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LOUIS PHILIPPE, 

 THE CAUSE OF THE PRESENT STATE OF FRANCE. 



THE French nation is at present divided into four political sections. 

 The most honourable but unpopular, the wealthiest but the least 

 vigorous, is that of the friends of legitimacy, because it is composed 

 of the ancient nobility, of the magistracy, of the clergy, and of al- 

 most the whole of the west and south provinces of France. Next 

 come the republican party, to which belong the greatest part of the 

 young generation of the middle classes that have received some educa- 

 tion, and all the admirers of the United States of America. ^Then fol- 

 low the partisans of the present dynasty, who are not very numerous, 

 but powerful, because they are supported by the public money, and 

 by nearly a million of passive and bribed slaves. The Buonapartists 

 form the last section ; but since the death of young Napoleon this 

 party is on the decline, because many of the most influential among 

 them have either been bought by the family of Orleans or have em- 

 braced republican principles ; and in a few years this section will be 

 entirely extinct, because there is not a single member of the family 

 of the great Corsican general who possesses those qualities which are 

 indispensable to a leader of a great nation. 



However, the great mass of the people of France are of no party, 

 and are always ready to revolutionize for the sake of anarchy and 

 plunder ; and all the low inhabitants of the great cities are of this 

 description. It may be asserted, without exaggeration, that Paris 

 alone contains above 20t,000 of these worthies, who in a few hours 

 may form a truly formidable body against the existing government, 

 and in behalf of any party that has the courage to raise the standard 

 of revolt, and lead them to fight with the hope and promise of bet- 

 tering their condition, because they have nothing to lose and much 

 to gain by a great national convulsion. Without the powerful aid 

 of this lawless class, neither the revolution of 1789 nor the " Three 

 Glorious Days of July " could have effected the wondrous political 

 changes which they produced. 



A nation, therefore, composed of such elements 'cannot be easily 

 governed ; and the man who presides over its destinies must not only 

 endeavour to gain the respect of all parties, and especially the af- 

 fection of the working and poorer classes, but must possess no ordi- 

 nary ability and great conciliating energy to maintain himself in 

 power and prevent agitation. 



If the son of the famous Egalite had not been, from his very youth, 

 the most selfish]and the most deceitful double-minded man in existence, 

 if the modern Dionysiusof Europe could have renounced his unparal- 

 leled thirst of gold and power, France would not be at present on 

 the eve of a new revolutionary eruption ; because, if the four above- 

 mentioned political parties would not have entirely ceased to exist, 

 at least they could not be so alarmingly exasperated and opposed to 



