XII. 1823. CHAP. foreign invaders, what will be the situation of Portugal! And are we not bound, by the most express treaty, as well as by obvious interest, to defend that ancient ally! Above all things, we ought to repeal, without delay, the Foreign Enlistment Bill-a measure which ought never to have been passed. Let us, in fine, without blindly rushing into war, be prepared for any emergency; speak a language that is truly British, pursue a policy which is truly free; look to free states as our best and natural allies against all enemies whatever; quarrelling with none, whatever be their form of government; keeping peace whenever we can, but not leaving ourselves unpre pared for war; not afraid of the issue, but calmly determined to brave its hazards; resolved to support, amid any sacrifice, the honour of the crown, the independence viii. 46, 64. of the country, and every principle considered most valuable and sacred amongst civilised nations." 1 1 Parl. Deb. 40. Mr Can ning adopts ple of noninterfer ence. Feb. 24. This animated and impassioned harangue contained the sentiments merely of an individual, who, how eminent sothe princi- ever, did not in the general case of necessity implicate any one but himself, or, at most, the political party to which he belonged. But on this occasion it was otherwise. Mr Brougham's speech was not merely the expression of his own or his party's opinion; it was the channel by which the feelings of a whole nation found vent. The cheers with which it was received from both sides of a most crowded House, the vast impression it made on the country, the enthusiasm it every where excited, proved, in the clearest manner, that it carried the universal mind with it. Mr Canning was not in the House when this important debate occurred, having vacated his seat upon his appointment as Foreign Minister, and not been yet again returned; but he gave his sanction to the principles it contained on 24th February, when he ob served, "I am compelled in justice to say that, when I entered upon the office I have the honour to fill, I found the principles on which the Government was acting XII. 1823. 1 Lord Lon Memoir, $ 19. reduced into writing, and this state paper formed what I CHAP. may be allowed to call the political creed of Ministers.1 Upon the execution of the principles there laid down, and upon it alone, is founded any claim I may have to donderry's credit from the House." And again, on 14th April, in Ante, c. xii. the debate on the Spanish negotiation, he said, "I cast no blame upon those who, seeing a great and powerful nation eager to crush and overwhelm with its vengeance a less numerous, but not less gallant people, are anxious to join the weaker party. Such feelings are honourable to those who entertain them. The bosoms in which they exist, unalloyed by any other feelings, are much more happy than those in which that feeling is chastened and tempered by considerations of prudence, interest, and expedience. I not only know, but absolutely envy, the feelings of those who call for war, for the issue of which they are not to be responsible; for I confess that the reasoning by which the war against Spain was attempted to be justified, appears to me to be much more calculated than the war itself to excite a strong feeling against those who had projected it. There is no analogy between the case of England in 1793 and France in 1823. What country had Spain attempted to seize or revolutionise, as France did before our declaration of 19th November 1792? England made war against France, not because she had altered her own government, or even dethroned her own king, but because she had invaded Geneva, Savoy, and Avignon; because she had overrun Belgium, and threatened to open the mouth of the Scheldt, in defiance of treaties; and because she openly announced, and acted upon, the determination to revolutionise every adjoining state. But this country is not prepared to give actual and efficient support to Spain; absolute bonâ fide neutrality is the limit to which it is prepared to go in behalf of a cause to which its Ministers can never feel indifferent." 2 On the other hand, it was maintained by M. de Cha Parl. Deb. viii. 242, 890, 895, XII. 1823. CHAP. teaubriand in the French Chamber, in a speech worthy of himself and of these great antagonists: “Has a government of one country a right to interfere in the M. de Cha- affairs of another? That great question of internareply in the tional law has been resolved by different writers on 41. teaubriand's French 42. the subject in different ways. Those who incline to the natural right, such as Bacon, Puffendorf, Grotius, and all the ancients, maintain that it is lawful to take up arms in the name of the human race against a society which violates the principles on which the social order reposes, on the same ground on which, in particular states, you punish an individual malefactor who disturbs the public repose. Those again who consider the question as one depending on civil right, are of opinion that no one government has a right to interfere in the affairs of another. Thus the first vest the right of intervention in duty, the