has devolved the actual direction upon his chief minister. The most marked feature of his administration has been the close personal and official amity and concord which has subsisted since their first meeting at Frankfort between himself and Bismarck. The delineation of the common policy of the two chancellors would require that we should take up M. Klaczko’s exposition of the career of the Prussian chancellor—a task which we cannot fulfil at present. Of course each one has had in view the aggrandizement of his own state, and given his concurrence to the designs of the other in the expectation of forwarding thereby his own plans. Bismarck cares nothing for Russia, and, after his residence at St. Petersburg as Prussian ambassador, he expressed his opinion of her by the motto which he pasted inside his watch-case: “Russia is nothingness.”[181] Gortchakoff undoubtedly cares as little for Prussia and the German Empire. Each one looks out for his own ship; for those men whose ideas are catholic are of a different class from mere clever diplomatists, and, unhappily, are rarely to be found among either kings or ministers of state.
Bismarck has always made his special accomplices in ruining the antagonist of the moment the next victims of his undermining schemes. What he has in prospect for Russia is as yet undisclosed. Nor is it certain that he will succeed in playing out his game, making Gortchakoff a mere card in his hand. The Russian is doubtless too astute and farseeing to rely on the disinterested friendship of the Prussian, or on his fidelity to any secret engagements, except so far as self-interest
or fear may hold him to his word. Thus far, however, the contract of facio ut facias has been well kept between the two, to their mutual advantage. Prussia has gained a great deal by it, and Russia something, although the decisive crisis is just now coming on, and still undecided, which will solve the problem how much she has gained or will gain. Nicholas died, baffled and disappointed. Alexander came to the throne sad and disheartened. Russia was crippled and exhausted by the terrible disasters of the Crimean war, her prestige and influence in Europe were diminished, and she was placed under humiliating and hampering restrictions by the treaty of Paris. Under Prince Gortchakoff’s administration she has recuperated and increased her strength by the mere force of her immense vitality. By skilful management she has regained a place in European politics almost equal to that of Germany. She has thrown off the trammels of the treaty of Paris. France, England, and Turkey have lost all they had gained by their costly victories. The allies of Turkey have been overcome by superior diplomacy together with adverse fortune, and made to play into the hands of their old antagonist; and Turkey has been driven into worse straits than any which have beset her in the most dangerous epochs of her former history. The initiative in the extraordinary political movements of this epoch has been taken by Bismarck, whom Gortchakoff has merely connived at or seconded. This secondary and mostly negative support has been, nevertheless, most important, probably even necessary, to the success of Bismarck’s schemes. It has involved, moreover, great changes in Russia’s traditional policy and considerable
sacrifices. This is especially the case in regard to the minor states of Germany and Denmark, so closely allied by intermarriages with Russia, formerly so decidedly supported and aided by her influence, yet of late abandoned without remonstrance to Prussian spoliation. Russia has been avenged on France, on Austria, and to a certain extent on England, and she has had the opportunity of reviving the question of the East with a view toward ulterior results. Thus far Bismarck has seemed to act toward Gortchakoff in the same way that the latter acted towards him in reference to the war on the French Empire. Certainly, much more must be expected from him, and it does not yet appear that he can dupe and outwit his copartner in politics as he did the weak, dreamy Louis Napoleon, or make use of him as a mere subservient agent, to be discarded when his services become unnecessary. Prince Gortchakoff appears to have managed matters thus far for the advantage of Russia with consummate adroitness. Moreover, whatever may have been the influences at work within the imperial family compelling the chancellor to yield his personal opinions or wishes, it is evident that in point of fact Russian policy has not been of late subservient to Bismarck’s designs, but, on the contrary, has forced him to modify them considerably in respect to France.
In the event of war between Russia and Turkey alone it is plain that Russia will not find it an easy task to effect the conquest of Turkey and to expel the Turks from Europe. It seems probable, however, that the Ottoman power must succumb after one desperate struggle, if left unaided by all the European
powers. It does not seem likely, however, that Europe will stand idly aloof; on the contrary, there is reason to apprehend that when the conflict threatens to become decisive of the fate of Turkey, all the great powers will become involved in a general war, which will make an epoch in history and determine the destinies of the world for the next ensuing age. We may conjecture, on grounds which are at least plausible, that if Russia is actively supported by any other powers, it will be Germany and Italy which will ally themselves with her, against Austria, England, and France. We can scarcely expect that a war of this kind would terminate in complete success to either of the belligerent parties. In the end all the great nations must come to some mutual agreement in a congress which shall settle the balance of power on a new basis, guarding against an absolute and dangerous preponderance of any one of the chief powers. What is to become of Constantinople we will not venture to predict. But let us suppose that Russia obtains this object of her long, patient, and persevering efforts and ardent aspirations. Must we suppose that this will necessarily be an event disastrous to the interests of the Catholic Church and civilization and to the religious, political, and social welfare of Europe and the world? The language of many most intelligent and religious men, particularly of Englishmen, and of many others, not particularly religious, who look at the matter purely in view of the temporal interests of nations, proves that a very strong and general conviction exists in the sense of the affirmative answer to this question. We think, however, that there is something to be said on the other
side. As the Catholic aspect of the question is the one most important in itself, and really involving all the others, we consider this aspect alone. It is the schismatical position of the Russian Church, and its complete subjection to the autocratic power of the ruler of the state, which furnishes the only reason for regarding the Turkish dominion in the Levant as a lesser and more tolerable evil than the transfer of the capital of Russia from St. Petersburg to Constantinople. All reasons, therefore, which encourage the hope and expectation of the reconciliation of Russia with the Holy See diminish, in proportion to their weight, the dread which the prospect of such an event may awaken.
We will here quote a remarkable passage from Dr. Mivart’s late essay on Contemporary Evolution having a bearing on this subject. Those who have read this work, or the review of it in our number of last December, will understand the value of the quotation we are about to make, as coming from a man who anticipates such a very different course of events from that whose possibility he here sets forth. It proves his cautious, scientific method of reasoning. He does not advance his own theory with absolute assertion as certain, and his acuteness, combined with candor, causes him to discern and bring into notice a contingency in the direction of Russia which, if it should turn out to be a future actuality, would alter most essentially the “evolution” whose probable course causes so much curious and anxious questioning of the signs of the times.
“Nevertheless, there are many who believe that a reversal will at length ensue, and some modification of the old theocracy be again generally established.
At present the only power which seems to contain enough of the old material is Russia. It may be that, instead of politically assimilating itself to Western Europe (like the manners of its highest class), it may come to exercise a powerfully reactionary tendency. It does not seem impossible that, availing itself of the mutually enfeebling wars and revolutionary disintegration of Western powers, it may hereafter come to play that part in Europe which was played of old by Macedon in Greece. Such a Western expansion might be greatly aided if, carrying out the idea of a former sovereign, it united itself to the Roman Church, and made itself the agent of the most powerful religious feelings and of all the theocratic reactionary tendencies latent in Western Europe. It does not even seem impossible that a Roman pontiff effectively restored to his civil princedom by such Russian agency might inaugurate, by a papal consecration in the Eternal City, yet a fresh dynasty of ‘Holy Roman emperors,’ a Sclavonic series succeeding to the suppressed German line, as the Germans succeeded in the person of Charlemagne to the first line of Cæsars.”[182]