The spirit-rapper; an autobiography
Lamartine, Arago, with the Girondins, those phrase-mongers of the old
revolution, the république of the respectables, of the Bourgeoisie,
attorneys, professors, and hommes de lettres; others, such as
Ledru-Rollin, and the Montagnards, a république démocratique, une et
indivisible, with Robespierre, Couthon, Saint-Just, Danton, and Marat;
while others still, too numerous to mention, wished, with Barbeuf, La
République démocratique et sociale; and not a few wished no government,
no political or social order at all. These were the Subterraneans,
reformers after our own hearts, and on whom we chiefly operated, and
through whom we brought the odic force to bear on the revolutionary
movement.
Aside from all these, but ready to coöperate, for the moment, with any
or all of them, as would best serve their purposes, were the
Imperialists, the Bonapartists. After the fall of Napoleon, and the
Restoration of the Bourbons, the Bonapartists had affected liberal, I
may say, democratic ideas, and had lent their powerful influence
throughout Europe to democratize the public mind; and at the time of
which I speak, the chief of the family was very nearly an avowed
socialist, and was hand-and-glove with the Subterraneans. They knew well
that they could be healed only when the waters should be troubled; and,
whether they were troubled by an angel of light or an angel of darkness,
was a matter of perfect indifference, unless, indeed, they had more
confidence in the latter than in the former.
Add to these parties the intrigues of England, who could not forgive the
Spanish match, that crowning act of the Philippine policy, also the
illusions we were able to keep up as to the views and intentions of Pius
the Ninth, and it required no messenger from another world to announce
that France was on the eve of a tremendous convulsion; that the days of
the King of the Barricades were numbered; and that, whatever might be
the afterclap, the reigning dynasty must fall, with a crash that would
be reverberated throughout all Europe. The only care of our party was to
push forward in front the more moderate reformers, more especially the
dynastique reformers, while we organized a Subterranean force that would
drive them, in the moment of their success, beyond the point at which
they aimed, and compel them to accept the République, which, if
proclaimed at Paris, we felt certain that we could, during the panic
which would succeed, fasten upon the nation.
The history of the events that followed is well known, and need not be
repeated. The old king, in the moment of peril, proved that he was a
true Bourbon, incapable of a wise decision or an energetic act. All at
once he had a horror of bloodshed, sacrificed his ministry, called to
his council Thiers, Odillon-Barrot, and other dynastiques, who, vainly
imagining that their bare names would allay the storm which they still
more vainly imagined that they had conjured up, ordered the troops back
to their barracks, and gave up the king and his dynasty to the armed and
infuriated mob. The king abdicated; the Regency, under the Duchess of
Orleans, was scouted; the royal family scampered for their lives towards
England, that _refugium peccatorum_; monarchy was abolished; the
République was proclaimed; a provisional government was organized
impromptu, and a convention of delegates, to be chosen by universal
suffrage, was ordered to meet and give France a regular political
organization.
But a few days elapsed before the movement in Paris was followed by
insurrections in Berlin, Vienna, and a large number of the smaller
German states. The Italian peninsula was all in a blaze; democracy was
in the ascendant in all Europe, except Russia, Spain, Belgium, and
Holland. Hungary demanded independence of Austria; the Slavic
populations of the Austrian Empire at Prague and Agram were preparing to
join in a panslavic movement; Pius the Ninth was deprived of all freedom
of action, and held virtually imprisoned; Naples and Sicily were in full
revolt, and the king ready to concede every thing, and, Bourbon-like
thwarting every effort of his loyal subjects to protect him; Charles
Albert declared himself the sword of the Holy See; the Lombardo-Venetian
kingdom rejected Austrian supremacy, and chose him for king. He marched
at the head of his troops, swelled by contingents from all Italy, to
drive the barbarians back over the mountains, and to clear the peninsula
of every vestige of foreign dominion.
We were elated; we felt that success was sure, and that our grand
philanthropic World-Reform was on the point of being completely
realized. But alas! _homo proponit, Deus disponit_. The spirits had
deceived us. Pius the Ninth displayed a passive courage that we had not
counted on, and nothing could induce him to sanction the war against
Austria; and in spite of all we could do, it finally leaked out, that he
had not sanctioned it, and that the revolutionists had belied him, and
entirely misrepresented his principles, conduct, and wishes. Old
Radetzky, after retreating before Charles Albert till he had obtained
reënforcements, turned upon his pursuer, defeated him, and drove him,
with shame and loss, out of Lombardy. Prince Windishgrätz beat the
rebels in Prague; the lazzaroni flogged the republican heroes in Naples,
and the people seized the throne, in spite of its weak and pusillanimous
occupant. In fine, Cavaignac, after four days of hard fighting,
prostrated the Subterraneans of Paris, and became Dictator of the
Republic. We were no longer in the years of grace ’91, ’92, or ’93. The
age was not as far gone in unbelief as we had reckoned, and the friends
of religion and society were more numerous and more energetic than we
had believed.
