EUROPE AFTER THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA
[Sidenote: Problem of the reconstruction of Europe after Napoleon's
fall.]
256. There is no more important chapter in the political history of
Europe than the reconstruction of the map after Napoleon's abdication.
The allies immediately reinstated the Bourbon dynasty on the throne of
France in the person of Louis XVI's younger brother, the count of
Provence, who became Louis XVIII.[436] They first restricted France to
the boundaries that she had had at the beginning of 1792, but later
deprived her of Savoy as a punishment for yielding to the domination of
Napoleon after his return from Elbe. A great congress of the European
powers was summoned to meet at Vienna, where the allies proposed to
settle all those difficult problems that faced them. They had no idea of
reëstablishing things just as they were before the Napoleonic cataclysm,
for the simple reason that Austria, Russia, and Prussia all had schemes
for their own advantage that precluded so simple an arrangement.
[Sidenote: Provisions of the Congress of Vienna in regard to the
Netherlands, Switzerland, Italy, and Germany.]
The Congress of Vienna began its sessions November 1, 1814. The allies
quickly agreed that Holland should become an hereditary kingdom under
the house of Orange, which had long played so conspicuous a rôle in the
nominal republic. In order that Holland might be the better able to
check any new encroachments on the part of France, the former Austrian
Netherlands were given to her. Switzerland was declared independent, as
were all the small Italian states which had existed prior to the
innovations of Napoleon, except the ancient republics of Venice and
Genoa, neither of which was restored. Genoa was given to the king of
Sardinia; Venetia to Austria, as an indemnity for her losses in the
Netherlands. Austria also received back her former territory of Milan,
and became, by reason of her control of northern Italy, a powerful
factor in determining the policy of the whole Italian peninsula. As to
Germany, no one desired to undo the great work of 1803 and restore the
old anarchy. The former members of the Rhine Confederation were bent
upon maintaining the "sovereignty" which Napoleon had secured for them;
consequently the allies determined that the several states of Germany
should be independent, but "united in a federal union."
[Illustration: EUROPE IN 1815]
[Sidenote: Dispute over disposal of the Polish territory and the fate of
the kingdom of Saxony.]
So far all was tolerably harmonious. Nevertheless, serious differences
of opinion developed at the congress, which nearly brought on war among
the allies themselves, and encouraged Napoleon's return from Elba. These
concerned the disposition of the Polish territory that Napoleon had
converted into the grand duchy of Warsaw. Prussia and Russia were agreed
that the best way would be to let the Tsar make a separate state of this
territory, and unite it in a personal union with his Russian realms.
Prussia was then to be indemnified for her losses in the East by
annexing the lands of the king of Saxony, who, it was argued, merited
this retribution for remaining faithful to Napoleon after the other
members of the Confederation of the Rhine had repudiated him.
Austria and England, on the other hand, were bitterly opposed to this
arrangement. They approved neither of dispossessing the king of Saxony
nor of extending the Tsar's influence westward by giving him Poland. The
great diplomatist, Talleyrand, who represented Louis XVIII at the
congress, now saw his chance. The allies had resolved to treat France as
a black sheep, and permit the other four great powers to arrange
matters to suit themselves. But they were now hopelessly at odds, and
Austria and England found France a welcome ally in their opposition to
the northern powers. So in this way the disturber of the peace of Europe
for the last quarter of a century was received back into the family of
nations.
[Sidenote: The compromise.]
A compromise was at last reached. The Tsar was allowed to create a
kingdom of Poland out of the grand duchy of Warsaw, but only half of the
possessions of the king of Saxony were ceded to Prussia. As a further
indemnity, Frederick William III was given certain districts on the left
bank of the Rhine which had belonged to ecclesiastical and petty lay
princes before the Treaty of Lunéville. The great importance of this
arrangement we shall see later when we come to trace the development of
the present German empire.
[Sidenote: Changes in the map of Europe since 1815.]
If one compares the map of Europe in 1815 with that of the present
day,[437] he will be struck with the following differences. In 1815
there was no German empire, and Prussia was a much smaller and less
compact state than now. It has evidently grown at the expense of its
neighbors, as several of the lesser German states of 1815,--Hanover,
Nassau, and Hesse-Cassel,--no longer appear on the map, and Schleswig
Holstein, which then belonged to Denmark, is now Prussian. It will be
noted that the present German empire does not include any part of the
Austrian countries, as did the Confederation of 1815, and that, on the
other hand, it does include all of Prussia. The kingdom of Poland has
become an integral part of the Russian dominions. Austria, excluded from
the German union, has entered into a dual union with Hungary, in which
the two countries are placed upon the same footing.
