The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1872-03-16 00:00:00

JOSEPH MAZZINI.

?'he Times of Tuesday has the following sketch of
the career of Mazzini :
We have to announce to-day the death of a man who in his
time has played a most singular part upon the theatre of
European politics; one whose name has for years been re-
garded as the symbol of Revolution, or rather of Republican-
ism one in whose personal character there were many •
fine and noble qualities but still a man who was
feared even more widely than he was loved, and one
whose departure from the scene of action, to say the
least, will be no unwelcome news to several crowned and dis-
crowned members of the family of European Novereigns.
He
was the man who ever "troubled Israel" by his ceaseless
efforts in the cause of Republicanism, and now at length he
is at rest. lie died on Sunday, at Pisa.
Joseph—or, to give him his Italian name, Giuseppe—
Mazzini was born at Genoa, where his father was a
physician of note and of good private meals. The year
of Ida birth is variously given as 1806, 1803, and 1809.
Be this as it may, he was an only son, and his
early education was conducted with great care anti
pains by his parents, who gent him to one of the
public schools, and afterwards to the University
of his native city. In youth he seas noted for the
warmth of his friendships, the strength and determination of
his will, aud the susceptibility of his feelings. From child,
hood, it is said, sentiments of social equality were fostered
in him by his parents. As a youth he was intended for the
legal profession; but the strttnit Liberal opinions he
had imbibed .as a child, and his conviction that the
oppressed • condition of his country called for men of
action and. public spirit, and that a noble . course
lay open before any on@ who would give himself
up, heart and soul, to the work of reforming her, led him
to devote himself to a politic ii career. In his ardent
aspiratioLs for the national unity of Italy it s7emed to him
that her deliverance from foreign tyranny was to be
achieved only by a return to the Relmblican glories of
ancient times. His patriotic enthusiasm in this direction
was fostered by his early studies, which developed in
him a passionate idea of the glories of a Republic,
and by the success which he had achieved in litera-
ture while still little more than a youth. In 1827 appeared
his maiden essay, " 'Amor Eatrio di Dante," which was
published in a Liberal journal, the Saba/pitao. This led him
to contribute other histori al, philosophical, and critical
papers to the Antefogia of Florence and the 1 rAlivatore Geno-
vese. Rut the authorities, perceiving that the periodical
literature of Italy was becoming far too strongly tainted
with advanced Liberal opinions, suppres•ted these journals,
and hoped, no doubt, thereby to have silenced their writer.

