The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-06-17
SPIRIT or THE PRESS.
EDITORIAL OPINIONS OF THE LEADING JOURNALS
UPON CURRENT ToPICs-CoArPuED EVERY
DAY FOR THE EVENING TELEGRAPH.
TIE CRITICAL CONDITION OF FRANCE.

Our latest cable dispatches from Paris do
not show that we, more than two thousand
miles away, exaggerated the situation in
France. We had prepared the public mind of
tbis country to regard the election in France
as n test of the French estimate of Napoleon
ism The facts which the elections brought
out justified our strongest statements. The
result of the Paris elections was so clearly, so
fully. so emphatically anti-Napoleonic, that no
one no matter what his previous opinion may
have been, was left room for doubt. The re-
sponse made by the other large cities and
generally throughout the departments was
quite as decided and quite as unmistakable.
Paris, the large cities generally the intelli-
gent sections of the departments, have all
spoken with one voice. and that voice has,
without any qualification, condemned the one
man government.
The situation is not much altered to our
view by the explanations which the Govern
ment, through the acknowledged official jour
nails, has given to France and the world That
the Government was fully aware of what was
to happen, and had taken all the necessary
precautions to prevent serious results seems
to us rather confirmatory of our views than
otherwise When praise is meted out libe-
rally to the troops for their patience, firmness,
and moderation in suppressing the disturb
ances, it convinces us, if conviction were neces-
sary, that anti-NapQleonic feelings were mani
tested, and manifested more strongly than we
have been encouraged to believe. Even the
Government and the Government journals can
not disguise the fact that the situation really is
serious Documents of secret societies have
been seized, but only through the instrument
tality of paid spies and hireling agents. This,
however, is not ALL The Duke de Persigny
is deeply exercised by all that has happened.
He has written to his friend OLIVIER the one
French statesman who has advocated the joint
cause of Napoleonism and liberty, admitting
the wisdom of Ollivier's position, and going
i'll for the empire and liberty on the ground
that q Just, firm government can bear the ex-
istence of every liberty, The Duke de Per-
signy thus admits that Napoleonism, if it
would live, must change its base. From the
fact that Baron Haussmann has resigned his
position as Prefect of the Seine, it is not un-
reasonable to conclude that the Duke de
Persigny foreshadows the future policy Of the
government.
Looking at all the facts of the case, and giving
them liberal Interpretation, we can come tono
other conclusion than that the policy which
the Emperor for seventeen years has been
sedulously pursuing has been endorsed by the
country and admitted by the Government.
1t is now made abundantly manifest that the
Emperor has made mistake; that his ideas,
grand as some of them have been, have not
laid hold of the French mind, and that France
now, in place of being driven, must be hu-
mored, fattered, yielded to, and otherwise
gently led. 1t was evidently Napoleon S
opinion that if France could only be dazzled
by imperial splendor and success, France
would be satisfied. No doubt he was so
far correct. The Russian war, the italian
campaign, the Grand Expositions, the costly
improvements of Paris, all for time had a
good effect. But wars and expositions are
expensive, and so is the remodelling of great
city like Paris; and unfortunately, the Empe-
hoc 70 oil t1o
penses incident to such undertakings to loom
too prominently before the public mind.
This, however, does not fully state the case
The Grench people not only now see the
costly result of this splendid and protracted
show; they have been feeling, and they are
now feeling, that the success which for time
gratifed their vanity has of late been totally
wanting. The Mexican blunder, with its
tragic results; still pains them. His inter-
ference in the affairs of Italy has been to them
a doubtful benefit His policy with regard
to Prussia is ON all hands admitted to have
been failure. He attempted too much
and accomplished too little After seventeen
years of pretentious and rather brilliant impe-
Iialism, France discovers and, hesitates not to
proclaim, that she is not what she once was,
not what she thinks she ought to be; that ter
ritorially she is too straitened; that among the
powers of Europe she is no longer the first,
and that liberty, except in form in which
liberty is an insult, is denied to her citizens.
In other words, France has declared that
twenty years of universal suffrage, coupled,
as universal suffrage has been, with impe-
rialism, has been a mockery and a sham.
The question which more than once we
have asked already, is still the prominent
question of the hour-What will Napoleon
do? Events have proved that to pursue the
policy which has become identified with his
name would be fraught with serious danger.
His establishment of Paris, which has made
that city at once the most beautiful city
and the most magnificent fortress in the
world, has not done so much for him as he
expected. A rising in Paris is now al
once more difficult and more easily put down
The days of barricades are gone, but Paris is
not France in the old sense any longer. The
sympathy between the heart and the extremi
ties is as strong, nay, stronger than ever. II
is this strength of sympathy, in fact, which
constitutes the difference. The railroads and
the telegraphs have compacted the great body
and every pulse of the body beats harmo.
niously with the action of the heart. In olden
times Paris alone felt and thought and acted
and France was willing to follow. Now all
France feels and thinks equally with Paris, anG
is equally ready to act Paris is no Longer
France, nor is France Paris. Yet Paris anc
France are now more a unit than ever they
have been. To hold Paris now is only to holC
part of France; and bloodshed in Paris nov
would not fail to act as a signal for genera
rising all over the country. In conflict Will
the people Napoleon knows well that it is nov
dangerous to trust the troops too far. Frencl
soldiers have found out the value of going witt