last in interest. I adopt in the abstract the principles of the last. I maintain that no government has a right to interfere in the affairs of another government. In truth, if this principle is not admitted, and above all by people who enjoy a free constitution, no nation could be in security. It would always be possible for the corruption of a minister or the ambition of a king to attack a state which attempted to ameliorate its condition. In many cases wars would be multiplied; you would adopt a principle of eternal hostility-a principle of which every one would constitute himself judge, since every one might say to his neighbour, Your institutions displease me; change them, or I declare war. "But when I present myself in this tribune to defend Continued. the right of intervention in the affairs of Spain, how is an exception to be made from the principle which I have so broadly announced? It is thus: When the modern political writers rejected the right of intervention, by taking it out of the category of natural to place it in that of civil right, they felt themselves very much embarrassed. 6 XII. 1823. Cases will occur in which it is impossible to abstain from CHAP. intervention without putting the State in danger. At the commencement of the Revolution, it was said,Perish the colonies rather than one principle,' and the colonies perished. Shall we also say, Perish the social order,' rather than sacrifice a principle, and let the social order perish? In order to avoid being shattered against a principle which themselves had established, the modern jurists have introduced an exception. They said, No government has a right to interfere in the affairs of another government, except in the case where the security and immediate interests of the first government are compromised.' I will show you immediately where the authority for that exception is to be found. The exception is as well established as the rule; for no state can allow its essential interests to perish without running the risk of perishing itself. Arrived at that point of the question, its aspect entirely changes; we are transported to another ground; I am no longer obliged to combat the rule, but to show that the case of the exception has accrued for France. 43. "I shall frequently have occasion, in the sequel of this discourse, to speak of England; for it is the country Continued. which our honourable antagonists oppose to us at every turn. It is Great Britain which singly at Verona has raised its voice against the principle of intervention; it is that country which alone is ready to take up arms to defend a free people; it is it which denounces an impious war, at variance with the rights of nations—a war which a small, servile, and bigoted faction undertakes, in the hope of being able to burn the Charter of France after having torn in pieces the Constitution of Spain. Well, gentlemen, England is that country; it alone has respected the rights of nations, and given us a great example. Let us see what England has done in former days. "That England, in safety amid the waves, and de VOL. II. 2 T XII. 1823. 44. CHAP. fended by its old institutions-that England, which has neither undergone the disasters of two invasions, nor the overturnings of a revolution of thirty years, conceives Continued. it has nothing to fear from the Spanish revolution, is quite conceivable, and no more than was to be expected. But does it follow from that, that France enjoys the same security, and is in the same position? When the circumstances were different-when the essential interests of Great Britain were compromised-did it not—justly, without doubt-depart from the principles which it so loudly invokes at this time? England, in entering on the war with France, published in 1793 the famous declaration of Whitehall, from which I read the following extract: 6 The intention announced to reform the abuses of the French government, to establish personal freedom and the rights of property on a solid basis, to secure to a numerous people just and moderate laws, a wise legislature, and an equitable administration-all these salutary views have unhappily disappeared. They have given place to a system destructive of all public order, sustained by proscriptions, exiles, and confiscations without number, by arbitrary imprisonments without number, and by massacres the memory of which alone makes us shudder. The inhabitants of that unhappy country, so long deceived by promises of happiness, everlastingly renewed at every fresh accession of public suffering, the commission of every new crime, have found themselves plunged in an abyss of calamities without example. 45. "Such a state of things cannot exist in France withContinued. out involving in danger the countries which adjoin it, without giving them the right, and imposing on them the duty, of doing everything in their power to arrest an evil which subsists only on the violation of all laws which unite men in the social union. His Majesty has no intention of denying to France the rights of reforming its laws; never will he desire to impose by external force a government on an independent state. He desires to do so |