The Sun.
London, England, 1848-02-28 00:00:00

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LONDON, MONDAY. FEBRUARY 28, 1848.

CONSOLIDATION

THE FRENCH REPUBLIC.

Every additional scrap of intelligence received
from Paris confirms our impression, more and more,
that the Revolution of 1848 is as glorious in the
principles which it embodies, as it is unparalleled in its
rapidity, its completeness, and its moderation. France
has imbibed wisdom from experience. Its people
have risen because they have been compelled—they
have triumphed because of their unanimity—they
have evinced the most extraordinary self-command
because their cause is the cause of justice and
humanity.
Since 1830—that famous epoch in which one man
was the recipient of the generosities of an entire
nation !—the liberties of Frenchmen have been cur-
tailed and stunted, in defiance of all the provisions of
the Charter. Since' 1830, the inhabitants of that
great country have protested' against the aggressions
of their perfidious and insidious Sovereign. The
struggle which commenced in 1834 has continued for
nearly fourteen years without intermission, the
royal absolutist maintaining his position by a policy
the verb of which was " craft," and the multitude
insisting upon the necessity of the due preservation
of their rights in the midst of the horror excited by
those comprehensive innovations which were never
theless received with a sublime obedience. For
fourteen years, we say, that struggle continued with
a deliberate ferocity, and a systematic falsity, on the
part of the Government, and a suppressed but
growing sentiment of wrath on the part of the com-
munity. One act of perfidy has not evoked
the recent convulsion of affairs in Paris. The
Revolution is merely the ultimate consequence of
a thousand thousand provocations. Even the awful
catalogue of official crimes condensed by the genius
of ODILON BARROT within the compass of his epi-
gramatic impeachment is but a meagre indication of
the offences which have each by each aroused the in-
dignation of a sensitive and most excitable populace.
Corruption is but one of the many plague-spots upon
the Cabinet of GUIZOT-but one of those hideous
poison-blots which affected France to the
very extremities, filling her heart with rage
and nerving her arms to a divine effort at
emancipation. The arbitrary power installed during
so many legislative and financial years in the Tuile-
ries evoked on its own head the vengeance of thirty
millions. Its Nemesis was that popular will which
it had outraged. It fraternized with Austria, it
slighted Italian patriotism, it defrauded the Spaniards
of their nationality, it strove to degrade that august
spirit of civism which had existed for centuries
among the mountains of Switzerland, it restrained the
feelings of the Portuguese for the sake of a dynastic
compact, it instigated the perpetration of such atro-
cities in Algeria as had scarcely ever been known
since the days of TAMERLANE the Conquerer, it had
partially trodden out the freedom of the press by the
execrable enactments of September, it had covered
France with infamy by the reflected infamy of its
associates, it had at length adventured upon a course
so flagrant in its opposition to that alone compatible
with civil liberty, as to take measures for the preven-
tion of freedom of discussion by the demonstration
of an armed force of 100,000 disciplined soldiers.
Against that last and consummating act of
violence the Parisians rose to a man; they
defied the austere intellect of GUIZOT, the un-
bridled Machiavellism of Louis Pntrappe, the daunt-
less cruelty of BUGEAUD, the obstinacy of HEBERT,
the determination of DUCUATEL, the sycophancy of
DELESSERT, and the loyal frigidity of JACQUEMINOT
—they defied all this ; they, regarded with indifference
a circle of enormous fortifications; they scorned the
obstacles which bristled before them in the shape
of swords, and bayonets, and cannon ; the
Parisians, we say, defied all this—they con-
quered the friendship of the National Guard
and afterwards of the troops of the line—they
disbanded the guards of the municipalities—they
captured the palaces, dethroned the Monarch, drove
forth the members of the Royal Family as fugitives,
and after achieving all this with a suddenness almost
incredible, they installed a Provisional Government,
which immediately afterwards proclaimed France to be
a Republic. Instead of the triumphal march of Des-
potism, we have witnessed the victorious progress of
Democracy. A week back, and France was to all
appearance tranquil under a constitutional sove-
reignty. Scarcely seven days—and that sovereignty
is demolished, and thirty millions of the human race
are declared to be the citizens of a democratic re-
public. The very rapidity with which all this has
been accomplished is a proof, that it had become an
absolute necessity—that Louts PHILIPPE had ren-
dered himself irrecoverably detestable—that the Re-
volution of 1848 has been the ebullition of an
epoch, the unanimous outburst of an entire people.
Such being the case, it is the duty of Europe at
once to recognise the existence of the French Re-
public. For that Republic is legitimately esta-
blished, and the names of the principal leaders are
enough of themselves to ensure to the Provisional
Government the respect of the Liberals of the world.
Those eminent Ministers, it will not be forgotten,
are—

DUPONT (de l'Eure), President of the Council,
LAMARTINE, Minister of Foreign Affairs,
LEDRU ROLLIN, Minister of the Interior,
BEDEAU, Minister of War,
MICHEL GOUDCHAUX, Minister of Finance,
ARAGo, Minister of Marine,
BETIIMONT, Minister of Agriculture and Commerce,
MARIE, Minister of Public Works,
CARNOT, Minister of Public Instruction,
CAvAioruc, Governor-General of Algeria,
GARNIEIt PAGES, Mayor of Paris.
umberless instances have been given of the mo-
deration of this great people in the midst of their
memorable and supreme excitement. While them-
selves fusilladed by the soldiery they have frequently
respected life and property, and have even chastised
their comrades when any act of brutality
has been detected. While storming the Tuileries,
they appear to have abstained from all destruction of
the works of art and vertu with which its galleries
and saloons are enriched, planting sentinels at the
different doorways to prevent all robbery and unne-
cessary outrage. One example, however, is worth a
hundred generalities. Here is one, and we commend
its perusal to our readers, for it seems to us to be in-
vested with a very sublime aspect: —" On taking the
Tuileries," says the Democratic Pacifique, "the people
found a magnificent image of Chri6t, in sculpture.
The people stopped and saluted it. My friends,'
cried a Pupa of the Ecole Pelytechnipe, Mid is Ma

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