tula. to the 30th June 1807—that is, during | the conqueror, with the iron driven a period of nine months—a million of into her soul, Prussia beheld her last human beings were consigned to mili- hopes expire on the shores of the Vistary hospitals, of whom at least a hundred thousand perished, independent of those slain in battle, who were nearly as many more! The mind finds it impossible to apprehend such enormous calamities; like the calculated distances of the sun or the fixed stars, they elude the grasp of the most vivid imagination; but even in the bewildering impression which they produce, they tend to show how boundless was the suffering then occasioned by human ambition; how awful the judgment of the Almighty then executed upon the earth! 85. Nor is it difficult to discern what were the national sins which were thus visited with so terrible a punishment. Fourteen years before, Austria, Russia, and Prussia had united their armies to partition Poland, and Suwarroff had entered Warsaw while yet reeking with patriot blood. In the prosecution of this guilty object, they neglected the volcano which was bursting forth in the west of Europe; they starved the war on the Rhine to feed that on the Vistula, and opened the gates of Germany to French ambition, in order to master the bulwarks of Sarmatia for themselves. Prussia, in particular, first drew off from the European alliance; and after the great barrier of frontier fortresses had been broken through in 1793, and revolutionary France stood, as Napoleon admits, "on the verge of ruin," allowed her to restore her tottering fortunes, and for ten long years stood by in dubious and selfish neutrality, anxious only to secure or increase her ill-gotten gains. And what was the result? Poland became the great theatre of punishment to the partitioning powers; her blood-stained fields beheld the writhing and the anguish of her spoilers. Pierced to the heart by hostile armies, driven up to a corner of her territory, within sight almost of the Sarmatian wilds, Austria saw her expiring efforts for independence overthrown on the field of Austerlitz. Reft of her dominions, bound in chains for the insult of 86. Banished almost from Europe, conquered in war, sullied in fame, Russia was compelled to sue for peace on the banks of the Niemen, the frontier of her Lithuanian spoils. The measure of her retribution was not yet complete; the grand-duchy of Warsaw was to become the outwork of France against Muscovy; the tide of war was to roll on to Red Russia; the sacred towers of Smolensko were to be shaken by Polish battalions; the sack of Praga was to be expiated by the flames of Moscow. That Providence superintends the progress of human affairs; that the retributions of justice apply to political societies as well as to single men; and that nations, which have no immortality, are destined to undergo the punishment of their flagrant iniquities in this world, was long ago announced in thunders from Mount Sinai, and may be read on every subsequent page of civilised history. But it is often in the third and fourth generation that the retribution descends; and in the complicated thread of intervening events, it is sometimes difficult to trace the connection which we know exists between the guilty deeds and the deserved suffering. In the present instance, however, the connection was immediate and palpable; the actors in the iniquitous spoliation were themselves the sufferers by its effects: it was the partition of Poland which opened the gates of Europe to France; it was the partitioning powers that sank beneath the car of Napoleon's ambition. 87. And was France, then, the instrument of these terrible dispensations, herself to escape the punishment of her sins? Was she, stained with the blood of the righteous, wrapt in the flames of the church, marked with the sign of the miscreant, to be the besom of destruction to others, and to bask only in the sunshine of glory herself? No! the dread hour of her retribution was steadily approaching; swift as was the march of her trium phant host, swifter still was the ad- offered to Prussia, the slights shown vance of the calamities which were to to her beautiful and high-spirited presage her fall. Already to the dis- queen, the enormous contributions imcerning eye was visible the handwriting posed on her inhabitants, the relenton the wall which foretold her doom. less rigour with which they were levied, At Tilsit she reached the highest point the forcible retention of her fortresses, of her ascendant; every subsequent the tearing away of half her dominions, change was a step nearer to her ruin. were injuries that could never be forTrue, the Continent had sunk beneath given. Her people, in consequence, her arms; true, Austria, Prussia, and imbibed the most unbounded horror Russia, had successively fallen in the at French oppression; and though the conflict; true, she had advanced her fire did not burst forth for some years eagles to the Niemen, and from the in open conflagration, it smouldered rock of Gibraltar to the Baltic Sea, incessantly in all ranks, from the throne no voice dared to breathe a whisper to the cottage, till at length its force against her authority: still the seeds became irresistible. This entire alienaof destruction were implanted in her tion of Prussia was one of the greatest bosom. Her feet were of base and errors ever committed by Napoleon in perishable clay. The resources of the the course of his eventful career, and empire were wasting away in the pur- this is admitted even by his warmest suit of the lurid phantoms which its panegyrists. "Frederick - William," people worshipped; its strength was says Thiers, "who had a horror of war, melting under the incessant drains and was dragged with so much relucwhich the career of victory demanded; tance into the coalition of 1813, when a hundred and fifty thousand men were Napoleon, half conquered, appeared an annually sacrificed to the Moloch of easy prey, would never have deserted its ambition. They saw it not they France but for this severity; and Nafelt it not: joyfully its youth "descend-poleon, having only Russia and Austria ed to the harvest of death." "They to combat, would not have been overREPENTED NOT of their sins, to give whelmed."