In the records of pride there does not exist so insulting a declaration.  It is insolent in words, in manner; but in substance it is not only insulting, but alarming.  It is a specimen of what may be expected from the masters we are preparing for our humbled country.  Their openness and candor consist in a direct avowal of their despotism and ambition.  We know that their declared resolution had been to surrender no object belonging to France previous to the war.  They had resolved that the Republic was entire, and must remain so.  As to what she has conquered from the Allies and united to the same indivisible body, it is of the same nature.  That is, the Allies are to give up whatever conquests they have made or may make upon France; but all which she has violently ravished from her neighbors, and thought fit to appropriate, are not to become so much as objects of negotiation.

In this unity and indivisibility of possession are sunk ten immense and wealthy provinces, full of strong, flourishing, and opulent cities, (the Austrian Netherlands,) the part of Europe the most necessary to preserve any communication between this kingdom and its natural allies, next to Holland the most interesting to this country, and without which Holland must virtually belong to France.  Savoy and Nice, the keys of Italy, and the citadel in her hands to bridle Switzerland, are in that consolidation.  The important territory of Liege is torn out of the heart of the Empire.  All these are integrant parts of the Republic, not to be subject to any discussion, or to be purchased by any equivalent.  Why?  Because there is a law which prevents it.  What law?  The law of nations?  The acknowledged public law of Europe?  Treaties and conventions of parties?  No,—­not a pretence of the kind.  It is a declaration not made in consequence of any prescription on her side,—­not on any cession or dereliction, actual or tacit, of other powers.  It is a declaration, pendente lite, in the middle of a war, one principal object of which was originally the defence, and has since been the recovery, of these very countries.

This strange law is not made for a trivial object, not for a single port or for a single fortress, but for a great kingdom,—­for the religion, the morals, the laws, the liberties, the lives and fortunes of millions of human creatures, who, without their consent or that of their lawful government, are, by an arbitrary act of this regicide and homicide government which they call a law, incorporated into their tyranny.

In other words, their will is the law, not only at home, but as to the concerns of every nation.  Who has made that law but the Regicide Republic itself, whose laws, like those of the Medes and Persians, they cannot alter or abrogate, or even so much as take into consideration?  Without the least ceremony or compliment, they have sent out of the world whole sets of laws and lawgivers.  They have swept away the very constitutions under which the legislatures