594 Politics and Pfospccts of Russia. [Dec. 



of Turkish power has for years stood upon a vault, and that the first rush 

 of a hostile force beyond the mountains burst it in, and buried the empire 

 less by the casualty of war, than by the course of nature. 



To the Christian there is a loftier view than the sepulchre of this fierce 

 and extinguished sovereignty ; he sees in the flashings of the sword that 

 laid it there, the unconscious instrument of a power, which it is guilt 

 lightly to name, but which may be, at this hour, commencing its superb 

 and terrible course of mingled mercy and retribution, and laying a world 

 in ruin, to raise it to a splendour beyond the imaginations of man. 



But no part of providential wisdom precludes the exercise of 

 human means. The first public duty is to follow the light of our under- 

 standings, and the first dictate of those understandings is, to summon 

 the whole strength of our country to a vigorous, determined, and prin- 

 cipled repulsion of the general enemy of Europe. 



The Sultan is virtually no more. The Ottoman empire is virtually 

 swept out of its place as an European kingdom. Its fall has not been 

 by battle, nor treachery. It has perished by its own decay. The 

 whole strength of Europe could not place it on its feet again. If it be 

 suffered to exist for a few years longer, they must be years of helpless- 

 ness, sustained only by the nursing of European cabinets. The breath 

 of life is no more in those fiery nostrils, that once blasted the continent. 

 The corpse lies there : it may lie in state, but it is beyond all the 

 unguents of the earth — it must henceforth dissolve into its original dust 

 and air. 



Russia is paramount. The continental powers already feel it, and are 

 already either preparing for desperate resistance or abject submission. 

 There is no alternative. Russia must be extinguished, or must extend. 

 As well might we stop the fall of the lava when it has once mounted 

 the summit of the volcano. It must rush on by the law of its creation, 

 turning all the material over which it rolls into the swelling of its course. 

 Every nation which stoops to the will of the Russian cabinet must become 

 an active vassal. Slavery is imprinted on its forehead ; and the first service 

 demanded of it will be to spend its blood in making slaves of the sur- 

 rounding nations. 



By the treaty of Adi'ianople, Russia is in possession of the Euxine. 

 There never was a gift more comprehensive of European empire. With 

 the Euxine in her power, it is no matter to the Czar under what name 

 Constantinople may be governed. The city is his ; the monarch is his 

 viceroy ; the people are his people ; for he can, at the first spur of his 

 despotic will, burn down the Seraglio, cashier the sovereign, and exile 

 the people. If it be his will, he can build a city on the Asiatic side of 

 the Bosphorus, that, favoured by his patronage, and sustained by his 

 commerce, would draiu away every piastre from its European rival, 

 and leave Constantinople a ruin within twenty years. 



The possession of the Euxine was the only thing wanting to make 

 Russia one of the IVIediterranean powers, and we all see how 

 directly that extraordinary possession gives her the means of being the 

 first of the Mediterranean powers. On this subject the map might be 

 enough ; but we shall give professional autliority. Captain Jones, R.N., 

 in his late Russian tour, thus speaks of the capabilities of the Euxine : 



" Russia would have here a most excellent nursery for seamen, as 

 every necessary article for building and rigging ships would soon spon- 

 taneously flow to the banks of the great rivers, as well as to their common 

 port — the Linian. 