There was no kingdom of Italy in 1815. Now Austria has lost all hold on
Lombardy and Venetia, and all the little states reëstablished by the
Congress of Vienna, including the Papal States, have disappeared. A new
kingdom, Belgium, has been created out of the old Austrian Netherlands
which the congress gave to the king of Holland. France, now a republic
again, has recovered Savoy, but has lost all her possessions on the
Rhine by the cession of Alsace and Lorraine to the German empire.
Lastly, Turkey in Europe has nearly disappeared, and several new states,
Greece, Servia, Roumania, and Bulgaria, have appeared in southeastern
Europe. It is the purpose of the following chapters to show how the
great changes indicated on the map took place and explain the
accompanying internal changes, in so far as they represent the general
trend of modern development or have an importance for Europe at large.
[Sidenote: Influence of Napoleon in spreading the reforms achieved by
the Revolution.]
[Sidenote: Reactionary policy in the smaller states of Europe.]
257. Napoleon had been as thoroughly despotic in his government as any
of the monarchs who regained their thrones after his downfall, but he
was a son of the Revolution and had no sympathy with the ancient abuses
that it had done away with. In spite of his despotism the people of the
countries that had come under his influence had learned the great
lessons of the French Revolution. Nevertheless, the restored monarchs in
many of the smaller European states proceeded to reëstablish the ancient
feudal abuses and to treat their subjects as if there had been no French
Revolution and no such man as Napoleon. In Spain, for example, the
Inquisition and the monasteries were restored and the clergy exempted
anew from taxation. In Hesse-Cassel, which had formed a part of the
kingdom of Westphalia, all the reforms introduced by Napoleon and his
brother were abolished. The privileges of the nobility, and also the
feudal burdens of the peasantry, were restored. The soldiers were even
required to assume the discarded pigtails and powdered wigs of the
eighteenth century. In Sardinia and Naples the returning monarchs
pursued the same policy of reaction. The reaction was not so sudden and
obvious in the greater European states,--France, Prussia, Austria, and
Russia.
[Sidenote: The restoration of the Bourbons in France.]
[Sidenote: Policy of Louis XVIII, 1814-1824.]
258. The French had aroused themselves in 1793-1794 to repel the foreign
powers, Austria and Prussia, who threatened to intervene in the domestic
concerns of the country, and to reëstablish the old régime. Twenty years
later, in 1814, when the allies entered Paris, there was no danger
either of a popular uprising, or of the reëstablishment of the old
abuses. It is true that the Bourbon line of kings was restored; but
France had always been monarchical at heart. It was only the ill-advised
conduct of Louis XVI in the peculiar circumstances of 1791-1792 that had
led to his deposition and the establishment of a republic, which
Napoleon had easily converted into a monarchy. The new king, Louis
XVIII, left the wonderful administrative system of Napoleon intact and
made no effort to destroy the great achievements of the Revolution. He
granted the nation a constitution called the "Charter," which is a most
interesting document from two standpoints.
[Sidenote: The Charter of 1814.]
In the first place, the provisions of the Charter of 1814 furnish us
with a statement of the permanent results of the Revolution. The
concessions that Louis XVIII found it expedient to make, "in view of the
expectations of enlightened Europe," help us to measure the distance
that separates his time from that of his elder brother. In the second
place, no other constitution has yet lasted the French so long as did
the Charter.[438] Although somewhat modified in 1830, it was maintained
down to 1848.
All Frenchmen are declared by the Charter to be equal before the law,
and equally eligible to civil and military positions. Personal and
religious liberty is insured, and all citizens, without distinction of
rank, are required to contribute to the taxes in proportion to their
means. In short, almost all the great reforms proclaimed by the first
Declaration of the Rights of Man are guaranteed. The laws are to be made
by the king in coöperation with a House of Peers and a popular body,
the Chamber of Deputies; the latter may impeach the king's ministers.
[Sidenote: Policy of the reactionary party in France.]
In spite of these enlightened provisions attempts were made by the old
emigrant nobles--still led by their original leader, the king's brother,
the count of Artois--and by the clergy, to further a reaction in France.
This party induced the French _parlement_ to pass certain oppressive
measures, and, as we shall see, persuaded Louis XVIII to coöperate with
the other reactionary rulers in interfering to quell the revolutionary
movements in Italy and Spain.
