tranquillity of that empire against 10,000 or
12,000 Swedes,--I say what stand will they be able to make against him
while the Emperor is already engaged in war with the Turks? and the
Poles, when they are once in peace among themselves (if after the
miseries of so long a war they are in a condition to undertake anything)
are by treaty obliged to join their aids against that common enemy of
Christianity.

Some will say I make great and sudden rises from very small beginnings.
My answer is, that I would have such an objector look back and reflect
why I show him, from such a speck of entity, at his first origin,
growing, through more improbable and almost insuperable difficulties, to
such a bulk as he has already attained to, and _whereby, as his
advocates, the Dutch themselves own, he is grown too formidable for the
repose, not only of his neighbours, but of Europe in general_.

But then, again, they will say he has no pretence either to make a peace
with the Swede separately from the Dane or to make war upon other
princes, some of whom he is bound in alliance with. Whoever thinks these
objections not answered must have considered the Czar neither as to his
nature or to his ends. The Dutch own further, _that he made war against
Sweden without any specious pretence_. He that made war without any
specious pretence may make a peace without any specious pretence, and
make a new war without any specious pretence for it too. His Imperial
Majesty (of Austria), like a wise Prince, when he was obliged to make
war with the Ottomans, made it, as in policy, he should, powerfully.
But, in the meantime, may not the Czar, who is a wise and potent Prince
too, follow the example upon the neighbouring Princes round him that are
Protestants? If he should, I tremble to speak it, it is not impossible,
but in this age of Christianity _the Protestant religion should, in a
great measure, be abolished_; and that among the Christians, the
_Greeks_ and _Romans_ may once more come to be the only Pretenders for
Universal Empire. The pure possibility carries with it warning enough
for the Maritime Powers, and all the other Protestant Princes, to
mediate a peace for Sweden, and strengthen his arms again, without which
no preparations can put them sufficiently upon their guard; and this
must be done early and betimes, _before the King of Sweden, either out
of despair or revenge, throws himself into the Czar's hands_. For 'tis a
certain maxim (which al