The Sun.
London, England, 1854-03-22 00:00:00

LONDON, WEDNESDAY, MARCH 22, 1854.

Whether it be or be not, in its origin a Coalition
War—as Mr. DISRAELI pronounced it to be in his
animated speech during the course of last even-
ing's dicussion—this momentous struggle of Eng-
land. and France against the Russian AUTOCRAT is
at any rate a War directed for the maintenance
of the holiest principles, for the maintenance of
the principles of truth and justice, and for the
consolidating upon firmer bases than ever of the
glorious and complicated system of modern civili-
zation. There is more in this than the rhetorical
turn of a sentence, or than the pomp of sonorous
phraseology. It is simply the utterance of a great
fact, a fact the importance of which deserves a more
general and a more thorough appreciation. Do the
generality of observers, we would ask, estimate it at
its right value, this warlike movement on the part of
the European Governments ? Let it be considered
for a few moments with dispassionate calmness
and deliberation by each one individually. Here
are we now, in this year of our LORD 1854, enter-
ing upon a conflict against the pride and ambition
of one of the most gigantic empires on the face of
the earth—after the lapse, since the close of the
last great war in 1815, of nearly forty years, of
just nine-and-thirty years of general tranquillity ?
Revolutionary contests have, no doubt, during,
that almost unprecedented interval of general tran-
quillity, agitated now one nation and now another.
But during those forty years, it may be observed with
truth, that there has been no war worthy of being
designated as European, there has been no widely-
extended struggle against each other, in which
the larger Powers have, at any time participated.
There has been the French conquest of Algeria.
There has been the emancipation of Greece by the
arbitres of the destinies of Christendom. There
has been the war of Schleswig Holstein, and the
war of the Sonderbund. There have been, at
intervals, the wars of Polish Independence, of
Italian Independence, and of Hungarian Inde-
pendence. There have been intermittent risings
of the Carlists in Spain, and of the Miguelites in
Portugal. The tornado of Democracy has raged for
awhile, and then suddenly died out among the greater
and the lesser States of the Germanic Confedera-
tion. During the last forty years we have wit-
nessed all these and similar explosions of the
Bellicose spirit of the European population. But
between 1815 and 1854 there has not arisen
until now any cause of battle among the chief of
the mightier Powers of Christendom. At last,
therefore, after—in this respect—a lull of the
principal portion of half a century, Europe is
roused once more to a general conflict—by what
summons? B 1 the summons predicted by the
Captive of St. Helena—by one more sagacious
than CimAR, more imperial than SE';OSTRIS,
more daring than ALEXANDER, and more
puissant than CHARLEMAGNE. ;*l3y the war
trumpet of the great northern Autocracy. By
the apparition of the Cossack hordes along the
frontiers of our European civilisation.
It is to oppose the advance of the Russians
westwards that France and England have united
at last their fleets and their battalions. An in-
cident—this--such as Europe has not witnessed
for centuries, not, indeed, since the remote epoch
of the Crusades. Hitherto opposed to each other
by a deadly animosity, they are at length com-
bining their energies for a glorious emulation.
At length they are drawing the sword, not face
to face, but side by side. The union-jack
and the tri-colour flutter at last in friendly
proximity—here over the military, and there
over the maritime armaments sent out together
by the two great allied Governments. And for
what purpose are all their mighty energies called
forth ? Not for the gratification of any idle am-
bition, not for the advancement of any selfish
motives, not with a view, as hitherto so very fre-
quently, of a territorial, or a political, or a com-
mercial angrandisement. But for the defence of
the weak—for the punishment of a powerful ag-
gressor—for the vindication of Turkish Indepen-
dence—for the maintenance of Right over Might
—for the blended cause of Truth and Justice--s•
for the consolidation upon firmer grounds of the
general peace of Christendom.
As if to complete by a crowning marvel all
the wonders of this extraordinary juncture—.
during these last forty years of European tran-
quillity, during this interval which has elapsed be-
tween 1815 and 1854, all that had been built up
by the last momentous struggle, at such enormous
cost of blood and money, has been since then
rased to its foundations and utterly dissipated.
The last European war, remember, the last " war
of the giants," was carried on for the revival of
Bourbonism and for the destruction of Bonapart-
ism. At what enormous expenditure to England,
we know by the increase of the National Debt, by
the increase of that debt which exceeds all the debts
of all the other nations of the earth put together,
according to the acknowledgment made a few
nights back in the House of Commons by her
MAJESTY'S Chancellor of the Exchequer. Well,
after all this—How are matters at present situ-
ated ? Why, twice since 1815 have the Bour-
bons been rejected by the French multitude—
in 1830 the elder, and in 1848 the younger
branch of that dynasty which. had been dragged
back at the chariot wheels of the Kings of Eu-
rope over the corpses of so many millions of their
fellow-countrymen. And now, in 1854, England
is adventuring again upon a general war—with
her most trusted ally the Imperial ruler of France,
the head and champion, and rppresentative of the
once obnoxious cause of Bonapartism. It is well.
For, never again, we believe, can England be the
Quixote of " Legitimacy."
Under this astonishing combination of circum-
stances, is it that the two principal Powers of
Western Europe, the two foremost Empires in
Christendom one the greatest military and the
other the greatest maritime nation on the globe,
are now entering together upon a struggle in which
the barbarism of Russia is confronted by the fleets
and the armies of civilisation. As indicative of
the nature of the two causes, Russia has prepared
for the struggle by a forced loan, while France has
obtained the sinews of war by a voluntary loan,
which voluntary loan has been eagerly advanced
by her own people, within an interval of a few
days, nearly to the full amount of the requested
350,000,000 francs. The former being regarded,
naturally enough, as a direct robbery, and the
latter as a safe investment.

It might almost have been reasonably expected
that the German Powers would have been alienated
at length from the councils of the AUTOCRAT, now
that a daring taunt on the part of his official jour-
nal has led to the disclosure of the secret
correspondence between the British and Rue-
sian Governments. It so happens, however,
that Austria is . too much a a vassal, and
Prussia too much of a cypher, in regard
to the northern Autocracy, to admit of their
withdrawal from a position of neutrality at

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