Europe Books

CHAPTER XXVIII. FRANCIS I. AND CHARLES V. The closer the study and the wider the contemplation a Frenchman bestows upon his country's history, the deeper will be his feelings of patriotic pride, dashed with a tinge of sadness. France, in respect of her national unity, is the most ancient amongst the states of Christian Europe. During her long existence she has passed through very different... more...

CHAPTER XXXV. HENRY IV., PROTESTANT KING. (1589-1593.) On the 2d of August, 1589, in the morning, upon his arrival in his quarters at Meudon, Henry of Navarre was saluted by the Protestants King of France. They were about five thousand in an army of forty thousand men. When, at ten o'clock, he entered the camp of the Catholics at St. Cloud, three of their principal leaders, Marshal d'Aumont,... more...

PREFACE TO KOSSUTH'S SPEECHES. Nothing appears in history similar to the enthusiasm roused by Kossuth in nations foreign to him, except perhaps the kindling for the First Crusade by the voice of Peter the Hermit. Then bishops, princes, and people alike understood the danger which overshadowed Europe from the Mohammedan powers; and by soundly directed, though fanatical instinct, all Christendom... more...

PREFACE This second part of "Les Origines de la France Contemporaine" will consist of two volumes.—Popular insurrections and the laws of the Constituent Assembly end in destroying all government in France; this forms the subject of the present volume.—A party arises around an extreme doctrine, grabs control of the government, and rules in conformity with its doctrine. This will form the... more...

Chapter I. — PROEM: FRIEDRICH'S HISTORY FROM THE DISTANCE WE ARE AT. About fourscore years ago, there used to be seen sauntering on the terraces of Sans Souci, for a short time in the afternoon, or you might have met him elsewhere at an earlier hour, riding or driving in a rapid business manner on the open roads or through the scraggy woods and avenues of that intricate amphibious Potsdam... more...

CHAPTER I. THE ORIGIN OF THE ENGLISH. At a period earlier than the dawn of written history there lived somewhere among the great table-lands and plains of Central Asia a race known to us only by the uncertain name of Aryans. These Aryans were a fair-skinned and well-built people, long past the stage of aboriginal savagery, and possessed of a considerable degree of primitive culture. Though mainly... more...

CHAPTER I. CHARLES X. AND THE DAYS OF JULY. Louis XVIII. in 1815 returned to his throne, borne on the shoulders of foreign soldiers, after the fight at Waterloo. The allied armies had a second time entered France to make her pass under the saws and harrows of humiliation. Paris was gay, for money was spent freely by the invading strangers. Sacrifices on the altar of the Emperor were over; enthusiasm... more...

An act was passed for the security of the king's person and government. To intend or devise the king's imprisonment, or bodily harm, or deposition, or levying war against him, was declared, during the lifetime of his present majesty, to be high treason. To affirm him to be a Papist or heretic, or to endeavor by speech or writing to alienate his subjects' affections from him; these... more...

CHAPTER XXIII.——THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR—CHARLES VI. AND THE DUKES OF BURGUNDY. Sully, in his Memoirs, characterizes the reign of Charles VI. as "that reign so pregnant of sinister events, the grave of good laws and good morals in France." There is no exaggeration in these words; the sixteenth century with its St. Bartholomew and The League, the eighteenth with its reign of terror, and... more...

THE FIRST CHAPTER. MULMUCIUS. Matth. West. Polyd. Now to proceede with the aforesaid authors, Mulmucius DunwallГ…ВЌ, or as other saie Dunuallo Mulmucius, the sonne of Cloton (as testifieth th'english chronicle and also Geffrey of Monmouth) got the vpper hand of the other dukes or rulers: and after his fathers deceasse began his reigne ouer the whole monarchie of Britaine, in the... more...