STATE PAPERS. 
ing government in France, and 
your lordship’s answer thereto, I 
have the honour to acquaint you, 
for the information of his Ma- 
jesty’s Government, that ata con- 
ference held on the 3rd inst. his 
Highness Prince Metternich ac- 
quainted us, thata M.deStrassant, 
~who had been stopped on his way 
-hither, at Lintz, from not having 
been furnished with proper pass- 
ports, had addressed a letter to 
his Imperial Majesty, and there- 
with forwarded some unopened 
letters which the Emperor had 
directed him to unseal in the pre- 
sence of the Plenipotentiaries of 
the Allied Powers. 
These proved to bea letter from 
Buonaparte, addressed to his Ma- 
jesty, professing a desire to con- 
tinue at peace, to observe the sti- 
pulations of the Treaty of Paris, 
&c.; and a letter from M. de 
Caulaincourt to Prince Metter- 
nich, containing similar profes- 
sions. 
After reading these papers, it 
was considered whether any, and 
what answer should be made 
thereto, when the general opinion 
‘appeared to be, that none should 
be returned, and no notice what- 
ever taken of the proposal. 
Upon this, as indeed upon all 
other occasions subsequent to the 
‘resumption of authority by Buo- 
-naparte, wherein the present state 
‘of the ‘Continental Powers with 
‘regard to France has come under 
‘discussion, but one opinion has 
‘appeared to direct the Councils of 
the several Sovereigns. They ad- 
‘here, and from the commence- 
ment have never ceased to adhere, 
to their Declaration of the 13th 
of March, with respect to the ac- 
tual Ruler of France. They are 
373 
in a state of hostility with him 
and his adherents, not from choice, 
but from necessity, because past 
experience has shewn, that no 
faith has been kept by him, and 
that no reliance can be placed on 
the professions of one who has 
hitherto no longer regarded the 
most solemn compacts, than as it 
may have suited his own conve- 
nience to observe them; whose 
word, the only assurance he can 
afford for his peaceable disposi- 
tion, is not less in direct opposi- 
tion to the tenour of his former 
life, than it is to the military po- 
sition in which he is actually 
placed. They feelthatthey should 
neither perform their duty to 
themselves or to the people com- 
mitted by Providence to their 
charge, if they were now to listen 
to those professions of a desire for 
peace which have been made, and 
suffer themselves thus to be lulled 
into the supposition that they 
might now relieve their people 
from the burthen of supporting 
immense military masses, by di- 
minishing their forces to a peace 
establishment, convinced as the 
several Sovereigns are, from past 
experience, that no sooner should 
they have been disarmed, than ad 
vantages would be taken of their 
want of preparation, to renew 
those scenes of aggression and 
bloodshed, from.which they had 
hoped that the peace so gloriously 
-won at Paris would long have se- 
cured them. 
They are at war, then, for the 
purpose of obtaining some secu- 
rity for their own independence, 
and for the*reconquest of that 
peace and permanent tranquillity 
for which the world has so Jong 
panted. They are noteven at war 
