The native American., 1838-03-31

o.ie, inuei hi'sei, Hau Deen the great patron OF
European infdelity. His encouragement of the
French sclollsts had made infidelity fashionable
amongst the higher ranks Of the Continent. Phi
losophy and religion were declared to be one, and
the Atheism Of the French Revolution was the
poisoned cup prepared by the hands of the Prus-
sian king. In due season justice was done, and
France, maddened into preternatural strength by
the draught, revenged her frenzy upon his king
dom.
Thus, while Austria was humbled by the de-
leat OF her armies and the capture of Vienna, and
Russia was assaed on her own frontier and com
PEELED to purchase victory by the sacrifice Of her
ancient capital, neither power was utterly pros
trated. Both bled from countless wounds; but
their blood was that of gallant warriors, shed in
desperate encounter, and, even in the moment of
defeat, retaining vigor for future victory. But the
wounds Of Prussia were all but mortal; the sword
was exchanged only for the lash and she was
compelled not SO much to follow the conqueror as
captive, as to drag his chariot i'll the harness Of
a slave Her restoration after so total a fall was
one OF the most remarkable events in the annals
of fallen nations. This was the punishment for
the guilty partition of Poland.
1t is equally remarkable that treachery to Po-
land seems to have been among the immediate
sources of the fall of Napoleon. He unquestion-
ably excited them into resistance which left
them at the mercy of their masters, wasted vast
quantity OF the national blood, and finally abandon
ed them to utter hopelessness of national indepen-
dence. What renders all this still more extraor-
binary is, that this vast machinery of retrbution
was set IN motion to avenge the ruin of people
who had long been the most fallen of Europe
powerless at home, Intellectual abroad, wasting
away by intestine feud, and apparently preserved
from the grave only by the contemptuous negli-
gence of Europe.
Was it for the purpose of showing that Provi-
dence will not suffer its high laws to be insuled
IN the instance of the most insignificant nation;
and that, while it leaves the chief punishments or
rewards of individuals to another state of exis-
tence, it enforces its high moral on kingdoms by
the promptitude Of its vsitations in this world!
1t is now. known to us, that the fate of Poland
long exercised Napoleon's most anxious delibera-
tion that she offered him her perpetual alliance as
the price Of her independence-her army, her
whole military population, all the resources Of a
nation of sixteen millions of men, against Rus
sia, with whom he was on the verge Of war
against Austria, whom he was determined to keep
down at the risk of war-and against Prussia
whose crown he had cast under his feet, and had
determined to keep there. 1t is equally known
that Napoleon wavered; that he was anxious to
secure the force Of Poland, but equally anxious
to escape the jealousy Of Austria. In other words,
that he was determined to gain what advantages
he could from both, and to cheat both in return.
Mr.. Alison thinks that his reasons for refusing
independence to Poland were solid With all
Difference to his Judgment, the general European
opinion seems to have been on the contrary side.
1t was unquestionably the impression, at the Pc
riod Of the Moscow retreat that if Napoleon had
spent the year 1912 in recognizing Poland, and
shaping her into the form of great European
kingdom, he would have been enabled to fall on
Russia with force altogether irresistible. In
1912, what could he fear from Austria, along
whose frontier he was moving with an army
thrice the strength of that which had conquered
her but six years before! From Prussia, what
could he fear! She was his magazine, his trea-
sury, his barrack, and his high-road. The whole
force of Poland was ready to take arms at his
bidding, and to take arms with more ardent en-
thusiasm, and more resolute sincerity, than any
other allies that the world could offer. He might
have thus marched with hundred thousand adj
dtional cavalry, the most fitting for Russian war
fare of any in Europe, uniting the wild impetu-
osity of the Tartar with the disciplined steadness
of the European, and exerting both against the en-
emy with fiery recollection of ancient hostility
and immediate wrongs. If there were difficult
ties connected with the habitual insubordination
Of Poland, what man on earth was filter to deal
with those difficulties than Napoleon-the man
who had reduced the turbulence of the German
sovereignties into implicit submissions man
who, by still more singular effort of his genius,
had reduced the republicanism of France into obe-
dence,--combined the explosive materials Of the
great rebellion at home into the manageable yet
resistless material of power abroad, and seizing
the fiery spirits of anarchy in their full vigor,I
forced them to labor at the erection of throne,
which, with all the power, had all the splendor
of necromancy! Even the delay of six months
in Poland would have brought him into period
of the year which alone was fit for warlike ope-
rations in the north--would have given him time
to seize both the two capitals of North and South
Russia-and, with Moscow and ST. Petersburg,
whether in his hands or in ashes, would have
forced Alexander to sign ruinous peace, or have
driven him into his deserts, never to reascend the
Russian throne, or have a Russian throne to re-
ascend.
And these opinions are not now stated for the
first time; they were the universal language Of
the period; they were the language of his own
camp, of his council of officers, and even of him
self But his time como. II ever spirit of
delusion was commissioned for the undoing Of a