* glory to the Lord." But the effect was not the less certain, that the operation of the circumstances producing it was not perceived; and among the many concurring causes which at this period were preparing the fall of the French empire, a prominent place must be assigned to that very treaty of Tilsit, which apparently carried its fortunes to their highest elevation. 88. In this treaty were to be discerned no marks of great political capacity on the part of the conqueror; in the harshness and perfidy with which it was accompanied, the foundation was laid for the most powerful future allies to the vanquished. The formation of the kingdom of Westphalia, and the grand-duchy of Warsaw, with three or four millions of souls, each connected only by a military road across the impoverished and indignant remaining dominions of Frederick-William, could not be supposed to add, in any considerable degree, to the strength of the French empire. The indignities 89. And what allies did Napoleon rear up on the Vistula by the arrangement of Tilsit, to prove a counterpoise to the deadly hostility of Prussia thus gathering strength in his rear? None equal to the enemies whom he created. Saxony, indeed, was made a faithful friend, and proved herself such in the hour of disaster, as well as the day of triumph. But the hopes of the Poles were cruelly blighted,† and that confi. dence in the restoration of their empire *THIERS, Consulat et l'Empire, vii. 638. "The treaty of Tilsit,' says Oginski, spread consternation through all the Polish provinces. Numbers in Lithuania and Voihynia had left their homes to join the and knew that their safety was compromised. army raised under the auspices of Napoleon, Those who waited only for his passage of the Niemen to declare themselves, were disappointed. Universally, the treaty was regard ed as the tomb of all the hopes which had been entertained of the restoration of the ancient monarchy; and from that moment, the confidence of all the Poles in the good revocably weakened."-OGINSKI, Mem. sur la intentions of the Emperor Napoleon was irPologne, ii. 345. the successes of the present war of little value, if they did not give him the means of reinstating the Sublime Porte in complete independence." One month had not elapsed since he had said to the Turkish ambassador, in a public audience at Finkenstein, "that his right left than the Sultan Selim should ever be to him." In consequence of these protestations, Turkey had thrown itself into the breach; she had braved the whole hostility of Russia, and defied the thunders of England when her fleets were anchored off the Seraglio Point. And what return did Napoleon make to these faithful allies for the exemplary fidelity with which they had stood by his fortunes when they were shaking in every quarter, and Europe, after the battle of Eylau, was ready to start up in fearful hostility in his rear? by his assistance, which might have rendered their warlike bands so powerful an ally on the shores of the Vistula, for ever destroyed. Instead of seeing their nationality revive, the ancient line of their princes restored, and their lost provinces again reunited under one sceptre, they beheld only a frag-hand was not more inseparable from his ment of their former empire wrested from Prussia, and handed over, too weak to defend itself, to the foreign government of the house of Saxony. The close alliance of Russia, and still more, the extraordinary intimacy which had sprung up between the two Emperors, precluded all hope that the vast provinces of Lithuania would ever again be restored to the domination of the Jagellons or the Sobieskis. The restoration of Poland thus seemed further removed than ever, in consequence of the successful efforts which a portion of its inhabitants had made for their liberation: they appeared to 91. The return he made was to sign have now as much to fear from the a convention with Alexander for the triumphs of the French as of the Rus-partition of all their European dominsian arms. Thus the treaty of Tilsit ions; and, not content with assuring irrevocably alienated Prussia, and at the Czar that he was at perfect liberty the same time extinguished the rising to chase the Ottomans into Asia, proardour of Poland; and while it broke vided only he did not lay violent hands down the strength of all the interven- on Constantinople, he stipulated for ing states, and presaged a future des- the largest share of the spoils, includperate strife between the despots of ing Thrace, Albania, Dalmatia, Epirus, the East and West on the banks of the and Greece, for himself; while the conNiemen, it laid no foundation in the sent of Austria was to be purchased by affections of mankind for the