same time that they maintain strictly those below. We might venture to predict, that those ineligible electors will not remain long satisfied; and that, sooner or later, a law will be passed by their deputies to enable them to elect themselves. It is no less probable, that the great mass of proprietors, the 44 out of 45 who pay less than 300 francs of direct taxes, and who are now mere spectators of the election, will feel dissatisfied at those who pay 300 enjoying political rights from which they are debarred. The narrower the line drawn between them, the more they will feel inclined to pass it. The Constituent Assembly, in 1790, thought it had guarded sufficiently against an appearance of aristocratic principle, by requiring only the payment of direct taxes to the amount of three days' labour, to enable any body to be an elector; but the citoyens passifs, finding themselves most numerous, very soon made themselves actifs! The multitude, especially when the spirit of liberty is new, and political institutions bear the stamp of antiquity, is apt to find a peculiar charm in republican institutions, and still more in democratic ones; but such a system requires, to be at all safe, a population wholly composed of proprietors, as in the United States; and although an unusual proportion of the population of France belongs to that class, yet most of these being very little above the condition of day-labourers, there is every reason to think that the experiment of a Republic would end as it did before, in the usurpation of an able demagogue, or a successful General. As soon as the great mass of a people, long subjected to an arbitrary monarchy, comes to have a taste of republican institutions, they are but too apt to go into all kinds of excesses to secure the inestimable benefit of equal rights, and the semblance at least of self-government. After all, however, the advantages of republican government, under any modifications, seem to be very questionable. Even the most splendid of the antient models, where liberty was the ruling passion, exhibit a monstrous assemblage of gentle manners in private life, and a cruel policy for the public-purity, disinterestedness, filial piety, wonderful courage and unshaken constancy in adversity; but, on the slightest suspicion of designs against liberty, or indeed in favour of the liberty of the subjects or slaves of the republic, the same virtuous people became capable of the most dreadful excesses, proscriptions, murders, civil wars, spoliations, and, by a strange illusion, the perpetrators of these crimes fancied they were setting a pattern of heroic virtue. It ought always to be remembered, too, that a perfect equality of property is the necessary condition or consequence of a perfect equality of political rights. Wherever universal suffrage is actually established, agrarian laws may be expected to follow; yet an equal division of the land would be impossible in practice, if it were only from the smallness of the shares into which it would be split: and from this, as well as other causes, the property of the soil will ultimately fall into the hands of a despotic administrator, who distributes the proceeds amongst the needy multitude. A Despot is thus the natural representative of the proletaires, who are the Sovereign: And under his rule property gives few enjoyments, and subjects the possessor to cares and dangers, while poverty is independence. No man then will build or plant for posterity; agriculture will be neglected, and famines ensue. proportion as population diminishes, the remaining inhabitants find it more difficult to provide a scanty subsistence: Such was the state of Italy in the worst times of Rome, when the Northern barbarians finally achieved its conquest;-and so it is in our own days at Algiers and Morocco. In Notwithstanding all its vices, the Despotic form of government has in it the elements not only of durability, but of popularity also; for it coincides, in many things, with the apparent interest of the multitude, though certainly not with their true interest, and favours their strongest propensities. The rabble of Constantinople know no superior between them and the Sultan or his immediate vicegerents; no intermediate class of proprietors, with political rights from which they are excluded; neither a constitutional aristocracy, nor an aristocracy of birth, wealth, or talents. The whole population stands on a dead level, which the Despot alone overtops. From his eminent but unstable situation, he may stretch down his hand to any one in the crowd, and raise him up to power at once; or the multitude may lift up theirs to him and pull him down to their feet. Taxes under a despotic government are sparingly laid this is one of its characteristics: Nations, it seems, can