious that experience can help us to foresee the consummation towards which all such changes converge.

It is the object of this essay to show that all the alterations of the political map, since the dissolution of the Roman Empire, have proceeded upon a uniform principle and in one direction; and that, from a comparison of accomplished facts with the tendency of existing movements, we may gather instruction of a practical kind respecting our prospects and duties, considered as both Englishmen and Europeans, or as citizens not only of the British Empire, but of the great commonwealth of civilized

states.

The reader will remember that this Essay was written nearly nineteen years ago. As in the case of the preceding Essay, the author adheres to its main principles and conclusions, but not to every sentence.

For the most part, nations are not more slow to anticipate the revolutions of time, than they are quick to forget the order of things which those revolutions supersede. Thus French historians of all systems, and politicians of all parties, are accustomed to assume that their nation and government have some ancient, natural, and immutable title to their present, and even more extensive boundaries;* although, in truth, France has very lately reached her existing limits-by nine hundred years of war and usurpation-and has no other right to them than the power to hold what she has seized, the gradual acquiescence of many vanquished peoples, and the final assent of the rest of Europe.

Whatever unity Gaul possessed as a province of the empire of the Cæsars-as a single fraction of that vast imperial unit— was a matter of Roman administration entirely; there was nothing national, much less modern or French in it. Nay, during the integrity of the province, as such, those bands of German warriors (through whom, by a singular fortune, the Frank name came by degrees to be imposed upon several distinct nationalities and independent states) had not crossed the Somme, and they never finally occupied or governed more than a small portion of the land between the Rhine, the Alps, and the Pyrenees. The army of Clovis had but a momentary and partial success south of the Loire, and made no conquest of Brittany. Charles the Great had no better title to the sovereignty of the various nations then in Gaul than to the rest of his evanescent empire, which was but an incident of the German invasions, and scarcely belongs to the history and settlement of modern Europe.

By the treaty of Verdun in 843, the Meuse and the Rhone

* This idea is more deeply rooted in the French mind than is commonly believed in England, and would be dangerous to the peace of Europe even if there were no Bonapartists living.

'La nature ne voulut que le maintien de nos limites naturelles. L'idée de les reprendre ne se perdra jamais : elle est profondément nationale et profondément historique.'-Thierry, Récits des Temps Mérov. i. 194.

'C'est seulement au traité de Verdun, en 843, que la France a reculé du Rhin et des Alpes. Elle n'a cessé de reclamer son antique heritage.'- Duruy, Hist. de France, i. 2.

Jusqu'où allait la Gaule, disait Richelieu, jusque là doit aller là France.' -Id. ii. 224. Compare Thiers, Hist. du Consulat et de l'Empire, vol. xvii. p. 124, and passim.

became the boundaries of Charles the Bald's nominal kingdom of France or Gaul. But so broken is the succession between ancient and Roman Gaul, this Carlovingian France, and the modern country of that name, that, towards the end of the tenth century, while the genuine Romans and primitive Celts were slaves, the Bretons, Normans, Burgundians, Visigoths, and Gascons maintained against the Franks their separate territories, their distinct nationality, names, and political independence. About this time it was that the duke of a small district north of the Loire, insulated by natural boundaries, and long afterwards called the Isle of France, assumed, with the consent of some of the chieftains of northern Gaul, the title of King; thereby effacing the last vestige of the Carlovingian sovereignty, while laying the foundation of the modern realm of France. For more than two centuries after Hugh Capet was crowned, the people south of the Loire were distinguished by the general name of Romans from the people above that river, who were called (though not invariably or without dispute) Franks or French. During this period the only monarch who reigned by legitimate right on both sides of this natural boundary of France was the King of England. Until the crusade of Simon de Montfort, followed by the annexation to the crown of France of Languedoc and Provence, the French of the north had vainly endeavoured to extend their rule over the Gallo-Roman or Gothic population of the south. The language divided and defined the two yet unmingled races. Throughout the war the Crusaders are described as the Franks, as a foreign nation invading a separate territory."* The annexation of Belgium or Switzerland at this day would not be a more cruel violation of national rights and feelings than that which is thus described by a French historian:-Thus were annexed to the kingdom of France the provinces of ancient Gaul situated right and left of the Rhone, except Guienne and the valleys at the foot of the Pyrenees. The most disastrous period in the history of the people of southern France is that at which they became French; when the king, whom their ancestors used to call the King of Paris, began to term them his subjects of the langue d'oc, in

* Milman's Latin Christianity, iv. 204.