The Sun.
London, England, 1851-04-14 00:00:00

[The following appeared in our Third Edition of
Saturdiy :---)

FRAN CE.

from Toulon, of the 7t,li instant, announces

that considerable activity is observable in the dock-
yards of that port. The ship of the line Charlemagne
has been armed, and the steam•frigate Napoleon is
being prepared for sea with all haste. A dispatch
bad been likewise received from the Minister of
Marine, ordering the equipment of the new frigate
the Sibylle.
The receipts of the Orleans and Bordeaux Railway
Company, from the Ist July last to the 6'h instant,
amount to 3,144 462 f., being an increase of 186,857 f.
as compared wi h the corresponJing period of the
preceding year.
M. de Lamartine, in the Pays, publishes an article
under the head of " Legitimacy or Socialism," in
reply to M. Emile de Girardin, who had declared that
there was no choice left between the Legitimatists and
the Socialists. We give an extract from the article of
M. de Lamartine

" The Presse asks, and the other journals interested in
the separation of France into two parties, ask after that
journal, what is there between legitimacy and so-
cialism? We reply boldly; there is almost the whole of
France between the two; only that! There is the Republic,
strong and moderate, which comes between, and will al-
ways come between, those unreflecting and irrecon-
cileable parties. There are humanity, country, reason,
property, labour, the pe Tie in immense proportion, and
in immense force. There are universal suffrage, the
national representation, the Government, the army.
There is everything which wants to live, and wants to
have its posterity live, against all that wants to die, in
dragging after it, in its fit of madness and suicide, coat!.
try, family, children, and generations to come. That is
what is between who you call legitimacy and what you
call socialism, that is between two principles carried to
their radical consequences, murderers of the country, of
civilization, and of themselves. And why did the re-
public of reason, of necessity, and of pacification,
which you applauded yourselves in crying out with
one confidence, spring into existence on February 25?
Preci3ely in order that France, fallen, all at once into
revolution from the biindness and impotent rashness of
the roan of monarchical coalition should not be enclosed
within that dilemma of blood, legitimacy and socialism.
It was in order that an elastic and pacific govern-
ment should promptly separate the armed parties,
and should interpose prudence, the instinct of pre.
nervation, and the generous character of interest of
Franco fur the madness of those radical factions, fur
whim immolation alone would have been p-ace. And
why did those admirable elections of 1848, effected under
the iofluence of that unhoped fur wisdom which seizes on
rati• ma in ex vreme peril, repudiate en masse Socialists and
Dagitim t.s s, to nominate a republican and n3odotrate re-
pre, eta ktion, courageous against all pas,ions, even against
its own? It was that the question should be establishal be-
tween the country and the patriots, and not between
two irreconcileable and desperate fictions of the coun-
ty. And why ,on M'ty 15 and in June, 1848, did the
people hurry up to Paris from the provinces ? It
was to fling themselves with the Assembly be-
tween these extreme and desperate parties who thirsted
for combat when France, society, and reason desired
peace. And why, in the election of December 10,
did France, when she c0u1.4 have voied fur a So-
cialist or Legitamatist, vote for a name (dangerous I
admit, but neutral), signifying precis-ly the contrary
to what you say, that is, not siguitying either Legitimacy
or Socialism, saying peace when you say war, concilia-
tion and no; hostiliq! And why did you yourselves
more than any one aid in giving that signification to
the election of the President of the R. public? It was
in order that the GovErnment, representing France,
should interpose with greater authority, greater popular
favour, between these two extreme principles, which de-
sire to have a solution of civil war in the place of a so-
lution of harmony.

M. de Lamartine concludes by an allusion to the
logic of M. de Girardin. He says :
" Ales, France has bad too much of this desperate logic.
She has had the logic of royalty : the emigration and its
follies. She has had the logic of revolution: the committee
of public safety and its sciffolds! She has had the logic of
war: the despotism of Napoleon and three millions of
meu immolated to the ambition of one man! She has bad
the logic of monarchical power without counterbalance:
the revolution of 1830 and the fall of a race legitimated
by trBdition 1 She has had the logic of resistance to re-
forms and the obstinacy of blindness: the revolwion of
1848 and the precipice of elective monarchy! She has
had the logic of impatient proletarianism : the battles
and the corpses of June, 1848! liould you give to her
the implacability of parties? No, you do nut wish this,
bu.t beware then of its conclusions."