5535. MORALITY (National), Extinction of.—
There are three epochs in history,
signalized by the total extinction of national
morality. The first was of the successors of
Alexander, not omitting himself. The next,
the successors of the first Cæsar. The third,
our own age. This was begun by the partition
of Poland, followed by that of the treaty of
Pilnitz; next the conflagration of Copenhagen;
then the enormities of Bonaparte, partitioning
the earth at his will, and devastating it with
fire and sword; now the conspiracy of Kings,
the successors of Bonaparte, blasphemously calling
themselves the Holy Alliance, and treading
in the footsteps of their incarcerated leader; not
yet indeed usurping the government of other
nations, avowedly and in detail, but controlling
by their armies the forms in which they will
permit them to be governed; and reserving, in
petto, the order and extent of the usurpations
further mediated.—
Autobiography. Washington ed. i, 102.
Ford ed., i, 141.
(1821)
