proper for the establishment of the system of the Balance of Power--a
system which must ever be called into action, when every higher
principle of international adjudication has ceased to be
applicable--and which, as it was the source whence had emanated the
whole moral and intellectual culture of the eighteenth century,
attained now a more systematic form, and held a more brilliant and
dignified place, than at any former period of history. England was the
strong, central prop of the great lever for the European Balance of
Power, while Austria, which in every age has been true to a pacific
system of policy, (although her moral existence depended on far higher
principles of religion), formed on the Continent the other main stay
to the system of the Balance of Power, now become the universal
principle of international policy. And this firm alliance between the
two powers was in general, the external basis of this system,
independently of the many fluctuations which were inherent to its very
nature. We must not however confound this principle of policy with a
conservative and pacific system, acting according to existing and
acknowledged rights; for although the former system be much akin to
the latter, and both may easily and naturally co-operate in a common
resistance to an overgrown power, regardless of all right; still they
are far from being one and the same; and differ widely in many
characteristic properties, nay in their very nature. The fundamental
law of the conservative and pacific policy is Right--not an abstract
notion and pure ideal of absolute justice, by which the international
policy of states is to be fashioned and regulated; but rather (if for
the sake of greater clearness I may be allowed the use of a
mathematical phrase) an applied right, that is to say, an existing and
acknowledged right. For if we seek the first origin and ultimate
foundation of all right and all justice, we must seek it in God alone,
who is the eternal arbiter of the world, of states and nations as well
as of individuals, and who well knows how to requite every great
political injustice on his appointed day of retribution, to visit it
with unexpected punishment, and to reduce it to its own nothingness by
an often fearful award. But so soon as man, or any earthly power
presumes to lay its hand upon this work--to propose to itself absolute
justice, to judge and regulate all things by that standard, and to
model the world in conformity to it--the consequence is a total
Revolution in all the relations of society--an entire subversion of
all existing order; and it is this false idea which is the principle
or the pretext of all those fanatic attempts at universal conquest,
and of every Revolution not directed to the attainment of specific
rights, but aiming at sweeping, unqualified and universal change. It
is only when in the general system of existing and positive
international rights, some occurrence has produced a chasm--some
interstice appears--some particular question remains, or becomes anew,
open and debateable ground--that a pacific policy acting on the
principle I have mentioned, can and will in such special cases, revert
to the original, pure and eternal justice of God. But in the material
system of the Balance of Power, right and wrong are not the ultimate
object, nor the sole criterion of political estimation, nor the sole
rule of political negociations; but the great object is the prevention
or removal of any ascendancy which endangers or even threatens danger
to the general interests of the powers. Both systems of policy may
very well concur in their effects, and in most cases really do concur,
for the establishment of political ascendancy is generally founded on
the violation of existing rights, or may easily lead thereto. But this
is not absolutely necessary; cases may easily be conceived where right
is clearly on the side of ascendant might, as was once the case in the
middle of the eighteenth century, and as happened in another way
towards the beginning of the same age, when the cause of justice was
espoused by preponderant power only. And in such cases, with a total
disregard to justice, this system of the material Balance of Power
will fling its weight into the opposing scale, in order to impede the
progress of overgrown dominion. In another respect, also, the
character and ordinary tendency of this system differ widely from that
pacific policy, which aims at the preservation of all existing and
acknowledged rights. In the latter system, it is only the actual
disturbance and real violation of the general peace of nations, which
can lead to the declaration of war. But on the contrary, in the former
system it is merely a formidable preponderance of power--a mere
possibility of its abuse--a dread of future danger, which is deemed a
sufficient motive for engaging in hostilities--a motive by which a
state, where this is the exclusive principle of policy, is
undoubtedly, as has often been objected to England, more easily and
more quickly determined, than any other: and such a motive may operate
the more easily in a country like England, where those inducements for
entering into war with more haste than is expedient or desirable, are
strengthened by the fact, that an insular and naval state,
concentrated within itself, can carry on hostilities with all the
advantages of peace, and with the wonted activity of trade. England
during the eighteenth century acquired the highest glory, and in
general made a very beneficial use of her great power, in contributing
to the general aid, security and freedom of Europe; and in what is
here said, it is by no means intended to cast a slur on, or to
