t!" Then, when
the murderous Empire, or the equally murderous Republic, or the grim
military despotism arrives instead of fraternity, the weak ones are
smitten with confusion. I pity them, for a bitterness almost as of death
must be lived through before one learns that God indeed doeth all things
well. The poor Revolutionists thought that they must have rapid changes,
and their hysterical visions appeared to them like perfectly wise and
accurate glances into the future. They were in a hurry, forgetting that
we cannot change our marvellous society on a sudden, any more than we
can change a single tissue of our bodies on a sudden--hence their
frantic hopes and frantic despair. If we gaze coolly round, we see that,
in spite of a muttering, threatening France and a watchful Germany, in
spite of the huge Russian storm-cloud that lowers heavily over Europe,
in spite of the venomous intrigues with which Austria is accredited,
there are still cheerful symptoms to be seen, and it may happen that the
very horror of war may at last drive all men to reject it, and declare
for fraternity. Look at that very France which is now so electric with
passion and suspicion, and compare it with the France of long ago. The
Gaul now thinks of killing the Teuton; but in the time of the good King
Henry IV. he delighted in slaying his brother Gaul. The race who now
only care to turn their hands against a rival nation once fought among
themselves like starving rats in a pit. Even in the most polished
society the men used to pick quarrels to fight to the death. In one year
of King Henry's reign nine thousand French gentlemen were killed in
duels! Bad as we are, we are not likely to return to such a state of
things as then was seen. The men belonged to one nation, and they ought
to have banded together so that no foreign foe might take advantage of
them; and yet they chose rather to slaughter each other at the rate of
nearly one hundred and ninety per week. Certainly, so far as France is
concerned, we can see some improvement; for, although the cowardly and
abominable practice of duelling is still kept up, only one man was
killed during the past twelve months, instead of nine thousand. In
England we have had nearly two hundred years of truce from civil wars;
in Germany the sections of the populace have at any rate stopped
fighting among themselves; in Italy there are no longer the shameful
feuds of Guelf and Ghibelline. It would seem, then, that civil