only yield a certain quantum of money and of obedience to such a government; and when it wants more of the one, it must be contented with less of the other. It is the hard, but necessary and not inglorious fate of the republican principle, in a well regulated monarchy, to check merely, and control rather than direct, the measures of the Government. If it governed habitually, it would as certainly change the monarchy into a republic, as the direct influence of the proletaires would change a republic as well as a monarchy into a wild democracy. Now it appears to us that the republican principle predominates at present in the French monarchy; and the transition from a republic to an arbitrary government is easier there than anywhere else, from the military bias of the nation-and because their present love for equality is not accompanied with an equal attachment to, or any fixed principles of civil liberty. A distinguished orator on the liberal side (General Foy), made lately in the Chamber of Deputies the following candid and spirited declaration of what the nation does not like, and of what it likes. Les François n'ont pas l'esprit tourné à l'aristocratie; après la liberté et la gloire, ce qui va le mieux à leur inclination, c'est un seul entre tous, auguste, placé dans une sphere elevée, resplendissant de l'éclat de la nation à laquelle il commande.-Vous avez beau leur dire que les classes superieures sont la décoration d'un monarchie-que la perpetuité des familles assure la durée des empires, et que leur preponderance est necessaire au maintien de la liberté-ils ne nous croiront pas; et leur incrédulité ne date pas d'hier. Notre histoire n'est que le récit de la longue guerre du Tiers Etat et de la royauté contre la noblesse notre revolution est, il faut l'esperer, la derniere bataille de cette guerre, couronnée par le complet et glorieux affranchisse ment du Tiers Etat. This General might as well have said at once, that Bonaparte's government is the only one his countrymen like, and are fit for! The French cannot divest themselves of the idea that an aristocracy is necessarily feudal, or necessarily composed of noblesse, or that the nobles have of course privileges; and it must be admitted, that their nobles have taken great pains to confirm these opinions. In that point of view, Spain, where the nobility have not yet quarrelled with the people, and have preserved their estates, and where the high dignitaries of the church are very popular, and in general deserving to be so by the exemplary simplicity of their lives, their learning, and their virtues, presents incomparably better bases for the establishment of civil liberty by a mixed monarchy, than the table rase of France, where the materials are to be recomposed from their simplest elements. A change of dynasty has been considered as the proper scal to a charter between king and people, the best pledge and token of its validity: And it is quite true that a new prince generally feels the necessity of making up for the deficiency of his title by the popularity of his measures. In France, however, from various circumstances, such as the revolutionary tenure of a great proportion of the landed property-the prejudices against the noblesse which surrounds the throne, &c.-legitimacy actually stands in the way of the present royal family; and as much may be expected from them as a compensation for this new species of blemish in their title, as, under other circumstances, for the opposite defect. It is asserted, and we are inclined to think correctly, that any other prince but a Bourbon, provided he was military and pleased the army, might dissolve the Chamber of Deputies at any time, call no new one, and govern gently but arbitrarily par des ordonnances, with little opposition from the great mass of the people, and in defiance of the murmurs of the constitutional party. We certainly do not mean to insinuate that the Bourbons are, more than other princes, particularly fond of the liberty of the people: They may be still less so; but they are peculiarly bound to respect it for their own sakes. Si les François n'avoient pas de Bourbons il faudroit en faire, was the late remark of a man who assuredly cannot be suspected of any bias in their favour-the celebrated friend of Bentham, and editor of his works. ५ The unfavourable results of the late elections are imputed by one party to the Government itself. The principles of the Charter, it is said, have been reluctantly and tardily applied, with a bad grace, in a manner implying mistrust of the people, and with some degree of insincerity. The few coming among the many must make up their minds to trust them. Henry IV. entered Paris, after the siege, bareheaded and unarmed; yet he was a conqueror, which his descendants