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ference to the general policy of Europe, and to our own share in it. Great Britain has on several occasions, reluctantly, engaged in negotiations, concluded treaties, and even given guarantees, not for any direct advantage or object of her own, but with a view to the maintenance of peace and law in Europe. Her sole purpose on these occasions has been to protect the weak, to avert war, and to strengthen the authority of those general engagements and contracts on which the tranquillity and progress of the world depend. It was for this reason that she sought in concert with her allies to regulate the succession to the Crown of Denmark, and to maintain the integrity of the dominions of that monarchy. It was for this she fought in the Crimea. It was for this that in 1867, when war was on the point of breaking out between France and Prussia on the question of Luxemburg, England adopted an expedient which was for the time successful, and has at least prolonged the peace of Europe for three years. We assert with confidence that the policy of this country in these transactions was noble and disinterested: but we confess with deep regret that the results of our intervention are not such as to encourage us to repeat it. We have not succeeded in obtaining any permanent security for peace, and we have encumbered ourselves with some onerous obligations, which we cannot defend without great national sacrifices or relinquish without dishonour. And why have these securities failed? Because we were treating with States and Ministers who have not apparently the same conception of truth and good faith that we have; who have ambitions to gratify and selfish objects to gain. The Danish question was settled by the Treaty of 1852, which was signed by Prussia and Austria, as well as by England, France, and Russia. Baron Bunsen reluctantly put his name to it by the express command of the King, but he did not conceal his own opinion and desire that it should be made only to be broken; and it was broken in 1864, when Prussia and Austria invaded Denmark, and wrested from her not only Holstein but Schleswig. So much for that German engagement. The Crimean War ended by the Treaty of 1856, and the limitation described in the preceding pages; we are now told by Prince Gortschakoff that this stipulation is no longer binding. The Luxemburg question was settled by the Convention of 1867. Three years had not elapsed before the war it was intended to avert broke out with increased violence, and Count Bismarck informs us that Prussia will, when she pleases, dispose of the neutrality of Luxemburg. To revert in passing to other transactions, Poland has been crushed, Cracow has been absorbed, Savoy has been annexed, in spite of remonstrances and pro

tests on our part which, as far as treaties went, were unanswerable. The only inference we can draw from these facts is that, in the present state of Europe, not the smallest reliance can be placed on the plighted faith of several of the most conspicuous of the Great Powers, and that in fact they only enter into engagements of this nature with the intention of breaking them when it suits their convenience. It is clear that an agreement entered into by one party who means to keep it with another who does not, is not an equitable contract; and it is one from which a wise man would abstain. With a strange inconsistency, Count Bismarck is signing Treaties with one hand, whilst he is tearing them with the other. What reliance can be placed on the Conventions between the German States, on the conclusion of the present Conference, or on a Treaty of Peace between Prussia and France, if the Treaties of 1856 and 1867 are set at naught with impunity? There are many excellent persons who think that a neutralisation of territory between the two great Empires which are now engaged in internecine war, and more especially of the disputed provinces of Alsace and Lorraine, would be the most satisfactory mode of terminating the contest, and of preventing the renewal of it hereafter. A barrier of neutral territory along the Rhine would, if it were practicable, restrain and protect the States on either side of it. The neutrality of Belgium and Switzerland has been of real advantage to both Prussia and France in the present war, and a blessing not only to the neutral States themselves but to all Europe. Would to God such pacific barriers were always inviolable! But, it must be acknowledged, that these menaces and attacks on the neutrality of the Black Sea and the neutrality of Luxemburg destroy our faith in such engagements How can this country pledge itself to aid in the maintenance of conditions, which those who are most interested in the observance of them are ready to violate? How can we risk the peace and honour of Great Britain on so precarious a foundation?

