p. 6 | Tendencies in France

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 29, 1868

Tendencies in France.

The throne of Louis Napoleon rests upon a mere crust of foundation, beneath which rage the most volcanic forces. Once the Empire may have meant peace, but now it means discontent and insubordination. Enthusiasm may meet the Emperor as he journeys to and fro in his dominions, but these apparently hearty demonstrations are about as spontaneous and genuine as theatrical applause manufactured by the hired claquer. The great personal popularity of the nephew of his uncle, and the warm admiration and deep affection cherished toward him by the French people, about which there has been, from time to time, so much bloviation are entirely mythical. Louis is popular among his subjects only in the shape of the coin of that name, which is now the more acceptable, however, on account of the counterfeit presentment of the royal features it bears.

Many signs have crept to the surface, particularly of late, going to show that the masses are growing very restive under the repressions to which they have been subjected, and that the mercurial Parisians are hungering and thirsting after a change of administration.

Thus the cause symbolized by the scepter is constantly becoming weaker, while the cause of republicanism gains all the other loses. This sapping and mining of the power of the throne, proceeding in augmenting ratio, must end some bright morning, if not stayed, in precipitating that throne suddenly into the midst of the volcanic elements above which it rests, making it convenient for Louis Napoleon to follow the example of Louis Philippe, and depart for England as unassuming Mr. Smith, sensitive to a fault about popular demonstrations, and nervously anxious to avoid the attentions likely to be thrust upon him.

The Emperor, take it all in all, has not proved a success. It is one of the misfortunes of crowned heads that they are not so free as private individuals to contract matrimonial alliances; and the head of the French nation gave mortal affront to the pride of his people, besides contemptuously disregarding their prejudices, by marrying a Spanish nobody. When Bonaparte wedded Josephine he was but a General of the Republic, who had carved his way with his sword; but Napoleon III belonged to a dynasty surrounded by a halo of glory, and could not afford to violate the dignities of his position. But his greatest misadventure was his abortive attempt to foist a monarchy upon Mexico, and to thrust a finger into the politics of the American continent. That miserable and ignominious failure obliterated the prestige gained in the Crimean war and at the battle of Solferino. His power has been waning ever since. Bismarck struck it a staggering blow by his triumph over Austria, and by the outgrowing unification of Germany. The recent oppressive restrictions which have been placed upon the independence of thought and of the press in France is another step on the road to ruin. Intellect, trained, self-reliant, and conscious of being in the right, cannot long be fettered. It will learn in time to burst the shackles which restrain its manifestations, and turn upon its imperial adversary with intensified resentment and fierce retaliation. This is a lesson that Louis Napoleon should have learned when he refuged in the United States. He ought to realize that the martyrs of the press will sow more widely the seeds of insubordination, to bear revolution as its ultimate fruit.

He relies now, for the perpetuation of his authority, upon his vast military establishment, upon which he lavishes his revenues, and to which he dispenses his favors. But bayonets may well tremble when “bayonets think,” as another Louis—Louis Kossuth—used to say. Already the bayonets upon which the French Emperor relies in a time of apprehended trouble, and as a measure of intimidation and repression now, have begun to think. For instance: At a great review of the National Guard of Paris in August last, so great was the fear of hostility to Louis Napoleon, that the men were entreated and commanded by their officers not to utter any shouts at all. They accordingly were reviewed by the Empress, and marched before the Emperor and Prince Imperial in gloomy silence; yet it is well known that if any one in the ranks had shouted vive Rochefort! or vive La Lanterne! the whole mass would have taken up the cry, and yelled it as an insult in the face of the impassive monarch, who sat there on horseback, knowing that he had not a sincere friend in the whole assemblage.

So great is the curiosity to see La Lanterne, that it has been smuggled into France, where its publication has been prohibited, and where the police are instructed to prevent its introduction, in the form of surreptitious filling for statuettes of Louis Napoleon. Thus in vain does he seek to prevent the spread of liberal ideas. He acts as a man would who should try to stay the force of volcanic forces beneath, by making the superincumbent mass heavier.—Chicago Republican.