The Past and the Present

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D. Appleton & Company, 1864 - Nineteenth century - 45 pages

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Page 40 - ... people in nations. War and commerce have civilized the world. The time for war is gone by ; commerce alone pushes its conquests. Let us then open to it a new route ; let us approximate the people of Oceania and Australia to Europe ; and let us make them partakers of the blessings of Christianity and civilization.
Page 28 - It is obviously impracticable in the federal government of these states, to secure all rights of independent sovereignty to each, and yet provide for the interest and safety of all. Individuals entering into society, must give up a share of liberty to preserve the rest.
Page 40 - ... men, races, and nations. This course is pointed out to us by the Christian religion, as well as by the efforts of those great men who have at intervals appeared in the world. The Christian faith teaches us that we are all brothers, and that in the eye of God, the slave is equal to the master, — as the Asiatic, the African and the Indian, are alike equal to the European.
Page 40 - The Prince paints a picture in bright colours of the harmony of nations in regard to this matter ; France, England, Holland, Russia, and the United States have a great commercial interest in the establishment of a communication between the two oceans ; but England has more than the others a political interest in the execution of this project. England, it is enthusiastically urged, will see with pleasure Central America becoming a powerful...
Page 39 - There exists in the New World a state as admirably situated as Constantinople, and we must say up to this time as uselessly occupied. We allude to the state of Nicaragua. As Constantinople is the centre of the ancient world, so is the town of Leon...
Page 40 - ... England and Holland have a great commercial interest in the establishment of a communication between the two oceans, but England has, more than the other powers, a political interest in the execution of this project. England will see with pleasure, Central America becoming a powerful and flourishing state, which will establish a balance of power by creating in Spanish America a new centre of active enterprise, powerful enough to give rise to a feeling of nationality, and to prevent, by backing...
Page 31 - Be our plain answer this : — The throne we honour is the people's choice ; the laws we reverence are our brave fathers' legacy ; the faith we follow teaches us to live in bonds of charity with all mankind, and die with hope of bliss beyond the grave. Tell your invaders this, and tell them, too, we seek no change : and, least of all, such change as they would bring us.
Page 40 - Massaya is situated between two extensive natural harbours, capable of giving shelter to the largest fleets, safe from attack. The state of Nicaragua can become, better than Constantinople, the necessary route for the great commerce of the world, for it is, for the United States, the shortest road to China and the East Indies, and for England and the rest of Europe, to New Holland, Polynesia, and the whole of the western coast of America. The state of Nicaragua is then destined to attain to an extraordinary...
Page 38 - ... on the work seventy-five millions of francs. It so happened that the progress of the public works of New York, with which I had been officially connected, having been unexpectedly and rather rudely stopped, I had gone to Europe ; where my business was to ascertain whether France and England would join the United States in constructing an interoceanic canal through the Isthmus of Panama, to be free to all the nations of the world, and to be forever consecrated to peace.
Page 39 - Map, frontispiece. she could become the entrepot of the commerce of all these countries, and obtain over them an immense preponderance ; for in politics, as in strategy, a central position always commands the circumference. This is what the proud city of Constantine could be, and this is what she is not, because, as Montesquieu says, ' God permitted that Turks should exist on earth, a people most fit to possess uselessly a great empire.

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