also.
This result, however, by no means followed; they were
gagged for the moment, but their voice was left to find an
utterance elsewhere. About the year 1030, Mazzmi was
affiliated to the secret society of the Carbonari, and this
affiliation was the introductory step to his subsequent
political life ; he was active, able, bold, and bnpe-
tuous ; and he soon rose into a position which gave
him great influence in the councils of that body. At one
time it appeared as if his career was likely to be cut short ;
for he was betrayed by a Pieitmontese spy, arrested, and de-
table I for six months as a prisoner in the fortress of Savona.
Ile was set free at the end of that time only on condition
of quitting Italy, and he came out of captivity to begin
a life of "exile and apostleship" as he termed it, by
founding the msociation of La Giovine Italia, and starting at
the same time, and under that winie title, at Marseilles, a
monthly journal, the chief end and aim of which was the
" regeneration" of Italy. It was about this time, too, that
he addressed to Charles Albert the celebrated letter which
drew down on him a sentence of perpetual banishment from
his native country.
It must be °Ailed, however, that "Young Italy" was an
improvement on the Earhonarism which it superseded ; at
all events, it was more humanitarian—more Catholic in its
scope. In addition to the Republican union of all
Rat), muter one common system of law, and the ex-
tinction of all foreign rule, the general principles of
this new League enforced on its members the duty
of working for the common "moral regeneration" of Italy,
and the establishment of political equality, not in the Italian
Peninsula only, but throughout Europe and tha world Its
watchword was " Liberty, Equality, and Humanity ;" its
motto, "God and the people ;" the white, red, and green
were adopted as their tricolour ; and it was said that hence-
forth education and insmrection were to supersede asaassi-
nation as their arms of attack.
alazzini was the life, soul, and centre of this forinidable
League, which soon spread through the capitals of Europe a
network of similar Associations, each modified so as to suit
the requirements of the several nations. Martini found hire.
self speedily banished from Marseilles, and for several months
be was forced to live in concealment. Still the " Giovine
Italia" was not without its effects. Its first fruit was
' a revolutionary expedition into Savoy, whkh was organ
lied at Geneva, but defeated by the Royal troops.
" For his own ascertained share in the affair Mazzini
Was sentenced to death in the Sardinian courts, but he
managed to keep his head on his shoulders, and to live to re-
commence his revolutionary enterprise with renewed vigour
and with enlarged aims. His "Young Italy" having
been suppressed—at all events for a time—he now founded
11l Switzerland another association, which he called
" New Europe," based su the principles of European
rights and the widest enfranchisement of the people.
In 1e37 he mated Su ttzerlani, anti took up his abode
In London, which subsequently, for many a long year,
be made, for the most part, his heademarters of opera-
tions in the Italian cause. He took, it is almett need-
less to say, a very prominent part in the great European
crisis of leis—a crisis which, no doubt, he helped as largely
as any other man to hying about. In February, ISM, he was
elected a member of the Tuscan Provisienal Ouverninent,
and in the following month he was chosen one of the
-Triumvirate of Rome amid the rejoicings of Italy. His pre-
sence at Rome Was the more welcome becausethis ideas had
long preceded him thither, and, indeed, may be said to have
aided in that revolution of which Rome was then the trium-
phant scene.
It has been the fashion to consider Mazzini as • simple
destructive; se a man able and willing to pull down, hut not
to build sip. It deserves, In cover, to he remembered in his
favour that, true to the twat part of the principles pro-
pounded in the literature of his "Young Italy," Mannar&
tenure of the supreme authority at Rome was marked by
such wisdom and moderation, and attended with such con-
sequent success, as to elicit a public tribute of admiration
Irons the lips of so Conservative a statesman as Used Palmer-
ston. He was the mainspring of the defence of Rom* against
the French; and on the surrender of that city atazzini
quitted Italy, and took up his abode at Lausanne, in Swit-
zerland.
At this period he made his name famousin France by ad-
- dressing to M. de Tocqueville and other Freech statesmen
some most hitter and reproachful letters on the high-handed
policy pursued in that country; and, finding his Continental
residenee too hot to hold him, he returned to Leaden, not,
, however, with any idea of abandoning his long-cherished
hopes for Italian unity. It was at his instigation that
the insurrections at Milan in 1073 and in Piedmont some
three or four years later were attempted. In 1839,
while lending the whole weight of his infleence to the
revolutionary movementa in Italy, he opposed with vigilance
and foresight the threatened predominance of France in the
South of Europe, and ref used to place faith in the Liberal
programme of the French Emperor. The Sicilian expedition
of 1840 owed, perhaps, as much to the entitle prudence
and secret organization of alarsini as to the personal
heroism of Garibaldi, with whom at one time, shortly after
the return of the Austrians to Milan, he wandered
about as a volunteer How far it is true that
In the course of subsequent events he helped as
the cause of Italian unity, as his friends assert, or how far,
by his impracticability, he stood in the way of the realisation
of Italian hopes, we must leave the future historian to de-
cide. His warm advocate*, however, do not scruple to
assert that "as the price of teeing an Italy strong enough
to live her own life, even under a Monarchical form of
Government, he willingly renounced the far dearer dream
he had ever cherished of an united Italian Republic."
Of late years Marztni's health was such as to help to keep
hint in comparative seclusion, although he still contrived to
exercise a considerable, though silent, influence on the
affairs of the Continent. Once, at least, he was elected by
Measles as its representative but he declined or neglected
to take his seat, and his election, consequently, was de-
clared informal. Early lathe present year he took up his
residence at Geneva, where he was recently described so
very feeble, shattered in health, and able to walk about on
bright sunny days only by the help of a stick.
Msxinl mu a copious writer. The list of his works ells
nearly ten pave of the catalogue of the British Museum. A
perfect ma-ter not only of Italian but of French and of
Esaglish literature, he became years ago • commentator upon
Dense, the author of works on philosophy, and a constant
contributor to some of the most thoughtfal iteriodieal litera-
ture in Paris and in London. He could spare time from his
philosophic study to provide for the relief and education of
the poor Italian organ-boys who wander about the streets
of London' and he would tuns from the warfare of polities
be mite in his elpostolale Pepelare, for the benefit of
nom workmen, ma= !as dall9o 91 Pall.". Then