The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1866-09-04


of the individual states OF which it is composed.
In the closing act, the Confederate
States solemnly bound themselves under
no .,pretext to wage war against any
OF the members; not to refer their dIi-
ferences to the adjudication OF arms, but to sub
init them to the deliberations and decisions of
the Diet created September, 1915, which, LAYING
down the organic law of the Confederation,
established the rules which were to control
Their interior, military, and exterior relations
and concerns. The special duty was ASSIGNED
TO the Diet to apply every mediation or, failing
these, TO solve the matters by final judgment.
The case of Austria comes strictly under the
provisions of the act of Confedo ration, and no
one VIII attempt to deny that her action-for
veal or woe to herself, for the destines OF Ger
many, for the quit of Europe, and for the re-
sponsibilities of Prussia-was grounded upon
what should have been q suggestion, at least If
not judgment of the Diet.
The German Confederation.
1t is scarcely necessary more pomtedly to
refer to the force and the tendencies OF
compact with which every intelligent reader is
Conversant. To any one of them familiar with
the duplcities which, at the time, characterized
either the relations of States or the relations
OF individuals, ii is needless to say that more
perfect treatise of hypocrisies falsehoods and
lies could be written than that condensed from
the compacts and treaties concluded on the 9th
OF June 1915. Intended, so far as the EN-
pre-" OF Germany is concerned, to be "a per-
petual Confederation of all her Statesr and
framed as a bulwark against domestic feuds
and foreign encroachments, they contained
elements of dissolution, not foreseen
perhaps, by some of the trainers, which
the ambition OF any one of the more power
iul parties might work up into utter ruin of
every guarantee. They committed the error
perhaps an intentioned error in the provisions
OF OF some shrewder diplomat, of bringing here
the secondary States, and there the still weaker
ones, within contact of naturally repugnant in
terests. Hence there has not been one of the
last fifty years in which the stronghanded have
not EnA sAw1, s..N..s
not how to hold on to their Punic faith and
maintain the ybrid compacts; but how, on the
contrary, TO throw dust in the eyes of the
world and pervert its stipulatlons and guaran-
tees to the detriment and rum of their unfortu-
nately impotent and imbecie associates. If a
plot against the liberties of nationaities and
populations which, in the scrutinies of God
are bound, sooner or later to be free
1t was an ingenious device of uncontrolled
despots, eXulting in the idea that they had
overthrown the most formidable, because the
most intelligent, the most heroic, and the most
generous despot of them all. If an error, it
was most stupidity fruitful error working to
the hopes and ends of despotism, in reducing
to the authority of two overshadowing sove-
reignties, the puny and tragmentary resistance
of twenty petty principalities and dukedoms
1t was an lllustl alton, so far as the superior
powers were concerned, of the thrifty wisdom
that would put the kite to watch the dove-cote
and the wolf the sheep.fod. OF the value of
such promise neither Austria nor Prussia
The Career of Prussia.
Of the two however, Prussia must have been
as she really was, the more ardent in the career
OF encroachment, She was fully conscious of
the inroads which the popular mind, in the
revolution of l84S, had made into the heart of
her power. The Diet, on which she could
heretofore rely, though crippled by the grasp of
her power, was still thorn in her side and an
obstacle in her way. For the last eighteen years
she bad been sedulously working to bring her
neople 10 the wholesome restraints of that des-
notlc power. Her own iniquities, wonderfully
helped br the equally grasping ambition Of
Austria and still more wonderfully subseryed
by the mad experiients OF a successful political
mouptebank, seem, by the triumph of her arms
to have put her in fair way of reganing the
elements of absolute power which, shred by
and, under the pressure of victorious
armies, which, even at the risk of
bankruptcy she keeps in the field, to give her
the promise OF riyeting back upon the people
Of Germany the yoke which Austria had lately
kept rather loosely fastened on their necks.
The French, who will, from every indication,
have word 10 say in this matter and that, it
may be in the principle of the fellow-feeling
which begets kindness, have a very pregnant
adage in point-otes-tol de Ia que je mig naeue-
get out of the way and let me come in, the
vigorous Anglo-SaXon rendering of this piece
fifty years of trials and expectations, thinks
that Austria should "get out of the way"-
that she has been long enough sucking the
substance of the people of Germany-and she
has therefore reached the conclusion that it is
her turn to ''come In" and indulge in that par
tlcularly pleasant process of suction which
leeds fat Kaisars and Kings and aristocrats at
the expense of the very life-blood of the people.
Who shall be the victorious sucker a short time
will reveal.