EXPECT AND PREPARE FOR WAR.

Anglo-Maori Warder, Volume 1, Issue 4, 16 May 1848, Page 4

EXPECT AND PREPARE FOR WAR.

FROM THE MORNING CHRONICLE. The amount of caution and foresight requisite a the present moment to secure the peace of Europe will be better appreciated if it be taken into account tliat the- system established by the treaty of Vienna is now, for the second time, undergoing a series of shocks calculated to weaken its foundations aud impair the guarantees of its authority and duration. The ul im <te tendency of these disturbances of the balance of power will, we doubt not, be beneficial. Political earthquakes are not, any more than natural ones, the r 'suit of trivial or ephemeral violations of the order of nature. The evil must be deep-seated and of long dulatioa, the furces subject to endue pressure must possets no ordinary btrength and pre&isteucy, to shake at all the superincumbent weight imposed on them. These shocks «iuc;i B b ilute the political world, aud destroy the equanimity of statesmen and diplomatists, wilt let in and air on many oppressive communities and possibly by their timely occurrence, their frequency and comparative moderation, obviate the worst part of the ra'astrophe which they are supposed to forebode. Complicated as the present position of Europe is becoming, the authority of the treaty of Vienna, and the duration of a general peace, are as jet in nothing like 60 precarious a condition as they were seventeen years ago. The fir«t series of shocks to which we a * luded were then at the height of their violence and frtqucucy. la the years 1830 and 1831 the whole of Europe, Great Britain itself not excepted, was in a most alarming siate. A geueral break up of the existing European system seemed all bat inevitable, in France, the Peninsula, Belgium, Switzerland, aud several of the states of Germany, there were acual revolutions, or leforms equivalent to revolution. EugTand, in persuitofher Reform Bill, seemed temporarily on the brink of revolution herself. Unhappy Poland, oetrayed by her sympathies with, and desire to imitate "France, grasped prematurely at independence, aud ribbed in the attempt. The troubled stale of Portugal, the attempts of Miua in Spaiu, the insurrections in lul\ the anarchy in Greece, the occupation of Algiers by the French, the revolt of Mehemit Ali, all combined to embarrass to a formidable extent the of Europe towards their own subjects and towards each other. Notwithstanding the solicitude with which the leadiog statesmen of Europe applied themselves to the preservation of peace, they would probably have failed but for tUe anxiety of the Ktug of ihe French to steady himself on his newly-acquired throne, and but for the promptness and resolution with which an Knglish Minister affirmed the cause of the revolutions which he deemed to be justifiable, and • I'l'u;eil to France aud Be'g.um the fruit of their gallant Alter * of -n-ecunty *nd aUrra, the I'f nv niu'-t Let." t r j i ■ u i : I u.»;ii_, u Un'ivciiJt I' t;i't.- (.»' liii u'j'n». and :o tin pirtial ; <i''jii*t uto* l. tiij 1 ; if in-* rt l.mopo which then took j hce. If *.•* *crj to founder the pros nt of aiMir* uiere'v ui:h : ••••■'« tapir tmm'-Jiate ins-runtv, we jcth.it ir. IMU.iI Hie pylit'-'i h,r..-i ti lluioj-e was much mnti gloomy, >,t lr„*r mote u «i organic change, tbAn it is now. Tbe .«j etc ot an lira m Italy end m ;>«ttzerland wa* men tor a v-liiL-, but the worst is over, and the teadenc) • * mjJerttion on all eid-t> i<s so r«ruarkub!'', t irt w» ii a* jnaoJy hype that the tame a seutiu:eiiti wwl