are not! It is observed, on the other hand, that the faction opposed to the Bourbons evinced from the beginning such a fixed determination to overturn them at any rate, as to justify a reluctance on their part to deliver themselves up into the hands of implacable enemies. Ever since the dissolution of the Ultra Chamber in 1816, the Government has been moving-slowly, perhaps, and unwillingly-but still it has been moving towards the principles of this party. This, however, was not enough for their impatience: It seemed indeed as if they would have been better pleased with better grounds to be displeased. The Bourbons have pardoned as many enemies as would have established a reputation for clemency in twenty kings of the old regime;-yet they are accused de n'avoir rien oublié! Civil liberty, such as it is in France, dates from their restoration,--yet ils n'ont rien appris!-The very abuse with which the press teems against their government, and the severity with which its measures are publicly convassed, contradict these exaggerations. French writers are fond of drawing comparisons between their institutions and ours. The following is an eloquent summary of their opinions. Une des chances les plus heureuses qui pût rencontrer la révolution de la Grande Bretagne a été, sans contredit, de s'operer par la prémiere classe de l'ordre social. Des résistances opiniâtres lui ont été ainsi epargnées, et l'exécution, en rencontrant moins d'obstacles, n'a pas eu à se défendre des écarts et de l'exagération qui succèdent aux efforts d'une nombreuse réunion d'hommes. Il est ar rivé de là que le parti aristocratique, ou celui de la grande propriété, s'est trouvé place de plein droit en tête des intêrets populaires. Cette circonstance a été très-favorable au repos de ce royaume, à la suite de ses troubles politiques; la querelle n'ayant existé qu'entre le trône et les grands, son issue n'a point laissé d'orages après elle. C'est une chose dont nous sommes forcés de convenir: mais de quelque avantage qu'aient été de pareils antécédens, l'observateur attentif n'y découvrira-t-il pas le principe de ce mal aise qui travaille actuellement la Grande Bretagne? En effet, la révolution, s'y exécutant par une classe déjà puissante, a bien pu répandre des germes de prosperité dans le sein de la nation qui y a accédé plus qu'elle ne l'a faite; mais ses principaux bénéfices ont dû appartenir à ses fondateurs. Où le regne d'un seul a cessé, le regne multiplié des grands a prévalu. Réunis dans un petit nombre de mains, les richesses et les emplois publics s'y sont concentrés encore davantage. La nation Anglaise a décuplé le produit de ses terres et celui des objets importés dans son ile par le travail industriel de ses machines et de ses manufactures; elle a couvert les mers des deux mondes de ses vaisseaux avec une telle profusion, que l'on a cru voir sortir de la Tamise la Grande Bretagne ellemême transformée en une multitude de villes flottantes; l'Indoustan est devenu sa conquête et sa province, comme les quartiers St. Germain et St. Honoré sont les faubourgs de Paris; ses comptoirs dominent tous les rivages et tous les archipels; enfin, l'Angleterre existe presque partout sur le globe; et cet immense mouvement de vie, qui déborde à deux mille lieues de distance, s'exécute au seul profit d'un très-petit nombre d'hommes connus sous le nom de Lords ou de marchands Anglais! Sur cette île, dont l'empire est si prodigieusement étendu, le peuple est-il heureux? Le peuple trouve-t-il dans la forme de son gouvernement, de vraies garanties d'une situation qu'il puisse cherir et d'une independance honorable? Je ne le crois pas. Admiré au-dehors, il manque de pain chez lui; redouté dans l'Inde et sur plusieurs points de l'Europe, il tremble au milieu de ses murailles; il fait mouvoir des milliers de machines, et ses malheureux artisans restent les bras croises; il est glorieux de sa terre natale; et pour ne pas y expirer de faim, il va être bientôt reduit à la fuir. A quoi attribuer ces contrastes déplorables de grandeur factice et de misere réelle, si ce n'est pas à une chose dont nous sommes heureusement préservés-que notre révolution a eloignée de nous pour un temps indefini, et que par des vues fausses et courtes on voudroit y établir. Ai-je besoin de nommer la grande propriété au nom de laquelle on nous prepare des innovations qui gâteraient notre avenir, et corromproient un présent auquel il ne manque que de savoir apprecier ce qu'il renferme de bon et d'honorable? En vain vous tourmenterez vous pour établir hors de la chambre des pairs des prééminences aristocratiques dans notre beau royaume. L'esprit de ses habitans vous repousse, et la Providence elle-même a donné un dementi a votre doctrine funeste en disséminant les propriétés. Quatre millions |