undervalue the old and well-acquired power of Great Britain, as such a
censure would be futile in itself, and extremely misplaced here. But
for the right understanding of the peculiar political character and
tendencies of an age, like the eighteenth century, so near to our own
times, it is necessary to observe that the system of the Balance of
Power is either merely the substitute for a higher principle, where
the latter is no longer susceptible of application, or in those cases
where the latter hath really force, the system of the Balance of Power
must be considered a mere supplement--a subordinate auxiliary for the
settlement of incidental questions. But with the great Revolution
which closed the eighteenth century, there commenced an epoch of
intellectual as well as political barbarism and desolation, to which
the mere negative principle of an equilibrium of power, however it
might be adequate to the ordinary relations of civilized states, was
no longer applicable; for now a higher principle of moral and social
reparation was needed. In no department of human activity can the
positive power of evil be overcome by a mere negative principle of
resistance, but solely by a principle of a homogeneous, though loftier
nature--a divine power acting within the same circle. A mighty
religious war, which has shaken all moral existence to its centre, and
convulsed it in all its depths, can be completely terminated only by a
true religious peace. But such a peace depends on the moral force of
principle, and not on the exact measurement of any physical
equilibrium. As during the late frightful Revolution, the political
relations of every state have been changed, and the whole Balance of
Power in Europe been disturbed, no force can now easily alter or
replace what has thus been established. Of this, England herself may
afford us an example. Certainly that great country in Southern
Asia--the richest of all the countries in the world--and which Great
Britain has annexed to her sway, by means of a navy that gives her the
empire of the seas, and whose population five or six times exceeds
that of the ocean-queen, and equals in numbers the best half of
Europe; has brought an accession of strength to England, which can not
possibly be measured, judged, or condemned according to the old narrow
rules of the system of the Balance of Power; since so many vast and
important results have accrued, and in all probability will yet accrue
to Europe and India herself from this most singular, and in the
history of the world, quite unprecedented connection; and since in
other respects, not only the internal administration of Hindostan, but
the entire conduct of the English in those transactions, has been at
once so wise and glorious. As the shallow, superficial notion of
illuminism, which during the greater part of the eighteenth century
was considered the all-ruling principle and highest object of all
science and speculation, is no longer adequate to the present views of
philosophy; in like manner the system of the Balance of Power has
ceased to be any longer applicable to the state of Europe in the late
general warfare, or to that state of things which it has given rise
to; and it is not from this system we can expect the final settlement
and adjustment of things, and the solution of the Gordian knot--the
great enigma of the world in our times.
After the system of the Balance of Power, the next leading and
characteristic principle in the history of the eighteenth century, is
the notion of illuminism, which exercised on the internal civilization
of all European nations the same influence which the former system
exerted on their external relations. People are so accustomed to
confound the principle of enlightenment with the abuse and false
application made of it during the last century, that in order to
represent this great epoch in all its historical bearings, I shall
endeavour to shew that to an impartial judge and observer, it offers
many and diverse points for consideration. For we must remember that
there was a true enlightenment by the side of a false one, and that
enlightenment was not every where of a negative character, precipitate
in its progress, and destructive in its effects. In its first obscure
beginnings, it had a solid, irreproachable, and very beneficial
character and tendency. During the public calamities, and general
anarchy of the seventeenth century, the natural sciences in all their
various branches, made silent but very extraordinary progress; and
numberless were the advantages of these new discoveries to all the
useful arts and sciences, especially in those commercial and maritime
states where such knowledge was mostly needed. A bold, enterprising
genius,[18] heir to the most splendid throne in the North, had as an
apprentice and artisan appropriated on the spot all these advantages
of modern civilization, and turned them to full account in navigation,
in the various mechanic arts, in the foundation of cities, and in the
general civilization of his subjects; and thus he became the founder
of the present greatness of Russia;--a greatness which is built on a
species of enlightenment, that so far from being of a futile and rash
nature, and of a destructive tendency, has exerted a gradual but
beneficial influence over the whole extent of an empire, which
stretches far into two continents of the globe. It was only by that
true and genuine improvement and civilization, which commenced under
Peter the Great, that Russia acquired the knowledge and mastery of her
own resources, and thus rose to a high and permanent grade in the
scale of nations.
