English Extracts.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VI, Issue 377, 14 June 1856, Page 4

English Extracts.

THE PROSPECT OF PEACE,

(From the "Examiner.") What an inexhaustible theme is the vanity of human wishes. Juvenal tells us how hard it is to distinguish what is to be desired, and that compliant gods ruin man by grantin g his prayers. With the telegraphic tiding of Russia's unconditional acceptance of the Austrian proposals the funds went up 3 per cent. Are the gentlemen of the Stock Exchange the rare, the gifted exceptions to the fallibility of judgment which the Roman satirist illustrated? Have they alone of mortal men the art of distinguishing what is, and what is not, for our good ? Does dealing in money confer this profound penetration ? Are \ve to look upon the rise and fall of that market as indications as unerring as those of the barometer ? Qr should we rather regard it as the foolometer which Sydney Smith proposed for the regulation of our judgment by the rule of avoidance or contraries. Who would take the opinion of these Stock' Exchange folks upon any question, except perhaps selling out or buying in, and yet they are supposed to be oracular on the fortunes of nations.

Should the prospect of peace at the present juncture be a matter of hope or fear ? Would it be a name, or a reality, a tfue state, or a mask ? There are things which cannot be refused, and which csn. as little be trusted. The Trojan question of the Greek horse has many varieties.

It is very possible that Russia is sincerely desirous of an end of the war, in which she finds herself overmatched. But if so, we may be sure that she proposes to herself a revenge for her present mortifications. Her pear was not ripe. Her war policy was a mistake. Her strength was the exaggerated repute of her strength, which has been dissipated by trial. She has been beaten in every encounter, but one; her fleets have been shut up to rot, or destroyed, and her territory has been occupied by the invading allies. It was not by force of arms that she made herself what she is, and by relying on force of arms she.would soon unmake herself. Her success has been through other instruments than the sword. In the arts of intrigue and corruption she is matchless. Germany, even now under her influences, shows with what consummate craft she can wind herself into the places of influence in foreign states. If she throws down her arms, it is to resume this winning game. Much prestige she his lost, but much still remains to her, which a prolongation of the contest would dissipate. It is her best policy to save what she can, and to resume the net of her intrigues all over the world. Peace is the cover for this work. In peace it has made its advances, and in peace again it will pursue its serpent-like way. The time may then come when recourse to arms to consummate wrong may not be so premature as it has been on this occasion, The first aim will of coarse be to break up the alliance which defeated the scheme of Nicholas. Russia will use all the arts and devices in which she is so skilled, to disunite France and England. Her business will be to sow jealousies and cultivate distrusts. She will bid any price for French favour. She would offer France a partition of Prussia-, servile as it has been to her, as she offered Iviglaud a share of the Turkish spoil. Her ciearly-traced part is mischiefmaker of Europe. She lias four scores ol revenge to settle, and embroilment must be the means to the malignant end. "7*lt must be the fault of the Western Pow-rs if sh» succeed, we may be told, for they have their own safety in their own ham's, and have only to hold together to defy Vn-Hti machinations. This is true, but Hut i curing: for nations, like individuals,

have their moments of evil temptation and weakness. But be the result what it may, it will be the misfortune of Europe formany a day to have to keep watch and ward against this insidious foe. We know her purposes, they are all as distinctly mapped out as her stolen territories, and we know how inflexibly she holds to her ends, however she may change her means, and therefore peace with her is but war in disguise. But we may be asked what is our drift. Are we for war without end ? No, but_ for war with an end—war with an endfurnishing the securities for peace. If Russia makes all the concessions required, peace cannot be refused ; but let there be no mistake about the treacherous character of the peace that we have to lay our accounts with. For of this we may be assured, that Russia does not make sudden and large concessions without a long-sighted calculation, to requite herself, and compass her objects by other means than open war.

Her conduct in yielding what she so lately refused cannot be reconciled with any frank and honest purpose. Her powers are strained, but not broken. She has not suffered enough to be cured for her ambition, and content to be permitted to live within her ill-gotten bounds. She has been baffled in her "designs, but not crippled in her forces ; and her mortifications are enough to inflame the spirit of revenge, not sufficient to produce|contrition and reformation. In a word, the snake is only scorched. Hango is the type of the Muscovite policy. The flag of-peace marshals the way into an ambuscade.

Deceit we shall find somewhere : it may j be in the negotiations as before ; if not, it is reserved for the relations that will follow. Do not let us be dupes ; let not our credulity rise with the stocks in the fool's paradise of the money market. If w; cannot help the turn of events, if we must accept one form of hostilities instead of another more frank and less dangerous, let us at least understand what we have to do with, and be on our guard accordingly. The play of Who's the Dupe ? will soon be soon be played out ; and if there be peace it will only end the first act of the drama, and many intricate passages will precede the denouement giving the triumph to no blindly , conducted cause. Yet nothing is more certain, in the event of peace, than the lesson preached throughout the country will be confidence in Russia. We shall be told to forget. Russia will remember.