The National Register. — London, England, 1809-08-27 00:00:00

Mt id Ldit. Bvo. chap. ix. sec. xix. and xxi. 32:3-324. " None but the Sovereign can make Alliances and Trca ties, either by himself or by his MiI:ISECES. Treaties con cluded by Ministers oblige the Sovereign and the State only when the Ministers have been duly authorised to make Ova and have done nothing contrary to their orders and instruction*; and here it may be observed that among the Romans the word fedus, a public compact, or solemn agreement, signified a Trealy made by order of the Sove reign Power, or that bad been afterwards ratified ; but liken Public Persons, or Ministers of State, had promised something relating to the Sovereign Power, without ad vice and command from it, this was called sponsio, or a simple promise and engagement. " When a Sovereign is informed of a Treaty made by ame of his Ministers without his orders, his silence alone does not imply a ratification, unless it will be accompanied with some act, or other circuinAance, which cannot well bear another explication : and much more if life agreement :were made von condition of its beine - ratified by the Sove reign, it is of no force till he has ratified it in a formal 23 caner." It appears from the Extraordinary Gazette, which eon , tains two letters from the Commander in Chief of the Ex peilition„ that the garrison of Flushing was more consider able than had been first .mentioned. We believe the ac count given in this paper sometime since will prove to be perfectly correct. We stated that owing to the oversight of not securing - Cadsand, MONNETT had increased his garri son to 8 or 9000 men ; this proves to have been the fact, at accounts in some measure for an error we had supposed him guilty of in wasting what. was supposed to have been a very small garrison in sanguinary and ineffectual sorties, It have from the dispatches that the other islands we have taken will supply our troops with cattle, provisions, and spirits, and there does not appear to be any thing war ranting a doubt of carrying the ulterior objects of the Expedition into effect ; at the same time we cannot but observe, that this must be attributed in a great measure to the rupture of the Armistice in Moldavia. If NAPOLEON had settled the business with Austria, there can be no doubt of his having sent a detachment of 40 or 30,000 men to join the meeting near Antwerp, but we fancy he will find suffi cient employment for all the forces he can muster in Ger many. The foolish and fictitious statement of the compa rative strength of the German and French forces which appoared in the last Bulletin, is now accounted for. Alai as we have before noticed, the object of this gasconade was certainly to accelerate the negotiations by intimidating the Austrian Emperor. Although we have no official account ci the armistice having been hroken off; yet it appears that in Holland, so long. since ai the 16th lust. it was con sidered iia a known and admitted fact ; and letters of that mention, that in consequence of this ciecurastance eulOni ht proda , :e had risen. ' it cannot !nerefore be doubted :hat our care:thin will operate a must formidable, and we trust favourable diver_ kiwi fur the Austrians; it will at any rate occupy a con sidereble force, which ought to have been marched to the Danube. It will certainly encourage, and perhaps be the me.ins of organising the insurrections, wh i ch we trust will he general, in Hesse, Westphalia, and the eastern parts of tiolJand. if our hopes and wishes as to this circumstance should be realised, we have no doubt the nations in his rear will find him employment in that quarter. In the mean time, the Spaniards may and ought to take advantage of the respite which these favourable changes atTord to them ; nothing but an impression upon the minds of that people, that they are fighting for their own' libertie h , and not for the privileges of particular orders, nothing bet • consciousness that their freedom and security is become ideetified with the Government they are called upon to de (cud, or capable of witiag that degree of cut:iusi,lsal lIIIN THE NATIONAL REGISTER; AUG. 27. which is necessary and essential to the eilectual deliverance of their country from the machinations of the Usurper. A gleam of hope seems to shoot along the dark prospects of the Continent; dark indeed if the Tyrant is able to create such a state of things as to make it either the policy or the interest of the powers that he to sink into a universal subserviency, and rather to court a disgraceful vassallage, than bury themselves under the ruin of their independence. What must be the result of such a state is obvious to the meanest capacity. Europe will become one great prison. The same fatal darkness will again pervade the Conti nent which has and always must attend universal des potism.---But darkness is not only the lot of man deprived of liberty and living under the controul of Tyranny ; but Tyrants who reign in solitude create an sail!, cial darkness, for with them education, knowledge, activity, social intercourse, love of one's country, and all the principle moral virtues, are considered in the odious light of resisting principles, and are therefore. proscribed and extinguished, and as to commerce and agriculture, which depend upon capital as their primum mobill, the Despot seizes upon that capital as fast as it appears, and thus " cuts down the tree of which he wishes to gather the fruit." The several great monarchies or rather tyrannies of the world, have proved great experiments upon the. hue. man character, both as to the Princes and the people.— Their power has been built upon the possession of some species of talents, which power has soon absorbed or ex, tinguished, and the master has then beconie the most de-, prayed of mankind, and the subjects the most degenerate. They have each beea rendered worse by the other. Those who possess power, which implies the possession of force, are soon led to believe that it supersedes every othet re quisite of government, whether for foreign objects, or those which are nearer home. The principle or the con sequences of this persuasion soon spread from the Sovereign to the landed proprietor, and to every order of men.— None are instructed, or will humble themselves to receive instruction, and the passions of the human breast, which it is the business of education to suppress, redoubles all their fury. The evil Own acts reciprocally upon itself, and Princes and subjects debase one another in turn, till one uni. versa! depravity, one universal deluge of misery, ignor ance, and confusion, overwhelms the whole earth, and no. where is an olive branch to be met with, upon which the spirit of peace and religion may find a resting place, and no where is an ark to be found in which may be saved a remnant of mankind. The report which has obtained for some days of the rupture of the Armistice, seems to gain more of confidence than we had considered it entitled to. It will be fortunate for this country and we hope for Europe in general, if the Emperor FRANCIS will emancipate himself from the insi dious and corrupted Councils by which his security is menaced. The report to which we allude is repeated in stronger terms than before, and it is conveyed to us in the. following broad expressions: "That the Emperor ofAurrnis had determined not to seal his ruin by acceding to BUONA• TA I`. I E . % oilers of Peace, that he had ordered notice to be. given to the French of the termination of the Armistice, and that the Archduke CHARLES had been replaced in the conimand of the army by Prince JOHN of Lichtenstein.' Lord WsLeour, who arrived from the Continent on Sim day last, is said to confirm this report, and likewise that the discontent in the Austrian army at the result of the battle. of Esling is excessive, it being the universal belief that if the success of the right win:; bad been followed up, the% French army would have been completely defeated ; that their ammunition was exhausted, and that but for the timid. Councils to which the Archduke CHARLES unfortunately listened, and the credit he gave to the weak representation made to him, they must have be. n cut to pieces, and their communic;:tion with Vienna intercepted. Prince JOHN is. said to have offered with thirty thousand men to has e crossed the Danube fOr this purpose, but. his plat) *as re jected% (