THE LAST BOURBON KINGS
Louis XIII (d. 1643)
|
+------------------+---------------------------------+
| |
Louis XIV (d. 1715) Philip, Duke of Orleans
| |
Louis XV (d. 1774), |
great-grandson of Louis XIV |
| |
Louis the Dauphin (d. 1765) |
| |
+------------------+-----------------+ |
| | | |
Louis XVI Louis XVIII Charles X |
(d. 1793) (d. 1824), (deposed 1830), |
| Count of Provence Count of Artois |
| |
Louis XVII (d. 1795) Louis Philippe I,
great-great-grandson of
Philip (deposed 1848)
[Sidenote: Charles X deposed in 1830 and replaced by Louis Philippe.]
In 1824 Louis XVIII died and was succeeded by the count of Artois, who
took the title of Charles X. Under his rule the reactionary policy of
the government naturally became more pronounced. A bill was passed
indemnifying the nobility for the property they had lost during the
Revolution. Other less just measures led to the dethronement of the
unpopular king in 1830, by a revolution. Louis Philippe, the descendant
of Henry IV through the younger, or Orleans, branch of the Bourbon
family, was put upon the throne.[439]
[Sidenote: Three chief results of Napoleon's influence in Germany.]
[Sidenote: Disappearance of most of the little states.]
259. The chief effects of the Napoleonic occupation of Germany were
three in number. First, the consolidation of territory that followed the
cession of the left bank of the Rhine to France had, as has been
explained, done away with the anomalous ecclesiastical states, the
territories of knights, and most of the free towns. Only thirty-eight
German states, including four towns, were left when the Congress of
Vienna took up the question of forming a confederation to replace the
defunct Holy Roman Empire.
[Sidenote: Advantageous position of Prussia.]
Second, the external and internal conditions of Prussia had been so
changed as to open the way for it to replace Austria as the controlling
power in Germany. A great part of the Slavic possessions gained in the
last two partitions of Poland had been lost, but as an indemnity Prussia
had received half of the kingdom of Saxony, in the very center of
Germany, and also the Rhine provinces, where the people were thoroughly
imbued with the revolutionary doctrines that had prevailed in France.
Prussia now embraced all the various types of people included in the
German nation and was comparatively free from the presence of non-German
races. In this respect it offered a marked contrast to the heterogeneous
and mongrel population of its great rival Austria.
The internal changes were no less remarkable. The reforms carried out
after Jena by the distinguished minister Stein and his successor,
Hardenberg, had done for Prussia somewhat the same that the first
National Assembly had done for France. The abolition of the feudal
social castes, and the liberation of the serfs made the economic
development of the country possible. The reorganization of the whole
military system prepared the way for Prussia's great victories in 1866
and 1870, which led to the formation of a new German empire under her
headship.
[Sidenote: Demand for constitutional government.]
Third, the agitations of the Napoleonic period had aroused the national
spirit. The appeal to the people to aid in the freeing of their country
from foreign oppression, and the idea of their participation in a
government based upon a written constitution, had produced widespread
discontent with the old absolute monarchy.
[Sidenote: The German Confederation of 1815.]
When the form of union for the German states came up for discussion at
the Congress of Vienna, two different plans were advocated. Prussia's
representatives submitted a scheme for a firm union like that of the
United States, in which the central government should control the
individual states in all matters of general interest. This idea was
successfully opposed by Austria, supported by the other German rulers.
Austria realized that her possessions, as a whole, could never be
included in any real German union, for even in the western portion of
her territory there were many Slavs, while in Hungary and the southern
provinces there were practically no Germans at all. On the other hand,
she felt that she might be the leader in a very loose union in which all
the members should be left practically independent. Her ideal of an
international union of sovereign princes under her own headship was
almost completely realized in the constitution adopted.
[Sidenote: Character of the German constitution.]
The confederation was not a union of the various _countries_ involved,
but of "The Sovereign Princes and Free Towns of Germany," including the
emperor of Austria and the king of Prussia for such of their possessions
as were formerly included in the German empire; the king of Denmark for
Holstein; and the king of the Netherlands for the grand duchy of
Luxembourg. The union thus included two sovereigns who were out-and-out
foreigners, and did not include all the possessions of its two most
important members.[440]
The diet which met at Frankfort was composed (as was perfectly logical),
not of representatives of the people, but of plenipotentiaries of the
rulers who were members of the confederation. The members reserved to
themselves the right of forming alliances of all kinds, but pledged
themselves to make no agreement prejudicial to the safety of the union
or of any of its members, or to make war upon any member of the
confederation on any pretense whatsoever. The constitution could not be
amended without the approval of _all_ the governments concerned. In
spite of its obvious weaknesses, the confederation of 1815 lasted for a
half a century, until Prussia finally expelled Austria from the union by
arms, and began the formation of the present German federation.