moral the acquisition of Servia! A more inisupport by which its dangers were to quitous and shameless instance of be encountered. treachery is not to be found even in the dark annals of Italian perfidy: and it is sufficient to demonstrate, what so many other circumstances conspire to indicate, that this great man was as regardless of the sanctity of treaties as he was of the duty of veracity; that vows were made by him only to be broken, and oaths intended to be kept only till it was expedient to violate them; and that in prosperous, equally as adverse fortune, no reliance could be placed upon his feelings of gratitude or sense of obligation, if a present interest was to be served by forgetting them. 90. But, if the treaty of Tilsit involved serious errors in policy, so far as Poland and Prussia were concerned, much more was it worthy of reprehension when the provisions for the immediate partition of Turkey are taken into consideration. Six months had not elapsed since he had written to Marmont, "to spare no protestations or assistance to Turkey, since she was the faithful ally of the French empire." Seven months had not elapsed since he had publicly declared at Posen, "that the full and complete independence of the Ottoman empire will ever be the object most at heart with the Empe- 92. The excuse set up for this monror, as it is indispensable to the security strous tergiversation by the French of France and Italy: he would esteem | writers, viz., that a few weeks before the battle of Friedland, an insurrection | are as incapable of betraying an ally as they are of forgetting an act of treachery committed against themselves. The time will come in this history, when the moment of retribution arrives, when Napoleon, hard pressed by the storms of winter and the arms of Russia, is to feel the bitterness of an ally's desertion, and when the perfidy of Tilsit is to be awfully avenged on the shores of the Beresina.* of the janizaries had taken place at Constantinople, and the ruling powers there had been overturned by open violence, is totally insufficient. The deposition of one sultan-no unusual occurrence in oriental dynasties-had made no change whatever in the amicable disposition of the Divan towards France, or their inveterate hostility to the ancient and hereditary rivals of the Mahommedan faith: on the contrary, the party of the janizaries which had now gained the ascendant, was precisely the one which had ever been inclined to prosecute hostilities with Russia with the most fanatical fervour. It ill became France to hold out a revolution in the Seraglio as a ground for considering all the existing obligations with Turkey as annulled, when her own changes of government since the Revolution had been so frequent, that Talleyrand had already sworn allegiance to ten in succession. And, in truth, this violation of public faith was as short-sighted as it was dishonour able. The secret articles soon came to the knowledge of the British government-they were communicated by their ambassador to the Divan, and produced an impression which was never forgotten. Honest and sincere, without foresight as without deceit, the Turks * The perfidious conduct of Napoleon towards Turkey has been almost overlooked by the liberal writers of Europe, in the vehemence of their indignation at him for not re-establishing the kingdom of Poland. Without doubt, if that great act of injustice could have been repaired by his victorious arm, and a compact powerful empire of sixteen millions of souls re-established on the banks of the Vistula, it would have been alike grateful to every lover of freedom, and important as forming a barrier against Muscovite aggrandisement in Europe. But was it possible to construct such an empire, to form such a barrier out of the disjointed elements of Polish anarchy? That is the point for consideration; and if it was not, then the French Emperor would have thrown away all the advantages of victory, if, for a visionary and impracticable scheme of this description, he had incurred the lasting and indelible animosity of the partitioning powers. With the aid of two hundred thousand brave men, indeed, which Poland could with ease have sent into the field, he might, for a season, have withstood the united armies of Russia, Austria, and Prussia; but could he rely on their tumultuary assemblies sustaining the 93. Towards the other powers of Europe the conduct of the two imperial despots was alike at variance with every principle of fidelity to their allies, or moderation towards their weaker neighbours. France abandoned Finland to Russia, and Alexander felt no scruples at accepting the project of rounding his territories in the neighbourhood of St Petersburg by wresting that important province from his faithful ally the King of Sweden, and even went the length of advancing his western frontier, by sharing in the spoils of his unhappy brother-in-arms the King of Prussia; while Russia surrendered Italy to France, and engaged to wink at the appropriation of the Papal States by Napoleon, who had resolved upon seizing them, in return for the condescension of the head of the church in recently travelling to Paris to place the imperial crown on his head. The rulers steady and durable efforts requisite for permanent success? What made Poland originally fall a victim to the coalesced powers, once little more than provinces of its mighty dominion? "The insane ambition," as John Sobieski said, "of a plebeian noblesse ;"the jealousy