It was the union of the
agrarian with the nationalist movements that made the downfall of the
Austrian system inevitable.

[Sidenote: Revolutions of 1848.]

The material for the conflagration in Austria was thus all prepared when in
February 1848 the fall of Louis Philippe fanned into a blaze the
smouldering fires of revolution throughout Europe. On the 3rd of March,
Kossuth, in the diet at Pressburg, delivered the famous speech which was
the declaration of war of Hungarian Liberalism against the Austrian system.
"From the charnel-house of the Vienna cabinet," he exclaimed, "a
pestilential air breathes on us, which dulls our nerves and paralyses the
flight of our spirit." Hungary liberated was to become the centre of
freedom for all the races under the Austrian crown, and the outcome was to
be a new "fraternization of the Austrian peoples." In the enthusiasm of the
moment the crucial question of the position to be occupied by the
conflicting nationalities in this "fraternal union" was overlooked.
Germanism had so far served as the basis of the Austrian system, not as a
national ideal, but because "it formed a sort of unnational mediating, and
common element among the contradictory and clamorous racial tendencies."
But with the growth of the idea of German unity, Germanism had established
a new ideal, of which the centre lay beyond the boundaries of the Austrian
monarchy, and which was bound to be antagonistic to the aspirations of
other races. The new doctrine of the fraternization of the Austrian races
would inevitably soon come into conflict with the traditional German
ascendancy strengthened by the new sentiment of a united Germany. It was on
this rock that, both in Austria and in Germany, the revolution suffered
shipwreck.

Meanwhile events progressed rapidly. On the 11th of March a meeting of
"young Czechs" at Prague drew up a petition embodying nationalist and
liberal demands; and on the same day the diet of Lower Austria petitioned
the crown to summon a meeting of the delegates of the diets to set the
Austrian finances in order. To this last proposal the government, next day,
gave its consent. But in the actual temper of the Viennese the slightest
concession was dangerous. The hall of the diet was invaded by a mob of
students and workmen, Kossuth's speech was read and its proposals adopted
as the popular programme, and the members of the diet were forced to lead a
tumultuous procession to the Hofburg, to force