[Sidenote: Political associations of German students.]
260. The liberal and progressive party in Germany was sadly disappointed
by the failure of the Congress of Vienna to weld Germany into a really
national state. They were troubled, too, by the delay of the king of
Prussia in granting the constitution that he had promised to his
subjects. Other indications were not wanting that the German princes
might not yet be ready to give up their former despotic power and adopt
the principles of the French Revolution advocated by the liberals. A
"League of Virtue" had been formed after the disastrous battle of Jena
to arouse and keep alive the zeal of the nation for expelling the
invader. This began to be reënforced, about 1815, by student
associations organized by those who had returned to their studies from
the war of independence. The students anathematized the reactionary
party in their meetings, and drank to the freedom of Germany. October
18, 1817, they held a celebration in the Wartburg to commemorate both
Luther's revolt and the anniversary of the battle of Leipsic. Speeches
were made in honor of the brave who had fallen in the war of
independence, and of the grand duke of Weimar, who was the first of the
North German princes to give his people a constitution. The day closed
with the burning of certain reactionary pamphlets.
This innocent burst of enthusiasm excited great apprehension in the
minds of the conservative statesmen of Europe, the leader among whom was
the Austrian minister, Metternich. The murder by a fanatical student of
a journalist, who was supposed to have influenced the Tsar to desert his
former liberal policy, cast discredit upon the liberal party. It also
gave Metternich an opportunity to emphasize the terrible results which
he anticipated would come from the students' associations, liberal
governments, and the freedom of the press.
[Illustration: Metternich]
[Sidenote: The 'Carlsbad Resolutions,' 1819.]
The extreme phase in the progress of reaction in Germany was reached
when, with this murder as an excuse, Metternich called together the
representatives of the larger states of the confederation at Carlsbad in
August, 1819. Here a series of resolutions were drawn up with the aim of
checking the free expression of opinions hostile to existing
institutions, and of discovering and bringing to justice the
revolutionists who were supposed to exist in dangerous numbers. These
"Carlsbad Resolutions" were laid before the diet by Austria and adopted,
though not without protest.
They provided that there should be a special official in each university
to watch the professors. Should any of them be found "abusing their
legitimate influence over the youthful mind and propagating harmful
doctrines hostile to the public order or subversive of the existing
governmental institutions," the offenders were to lose their positions.
The general students' union, which was suspected of being too
revolutionary, was to be suppressed. Moreover, no newspaper, magazine,
or pamphlet was to go to press without the previous approval of
government officials, who were to determine whether it contained
anything tending to foster discontent with the government. Lastly, a
special commission was appointed to investigate the revolutionary
conspiracies which Metternich and his sympathizers supposed to exist
throughout Germany.[441]
The attack upon the freedom of the press, and especially the
interference with the liberty of teaching in the great institutions of
learning, which were already becoming the home of the highest
scholarship in the world, scandalized all the progressive spirits in
Germany. Yet no successful protest was raised, and Germany as a whole,
acquiesced for a generation in Metternich's system of discouraging
reform of all kinds.
[Sidenote: The southern German states receive constitutions, 1818-1820.]
[Sidenote: Formation of a customs union--_zollverein_--with Prussia at
its head.]
Nevertheless, important progress was made in southern Germany. As early
as 1818 the king of Bavaria granted his people a constitution in which
he stated their rights and admitted them to a share in the government by
establishing a parliament. His example was followed within two years by
the rulers of Baden, Würtemberg, and Hesse. Another change for the
better was the gradual formation of a customs union, which permitted
goods to be sent freely from one German state to another without the
payment of duties at each boundary line. This yielded some of the
advantages of a political union. This economic union, of which Prussia
was the head, and from which Austria was excluded, was a harbinger of
the future German empire.[442]
[Sidenote: Metternich opposes revolutionary movements in Spain and
Italy.]
261. Metternich had met with signal success in his efforts to keep
Germany at a standstill. When, in 1820, the kings of Spain and Naples
were compelled by popular uprisings to accept constitutions, and so
surrender their ancient right to rule their subjects despotically, it
was but natural that Metternich should urge the European powers to
unite for the purpose of suppressing such manifestations. He urged that
revolts of this kind set a dangerous example and threatened the
tranquillity and security of all the other absolute monarchs.
