, 1866-05-11

Slavonic Professionalism threatens CT
viiization,-and is, on the whole, desired
by the mass Of the people affected. All
that is strictly true, and the omitted cir
cumstance, that the H~OhenZollerns Will
benefit rather more than anybody else,
is a mere accident of the situation. The
unity of North Germany would be a great
benefit to the world, and to talk of "steal-
ing provinces,' and "receivlng territories"
aud conquering free peoples, is as unrea-
sonable in North Germany as 1t ever was
in Italy. The people want TO be econ
quered," for if they do not they can
strengthen Austria's hands Till conquest
is out Of the question. Their Courts are
quite willing to sanction an uprising, or
for that matter to organize a er6e enmaSSe,
The wretched little Kings, and Electors,
and reigning Dukes who arc to be relega-
ted to the position of enormously veal
thy mobiles, the Hanoverian person who
courts France, and the Saxon gentleman
who is always sending his treasure to for
~tresscs, and the MeckIcnburger who has
re- established the stick, and the Hessian
who receives his Ministry in his opera
box are all astounded with the immOrQlI-
ty Of Prussia, all quite willing to fight if
anybody else will. But nobody else
will. The Princes are in the position Of
the Italian Dukes, with this difference,
that, not being foreigners, they are, eX-
cept 10 IIessc and Hanover, not person
ally detested, and are for local and pecu-
mary reasons rather liked in their capt.
tails. But as sovereign rulers their part
on earth has been played, and Prussia in
Diminishing them TO an honorable retire
ment will but change a ftudal organlZa-
ton unSuited to the times into scientific
cally organized native monarchy, not yet
free indeed, and penetrated with the dis
ease of militarism, but fairly governed,
open to commerce, free from obscuran-
tism, and sure to be in the generation
once more constitutional. There is no
particular reason why we should rave at
such a probability as that, or affect an
immense regard for the forty or fifty OPP
presSiye and greedy little families whose
power of doing evi! will be reduced in
the process. We do not like, any more
than the Duly NeOS, the mode OF the
operation. War, though not the great
est of evils, is a great one, and Count Won
Bismark, though not the most i~ns0lcnt Of
mankind, has a frankness which is based
on contempt, but war and the Count are
temporary nuisances, and the ducal organ
ization of Germany is a permanent gain
"a gain because it unites Il great people
under a form admitting Of action, a gain
because it prohibits their union in a
form which would be a menace TO Europe.
Liberals no more want to see a united
Germany threatening all the world, with
the secret sympathy of the Royal caste
in every country, than they want to see
Lippe Limberg maintained in his posses
sion of the right of life and death. Doubt
less the means might have been better
We should have greatly preferred to see
the ablest and wisest heads of Germany
assembled at Frankfort in peaceful par
lament, there to decree a union instantly
carried out !; but how much chance is
there of all that, or is the world to wait
for it's great objects till kings surrender
thrones from generosity, and armies
disband themselves from a conviction
that war %endangers the soul? Let US
form any judgment acceptable at once to
the reason and the conscience, but let it