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REPORT PRESENTED TO THE KING DURING HIS JOURNEY FROM GHENT TO PARIS, JUNE, 1815.

We showed that the principles of legitimacy must be held sacred in the interest of the people themselves, because legitimate governments can alone be strong and durable, whereas illegitimate governments, relying upon force only, fall to pieces the moment that support fails them, and then the people are delivered over to a succession of revolutions of which no one can foresee the end.

It took much time and trouble to get a hearing for these principles: They were too strict for the policy of some of the courts; they were contrary to the system adopted by the English in India, and probably inconvenient for Russia, who had certainly ignored them in several important and recent transactions; and before we succeeded in obtaining their recognition the Allied Powers had already made arrangements directly at variance with them. . . .

Their [the French delegates'] enlightened co-operation alone enabled me to overcome the many obstacles, to extinguish the ill feeling, and to remove the bad impressions with which I had to deal-enabled me, in a word, to restore to your Majesty's Government the influence which is justly its due in the councils of Europe. It was by determining to uphold the principle of legitimacy that we obtained this important result. . . .5

The principle of legitimacy was also imperiled, and most seriously imperiled, by the foolish conduct of the defenders of legitimate power, who did not distinguish between the source of power and its exercise, and believed, or acted as if they believed, that legitimate power must necessarily be absolute and unquestioned.

However legitimate a power may be, its exercise nevertheless must vary according to the objects to which it is applied, and according to time and place. Now, the spirit of the present age in great civilized states demands that supreme authority shall not be exercised except with the concurrence of representatives chosen by the people subject to it. . . .

It cannot be denied that, great as may be the advantages of legitimacy, it may nevertheless lead to abuses. This is felt strongly, because during the twenty years immediately preceding the Revolution the tendency of all political writing was to expose and exaggerate these abuses. Few persons know how to appreciate the advantages of legitimacy, because they are all in the future; but everybody is at once struck by its abuses, Pallain, op. cit., 523. Ibid., 538. Ibid., 540.

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because they may occur at any moment and show themselves upon every occasion. Has any one during the last twenty years reflected enough to perceive that none but a legitimate government can be stable? A government that offers to every ambitious man the chance of upsetting it and placing another in its stead, lives a threatened life, and bears within itself a fermenting spirit of revolution, ready at any moment to break out. The notion unhappily prevails that legitimacy affords a sovereign too much facility for setting himself above all laws, by securing him in the possession of the throne, however ill he may govern.'

The Holy Alliance was signed at Paris September 26, 1815, and received the limited approval of the British Prince Regent on October 6. It was published by the Tsar on the following Christmas day with a prefatory statement instinct with sounding religious sentiment. The documents which follow are the essential pronouncements of the Alliance and prove better than any comment the purposes of the allies.

1. THE HOLY ALLIANCE."

In the name of the Most Holy and Indivisible Trinity.

Their Majesties the Emperor of Austria, the King of Prussia, and the Emperor of Russia, in consequence of the great events which have marked the course of the last three years in Europe, and especially of the blessings which it has pleased divine Providence to shower down upon those states which place their confidence and their hope in it alone, having acquired the intimate conviction of the necessity of settling the steps to be observed by the powers, in their reciprocal relations, upon the sublime truths which the holy religion of our Savior teaches;

'Pallain, op. cit., 541–542.

8

France "acceded" to it November 11, 1815, apparently without the action being accepted.

The British letter stated:

"As the forms of the British constitution

preclude me from acceding formally to this treaty, in the shape in which it has been presented to me, I adopt this course of conveying to the August Sovereigns who have signed it, my entire concurrence in the principles they have laid down, and in the declaration which they have set forth, of making the divine precepts of the Christian religion the invariable rule of their conduct in all their relations, social and political, and of cementing the union which ought ever to subsist between all Christian nations." (3 British and Foreign State Papers, 213.)

Translated from 3 British and Foreign State Papers, 211-212.

They solemnly declare that the present act has no other object than to publish, in the face of the whole world, their fixed resolution, both in the administration of their respective states, and in their political relations with every other Government, to take for their sole guide the precepts of that holy religion, namely, the precepts of justice, Christian charity and peace, which, far from being applicable only to private concerns must have an immediate influence upon the counsels of princes, and guide all their steps, as being the only means of consolidating human institutions and remedying their imperfections. In consequence, their Majesties have agreed on the following articles:

Art. I. Conformably to the words of the holy Scriptures which command all men to consider each other as brethren, the three contracting monarchs will remain united by the bonds of a true and indissoluble fraternity, and, considering each other as fellow-countrymen, they will, on all occasions and in all places, lend each other aid and assistance; and, regarding themselves toward their subjects and armies as fathers of families, they will lead them, in the same spirit of fraternity with which they are animated, to protect religion, peace and justice.

