tutional liberty. But every shot she fired in the Crimea was in favor of Papal aggression, and tended to hinder or defeat a noble experiment in civilization, whose success might open a new era for the world, and especially for the wasted East. It would be wise for those among us who desire that the influence of Russia may be destroyed, to inquire what will take its place in Europe; what power will be in the ascendant, if Russia falls. The choice seems to be between the Papacy and Atheism; a thought worthy the serious attention of Americans, and especially of American Christians. Protestant England, even if she remains Protestant, can not now rule Europe. She holds, and must continue to hold, with her present policy, only a secondary position. She has shaken hands with the Papacy, and she must eat the fruits of her bargain. A Sclavonic civilization, Atheism and the Papacy, are the real contending powers in Europe. With which should America sympathize?

The aggressive intermeddling policy of England, by which she attempted to repress the growth of all other nations in order to aggrandize herself, and compel them to buy and sell only as she should dictate, a policy which explains alike the Crimean war and the earnest support she has given to our own rebellion, has been lately exposed and rebuked by Mr. Cobden and Mr. Bright, in a debate upon the relations of the British Government to China.

England is endeavoring to conquer China, as she has attempted to cripple Russia, and the United States, in order to force her to purchase from and sell to her alone.

Mr. Cobden first showed by statistics that the intervention of the Government had nearly destroyed the trade with China, and then continued as follows:

"This is the moral-that it is not by blood and violence that you are to extend your commerce. That is the way to destroy trade, and not the way to create it. I hope that after all this expecrience we shall none of us again advocate any violent measures with the view of extending our trade either in China trade either in China or elsewhere. The noble lord told us truly that there is one-third

of the human race-that is 350,000,000 or 400,000,000 of human beings-in China. They are but very small customers, but look at it in another way. If you are to follow that policy which is peculiarly the noble lord's (Palmerstone's), if you are to break into the country, hold it, and be its police; if you are to make another Turkey in China, and if, in addition to meeting Russia and France, you are to meet the United States at Pekin; if you are to trouble yourselves and future generations with governing and controlling, and intriguing in China, recollect that you have a country of vast extent and prodigious population to govern, and that you ought well to consider whether it is worth your while to incur all these risks, and enter upon this policy, with the proofs that you have that you are not likely to do more trade with that country than you are with Brazil or Egypt."

The insolent spirit of England, which leads her to meddle with the affairs of all nations, and attempt to control them all, was thus rebuked by Mr. Bright:

“Here we are, a small island on the opposite side of the globe, with a population so limited that we are told we have not an army that we could transport to Denmark [hear, hear], yet still we are somehow to take within our great ambition this vast empire of three or four hundred millions of persons; we are to influence the dynasty that shall sit on its throne; and in point of fact, we are to direct the whole affairs of the country, just as we should those of some small neighbor close to our shores. I do not know how such an idea ever got into any man's head, but having once entered in, and having taken absolute possession of the noble viscount, I suppose at his time of life he cannot get rid of it."

The time is not far distant, when England will receive the just retribution for the insults and wrongs which she has wantonly heaped on the nations. She has reached the limit of her aggressions, and henceforth Russia and the United States will both stand across her path.

CHAPTER XXVII.

THE NATIONAL IDEA OF RUSSIA.

THE life of a nation resembles that of an individual. Its early portion is spent in mere growth and preparation, which has, perhaps, no definite aims. There is enlargement of parts, a husbanding of strength, a discipline of faculties, with no distinct perception of the purpose which is to be attained. But the period at length comes when the object for which the man is to live and act presents itself clearly to the mind, and the individual perceives his task, his mission in life is revealed, and thenceforth his effort is to shape his actual life according to the idea which he has formed. So also with great nations. There is a preparatory period in which there is no consciousness of a special national destiny. Like the boy at school, a nation in childhood forms no settled plan for the future; but, in the progress of its growth, there is gradually shadowed forth-no one can explain how-a conception of what the national purpose should be, and this in time shapes itself to a clearly-defined idea, and becomes the object of national existence and effort. This may be called the national idea, and when truly so, it shapes the whole policy of a government, and directs upon itself the whole. energy of a people. As with an individual, so with a nation, the actual achievement will bear some proportion to the grandeur of the conception and the loftiness of the aims, for, in the arrangement of the universe, there

seems to be some correspondence between desire and ca. pacity.

Russia, as it would seem, has now so far emerged from her years of childhood as to have formed a distinct and individual national idea, upon which she has shaped a welldefined national policy, and to this all her efforts tend. This, then, must be the key to all her movements, and until we obtain a clear view of her national idea, Russia will remain an enigma, and we shall hear only of despotism and barbarism. This policy will, perhaps, be best understood by presenting, as preliminary, some negative statements. And first among these, it may be truly affirmed that the conquest of Western Europe is no part of the policy of Russia. The oft-repeated cry that the Crimean war was undertaken for the purpose of preventing the Czar from overrunning Europe, and that, therefore, it was a contest of civilization against barbarism, has no foundation in fact. There is not a single proof that Russia has ever entertained the idea of using her military power for the conquest of England, France, Germany, or any of the larger nations of Europe. Her designs in this direction have been confined to a control of the Baltic and the adjacent sea. The Russian Court has never been seized with such a madness for conquest. The Russian statesman knows full well that if all these Western crowns could be laid at the feet of the Emperor, the gift, if accepted, would be fatal to his country. The incorporation of such masses of heterogeneous material into her state, is no part of the Russian scheme. On the contrary, such an idea is the exact opposite of the one which really rules her. She is much more likely to draw around her a cordon of armies to keep Europe out and away, than to use them to conquer and incorporate the Western nations. In fact, this is precisely the signification of her military system, so far as Europe is concerned. Her fortifications are intended to keep Europe away, while within her bristling lines of artillery she pursues her national work. Russia would never attack Western Europe unless in selfdefense, to ward off a clearly-meditated blow. Whatever

has been written in regard to the peril of England or France from the arms of Russia, has been either in ignorance of her real and obvious policy, or with the direct design to cover the true character and objects of the war. That hereafter she may seek to cripple these powers, whenever she has the ability, may perhaps be expected.

France and England have made an issue not to be misunderstood or evaded. Their utmost strength was employed to humble Russia, and will be while a hope of success remains. Necessity will compel her to a similar course toward them. She has been taught, in a manner which she will never forget, that she has nothing to hope except from their inability to injure. The idea of the conquest and incorporation of the Western nations, Papal and Protestant, is clearly an absurdity too palpable to be entertained. It is not, by any means, a universal dominion of this sort to which Russian ambition aspires. The associating of all animals of different natures in one harmonious family, and within one cage, is a trivial feat compared with bringing into peaceful relationship, under one government, the different races and religions of Europe. The thing is impossible, even were there adequate physical power, until the people shall be all righteous—in short, until the millennial age.

But, possible or impossible, it is not a purpose which the rulers of Russia have ever seriously entertained. Whoever will glance at the map of Europe will perceive at once, that, so far from its being demanded by any interest of Russia that she should absorb the German states, she greatly needs them precisely where they are. They constitute her southern frontier defense, and help to render her impregnable, by standing between her and her more formidable Western foes. Not conquest and incorporation of Germany, but influence over its policy, is what Russia both requires and seeks; this, through the Sclavonic race, she will be very likely to attain. Of this, the course and position of Austria and Prussia afford sufficient proof. Instead of meditating aggressive war upon France and England,