The object of all legislation is to substitute law for force in the government of society; not but that law itself must rely on force in the last resort to execute its provisions; but the knowledge that the law can and will be enforced suffices for the most part to compel men to obey and respect it. The sanction of international law is war. There is unfortunately no other. There are no other means of enforcing international contracts. Hence if they cease to be obeyed and respected from considerations of duty and honour, they have no real force but that which they may derive from the armed strength of those who support them. The decay of those motives of duty

and honour is therefore the greatest misfortune that can befall mankind, because it throws us back from a state of peace based on law, to a state of war regulated by force. Once or twice in history the world has dreamed of a council of nations, which should be a high court of justice and chivalry, to redress all wrongs and maintain order by peace; but like the legend of King Arthur's knights, the lofty conception was marred and destroyed by the unworthiness of those who ought to have upheld it. The evils of a long series of wars had taught men the blessings of peace in 1815, and accordingly the fabric of Europe was reconstructed on a pacific and legal basis, and for nearly fifty years the conditions were tolerably observed, or were seldom, at least, audaciously violated. The blessings of peace have apparently rendered men more impatient of those restraints by which alone peace can be preserved, and, like Luther's drunken peasant on horseback, no sooner is the world thrown back from one side than it falls over on the other. The Emperor Napoleon III. and Count Bismarck are the main authors and instigators of this new and most unhappy era in history, which has blighted the fairest promises of this century. For with the destruction of good faith and honour between man and man, between nation and nation, everything else that is worth living for comes in its turn to be destroyed. 'Populus jura 'naturæ gentiumque violans suæ quoque tranquillitatis in 'posterum rescindit munimenta.'

Whatever else may betide, the policy of England stands firm on this immoveable basis, that Treaties, when made, must be respected. No Government which is to exist in this country can abandon those principles: no Government can flinch from the active defence of them. The experience of the transactions to which we have here alluded convinces us more and more that we cannot expect to obtain from the dominant and successful politicians of the day in some foreign countries a full and steady recognition of this rule of conduct. We must wait till the more enlightened conscience of nations, and a keener experience of the consequences of violated faith, bring back our Continental neighbours to a livelier sense of these old truths. Meanwhile it imposes on us the duty of cautiously abstaining from entering into any fresh engagements whatever with States devoid of political principle, and the no less imperative duty of maintaining the positive engagements we have already contracted with the strength and energy of this Empire.

No. CCLXXII. will be published in April.

THE

EDINBURGH REVIEW,

APRIL, 1871.

No. CCLXXII.

ART. I.-1. Recollections of a Long Life (1786-1869). By the late Lord BROUGHTON DE GYFFORD. 5 vols. 8vo, [Not published.] 1865.

2. The Life of Henry John Temple, Viscount Temple, with Selections from his Diaries and Correspondence. By the Right Hon. Sir HENRY LYTTON BULWER, G. C.B., M.P. 2 vols. 8vo. London: 1870.

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ORD PALMERSTON and Lord Broughton-who was better known to his contemporaries, as he will be to posterity, by the familiar name of John Cam Hobhouse-were born within a few months of each other; the one in 1784, the other in 1786. The lives of both these eminent men were extended to the furthest span of human existence, for they passed the age of fourscore in full possession of their faculties. The time in which their lives were cast was the most eventful period of modern history; and in the parliamentary and administrative service of their country both of them bore a conspicuous part. Although Lord Palmerston entered life as a political descendant of Pitt and Canning, with all the advantages of high birth and early official connexions, whilst Hobhouse sprang from a humbler stock of Bristol merchants and Dissenters, and owed his earlier celebrity to the vehemence of his liberal opinions, they met at last in the Cabinets of Lord Melbourne and Lord John Russell, and no two members of those Administrations more cordially agreed in spirit and in policy, for they had both reached that broad and secure ground of Whig principles on which the Conservative traditions of the one blended with the Radical tendencies of the other.

The life of Lord Palmerston has in part been written and

VOL. CXXXIII. NO. CCLXXII.

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