The Statesman.
London, England, 1814-04-15 00:00:00

Tom EDITOR up 71116 STATESMAN.

Sias—Believing, as I sincerely do, that you wish
well to "the cause of liberty all over the world,"
lam disposed, whenever I perceive any sentiments
in your Paper of a different tendency, either to
question the accuracy of my own deductions ; or, if
the case is too clear for that, to attribute the apparent
discrepancy to that hurry of composition, and want of
time for mature reflection, which the compilers of
Daily Papers labour under; and which, I believe,
have frequently exposed certain patriotic Editors to
feel the rigour of the Law, whilst great indul-
gences have been enjoyed by Journalists of different
gentirnents. Impressed with this Idea, and consci-
ous also of your present unmerited sufferings, lam
disposed to think, that it must have been from some
of these causes that certain remarks, on which I
shall take the liberty of making a friendly animad-
version, have found a place in your Paper of Satur-
day last.—" The Paris Papers, which arrived the pre-
ceding day, present (you inform us) a picture to our
mind of the most gratifying nature. After twenty-
five years of successive convulsions, and almost uniti-
terfupted warfare, every friend of the human race
(you say) must rejoice in the prospect of peace, or.
der, and happiness, which now dawns on France
and on the world ; and every lover of freedom must
exult in the consideration, that the noble and enlight-
ened principles which gave the first impulse to the
Revolution of 1789, are still actively and effectively
at work in the Revolution of 1814." I need not tell
you, Sir, that lam a friend to peace, but I like to
see peace proceed from a pacific spirit only; but the
sentiment, the correctness of whichl cannot agree to,

irthis..-the principles,yoe say, which gave the first im-
pulse to the Revolution of 1789, have been effective
is producing that of 1814, consequently the present
Revoletiooot Peritonea to give us pleasure. Now,
if this be true, what occasion was there for this long,
ruinous, and murderous Isar ?•• Has not this war
lasted upwards of 21 years ? Did it not begin with
threats of annihilation and dismemberment ? Was it
not intended to overturn the first free Constitution,
the objtat of the vows, the hopes, and affections of
all France? Was it not designed by this war, not
only to subvert that free government, but also to ex-
terminate French principles? How then can I snp-
-1
pose, that this war, crowned with success, as it ap
pears now to be, is likely to leave in a fixed and

flourishing condition, those very principles it wasl
originally designed, to eradicate? What has pro-
duced so wonderful a change in its nature ?—What
modern miracle has given this ferocious monster the
gentleness of the lamb, and made it the friend of the
liberties of mankind, instead of the foe ?
Every man (if he is net a downright ideot) must
be tenable how gieatly It wilt enchant* the trisraph
of the' war-faction in England, to receive accounts
from Paris, where BONAPARTR is treated as the
greatest tyrant that ever existed ; and the Allies
eulogized as the deliverers of those poor galley staves
of the capital, who have so long smarted under the
scourge of the Corsican oppressor : these accounts, I
say, must be very gratifying to many persons in
London ; but they will not bo very honourable to
the Parisians themselves, who have not only sub-
mitted to wear these chains, as we call them, but
have even gloried in them : Nay, we learn, that
the very day before the capture of Paris, they
exultingly exclaimed Vive tEmpereur, Vive let
France, and freely shed their blood for the man
we call their tyrant. Bat when they found resist.
mice vain, and it was necessary to conciliate
the foe, or pillage, violation, and, perhaps, a gene-
ral conflagration, would have been the consequence,
then the cry was a bat le Tyran. Now, what
shall we call this? Is it change of sentiment,
er only change of language? If it is the first, how
contemptible does it make the Parisians! if it is the
second only, how silly must all our boasting appear!
If an Englishman, for the paltry consideration of
saving his windows from being broken, will join in
tha cry of a mob which he despises, what right has
he to blame a Frenchnian, who saves his goods and
chattels, the honour of his wife, or that of his
daughter, and even his-own life, by crying a bas le
Tyran.

If the Reader imagines that it is my intention to
advocate the causg of- nost %PARTE I can assure him
that he is very much mistaken. No, Sir; my design
is to maintain the independence of free -nations---a
cause in which no people are more nearly interested
than the people of this country. It is essential to
the very existence of a free State, that it should hare
the nomination of its Supreme Magistrate and the
establishment of its own Constitution. BONAPARTE,
for any thing I know to the contrary, may be a Ty-
rant or a great Statesman; nay, were he a thief, a Jew,
a Turk, an Atheist, a cannibal, or, to finish the
climax, a very Devil incarnate, it would not make
the weight of a feather for or against my argument;
he may be any thing you please, except an Usurper,
but that he cannot be, because he was invested with
the Executive Authority by the French nation. He
came by the power he exercised in the same way that
IleGu CAPE; the first Prince of the late dynasty,
came by his ; and, if you please, you may say,
in the very same way that our WILLIAM the
THIRD and Cuenca the Ft RS r came by theirs; conse-
quently, in the self same way that oar preeent much-
loved King comes by his. FORTZSCUI tells us, that
the power by which a King reigns io England is
potestas populo effiuxa, or a ewer delegated by the
people; and, he adds, that he cannot govern by any
other power : and, indeed, the fact is, that there is
no legitimate authority whatever, but that which
this great Constitutional Writer says proceeds from
the people; now it cannot be denied that such is the
authority which at this instant is enjoyed by BONA..
PLAT& It IS a power the more pore and the more wor-
thy of veneration Ind respect, in that it is immedi-
ately derived from the people, who are the source
of all lawful power; it comes directly from the fowl-
.