[Sidenote: Italy only 'a geographical expression' in 1820.]
Italy was at this time what Metternich called only "a geographical
expression"; it had no political unity whatever. Lombardy and Venetia,
in the northern part, were in the hands of Austria, and Parma, Modena,
and Tuscany belonged to members of the Austrian family. In the south,
the considerable kingdom of the Two Sicilies was ruled over by a branch
of the Spanish Bourbons. In the center, cutting the peninsula in twain,
were the Papal States, which extended north to the Po. The presence of
Austria, and the apparent impossibility of inducing the pope to submit
to any government but his own, seemed to preclude all hope of making
Italy into a true nation. Yet fifty years later the kingdom of Italy, as
it now appears on the map of Europe, came into existence through the
final exclusion of Austria from the peninsula and the extinction of the
political power of the pope.
[Sidenote: Reforms introduced in Italy during the Napoleonic
occupation.]
Although Napoleon had governed Italy despotically he had introduced a
great many important reforms. He had established political equality and
an orderly administration, and had forwarded public improvements; the
vestiges of the feudal régime had vanished at his approach. Moreover, he
had held out the hope of a united Italy, from which the foreign powers
who had plagued and distracted her for centuries should be banished. But
his unscrupulous use of Italy to advance his personal ambitions
disappointed those who at first had placed their hopes in him, and they
came to look for his downfall as eagerly as did the nobility and the
dispossessed clergy, whose hopes were centered in Austria. It became
clear to the more thoughtful Italians that Italy must look to herself
and her own resources if she were ever to become an independent European
state.
[Sidenote: Reaction in Italy after Napoleon's downfall.]
[Sidenote: The _Carbonari_.]
The downfall of Napoleon left Italy seemingly in a worse state than that
in which he had found it. The hold of Austria was strengthened by her
acquisition of Venice. The petty despots of Parma, Modena, and Tuscany,
reseated on their thrones by the Congress of Vienna, hastened to sweep
away the reforms of the Corsican and to reëstablish all the abuses of
the old régime, now doubly conspicuous and obnoxious by reason of their
temporary abolition. The lesser Italian princes, moreover, showed
themselves to be heartily in sympathy with the hated Austria. Popular
discontent spread throughout the peninsula and led to the formation of
numerous secret societies, which assumed strange names, practiced
mysterious rites, and plotted darkly in the name of Italian liberty and
independence. By far the most noted of these associations was that of
the _Carbonari_, i.e., charcoal burners. Its objects were individual
liberty, constitutional government, and national independence and unity;
these it undertook to promote by agitation, conspiracy, and, if
necessary, by revolution.
[Sidenote: Temporary constitutions in Spain and Naples, 1820.]
The Italian agitators had a superstitious respect for a constitution;
they appear to have regarded it not so much as a form of government to
be carefully adapted to the needs of a particular country and time, as a
species of talisman which would insure liberty and prosperity to its
happy possessor. So when the Neapolitans heard that the king of Spain
had been forced by an insurrection to grant a constitution, they made
the first attempt on the part of the Italian people to gain
constitutional liberty by compelling their king to agree to accept the
Spanish constitution (July, 1820). However, at the same time that he was
invoking the vengeance of God upon his own head should he violate his
oath of fidelity to the constitution, he was casting about for foreign
assistance to suppress the revolution and enable him to return to his
old ways.
[Sidenote: Austria intervenes in Italy (1821), in support of
absolutism.]
262. He had not long to wait. The alert Metternich invited Russia,
Prussia, France, and England to unite in order to check the development
of "revolt and crime." He declared that the liberal movements, if
unrestrained, would prove "not less tyrannical and fearful" in their
results than that against which the allies had combined in the person of
Napoleon. "Revolution" appeared to him and his conservative sympathizers
as heresy appeared to Philip II,--it was a fearful disease that not only
destroyed those whom it attacked directly, but spread contagion wherever
it appeared and justified prompt and sharp measures of quarantine and
even violent intervention with a view of stamping out the devastating
plague.
To the great joy of the king of Naples, Austria marched its troops into
his territory (March, 1821) and, meeting but an ill-organized
opposition, freed him from the limitations which his subjects had for
the moment imposed upon him. An attempt on the part of the subjects of
the king of Sardinia to win a constitution was also repressed by
Austrian troops.
[Sidenote: Hopeful signs in Italy.]
The weakness of the liberal movement in both southern and northern Italy
appeared to be conclusively demonstrated. A new attempt ten years later,
in Piedmont,[443] Modena, and the Papal States, to get rid of the
existing despotism was quite as futile as the revolution of 1820-1821.
