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speeches, on the subject of war, in an hour fraught with imminent peril to the peace of Europe, and the progress of improvement among mankind, did equal credit to their patriotism and to their philanthropy. That enlightened and virtuous government, of which you formed a part, responded, in appropriate strains, to the pacific voice of France. It is time for France to have done with war. An economist of her own computes, that, since the foundation of her monarchy, she has conducted no fewer than thirteen hundred wars. More than half of the last three hundred years have been spent by France and England in the work of mutual destruction ! But this mutual slaughter is of older date. The matter may more fully be stated thus :-From 1110 to 1803, a period of nearly 700 years, they spent 260 in war! Murderous infatuation! How blinded have these nations been to the true principles of commerce, and to their own respective interests! Nothing is more certain than that home trade is more lucrative than foreign. The market is near-the property safe-the return quick. Next in importance are neighbouring countries, as spheres of profitable commerce. France and England, therefore, instead of being the first, should be the last, to quarrel. Instead of being “natural enemies," they are natural friends! It is really to be hoped that

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such is now the conviction of the best citizens of both countries. In all their past conflicts, the people of each country were less in fault than their haughty Heads, who plundered them of their substance, and, without a sigh, poured out their blood like water! those days, the two nations were nothing but the burdenbearers of royalty. But, let us thank a gracious Providence, both nations have begun at length to awake from their dream. They find they must bear the costs, and hence they infer their right to inquire into the propriety, of war. Nations really free will not permit their rulers to slay multitudes, and waste millions, without a strong

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necessity, and that necessity must first be proved. Nations really free will not be the sport of weak men, of men not so weak as wicked. On the subject of their own interests, the multitude are seldom long mistaken; and the bulk of thinking men among the people of England have made up their minds to the truth of the assertion, that "War is universally a losing game; and must, sooner or later, be followed by disastrous consequences. If such are the merits of war itself, it becomes a matter of some importance to inquire into the merits of the military character, and its claims on the respect and admiration of mankind. On this point there has been in England, within the last twenty years, a strong re-action. To this happy change, that great organ of opinion to which I have repeatedly referred, and with which you, Sir, stand so closely and so honourably identified, has most materially contributed. It has lost no opportunity of casting a withering glance at the laurels of conquest, and of making a passing thrust at such as have flourished by their country's ruin, and become great through murder !

Permit me now, Sir, to sift the claims of the soldier, and to compare them with those of the Christian missionary. The attempt will not be useless, if, in the smallest degree, it tend to propagate a more general and intense hatred to the principles and spirit of those men, whoever they may be, and of whatever country, whose ambition or other passions would renew, under any pretence, the countless miseries of war! Warriors and warlike statesmen have hitherto been too much the idols, the gods of mankind! It is time for the friends of humanity to approach them, and take their true moral and intellectual dimensions. It has been too long the custom to identify them with all that is generous in spirit, great in action, and noble in nature. Those men themselves have done their best to propa* Edinburgh Review, vol. xxxii. p. 43. See ib. vol. xx. p. 216.

gate the delusion. They have contrived to monopolize nearly all the honour of nations. They have long looked down with contempt upon men of a wise, and prudent, and peaceful spirit, who fear God and keep his command to "Do no murder!" Let us look a little more closely at these monopolists of honour and glory.

The medium through which the martial character has generally been viewed, has not been that of the prophets and apostles, but of Homer and of Ossian-not that of humility and reason, but of pride and passion. The greatest conqueror, in all ages, has been too frequently deemed the greatest man. It cannot, however, be denied,―nay, it is confessed and deplored, that in all past time, war has appropriated to itself much of the genius of the world, a very large portion of the finest talents that ever adorned the human race. Moral qualities, too, of a very elevated order, have occasionally distinguished men who have passed their lives in arms. But the greatness of the majority of fighting men has been of a very questionable character. The military genius which mankind have most frequently praised and rewarded, has been, in my poor judgment, very little more than a species of mortiferous instinct, enjoyed in common with the tiger, the bear, and the other tenants of the jungle and the desert-a ferocity the more terrible and destructive, as being under the direction, without the restraint, of reason. It was a dexterity in destroying, combined with a delight in destruction! Such were most of Homer's heroes, especially Achilles, whom," as Mr. Foster remarks, "it had deserved a conspiracy of the tribes, then called nations, to chain or to suffocate;" and such were most of the generals of the French republic, and even of the empire. This spirit is strikingly described by the bard of our fatherland, who, adverting to the gentle spirits of warmer skies, thus contrasts them with a Caledonian soldier, animated by blind loyalty and Highland whisky :

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"But bring a Scotchman frae his hill
Clap in his cheek a Highland gill,
Say, such is royal GEORGE's will,
And there's the foe!

He has nae thought but how to kill
Twa at a blow!

Nae cauld faint-hearted doubtings tease him;
Death comes!-wi' fearless eye he sees him;
Wi' bloody hand a welcome gies him,
And when he fa's,

His latest draught o' breathin' lea'es him
In faint huzzas!"

This, in the poet's eye, is the model of a true hero ; he throws the reins of reason into the hands of passion; while he shoots, stabs, and cuts throats to please king George ! He is not "teased by faint-hearted doubtings," as he proceeds to imbrue his hands in the blood of his fellow man! He is, therefore, brave. It is enough for him that human slaughter is the sovereign's "will." He is, therefore, loyal. He "asks no questions for conscience' sake." Considerations of justice, humanity, or religion, would be cowardice! The most gallant man, in the vulgar sense of the term, is he who having succeeded in divesting himself of all that is gentle, lovely, and humane, without fear or remorse, reflection or pity, rushes like a wild beast on mankind to destroy them!

The fame of the battle-field, more than any other kind of fame, is factitious, delusive, and equivocal. The great general, in ancient times, was frequently little more than a dexterous or a fortunate gambler, indebted for success, not so much to the coarse, the brutal, the ferocious element of personal bravery, so called, as to the chapter of accidents, to craft, to stratagem, to falsehood, to treachery, to the incompetence, disadvantages, or calamities, of the adversary. The same remark extensively applies to more modern commanders, not

withstanding the refinements of latter ages. It has, however, been contended, and, as I have already said, it is confessed, that the mind which comprehends, at a glance, the character and capabilities of a country, and accurately ascertains the positions which it affords for the successful conduct of a campaign, is one of a superior order. On this ground it was customary to extol as most transcendent the powers of Napoleon, and to pronounce him the greatest of all great men. It would certainly be neither wise nor just to deny his marvellous skill in disposing his troops so as to counteract greater forces; in supplying, by science and experience, the defect of numbers; and in giving unity, energy, and resistless impulse, to all the parts of an extended and complicated system of operations, amid casualties, crosses, and obstructions, which no wisdom could fore. see, and against which no prudence could prepare. In these respects, to mention no others, he unquestionably displayed a stupendous capacity, and an amazing versatility of genius. Granting all this, however, we do but grant him the possession of qualities possessed in equal degrees by many benefactors of mankind-the abilities of an engineer of the highest order. We grant his surpassing skill in the application of physical force, in the use of physical means to compass physical ends. Generalship is, therefore, to a great extent, a coarse question of matter. There is nothing in it which authorizes either those who sustain the character with the highest celebrity, or their worshippers, to claim for them kindred with such men as Bacon and Newton, Burke and Smith, Shakspeare and Milton, and the loftier spirits of our race. What is it but an affair of rivers and ramparts-hedges and ditches-horses and human beingsbows and battle-axes-musketry and cannon? But, putting the matter at the highest point, what is a genius for war but a genius for shedding blood? The curse of this genius has been mercifully bestowed upon only a

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