The National Register.
London, England, 1815-07-16 00:00:00

POLITICAL DISQUISITION.

POLICY OF THE FRENCH GOVERNMENTS

Future historians will look at our times and throw
down their pen in despair. The multiplicity and dose
succession of events, but above all their importance,
which would demand for each, volumes of detail and
elucidation, will perplex their minds and appal their cou-
rage. To facilitate, they will divide the task. Portions
of time will become the subject of their labours, and
these partial histories will attest to posterity, more pow-
er fully than the gigantic-memorials raised by Alexander
in India, the stupendous character of our age.
It is usual, and perhaps natural, for the generality of
men, to complain of the hardness of the period in which
they live. Common eyes are only fixed on the common
interests of life ; and if they glance at the expansive the-
atro of human events, it is only to ascertain how far their j
own views are affected by them. The fetters of
trade, the weight of taxes, the absence and
,the pe-
rils of beloved friends and relations, form in the
sight of most persons, the chief and abhorred features
of the times. Hence they are prone to lament and to
complain ; to sigh for better days, or to sink into de-
spondency. Minds that embrace at once the vast field of
the world and do not separate their interests from those
of mankind, take a different view o fth ngs. They shrink
hack with disgust from those ignominous ages when the
intellects of man slumbered, and no deed of heroism or
virtue cast a fleeting beam through the gloom. They
feel, but rise superior to the difficulties and hardships
which circumstances impose upon them, and proud co-
temporaries of mighty events, prefer the blaze of their gran-
deur to the inglorious obscurity of more tranquil ages.
Let those who consider this doctrine as erroneous, ask
themselves what period of history would have suited them
better than the present. Is there a single British spirit
that would not prefer the time when the sword of his
country has liberated the world, when her.banners wave
over the palaces of the fallep oppressor, and grateful na-
tions follow her as their leader in the light, to her days of
ease and indolence ? However tremendous the struggle
that has so long convulsed the world, like
Vu!. VII, Nu. CIGLYCIV

has had its terrible joys, which few vs ould have willing'y
resigned evtn to avoid its terrors.

Let us not, however, imagine that our course is re:,
•
and that from the harbour we can safely enjoy the te-
multuous spectacle of the past. England has, indeed,
headed Europe to conquest and to freedom . • England has,
indeed, replaced a legitimate sovereign on the throne;
but we fear she has restored in vain the sceptre and the
sword. The monarch whom her voice and that of Con-
tinental nations has proclaimed king of France, lays
himself the mine that will destroy his power. We know
that mercy is the noblest attribute of Kings ; but mercy
to the guilty is sometimes injustice to the innocent. But
even if crime must be pardoned, it need not be rewarded.
What should we say of a man, who because he had dis-
armed the assassin who aimed at his life, should restore
the dagger to his hands, and clasp him to his bosom as a
friend ? We should deem his conduct the extreme of
madness? What then are we to think of a monarch, who
not, only forgives those whose machinations drove him
from his throne, and who denounce'd the pain of death
against him and his family, if they re-entered Franc'',
but who maintains them in the offices in which they served
the usurper, and thus leaves them full power to renew
their plots without either check or peril. If Louis
XVIII. displayed true magnanimity at his first re-
storation, when he forgot all difference of prtie4,
and endeavoured to turn his enemies into friends, ra-
ther than to destroy them, is he now entitled to the saran
praise ? Has he not perceived the fruit Ivhich lenity
produced, and is he justified in having recourse to
' same dangerous palliative a second time ? If Ilk cr.'. a
security alone was concerned : if the fall of his thrcre
did not shake every other seat of legitimate empire,
and threaten the renewal of all the horrors and exces-.es
of the revolution, then although nations might pity his
blindness, they would not inteifcre with his cheiee.
But when he admits within his very council all the ele-
ments of future conspiracie m, how can the Allies retire to
their states and fancy they have secured the peace of the
world ? Or how can he expect that they will leave the mea-is
and strength of his country unimpaired, when they must de-
rive from itswea,ness that security which his impolicy de.
We are no advocates :or tileiheildiry,

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