of a hundred thousand electors incapable alike of governing themselves or of permitting the steady national government of others. Was this fatal element of discord eradicated from the Polish heart? Is it yet eradicated? Was it possible, by re-establishing Poland in 1807, to have done anything but, as Talleyrand well expressed it, "organised anarchy?" These are the considerations which then presented, and still present, an invincible obstacle to a measure in other points of view recommended by so many considerations of justice and expedience. It is evident that the passions of the people, their insane desire for democratic equality, were so powerful, that, if re-established in its full original extent, Poland would speedily have again fallen under the dominion of its former conquerors: the same causes which formerly proved fatal to its independence would, without doubt, again have had the same effect. willing to forego, or postpone, his rivalry with Russia; to permit her to emerge, apparently crowned with the laurels of victory, from defeat, and derive greater advantages from the rout of Friedland than she had reaped even from the triumph of Pultowa or the sack of Ismael. All these sources of aggrandisement to his great Continental rival were to Napoleon as nothing, provided only they led to the overthrow of the maritime power of England. That accomplished, he anticipated little comparative difficulty even with the colossal strength of the Scythian monarch. In yielding to his seductions, Alexander appears to have been impressed with a belief that he was the man of destiny, and that, in continuing the combat, he was striving against fate.‡ of the Continent drew an imaginary line across Europe, and mutually gave each other carte blanche in regard to spoliations, however unjustifiable, committed on their own side of the division. Napoleon surrendered half the European territories of Turkey to Alexander, and appropriated the other half to himself; while Alexander engaged to throw no obstacles in the way of the dethronement of the sovereigns of the Spanish peninsula, to make way for the elevation of princes of the Buonaparte family. Both appear to have conceived that, in thus suddenly closing their deadly strife, and turning their irresistible arms against the secondary states in their vicinity, they would gain important present objects, and mutually find room for the exercise of their future ambition, without encroaching on each other: forgetting that the desires of the human heart are insatiable; that the more powerful empires become, the more ardently do they pant after universal dominion; and that the same causes which arrayed Rome against Carthage in ancient, and brought Tamerlane and Bajazet into fierce collision in modern times, could not fail to become more powerful in their opera-burg had been drawn into the contest tion from the mutual aggrandisement which their gigantic empires received. "Nec mundus," said Alexander the Great, "duobus solibus regi potest, nec duo summa regna, salvo statu terrarum, potest habere." 94. The great and ruling principle which actuated Napoleon in the negotiations at Tilsit, was the desire to combine all Europe into a cordial union against Britain. For this end he was * "Neither can the world," said Alexander the Great, "be ruled by two suns, nor contain two empires of the greatest magnitude, without destroying the peace of nations."-QUINTUS CURTIUS, iv. c. 11. + "It cannot admit of a doubt," says Bignon, "that in the treaty of Tilsit, as in all the actions of his life, it was the desire to force England to conclude peace, that was the sole, the only principle of Napoleon's actions. A prolonged state of war with Russia, or even the conclusion of a treaty which would only have put a period to the bloodshed, would not have satisfied him. It was necessary, not merely that he should have an enemy the less-he required an ally the more. Russia, it is true, had ceased to com 95. Nor had England any great cause of complaint against him for violating his engagements to her, whatever Sweden or Turkey might have for the ambitious projects entertained at their expense. The cabinet of St James's had themselves receded from the spirit as well as the letter of the confederacy; the subsidies promised by Mr Pitt had disappeared; the cabinet of St Peters for the interest of Germany and England, and both had withdrawn or been overthrown, leaving Russia alone to maintain it. So circumstanced, Great Britain had no reason to be surprised if Alexander took the first opportunity to extricate himself from a struggle in which the parties chiefly interested no longer appeared to take any share; nor could she complain if she was left alone to continue a contest which she seemed bat his army, but he required that she should enlist herself on his side; that she should enter into the strife with England, if not with arms, at least by joining in the Continental blockade, which was to aim a deadly thrust at her power. All his lures held out to Alexander were calculated for that end: it is as referring to that object that all the minor arrangements to which he consented are to be regarded."-BIGNON, vi. 351, 352. "Sire," said one of the Russian counsellors to Alexander at 'Tilsit, "I take the liberty of reminding you of the fate of your father, as the consequence of French alliance." "Oh God!" replied the Emperor, "I know it; I see it; but how can I withstand the destiny which directs me?"-SAVARY, iii. 92. |