Art. II. In consequence, the sole principle in force, either between the said Governments or between their subjects, shall be that of doing each other reciprocal service, of testifying by unalterable goodwill the mutual affection which ought to animate them, of considering themselves all as members of one and the same Christian nation; for the three allied princes look on themselves as merely delegated by Providence to govern three branches of the one family, namely, Austria, Prussia and Russia, and thus confess that the Christian world, of which they and their people form a part, has in reality no other Sovereign than Him to whom alone power really belongs, because in Him alone are found all the treasures of love, science and infinite wisdom, that is to say, God, our divine Savior, the Word of the Most High, the Word of Life. Their Majesties consequently recommend, with the most tender solicitude for their peoples, as the sole means of enjoying that peace which arises from a good conscience and which alone is durable, to strengthen themselves every day more and more in the principles and exercise of the duties which the divine Savior has taught to mankind.

Art. III. All the powers who shall choose solemnly to avow the sacred principles which have dictated the present act, and shall acknowledge how important it is for the happiness of nations, too long agitated, that these truths should henceforth exercise over the destinies of mankind all

DECLARATION OF AIX-LA-CHAPELLE

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the influence which belongs to them, will be received with equal ardor and affection into this holy alliance.

Done in triplicate and signed at Paris, the year of grace 1815, the 14th (26th) September.

FRANCIS.
FREDERICK WILLIAM.
ALEXANDER.

2. DECLARATION OF THE FIVE CABINETS, SIGNED AT AIX-LACHAPELLE, NOVEMBER 15, 1818.10

At the period of completing the pacification of Europe by the resolution of withdrawing the foreign troops from the French territory; and when there is an end of those measures of precaution which unfortunate circumstances had rendered necessary, the ministers and plenipotentiaries of their Majesties the Emperor of Austria, the King of France, the King of Great Britain, the King of Prussia and the Emperor of all the Russias have received orders from their sovereigns to make known to all the Courts of Europe, the results of their meeting at Aix-la-Chapelle, and with that view to publish the following declaration:

The convention of the 7th of October, which definitively regulated the execution of the engagements agreed to in the treaty of peace of November 20, 1815," is considered by the sovereigns who concurred therein as the accomplishment of the work of peace and as the completion of the political system destined to insure its solidity.

The intimate union established among the monarchs, who are joint parties to the system, by their own principles no less than by the interests of their people offers to Europe the most sacred pledge of its future tranquility.

10 No. VII in Convention . . . for the evacuation of the French Territory. (Parl. Pap. 1819, XVIII, 351); Archives diplomatiques pour l'histoire du tems et des états, III, 526-527; Angeberg, op. cit., 1760.

A protocol signed the same day declared the joint policy of the courts.

The political system known as that of the Holy Alliance had its origin in the treaty of Chaumont of March 1, 1814 (1 British and Foreign State Papers, 121129) and the treaty of Vienna of March 25, 1815 (ibid., 2, 443). Its purely secular embodiment was the so-called quadruple alliance signed at Paris, November 20, 1815 (ibid., 3, 273-280).

"The treaty referred to ended the military occupation of French territory:

"Art. I. The troops composing the army of occupation shall be withdrawn from the territory of France by the 30th of November next, or sooner, if possible."

The object of this union is as simple as it is great and salutary. It does not tend to any new political combination—to any change in the relations sanctioned by existing treaties. Calm and consistent in its proceedings, it has no other object than the maintenance of peace, and the guaranty of those transactions on which the peace was founded and consolidated.

The Sovereigns, in forming this august union, have regarded as its fundamental basis their invariable resolution never to depart, either among themselves or in their relations with other states, from the strictest observation of the principles of the right of nations; principles which, in their application to a state of permanent peace, can alone effectually guarantee the independence of each government and the stability of the general association.

Faithful to these principles, the Sovereigns will maintain them equally in those meetings at which they may be personally present, or in those which shall take place among their ministers; whether they be for the purpose of discussing in common their own interests or whether they shall relate to questions in which other governments shall formally claim that interference. The same spirit which will direct their councils and reign in their diplomatic communications will preside also at these meetings; and the repose of the world will be constantly their motive and their end. It is with these sentiments that the Sovereigns have consummated the work to which they were called. They will not cease to labor for its confirmation and perfection. They solemnly acknowledge that their duties toward God and the people whom they govern make it peremptory for them to give to the world, as far as lies in their power, an example of justice, of concord and of moderation; happy in the power of consecrating, from henceforth, all their efforts to protect the arts of peace, to increase the internal prosperity of their states, and to awaken those sentiments of religion and morality whose influence has been but too much enfeebled by the misfortune of the times.

For Austria: METTERNICH.

France: RICHELIEU. Great Britain: CASTLEREAGH. WELLINGTON.

Prussia: HARDENBERG.

BERNSTORFF.

Russia: NEsselrode.

CAPO D'ISTRIA.

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