The separation of the Russian church from the authority of the Greek
patriarch, who had now fallen under Turkish dependance, appeared a
necessary condition for opening a door in Russia to the moral and
intellectual civilization of Europe; nor when we consider that such a
step was but the continuation of an original schism, can we deem it a
subject of blame. It does not appear, however, that the system of a
_national church_, which has sprung out of this separation, has
been here as much abused as in the Anglican church, or in that system
of anti-papal opposition nearly akin to it, adopted in one or more
Catholic countries of Europe. The very system, however, of an
exclusively national religion, must ever be an object of the greatest
solicitude, for it is but too easily susceptible of an extension most
fatal to Christian government, which nothing so much impairs and
undermines as any leaning to the Mahometan confusion of spiritual and
temporal power in the hands of the same person.
Men have often blamed that harsh junction of opposites observable in
the sudden and artificial civilization of Russia; that is to say, the
contrast which there exists between the highest intellectual luxury,
and the most exquisite and fashionable refinement in thought and
manners among the higher classes, at the court and in the capital, and
the very low grade of civilization, the state of utter or at least
semi-barbarism, to which so large a portion of the population are
reduced. But no very prejudicial effects have resulted to society in
Russia, from this conjunction of elements, and from the obstacles
which so many vast masses have opposed to the progress of
civilization; and even that hurry and precipitancy in the career of
enlightenment, which was the great fault of almost all other European
countries, was by this means avoided, or rather prevented by the very
nature of things. The only thing here to be apprehended and guarded
against was this, that in copying the civilization of Europe, Russia
should not introduce along with it those negative and destructive
principles--those maxims of liberalism and irreligion which were
almost exclusively prevalent in European literature and science during
the eighteenth century; in a word that Protestantism, (in the wide and
comprehensive signification of that term,) should not become too
predominant in the public mind.
The first ground-work of the modern civilization of Russia, as laid
down by Peter the Great, was of a thoroughly practical nature,
directed in part to objects of commercial utility, after the manner of
the Dutch and English. The moral corruption occasioned by the French
philosophy introduced under Catherine II., was confined to a small
circle; and in the course of succeeding times, this philosophy came to
be considered as an exotic element of destruction, which so far from
being adequate to the exigencies of the age, struck at the very root
of society. In a more recent period, liberal and Revolutionary
theories of government, copied from constitutional countries, may at
most have led to a criminal enterprise; but have not exercised any the
least permanent influence on the bulk of the nation. But the great and
essential point for this European and Asiatic Empire,--the seat of a
progressive enlightenment,--as well as for the rest of Europe, is
still this--that this enlightenment, which is the basis on which this
empire is founded, should never take an irreligious course, but should
ever maintain a decidedly religious character. And in this respect
more than any other, a generous monarch[19] who became great in the
school of adversity, must be considered as the second founder of
Russian greatness, because he has stamped on this empire a strong,
permanent religious impress. I do not allude here of course to any
fanatic measure of coercion, but to the moral influence of
religion--to its firm establishment as the general principle of
European government in the present times.