Our hopes were damped, but not extinguished. We had thus far used the
Pope, but we could use him no longer, and we must get rid of him, and
completely secularize the Roman government. We had used the Italian
princes; we must now reject them, and abandon Gioberti for Mazzini. We
succeeded in wresting the government entirely from the Pope, but he
himself escaped us, and fled to Gaëta, which was a serious injury to our
cause. The Pope in exile is more powerful than in the Vatican. We meant
to have confined him in his palace, and held him as a puppet in our
hands, and still for a time continued the use of his name; but in this
his flight defeated us. We were obliged to proclaim the Roman Republic,
and the temporal deposition of the Pope, prematurely; but still we
hoped, as we took care not to touch his person or his spiritual
prerogatives, that we should not lose the sympathy of the Catholic
public.
But it was all in vain. Our magic failed us; a more powerful magician
than we intervened, and everywhere the reaction gained ground against
us. Austria, whom we thought we had disposed of, rose Antæus-like from
the ground; the Giobertians, predominant in the Subalpine kingdom, would
not own us. Florence was deserting us; Venice held out, indeed, but
Lombardy was chained by old Radetzky. Great Britain wished us well, gave
us good advice, but came not to our aid; and Spain and Portugal, that we
thought dead, suddenly started into life against us. Russia, though she
loved not the Papacy, detested us, and was ready to interpose to bring
Prussia to her senses, and to assist Austria. And last of all, the
French Republic, which we had been the principal agents in creating,
fearing the preponderance of Austria, and anxious to have an outpost in
the Eternal City, sent her troops against us.
It was in vain to struggle. I saw clearly that the battle was against
us, and that we should never succeed, by political and social
revolutions, in effecting our purpose; and I made up my mind at once to
have nothing more to do with them. I resolved to return home, and fall
back on what I have hinted as an ulterior project. It was in the Autumn
of 1849. The abortive attempt to reorganize the German Empire had
failed, and not to our regret, since we saw, if reorganized at all, it
would not be on democratic principles; the authority of St. Peter was
reëstablished at Rome; the Magyars were forever prostrated in Hungary,
and our friend Kossuth had taken refuge with his friends the Mussulmans,
and France was becoming an orderly government under the Presidency of
Louis Napoleon and the conservative majority of the Legislative
Assembly. There was nothing more that we could do.
It is true, that many of our friends thought differently from me, and
wished to continue the struggle; but I told them that, if they did, they
must do so without my active coöperation; that I should leave them to
their simple human strength, and they would find all their plans
miscarry. The time is not opportune. Christianity has yet a stronger
hold on the European populations than you or I had calculated, and the
Christian party can no longer be duped and made to fight for us. They
thrill with horror now to hear us say, “Christianity is democracy, and
Jesus Christ was the first democrat.” They are beginning to see, as
clearly as we do, that all this is at best absurd, and that our movement
is essentially anti-Christian. They see, they admit, they deplore a
certain number of political and social abuses; but they believe these
abuses more tolerable than the reforms we would effect.
We have given the bishops, the clergy, and the pious laity a horrid
fright; and you will see them, almost to a man, before three years
expire, exultingly consenting to the reëstablishment of pure Cæsarism,
in order to be relieved of their fears of us. Louis Napoleon will
succeed in making himself, almost with the unanimous voice of France,
proclaimed Emperor, with absolute, or virtually absolute power, with no
effective check on his arbitrary will; parliamentary government will be
scouted, as hardly a step removed from Subterranean democracy; free
discussion of public affairs will be closed; the press will be muzzled,
and no voice will be heard throughout the empire, save a voice in praise
or flattery of the new Emperor.
But herein is our consolation and our hope for the future. The new
Emperor will have to deal with Frenchmen; and he counts without his
host, if he thinks he can, for any great length of time, silence
thirty-six millions of French voices, or make them all speak one way.
Mortal man cannot do it. Satan himself could not do it; and only One,
whom we name not here, could do it. Now they are afraid of us, and have
had even an excess of talk. They will consent for a time, even as a
novelty, to be silent, or shout, as an admirable change, _Vive l’
Empereur_, instead of _Vive la République démocratique et sociale_,—_à
bas les Démocrates_, instead of _à bas l’ Aristocrates_, or _l’
Aristocrates à la lantern_, and _à bas les socialistes_, instead of _à
bas les Rois_. But rely upon it, that after a brief repose, these same
Frenchmen will be desirous of _mouvement_, and will by no means be
pleased to find themselves doomed to the silence and stillness of death.
Then will be our time once more, and perhaps then we may be more
successful. Till then I engage no more in political and social reforms.
I shall take myself to that which underlies all political and social
ideas, and slowly, perhaps, but surely, prepare a glorious future. You
will hear from me again, or if not, you will feel the influence of what
I shall do.
With remarks like these, I took my leave of my European revolutionary
friends. I communicated to Priscilla, who had faithfully served me
throughout the time I had been abroad, and powerfully contributed to
such successes as we had had, my design of returning home. We were in
Paris. She would, perhaps, have rather returned to Rome. She had, in
fact, began to droop, and to be weary of the part I had forced her to