Yet there were two hopeful signs. England protested as early as 1820
against Metternich's theory of interfering in the domestic affairs of
other independent states in order to prevent reforms of which he
disapproved, and France emphatically repudiated the doctrine of
intervention on the accession of Louis Philippe in 1830. A second and
far more important indication of progress was the increasing conviction
on the part of the Italians that their country ought to be a single
nation and not, as hitherto, a group of small independent states under
foreign influence.
[Sidenote: Mazzini, 1805-1872.]
A great leader arose in the person of the delicately organized and
highly endowed Mazzini. He quickly became disgusted with the
inefficiency and the silly mystery of the Carbonari, and founded a new
association, called "Young Italy." This aimed to bring about the
regeneration of Italy through the education of the young men in lofty
republican principles. Mazzini had no confidence in princes and treaties
and foreign aid. "We are of the people and will treat with the people.
They will understand us," he said. He was not the man to organize a
successful revolution, but he inspired the young Italians with an almost
religious enthusiasm for the cause of Italy's liberation. His writings,
which were widely read throughout the peninsula, created a feeling of
loyalty to a common country among the patriots who were scattered
through the different states of Italy.[444]
[Sidenote: Plan of uniting Italy under the headship of the pope.]
[Sidenote: Early reforms of Pius IX (pope, 1846-1878).]
There was a great diversity of opinion among the reformers as to the
best way to make Italy into a nation. Mazzini's party saw no hope except
in republican institutions, but others were confident that an
enlightened pope could form an Italian federation, of which he should be
the head. And when Pius IX, upon his accession in 1846, immediately
began to consult the interests and wishes of his people by subjecting
priests to taxation, admitting laymen to his councils and tribunals,
granting greater liberty of the press, and even protesting against
Austrian encroachments, there seemed to be some ground for the belief
that the pope might take the lead in the regeneration of Italy. But he
soon grew suspicious of the liberals, and the outcome furnished one more
proof of the sagacity of Machiavelli, who had pointed out over three
centuries earlier that the temporal possessions of the pope constituted
the chief obstacle to Italian unity.
The future belonged neither to the republicans nor to the papal party,
but to those who looked for salvation in the gradual reformation of the
existing monarchies, especially of the kingdom of Sardinia. Only in this
way was there any prospect of ousting Austria, and without that no
union, whether federal or otherwise, could possibly be formed.
[Sidenote: Reason of Austria's influence after the Congress of Vienna.]
From 1815 to 1848 those who believed in keeping things as they were at
any cost were able, under the leadership of Metternich, to oppose pretty
successfully those who from time to time attempted to secure for the
people a greater control of the government and to satisfy the craving
for national life. This did not mean, of course, that no progress was
made during this long period in realizing the ideals of the liberal
party in the various European states, or that one man can block the
advance of nations for a generation. The very fact that Austria had,
after the Congress of Vienna, assumed the leading rôle in Europe that
France had played during the period following the Revolution of 1789, is
a sufficient indication that Metternich's aversion to change
corresponded to a general conviction that it was best, for the time
being, to let well enough alone.
[Sidenote: Creation of the kingdom of Greece, 1829.]
Two events, at least, during the period of Metternich's influence served
to encourage the liberals of Europe. In 1821 the inhabitants of Greece
had revolted against the oppressive government of the Turks. The Turkish
government set to work to suppress the revolt by atrocious massacres. It
is said that twenty thousand of the inhabitants of the island of Chios
were slaughtered. The Greeks, however, succeeded in arousing the
sympathy of western Europe, and they held out until England, Russia, and
France intervened and forced the Sultan to recognize the independence of
Greece in 1829.[445]
[Sidenote: Belgium becomes an independent kingdom in 1831.]
Another little kingdom was added to the European states by the revolt of
the former Austrian Netherlands from the king of Holland, to whom they
had been assigned by the Congress of Vienna. The southern Netherlands
were still as different from the northern as they had been in the time
of William the Silent.[446] Holland was Protestant and German, while the
southern provinces, to whom the union had always been distasteful, were
Catholic and akin to the French in their sympathies. Encouraged by the
revolution at Paris in 1830, the people of Brussels rose in revolt
against their Dutch king, and forced his troops to leave the city.
Through the influence of England and France the European powers agreed
to recognize the independence of the Belgians, who established a kingdom
and introduced an excellent constitution providing for a limited
monarchy modeled upon that of England.