The principle of illuminism, when properly conceived, has nothing at
all reprehensible in itself, or at variance with the Christian
religion. In the same way that Christianity, if not only its dogmas
were developed, but its general influence extended, and made
triumphant in the world, would soon supplant the existing human
Reformation, and be the true, the divine reformation of mankind, of
the world, and even of the visible creation; so it is itself the true
illumination, whereof Holy Writ speaketh: it is that light of eternal
light, which was in the beginning, and which was the life of men, (as
the words from the mouth of eternal Truth declare,) and in which men
are once more to find their life. But to descend from this lofty idea
into the world of historical experience, we should carefully
distinguish between a true, lasting, and vivifying illumination, and a
false, mimic, and illusive species of enlightenment. One thing is the
warm, genial light of the sun returning to the new-born spring, or the
fresh glow of morning after the lengthened night--and another the
transient glimmer of a bonfire, which after exciting a false alarm,
sinks rapidly again into darkness. One thing is the solitary midnight
lamp of silent meditation--and another the lightning which flashes
athwart the gloomy heavens, or the dark lantern of the murderer
stealing his way along in the night, or the torchlight in the robbers'
cave, where the spoil is divided, and new misdeeds are concerted.
For all these various significations of true and false illumination,
the eighteenth century in its real or pretended enlightenment may
furnish us with historical proofs. Thus without misapprehending or
disowning that true and divine light visible even in the progress of
science, or without rejecting, or contracting in too narrow bounds the
salutary and necessary light of human reason, still we must be careful
to distinguish from the former the light which is illusive, or
changeable, as well as that which is spurious, and counterfeited by
the powers of darkness.
In this consists the sign of a false enlightenment--if not merely in
its origin, and in its outward effects, but in its own nature as well
as undeviating course, it retains a negative character, and is
therefore hollow and superficial. But any system which is originally
destitute of a firm and solid foundation, may easily be driven into an
irregular and devious, and ultimately into a most fatal course. This
is in short the essential distinction observable in the progress of a
genuine and a spurious species of enlightenment. This illuminism
exercised so general an influence in the eighteenth century on church
and state, on science and on social life, on the relations of policy
and the course of public events, that even Spain and the Papal
territories were not exempt from its influence--an influence which was
perceptible on the one hand, in many useful reforms in the internal
administration of those states--and on the other hand, in the
expulsion of the Jesuits, which was first commenced by Portugal and
Spain, and to which the jealousy of other religious orders had
contributed. But the whole transaction must be ascribed to a
destructive party of Illuminati, that had secretly grown up in those
countries, and now expanded to public view, and appeared in full
power. To such a party those religious orders which had fallen into a
state of real degeneracy, inactivity, and ignorance, so far from being
objects of hatred, were exceedingly welcome for the promotion of their
secret views. But not so an order, which was distinguished for its
zeal and activity, its devotion to the interests of the church, its
scientific acquirements, and knowledge of the world. A critical
enquiry into the truth or falsehood of the several charges and
accusations against the Jesuits, must be reserved to a special history
of those countries I have named, or to a particular history of the
order. But their expulsion is here mentioned, as it is a very
characteristic circumstance in the history of that age of pretended
illumination. It may be generally thought that the determination which
Pope Ganganelli at last came to for the suppression of the order, was
extorted from him by the overruling influence of the secular powers.
But if such a supposition be really admissible, it is evident on the
other hand, that the restoration of the order was effected by the
virtuous Pontiff who ruled the church in the late period of
oppression, at the very moment when the iron yoke of military
despotism weighed heaviest on the nations of Europe.
The true progress of Christian enlightenment in the pursuits of
philosophy and science, I shall have occasion to mention afterwards.
The principle of toleration, which was solidly established by the
German treaty of religious peace, became an essential element of
social illumination. By degrees this principle was admitted throughout
almost all Europe--yet we must observe that its adoption cannot be
determined by one uniform, invariable rule in all countries, but that
local circumstances, respecting which it is often difficult for the
distant observer to come to a right judgment, must and ought to
produce numerous modifications in the application of the principle.
