Europe in the Nineteenth Century: 1815-1914 [antikvár]

Chapter 1 Reaction and Revolution In France (1815-1870) Napoleon bequeathed to his successors the problem of reconciling two divergent aims: the establishment of a form of government acceptable to France combined with the pursuit of a policy acceptable to Europe. For over half a century this problem taxed to the utmost the resources of French statesmanship. The French people were resolved at all costs to break up the settlement of 1815, which was associated in their minds with contracted frontiers and loss of national prestige. The Powers were equally resolved to preserve this settlement in all its integrity, conscious that its violation would open the door to endless confiKion and the peril of a European conflagration. Three different attempts were made to devise a satisfactory solution of the problem; each in turn met with failure. The position of the Bourbons was compromised from the outset by their dependence upon the Allies, in whose baggage-train, as it was scornfully said, they had returned to France. ViHaile the crisis which precipitated their ruin was provoked by the folly of their domestic administration, their fall would appear to have been inevitable sooner or later. The Orleans Monarchy adopted a foreign policy which was in diametrical opposition to the wishes of the nation, and the support of the middle classes only retarded, but could not avert, its ultimate downfall. Napoleon III was more fortunate in rallying French sentunent for a time to his throne, but his very success involved the alienation of Europe, whose apprehensions were awakened by his efforts to revive the glories of the First Empire; and in the end he, too, shared the fate of his predecessors. The record of these three successive attempts constitutes the history of France from 1815 to 1870; they furnish the thread which gives unity and coherence to the period.