continue for some time to actuate both the promoters and the antagonists of the constitutional reforms which are evert where the order of the day. It is not the piob«ibility at the present moment of any serious disturbance of the peace of Europe, but its inevitable occurrence within a limited period, say half a dozen yeats at the utmost, that we are anxious to impress upon our leaders. If the flames of war were on the point of breaking out, it be useless for the great commander to whose unpublished opinions we have taken the great, but, we trust, not unpardonable liberty of alluding, to continue urging upon successive Governments the necessity of taking timely steps to keep the hearths, and homes a d altars of England, now, as bitheitOi unscathed by the couflttgra'ion. It would be lost labour for us to communicate to our countrymen and to Europe our sense of the insecurity of our nitons! defence, if there were not yet time to retrieve our worst errors, to atone for the apatjiy of previous Governments, and to secure for this 41 Inviolate island of the brave and free'' that immunity from the evils of hostile invasion, and from all the worst calamities of war, which it has enjoyed and boasted of so lug, V'ekuow there are many who are «o blinded by pacific and philanthropic crotchets, and by a hubit of interpreting good-naturedly the motives of their fellow-men, that they look upon a seventy years pence as quite as practicable and as possible as one of thirty years. Such persons will be the first to appeal to the example of 1850, and to infer that the storm wdl blow over now as it did then, an J be succeeded by as protracted a calm. We are sorry to dis'urb these speculators on the perpetuity of peace in their consolatory hut most mischievous hallucination®. We may remind tbein, however, that if Europe in 1832 relapsed into repose, it was partly because the immediate objects of the uitions was succeded in obtaining ameliorations—as France, Belgium, England, Switzerland—were at'ained w.th unwonted promptness and facility ; and partly beousc the disturbing or regenerative forces of other nation's had not then developed sufficient energy to uplift the weiqhc of the system which crushed' them. A new spirit) however, is abroad in Europe to the warlike as wel' as pacific tendencies of whose interleience it would be madness to shut ciureyes. It must be remembered likewise, or it would be if the mass of mankind were competent, which they are not, to comprehend how much their destinies depend on the energies and volitions of some half a-dozenorso of the foremost men of the time—it must uot be forgotten that in 1830 four men were still in all the vigour and vigilance of their faculties who are now well stricken in years, and weighed down by the unitel pressure of age, iofirmities, and cares. In 1830. the Duke of Wellington, Prince Metternich, Louis Phillipe, andMehemet Ali, whom we may characterise as the four sponsors of the peace of Europe, had 20 good years of work in them. How many have they now left i That is the first enquiry which he must mike who would compare the dunces of peace and war at the present time. Whatever the errors of s.lfish ambition or despotic will wlrchsome of those eminent men have committed, it were unwise to conceal from ourselves, unwise to deny that they are the four pillars of the peace of Europe. When they fall, thefabric they have upheld so long will begin to totter. When they are laid to rest in their graves, war will not be far off. Well, the worid generally, or at least the too practical people of England, with their 4< apathy, in regard to fore'gn politics," tike little note of that. They honour the men, or at least admire where they cannot honour, but the worth of these men, even in their extreme age, the public generally will not understand until they are gone to their long rest. One of the four, however—the oldest, the greatest, and the best of them all—a man whose experience and whose p-actical sagacity are alike unrivalled, and who has nu sordul interests no paltry personal ambitions, to warp orprjudice the workings of his mind—has serious thoughts about the matter. *' The euoset of life gives him mystical lore.'* and he repairs to Government a'ter Government of the country which he has served as no man evet erved it, imploiin; them to preya e for the coming stoira. The u'teierof these solemn wjrnings, t is petitioner at the door of successive Cabi nets whoasks no more than that he should be allowed to f-pend the "canty remnant of his honoured life in strengthening the defences of this island, is the most honoured subject of her Majesty, the greatest man now living, one of the profoundest masters of war that the world h«s ever seen, the only living man perhaps for whom the English people feel any profound attachment or genuine enthusiasm—and he cannot get a bearing; or, if heard, he is unheeded. Personal, and pecuniary, and party interests monopolise the attention of the Government, occupy the time of the Legislate, and absorb with a fearful axclusiveness, the thoughts of our whole {eople.