| 
-HISTORY OF EUROPE. 
so entirely had these artful and en. 
terprising meu obtained the confi- 
dence and prepossession of the mui- 
titude. When they had new 
moulded the public mind, according 
to their own form, they conceived 
the vast prospect of extending the 
same influence over their neighbours; 
and they succeeded beyond their 
own expectations, and even beyond 
the fears of their enemies. They 
did for the grandeur of France more 
than had been done in its most tri- 
umphant periods, and more than 
ever had been done for a country 
by its most victorious rulers. They 
did those things through means not 
heretofore imayined. All was new 
and unprecedented in their hands: 
they created, as it were, the very 
materials with which so many stu- 
pendous deeds were performed: 
their statesmen, their generals, their 
soldiers, were of their own forma. 
tion. When they began the execu- 
tion of the vast plans they had 
formed, they had the whole world 
to encounter: all kings, all states, 
all nations were at once their de- 
clared, and, as they menaced de- 
struction to mers establishment but 
their own, their necessary enemics. 
What rendered their a€tions pecu- 
liarly striking and marvellous, the 
attors in those astonishing scenes 
were men wholly unknown to their 
country, before they assumed the 
reins of government ; they were not 
-conspicuouseither by birth, station, 
or riches: their consequence was 
innate, and called forth by a singu- 
“larity of events, without which it 
‘must have remained in that obscu- 
ity which is the atrendant ofall those 
talents, however great, that are not 
_ brought forth by great occasions. 
assembly ever displayed a more 
aw 
o> 
faaa 
astonishing mixture of shining quali. 
ties, and of atrocious vicess Am- 
bitious, cruel, unprincipled, are 
epithets inadequate to convey an 
apposite idea of their enormities. 
They were true to their character 
from the very beginning; overturn. 
ing without scruple or remorse 
whatever stood in their way, and 
compassing their ends without ever 
adverting to the rectitude or moral 
impropriety, or turpitude of the 
means employed. #The only quali- 
fications, on which they seemed to 
set a substantial value, were courage 
and capacity, boldness and expe- 
dition. These, divested of all vir. 
tuous or sentimental feelings, ap. 
pear to have been the real attributes 
of those extraordinary, but not re. 
spectable names that continued for 
three years to keep all Europe in 
unceasing alarms ; that made kings 
rembie on their thrones, that pro. 
gressively overcame all their ene. 
mies; that changed the fear of all 
christendom in some of the most ese 
sential respects ; that introduced sys- 
tems which, if through the hand of 
power they may be repressed, will 
never be eradicated; that founded 
in short an epoch, from which may 
be dated events that are only be- 
ginning to unfold themselves, andthe 
ultimate issue of which it is not with- 
in the compass of the profoundest 
politics to ascertain ; but which- will 
probably, if not certainly, be felt 
in the remotest ages to come. 
Such were the men who now 
yielded, for the first time, to their 
antagonists; but these were not the 
rivals, but the supporters of their 
power. To this they were com. 
pelled by the circumstances of the 
times; and they were t.0 wise to 
oppose the irresistible wali of a peo- 
ple 
