us rush upon disaster, and submit to every extremity rather than forego the rancorous and headstrong desire of revenge.
The writer of the paragraph talks familiarly of marching to Paris, and bringing Bonaparte to the block. He seems to wonder at the delay which has already taken place. This is the very style of ancient Pistol, "Bid him prepare, for I will cut his throat." This high tone of impotent menace and premature triumph always "reverbs its own hollowness." It is the echo of fear. Instead of a proud repose on our own strength and courage, these writers only feel secure in the destruction of an adversary. The natural intoxication of success is heightened into a sort of delirium by the recollection of the panic into which they had been thrown. The Times' editor thinks that nothing can be so easy as for an army "to run with the stream of popular feeling" from one end of Europe to the other. Strange that these persons, like desperate adventurers, are incorrigible to experience. They are always setting out on the same forlorn hope. The tide of fortune, while it sets in strong against us, they prove to be the most variable of all things; but it no sooner changes in our favour, than it straight
"Flows on to the Propontic,
And knows no ebb."
To encourage themselves in the extravagance of their voluntary delusions, they are as prodigal of titles of honour as the college of heralds, and erect a standard of military fame, with all the authority, but not with the impartiality of history. Lord Wellington is "the great commander," and "the unconquered general," while "the little captain," and "the hero" or "the deserter of Smorgonne," are the only qualifications of Bonaparte. If such are the true denominations and relative proportions of these two generals, then it is quite right to give to each of them the honour due;—if they are not, then it is quite wrong to stake the welfare of nations on a turn of expression—to put little equivocal scraps of paper into false scales, and decide the fate of Europe by nick-
