Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1861-04-13

"'eoks VI her vast heets at Salau1ie and Mycale.
The modern attempts at federation have been
more successful. The Helvetio confederacy has
taken five centuries TO reach it's present power.
In 1907, three cantons, Uri, Schwytz, and Inter
walden, entered into oonfederacy for mutual
| aid against Austria. Other cantons have been
added from time TO limestone by conquest,
others By voluntary aannxation. The present
number, twenty-five, was not completed till
the time Of Napoleon l., and the present
compact, b, which ell are placed on perfect
equality, only datss from the peace Of 1914.
The Swiss cOnfederacy greatly lacks political
unity and efficacy. II is rather 90 association Of
cantons for mutual defence, than fusion and
assimilation Of people into one body polite The
general diet, 1t Is true, declares war, concludes
peace, contracts foreign alliances. nomiuases d.
plomatic representative determines the amount of
military force, and lgoverns :he expenditure Of
the finances of the confederation. But il has no
head. The president Of !,hs diet is simply the
burgomaster Of the canton in which it meets. The
republic has president, no individual execu-
tive'under any name. The scanty executive and
judicial powers which are vested in the federal
government are lodged with the diet, body con-
fore tardy aud.ineficieut in its operations. 3. II
Swiss canton lie invaded, it demands help from the
adjacent canton, and at the same time sends word
to the vorost, which convokes the diet and federal
iuterpostion cannot be had till after the debates
and decisions Of that body. rapid and ener.
getic enemy, as in the case Of Massena, has often
done great and irreparabls mischief before the
unwieldy powers Of the general government could
be summoned and concentrated. Switzerland,
which has been compared Ito a1great town, Of
which the valleys are the streets, and tho noun
tans groups of contiguous houses, owes the pres-
erVs,ion Of it's liberties more to its very peculiar
physical surface than to the energy aud efficiency
Of its government Its free and hardy races are
held together more by the circumambent pressure
Of the European monarchiss, than BY the strength
or vitality Of their federal "bund."
The provinces. or states Of Holland, federated
BY tho "Uniou Of Utrecht" in 1879, enacted bril-
liant part in the history Of Europe in the sixteenth
seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. The COM
paet was an imperfect one-a combination Of
states, not union Of people, animated BY one po-
litcal life. Identity Of language. religion, iu,er
ests, and dangers, however, secured long dura-
tion to this oonfedersey; and With all it's imper-
fecton, ts astonishing results have caused t to be
regarded as master piece Of enlighted end sue
cessful policy. Under the combined influence of
freedom and union, che people who occupied that
strip Of sand. not unfrequently submerged beneath
the ocean, rapidly rose. to the rank of first rate
power, attained great colonial empire, q COM
merce aud an opulence beyond shat of any other
nation 10 Europe, and enjoyed internal tranquility
aud religious freedom and life, while the rest of
Europe was deso!sted by religious and political
Long prosperity and tesming wealth,
however, engendered or stimulated the seeds of
political decay. Holland vas rent asunder by the
violence of party dissensions, and weakened by an
disposition to intermeddls in the wars
IF France and England. After the terrible vicis-
,udes Of her latter history, she willing to re-
pose under the shadow Of royalty, and the great
,st republic Of the Old World 10 now one of the
,msllest Of les mouarchies.
The benefits which union and freedom had con-
fsrred upon her. however. appear from the fact
hat after all her losses, and the long interruption
of her commerce. Holland was still at her eman-
,ipstion from the yoke Of the French. in 1914,
'the richest country in Europe"