That wide toleration which in Holland and North America has for a long
time incorporated into the state a multitude of petty sects, would
not be practicable or expedient in other countries. The religious
liberty which in the Russian Empire is extended even to Mahometans,
and to certain tribes of Buddhists and Pagans, would not apply to the
circumstances of most other civilized countries. There are in the
deep-rooted habits of nations, and in the constitution of individual
states, very peculiar, and often apparently singular, circumstances
and combinations, which no man should judge of hastily, and according
to abstract principles, until he has obtained a close, accurate, and
deep insight into the historical condition and situation of a country.
Thus while England is intolerant in her Constitution at home, she
gives the fullest latitude in Canada to the North American principle
of religious freedom; and the whole British Empire in India is founded
on toleration--that is to say, on the principle of governing the
Indians according to their own laws, manners, customs, and opinions.
By this policy the English have become almost complete masters of this
great and fertile country; and their enlightened rule forms a strong
contrast to the earlier tyranny of the Mahometans, who hold the Indian
idolatry in the utmost abhorrence; although that idolatry, amid a
chaos of errors and fables, contains many better and higher vestiges
of ancient truth, than the mere negative and fanatic superstition of
Mahomet. Even the French, when they had a firm footing in India,
committed a capital fault in forming alliances more with the
Mahometans than with the native Indian powers.
In Europe, Norway alone, among the Protestant states, has maintained
down to our times laws of severe exclusion against every religion
differing from the established one--an exclusion which extends as well
to Jews as to Catholics; while Spain and Portugal only, among Catholic
countries, offer an example of similar intolerance. To abolish
suddenly without urgent and overpowering reasons, or some new
historical emergency, laws which have thus grown out of the general
circumstances of a country, which have existed for ages, and have
taken deep root in the manners and habits of life, provokes suspicion,
and may occasion danger. But we must not suppose that a severe and
exclusive system of legislation, like that existing in Spain, can
always counteract the occult and far more dangerous opposition of
secret sects and societies. This might be proved, or rendered probable
by many facts in the history of those countries during the eighteenth
century. In Italy this rigid and exclusive legislation was never
carried to the same unqualified extent. Intolerance there never
extended to the Jews, nor to the Greek schismatics, and in recent
times it does not, as formerly, affect the Protestants. In Germany,
toleration was legally established by the treaty of Westphalia, and
there the cause of toleration stood in no need of the modern principle
of illuminism--the all-stirring and animating principle of the
eighteenth century. But here illuminism in its first negative period
was directed against prejudices and abuses of another kind. In certain
Protestant countries in the North of Germany, this period of
illumination dates from the abolition of trials for witchcraft. And
against so modest a beginning not the slightest objection could be
urged; for in general the criminal law which the later and already
degenerate middle age bequeathed to modern times, afforded ample scope
for amelioration, and contained many barbarous edicts that deserved to
be abolished. The use of torture, and of un-christian and excruciating
modes of execution, were next the objects of Reform. The total
abolition of capital punishment, which this legal Reform soon aimed at
in its ulterior progress, the experience of mankind has not yet found
to be either possible or practicable. Who will be disposed to deny
that the many abuses which were now corrected, and the many vulgar
prejudices which were refuted or done away with, were especially at
the outset, in a great measure such as were truly deserving of that
name, and that very many of those reforms were useful and necessary,
just and wholesome. It appears, however, sometimes, that barbarous
abuses thus hastily and precipitately removed, soon reappear under
other forms and denominations. This may easily be the case, where
those useful and necessary reforms are confined to the outward
surface, and do not penetrate to the roots, and internal essence of
things.--It is worthy of remark, that in the absence of solid and
positive principles, the mere removal of abuses--a mere negative
course of conduct, will never alone attain the desired end, nor is it
in itself always safe and certain. Soon a rash and passionate
precipitancy will be apparent in the conduct of affairs--the standard
and real term of our exertions will be lost sight of, and things will
fall into a ruinous course; and such is the character of that period
of transition from the age of illuminism to the time of the French
Revolution. Was there a single object, not only in the questions
relating to humanity, but in the whole department of public life and
general belief, in religion and in government, which was not soon
regarded as a prejudice or an abuse?
