Orleans independent standard. [volume] (Irasburgh, Vt.) 1856-1871, 1870-08-02
The Napoleonio Dynasty.

France is the only nation on the face of
| the globe that could have produced such
men as the Napoleons. Her soil is alone
/ fit for such generation. No other would
| have adopted the little corporal and fol-
lowed him through seas of blood, that he
might aggrandize himself and reflect his
! glory on her. She was dazzled by his gen.
Jus and proves, and lent herself to accom-
| plish his ideas. 1t was the endorsement
of France that made Napoleon Bonaparte
and rendered him alike the terror and the
| scourge of Europe till the nations arose
and quenched his baleful star in the blood
| and overthrow of his followers Nor is
there a nation in the world that would have
accepted the nephew of Bonaparte, or per-
mitted him to ascend the throne and hold
| it and follow him through so many con-
| ficts and perils. He has had the art to
please French vanity, to tickle its passion
| for glory, and to delude France with the
| idea that her glory was co-incident with
his ambition. He has made her content
under his empire by declaring it ever to be
what it never is, and by imposing the
intellect of the nation. In the name of
| freedom he has suppressed it, and with the
forms of republicanism he has established
has cajoled the people into popular errors,
| by which they have surrendered popular
government, and to-day he stands, by con-
sent of France, the most absolute and fear
ed of the reigning despots of Europe. The
empire is a popular and representative
government, just as it is peace" i. e. by
the will of the Emperor. i've doubt if the
| Gar of Russia is so absolute in his power
as the French Emperor, and his absolut-
ism is all the greater because the French
nation believes the will of Napoleon to be
only the expression of its will. 1t has sur
rendered itself to his domination, and be-
cause the people have chosen slavery, they
call it freedom.
| But whom the gods would destroy they
| first make mad. intoxicated by the result
of the pjebiscitum, Napoleon aims to extend
the area of peace" and of French freedom
to the banks of the Rhine. Refusing to
Germany the right to lend prince to the
Spanish throne, he asserts for himself the
| right to annex Prussian territory to his
own dominion. He arrogates rights for
himself that he impudently and imperious-
| ly denies to others. To prevent Germany
| from disturbing the balance of power. he
hastens to disturb and derange it himself.
He is ready to plunge Europe into war
| whose end no one can predict, and whose
| blood no one can measure, and whose mis-
cry no one can compute, that he may win
| for himself the dictation that he refuses to
| Prussia. In the annals of human strife
there has been no more causeless war, and
there is likely to be none so bloody. Its
only motive is ambition. Its only legiti
mate end can be overthrow. As Butcher
and st. Helena confined the mad rage OF
the First Napoleon, so another Butcher
and another st. Helena must limit the
vaulting ambition of the second Napoleon.
1t is hardly possible that the other ma
tons of Europe should remain neutral. 1t
is true the demands of civilization and of
christianity are all for peace. War is alb
hOrrent to industry, commerce, wealth, and
religion. Only the most terrible necessity
will force Europe into general contest
Every attempt will be made to limit the
war. Mediation and argument and threat
ening will be employed to restrain the con-
testants and limit the duration and misery
of the conflict. Such attempts may sue
coed. We trust they will. But we cannot
be blind to the fact that there is little prob
ability of their success. Napoleon, from
the first, has been blind and deaf. He has
been obstinately bent on war. His object
is the annexation of the provinces of the
Rhine. We imagine that this can only be
done by conquest. Nor do we believe that
such result can be acquiesced in either
by England or Russia We know that
commerce has made England pusilanimous.
But she is not yet insensible to honor
She is not yet willing to see the Napoleonic
dynasty become supreme in Europe. In
this last struggle of the Latin race to get
the supremacy on the continent; of the old
ideas which have been kept alive and pro-
mulgated at Rome to overwhelm the ideas
of Constitutional and Protestant freedom,
the Anglo Saxon must eventually bear his
hand. The Teutonic and Saxon races
must arm against the Latin. The real
causes of the war lie back of its ostensible
reasons. Providence may have used Prim
and Leopolds to ignite the train, but the
train has been laid for years. The civil
ization of Pagan Rome, dressed in the &c.
, clesiastical garb of corrupt Latin chris.
tianity, and reaching more than its old
, imperial sensualism il the vices and luxu.