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stripping her American colonies by oppressive enactments, and leaving the people of India just enough to enable them to continue their toil for her.

As shown in quotations previously made, she struggled hard to render manufactures, commerce, and a navy, impossible in America, for the same reasons that she would gladly destroy them now; and she ruined the domestic manufactures of India, in order to compel the Hindoos to raise the raw material for her own mills, and then to purchase from her the manufactured articles, the Indian consumer paying thus not only the profit of manufacture to England, but the freight to her ships for carrying it twice across the ocean.

The position of England at the time just preceding the Alliance with France, and the Crimean war, her necessities, dangers, hopes and fears, were the natural result of the policy which she had been pursuing for more than a hundred years, to compel the nations to be tributary to her capital, skill, machinery, and ships, to make them virtually mere colonial appendages of her own central power.

Her aim was, to control, and bring to her own mills, as far as possible, the raw material of the world, and having manufactured it, resell it in all markets, levying upon the people the tribute of her profits, and the freight of her ships. To the full extent of her ability she prevented every other nation from manufacturing for itself, or building up a commerce or a navy of its own. While her own manufactures were in their infancy, she excluded every rival from the markets that she could control, as she did from the American colonies; but so soon as her accumulated capital, her skill and experience, and her perfected machinery, gave her the necessary superiority, then she proclaimed the doctrine of free trade to all the nations, knowing well that if she could thus gain access to the markets of the world, her capital and skill would thus enable her to crush the growth of manufactures elsewhere. Particularly did she desire a perfectly untrammelled trade with Russia and America, because exactly in proportion as she could introduce her own goods,

would she prevent the erection of mills, and the growth of a commerce and a navy.

In this policy the South has continually sympathized most earnestly with England, because she feared as much as Great Britain the rapid growth of the Free States, and the Southern leaders have persistently opposed any substantial protection to Northern manufactures, because of the wealth, the commerce, and the navy, which they would

create.

If the North could only be restricted to the raising of grain, wool, stock, etc., the supremacy of the Slave States would be permanent and complete.

At the time of the formation of the French Alliance, the power of England was based, not upon her military strength, nor upon the extent of her territory, nor upon the number of her people, but upon her capital, her mills, and her navy, and these again depended upon her power to control the lands producing her raw material, and the markets for the sale of her goods. At this time France was becoming a formidable naval power, and England feared that she would attempt to avenge the disgrace of Waterloo; Russia was cherishing her manufacturus, opening up on all sides her resources, increasing her navy, and growing on towards India. In the West, the United States were meeting her already in the world's markets with the produce of their own looms, while their commercial marine was equal to her own. Such was the condition of England just previous to the alliance.

CHAPTER VII.

REMOTER CAUSES OF THE PRESENT POLICY OF FRANCE.

In addition to the motives which have governed England in her struggle to compel all nations to become tributary to her, there are others of almost equal power that are peculiar to France, and which must be studied, in order to understand her attack upon Russia, her present attitude towards the United States, and her movement upon Mexico.

First-France has never forgotten that she was once the Imperial Head of the nations of Europe; in fact, the political and religious Dictator of the world. The Empire of Charlemagne is regarded as presenting France in her rightful position, as Ruler of the Latin nations, and these, it is believed, ought to be supreme in Europe. The Kingdom of Charlemagne is looked upon as the luminous point, the triumphant era in the history of France, and the idea of re-establishing her lost supremacy, of making her throne once more the Imperial center of the world, has influenced the policy of her ablest statesmen, and her most ambitious kings. It is well known that this thought was a leading one in the mind of the first Napoleon, and he indicated this most clearly by causing himself to be crowned with the iron crown of Charlemagne, as a sign of what he intended to be, and to do.

His expedition into Egypt was connected with this idea of making France the central power of Europe. He hoped to wrest from England the control of the Eastern trade, by holding Egypt, and other Eastern shores of the Mediter

ranean, and by bringing the wealth of the Indies to the French cities, through the old canal of the Pharoahs. He thought in this manner to possess himself of Constantinople, to revive the Eastern Empire, and so render impossible the further progress of Russia towards the East.

The declarations and the acts of Louis Napoleon have given explicit notice to the world, that he has fully adopted the main ideas of his uncle, and that he intends to carry them out. His alliance with England, for the double purpose of ridding himself of a powerful adversary while he perfected his plans, and of using her for his own purposes; his attack on Russia, his movement upon Italy, and the occupation of Rome, his position in Syria, the finishing of the ship canal across the Isthmus of Suez, in which he is now engaged, the plans which years ago he made of a ship canal across the American Isthmus at Panama, the explorations which he has made of the mineral wealth of our Pacific coast, and now his occupation of Mexico-all are parts of one gigantic scheme, to make France once more the recognized head of the Latin races in all parts of the world, and give to her more than the power and splendor of the Empire of Charlemagne. Whoever attempts to study the career of Louis Napoleon without understanding this scheme, will have no key to his policy. Viewed in connection with this, every movement is plain.

But the religious sentiment has also exerted an important influence upon the policy of France. In the time of Charlemagne, she was the one Empire which, with the one Church, ruled all the Western world. The Roman Church and the Roman Empire, with the French king at its head, they were jointly supreme. The Empire was the earthly ally and supporter of the Church, and the Church gave to the Empire the full authority of what was deemed by all a Divine sanction. Charlemagne was crowned as Emperor of the Romans, and the Roman Church, and Roman Empire, with France as its head, were expected to go down into the future together.

The Imperial crown then passed from France into the

possession of Germany; but France has not forgotten that she was once the political head and recognized defender of the Latin Church, and from the time of Charlemagne to the present, the French clergy have mourned over their lost glory, and have hoped that in some manner it might be regained. For the double purpose of restoring the Roman Empire, with France at its head, and he the Emperor of France, and of bringing to his support the power of the church, Napoleon caused himself to be crowned by the Pope with the crown of Charlemagne, reviving in the French clergy the hope of the restoration of their former power. For precisely similar reasons, Louis Napoleon has connected his movements with the old ambitions of the French clergy, and of the Catholic Church as a whole, espousing the cause of the Roman Church at Jerusalem and Constantinople, and taking on that occasion the part of champion of the Western Church, and then pushing Austria aside in Italy, and lifting France to the foremost position among the Latin races; and, finally, invading Mexico, and threatening the United States, with the solemnly avowed intention of restoring in America the prestige of the Latin race, and of course, the power of the Roman Church.

These two ideas, the restoration of the Empire, and the supremacy of the Roman Catholic Church, must not be lost sight of by any one who wishes to understand the policy of France, and they should be very carefully considered by Americans, because thus only can we know the power of the motives by which the French Emperor is governed, both in his attack upon Mexico, and in his hostility to the Republic.

Thus only can we judge whether it is probable that he will abandon for slight reasons what he has undertaken on this continent, or whether it will be necessary for us to decide by arms the question of imposing a French Monarchy by force upon a people inhabiting our border, with the avowed intention of using the territory, the resources, and the proximity of position, as a standing menace to this Republic, and to our Protestant Faith.

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