In what light do our own Ministers regard the events
in France ? what course are they prepared to shape with reference to them ? If they anticipate from them any diminution of the difficulties of the coming session, they will indulge the foolish confidence of those who "cry peace, peace, when there is no peace." Their relations with foreigners have been only rendered more complicated and precarious by these events : the necessity for immediate action on their part to terminate all open foreign questions, and, efface all causes of irritation and dissension in their domestic policy, has only been rendered more urgent. If anything like a permanent under- standing between the French Usurper and the Northern Powers be established, a formidable league, not for warlike aggression, but for the enforcement of measures calculated to embarrass and im- poverish this country, the asylum of political exiles and free ex- pression of opinion, is highly probable. In the event of such a combination, a panic in any section of society, occasioned by in- novations the necessity for which is not obvious—or disaffection in another, engendered by perpetuation of proved abuses in the con- stitution—or disloyalty and discontent in our Colonies and depen- dencies, in consequence of long-accumulating grievances—or irrita- tion among numerous classes of the community, on the ground of unequal imposts and unnecessary expenditure—or commercial pres- sure and inconvenience, originating in unwise laws injudiciously administered,—each or all of these, by perpetuating internal dis- sensions, would weaken the nation in the presence of foreign enemies. The late movement in France is an additional reason for prompt and judicious action on the part of our rulers, not for prolonged. negligence. It will be a lamentable mistake if our Ministers see nothing more in the Napoleonic coup d'etat than the overthrow of an ill-Constructed constitution, or the discredit of a form of government distasteful to themselves—the Republican. Against the weapons he employs, a mixed Monarchy, of the King, Lords, and Commons pattern, would have fared no better.
Previous page
