The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1853-03-31
POLITICS OF EUROPE,
BY CHARLES REEMELIN.

GOu 10 Moan ana MS sOns, W OO INV
multiply, and replenish the earth" mas more
than any other divine commandment been ioi-
lowed by the human family. Nation after nation
has been the parent beehive, from whence the
earth has been replenished with human beings,
and each country emigrated into has in turn
become wealthy. prosperous free, and great;
while every country emigrdted from, has grad
ually ceased to grow.
This truth history teaches on every page;
and from its earliest records to the present the
lesson is ever the same. Historians have gwen
lis all kinds of reasons for the cause why the
empire of the world has shifted from nation TO
nation, and from one continent to another.
Some have found il in wealth, others in high
state of civilization, some again IN PERSONA
proves, others again in commerce, some I'D
race others ia climate; some IN CIVIL institu-
tons, others in religion but all seem to have
overlooked the primary cause OF national pros
perity-popuiation Why overlook the ever
present significant fact, that the travelling char
acter of empire has for its cause the true polt-
zeal axiom; that the empire oUer man has trav-
elled tcith man and whichever way the sur
plus population of the world tended, in the
same direction, empire, wealth, and human ge-
Mus has travelled 1t has passed into prov
erb, that
Westward the Star of Empire wends its way"
Why! Because westward is the present
tendency of the worlds population.
This political truth, which explains more
facts in history than any other truth, is OF the
utmost importance in forming a correct judy
ment Vt the.political economy of Europe The
empire of the world, which is as yet concen-
trated in Europe, must leave it if emigration
continues much longer and those nations will
sink the fastest from which the largest emigra-
ton takes place The North American CONT
nent is the principal recipient Of this migrating
population, and with it must come to it nation
al greatness, and a preponderating influence
over human affairs.
Before, however, we apply our axiom, it is
proper to examine whether history teaches any
such lesson.
Egypt was great and all-powerful; it per-
mtted the Jews to migrate, and kept supply
ing Northern and Eastern Africa with popula-
tons it's wise men and its energetic and en-
terprising men migrated, and she fell
Greece reached, in literature and in arms,
the highest pinnacle; it gave its mythology, its
laws, its arts, and its genius, to other lands it
planted colonies in Sicily and Italy, and it fell.
The Ph4nicians the masters of the worlds
commerce. swarmed forth one new settlement
after another; they carried to the remotest
distances the arts and the civilization of COM
mercial people; but they carried away from
home the human blood upon which that COM
merce rested; they created rivals, and they fell.
Sidon and Tyre, too, shared the same fate.
Asia Minor has always sent forth population
after population. Troy's fall was sung by Ho-
mer He sung the fall of the parent stock I'M
der the strokes of its own progeny.
Carthage would not be satisfied at homo, and
having, like Ph@nicia of old, handed the arts
of trade and naval knowledge to its colonies, it
fell from want Of vitality at home, and from
the hands of the Roman who had not yet spread
himself beyond this early home.
Rome, too reached the teeming point of its
greatness when the extension of Roman iuris
dicton, Of Roman language, and of Roman lit
erature was the object of its Pompey its Cesar,
and its Cicero. Rome built splendid roads to
enable its population to migrate it did migrate,
and with it migrated Rome's power over the
world.
Asia has never recovered from that great
emigration which sent the Goths to Spain, the
Lombards to. Italy, the Huns to France, and
then back to Hungary and from which emf
grafton Europe received new life-blood bodily,
while the emigrants found the wisdom of ages
| io'uy w hicot tucu anu ultudtiy W ClNilZc
and to conquer them. The Asiatcs became
barbarians; their physical strength conquered
Europe, but Europes Christianity and Europe's
law conquered them at last And as we come
down to our own times, the same significant
| facts strike US on every page.
columbus found, Tor Spain America Amer
lea brought to Spain gold and power; but it
took from it its enterprising population. Under
this process, SPAIN that had already drove
away from her large and wealthy population,
the Moors, sunk gradually in power, until now
she is not equal in power to some of her former
provinces That proud nation, whose infantry
was once the terror in many battle has sunk
so low that it has to ask France and England
to guaranty it the last remnant of its former
greatness-the Island of Cuba.
France, too, furnished an example how a
nation may be virtually injured by driving
away Il part of its population France has ex-
lied her HuguenOts, and it drove them to Elan.
ders, to Germany, and ~ England. With them
migrated those very elements Of prosperity and
of greatness which France needs now and has
ever needed
The Normans, too, that race of heroes on
land and sea, they spread too much to retain
any power at home.
The Danish history too, in former times,
proves my proposition; and Holland even now
Is lingering in gradual decline from the same
cause The Cape of Good Hope and its East
India possessions have received Hollands real
basis for greatness-its men.
could multiply example after example, for,
as stated in the outset, history points with it's
significant finger to the migratory character of
man, and to his unchanged devotion to Gods
commandment "to replenish the earth, as the
great cause Of the rise and fall of empires But
the history of our own times is still more point
ed in teaching this lesson.
lreland-what has its population been, but
exiles on its own soil England's dominion
has driven, and is still driving, Irelands people
from home. Canada and the United States re-
ceive this population--and as Ireland sinks
America rises
England, too. What is now drawing her
down hill but her colonies She has in
great part peopled North America, and she is
still hourly and weekly sending away its pop.
ulation to East India, New Holland, and to this
country. That emigration is the cancer which
gnaws Eugland's greatness, and as the chill
dren she has driven and is driving abroad grow
to greatness in foreign climes the mother coun-
try sinks. We see it and England begins to
see it when it is too late.
The sons-f my own native land too, Ger
many, are forced away from their native
soil. In every part of the world do we find,
not German colonies, but German settlements
and German homes Go whore you will and
you will find Germans From the plains of
Southern Russia to the Western prairies of
America from the St. Lawrence to Texas in
Mexico; in South America; in East India in
Allsiers on the Cape of Good Hope-every-
where Germans are to be found, carrying there
with them their native industry, perseverance,
and ingenuity. But while every other nation
has migrated with view of increasing power
at home, it is not so with the German Ger
many has no foreign possessions, no colonies
and while German genius has been forced from