In Germany, when the Empress Maria Theresa ascended the Imperial
throne, the long established peace of the empire, which it had once
cost such efforts to secure and preserve, appeared to the new school
of philosophy, a ridiculous prejudice of unenlightened, pedantic
Burghers of state. But fifty years afterwards, during the atheistic
and revolutionary period of the French philosophy, immediately prior
to the French Revolution, as well as at its commencement,
Christianity, and in fact all religion, was considered as a mere
prejudice of the infancy of the human mind, totally destitute of
foundation in truth, and no longer adapted to the spirit of the age;
monarchy and the whole civilization of modern Europe as abuses no
longer to be tolerated. It was only when men had reached this extreme
term of their boasted enlightenment, that a re-action took place. But
prior to this, towards the middle of the eighteenth century, and in
the ten years immediatedly subsequent, the spirit of the age bore all
before it in its irresistible progress. As in ancient times, monarchs
had competed for the title of Most Christian, or Most Catholic, so now
the potentates pre-eminent for power and understanding, were flattered
by the title of enlightened. It is not without a great shock to our
feelings, we contemplate the close intimacy which subsisted between a
monarch grown grey in the toils of war and the cares of state, a
powerful Empress of a Northern court, and the most depraved champions
of French infidelity. With respect to the third of those eminent
potentates of the age of illuminism, Joseph II., it has never been
denied by those most competent to form a correct opinion on this
subject, that among the various measures and regulations passed in the
short reign of that active emperor, although some are not entitled to
the same praise, yet many were really adapted to the exigencies of the
age, and have been attended with the most beneficial consequences to
industry and to intellectual cultivation. But the serious turn which
things afterwards took, the universal convulsion, and remodelling of
the world, have long fully demonstrated, that not one or two only, but
many of the most active and enlightened sovereigns of that age,
yielded far too much to the prevailing principles of the time, and
followed too readily the spirit of that age in its wild, rapid, and
all-destructive career.
To the many elements of internal ferment already existing in France,
the imitation of English manners under the Regent, which was soon
succeeded by an imitation of English literature and philosophy, added
a source of equal danger. For to maintain within certain prescribed
limits this English philosophy that reduces everything to the
experience of sensation, the French wanted that sense of equilibrium
innate in the English, and which their constitution had rendered
almost instinctive to them; and by means of which in philosophy, as in
their internal government, and in their relations with Foreign states,
they can keep within bounds; and with them a philosophy, however
unspiritual and ungodly, does not so rapidly rush into a headlong and
destructive course, as it did in France and in Europe during the
atheistical and revolutionary period of literature and science; for
the deadly influence of this spirit was not confined to France--the
land of its birth--but spread over every country. This is the
important and essential distinction between the philosophy of Locke or
of Hume for example, which I before designated as the Protestantism of
philosophy, in opposition to the thoroughly revolutionary philosophy
of French atheism--for though the former by its opposition to all
spiritual ideas is of a negative character, yet most of its partisans
and champions contrive to make some sort of capitulation with divine
faith, and to preserve a kind of belief in moral feeling. The French
philosophy was in fact a new Pagan idolatry of nature, and even the
most splendid discoveries of natural science, which might and ought to
have pointed to a higher principle, were not contemplated in their
true spirit, nor employed to proper advantage, but were even made the
instruments of a fanatic hostility towards the Deity. Even among the
comparatively better natural philosophers of France, materialism was
too generally the basis of their science, and a sensual enthusiasm for
nature too much the prevailing tone of their writings.