THE REVOLUTION OF 1848 THE W. ALISON PHILLIPS Influence of February tion upon HE February Revolution in Paris was not the cause of the political upheaval which, in 1848, convulsed Europe from Ireland to the banks of the Danube. It had been preceded by the victory of Liberalism in Switzerland, by the successful revolutions the in Naples and Palermo, and by the proclama- Revolution of a Constitution in Piedmont. But, Europe. flaming out in the very centre of the European system, it was, as it were, the beacon fire which gave the signal for the simultaneous outbreak of revolutionary movements which, though long prepared, might but for this have been detached and spasmodic. The shock of the political cataclysm was felt in the remotest corners of Europe. Republican agitations in Spain and Belgium, Chartist gatherings in England, Fenian unrest in Ireland, seemed for a time to threaten to emulate the revolutionary victories in France. But the true interest of the movements of 1848 was rapidly concentrated in central Europe, wherever Austrian diplomacy and Austrian arms had Effect in sought to throw a dam across the advancing tide of National and Liberal sentiment. The history of the Revolutionary movements of 1848 is, in fact, not only in the Austrian Empire itself, but in Germany and in Italy, that of collapse of the Austrian system before the revolutionary forces it had sought to control, and of its marvellous recovery, due to the irreconcilable divisions in the ranks of the forces by which it had been overthrown. The scandal of the Gallacian rising had been but the most flagrant of a multitude of proofs of the utter bloodlessness of the Austrian administration. From the news of the February Revolution the government of the Hofburg could draw no better moral for the Viennese than the tendency of all constitutional government to degenerate into Communism. But the loyal Austrians were in a mood to accept the risk. "Rather a constitutional hell than an absolutist paradise!" was the cry-and Austria in 1848 was by no means a heaven. The state was on the verge of bankruptcy; and, since no accounts were ever published, the popular imagination painted affairs even worse than they were. The proclamation of the government, calling on the people to rally to the throne, was answered, on March 4, by a run on the banks, and a political would have followed the financial crisis, even without the impulse given to it by events in Hungary. March 3. The news of the downfall of the July Monarchy found the Diet at Pressburg engaged in the discussion of a programme of moderate reform. The effect on the imaginative and excitable Magyars was electric. The cautious policy of conservative change seemed utterly inadequate to the greatness of the crisis; and Kossuth, in his famous speech of March 3, Kossuth's gave voice to the new and wider aspirations speech of of the Magyar race, whose liberties could never be secure so long as the nations beyond the Leitha groaned under absolute rule. "From the charnel-house of the Vienna cabinet a pestilential air breathes on us, which dulls our nerves and paralyzes the flight of our spirit!" Hungary, then, must have a truly national government, with a ministry responsible to the people; and, herself free, must become the guarantee of freedom for all the Austrian races. The effect of this speech in Hungary and beyond was immense. "To re- Effects of place the bad cement of bayonets and official oppression by the firm mortar of a free Constitution" was an object which appealed to the enlightened sentiment of every race in the Austrian dominions. It was less easy to reconcile conflicting views as to the exact position to be occupied by the various nationalities in this new "fraternization of the Austrian peoples." Hitherto Germanism had formed the basis of the Austrian system, not as a national ideal, but because "it formed a sort of unna the speech. Revolution in Bohemia and Vienna. tional, mediating, and common element among the contradictory and clamorous racial tendencies." But with the growth of the idea of national unity in Germany itself, Germanism had established a new ideal, having its centre outside the boundaries of the Austrian Empire, and which brought it into direct antagonism with the aspirations of the other races. Between the traditional German ascendency, strengthened by the new sentiment of a united Germany, and this new doctrine of the fraternization of the Austrian nationalities, a conflict was inevitable. For the moment, however, the divergent tendencies of the popular ideals were overlooked in the general enthusiasm. It was not in Pressburg only that the spark from Paris had fallen on inflammable material, though the agitation for reform did not at once assume a violent form. In Prague, on March 11, a great meeting convened by the "young Czechs" agreed on a petition to the Crown, embodying Nationalist and Liberal demands; and, on the same day, at Vienna, the Diet of Lower Austria passed an address to the Emperor praying for the convocation of delegates of the provincial Diets to set order into the tangled affairs of the Austrian finances. In this moderate demand of the Diet the government, next day, timidly acquiesced. But the Vienna is slightest concession from above was perilous in the present temper of the Viennese, roused aroused. as they were at last from their "sleep of hibernating beasts." A mob of students and workmen invaded the hall of the Diet; Kossuth's speech was read; its proposals were accepted as the popular programme; and the members of the Diet were forced to lead the crowd in tumultuous procession to the Hofburg, to force from the Government its assent to a petition based on all the catchwords of the Revolution.. Not till the mob was thundering at the door of his cabinet did Metternich believe that the incredible had happened, and loyal Vienna become a second Paris. Hastily placing hist resignation in the hands of the Emperor, the old chancellor escaped from the palace and passed into exile. The effect produced by the news of Met- Fall of ternich's fall was stupendous. It was not that May 13, 1848 an experienced hand had been suddenly removed from the helm of state. The natural indolence of the chancellor had grown upon him with age, and he was no longer the shrewd statesman of former years. Of his diplomatic talent little survived but his capacity for more or less impressive phrase-making. The ship of the state was no more helpless without than with this pilot. But his name had become associated indissolubly with a system; and just as in 1789, the Fall of the Bastille had been hailed as the symbol of the opening of a new era, so that of Metternich was welcomed in 1848 as marking the collapse of the com |