Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine Volume 84 Primary Source Edition

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Publisher : Forgotten Books
ISBN 13 : 9780428997540
Total Pages : 776 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (975 download)

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Download or read book Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 84 written by and published by Forgotten Books. This book was released on 2018-01-13 with total page 776 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 84: July December, 1858 It was to the other element, shown in idle luxury and the pride of wealth, that Spain, at a time when she seemed striding onward to European dominion, owed her fall. With thankfulness we feel that from neither of these sources of ruin has the faintest cloud yet darkened the lustre of British prosperity. Wherever our sword has been drawn, it has been that of the protector and the liberator, not of the oppressor and enslaver - Pacisque imponere morem, Parcere subjectis et debellaresuperbos. To no chapters in the proud history of our battles can we point with more confidence for the vindication of this truth, than to those two last Indian wars, which, to a heedless observer, judging of them by analogy with the acts of other powers, might be deemed to illustrate the spirit of aggression. What was the chief result of the campaign on the Sutlej, but the salvation of the submissive people of Hindostan from the tyrannous rule of a savage soldiery? Seventy thousand strong, with arms and money, and the powerful discipline which old Runjeet Singh had communicated to them, they thought they might take India and keep it to themselves. The bloody reign of anarchy and extirpation which such an oligarchy would have held had they been successful, can be conceived only from the scenes which then took place at Lahore, and those which befell at Delhi and Cawnpore the other day. But for that protracted list of bloody battles, of which Ferozeshah, Aliwal, Sobraon, and Chillianwallah are still familiar to us, the project would have succeeded. And in the last and most desperate of our trials, who were the enemies? Not the docile people of the land - for they remained true even during the temporary paralysis of the strong protecting hand but a pampered soldiery, trained to mimic our own supreme warlike tactics, and idly dreaming that the Empire which they thought the held for us, they might take an hold for themselves. No: from the we are hereafter to stand or to fall, we must for ever be an example to the world, as the first nation that has wielded its power, not in selfishness or cruelty, but in beneficence. Nor have our late terrible trials passed away without assuring us that we are free from all symptoms of moral decay. When the war with Russia began, it was felt that we were going forth against along-cultivated warlike power - "a man of war from his youth;" and we assured ourselves with justice that the resources accumulated by a long career of peaceful progress would give the material elements of warlike strength to us much more abundantly than the development of purely military power could impart them to our enemy. The wealth accumulated by our agriculture, manufactures, and commerce, would afford inexhaustible pecuniary resources; our shipping would supply a navy or transport our troops; the mechanical skill, cultivated for peaceful purposes, would instantly be turned to the creation of destructive engines. All this was exultingly feAbout the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com