Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

84FATE OF PAKIS.

with half measures shall have taken one step towards the truth, — when religion shall be recognised as the only important principle of society, actuated no longer by perishable, but by real, that is, eternal interests, — Paris, frivolous Paris, exalted so proudly under the reign of a sceptical philosophy, Paris, the wanton capital of indifference and of cynicism, will it preserve its supremacy amid generations taught by fear, sanctified by chastisements, undeceived by experience, and perfected by meditation ?

The reaction would have to proceed from Paris itself. Dare we hope for such a prodigy ? Who will assure us that at the termination of the epoch of destruction, and when the new light of faith shall illume the heart of all Europe, the centre of civilisation shall not be removed ? Who, in short, shall say, whether France, east off for her impiety, will not then become to the regenerated Catholics what Greece was to the early Christians, the ruined temple of pride and eloquence ? What right has she to hope for immunity ? Nations die like individuals, and volcanic nations die quickly.

Our past was so brilliant, our present is so tarnished, that instead of boldly invoking the future, we ought. to look forward to it with fear. I avow it, from henceforth, that my fears for my country exceed my hopes; and the impetuosity of that young France, which, under the bloody reign of the Convention, promised such glorious triumphs, now appears to me as the symptom of dotage and decay. Yet the present state of things, with all its evils, is better for us than the era which it presages, and from which I essay in vain to turn away my thoughts.