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Show THE FEEJJCH REVOLUTION. This is a very comprehensive work, dediricd "to d'-'SLTiho the principal facts of the French revolution and fir.-t empires not to comment large1' on the i-i.-iiuilioiH of old France, or to 'show fully how tiu'y contributed to to the events that followed 17 iO. The author admits that the revolution destroyed a great doal that was worthless and in decay in Franco, ' stimulated tue iudiiatry and promoted ; the mater; .1 progn-.-s.ind wealth of 'the nation, save better institution:! to a large part of the continent, and re- ' moved a ml ruber of ancient abiijci. j Yet, he add,, it m ly be qufstioncd whether, as regard.s the permanent interests of mankind, this period of ' confusion and the rule of the sword, ! has not led lo as much evil as good. Despotism and Uumocracy are yet ai battle; wiiolo nations have turned into armed campi, prcpiring for an internecine struggle, and at no time have the claims and privileges I of weak states been held in so little respect. At no time in her history I was the influence of France so great over adjoining countries a3 when it swept away thrones, princedoms and I powers in a pretended crusade for the rights of man, and placet! the continent Junder the feet of Napoleon. Tho state of Franco before , the revolution is strickingly reviewed re-viewed the despotism of the government, govern-ment, the serldem of the people, the decay of public works, the licentiousness of the monarchy, the corruptions and wealth of the ! church establishment, tho selfish anil oppressive rule of an arrogant no bility, wh'i assumed even the powci '' of life and death over the peasantry Yet there was no harmony amonj thp rulintr nowers. each was iealoti; of and hostile to the other, and the dissensions between tho crown, the church and ftie nobility involved them in deadly quarrels, gradually weakening the respect of the people for all authority. A great middle class, consisting of the professional and mercantile orders, comprised the most enlightened and respectable class of the country. They were separated from the ruling classes who esteemed them inferior beings, and they were also cut ou from tlio mass of tho people by certain exclusive I professional distinctions. These offensive ehiss distinctions inflamed the wretched and ignorant masses against the borgeoisie or middle interest, in-terest, as well as against the nobility and the government, and it was from the impoverished agricultural laborer and tho dangerous and criminal population ol the cities that Jacobinism Jacobin-ism recruited its armies of devastation and crime. It was with this rotten society that Voltaire and Rosseau had to deal; the former destroyed the faith of the people; the latter reconstructed a reform society on an impossible basis. The reader can see from this picture that the revolution of 17S9 was inevitable. Y'ct as if to show how . a:iu i tOie tendenev thinkers in France had tho least ap. prehension of coming danger, and it was believed that the genius of a polite age would not allow popular excesses or passions, Tho same feeling generally prevailed in 1SG0, just prior to the rpening of our great sectional war. It was thought next to impossible that the free people of the United States would allow themselves them-selves to be plunged into'such a struggle. strug-gle. Yet there were found plenty of men and influences on both sides of the line to precipitate and push on the war to the bitter end. The following chapters sketch the states general and national assembly; the constitution of 1790-1; the legis lative assembly; the convention, to the fall of the moderates; the reign of terror to the fall of Robespierre; Thermidor, French conquests; the directory, Bonaparte, Egypt and the ISth Brumaire; Marengo, Lunc-ville, Lunc-ville, Amiens, the consulate, renewal of war ; the empire to Tdcet ; the empire to 1S12; tail of Napoleon; the hundred days and Waterloo. The author in the last chapter, briefly refers to tho last empire and its disastrous dis-astrous close,terming it "a feeble image im-age of the first, without the military genius of its chief; and it disappeared in the great war of 1S70, in which Prussia, leading a united Germany, more than avenged the disaster of Jena, and has torn from France Alsace and Lorraine, spared in 1S14 and 1S15. France remains torn by-revolutionary by-revolutionary troubles kept under only by the power of the sword in the hands of a soldier brave indeed, but not a chief of the first order. The general results of these event, which all ran up to 17S9-1S15, are that government gov-ernment in France is never secure, and that the nation appears to have lost some essential elements of general gen-eral welfare; and though the gre.t convulsion of the hist century is not the only, it certainly is a principal cause of this evil disorder. The greatest of English historians re-i re-i marked, a few years before 17Si), that i the era ol wars see nod about to close, land that Europe would be for all i time secure from the barbarism ol the savage hordes which had overturned imperial Rome. Wnat would Gibbon ; have said had he lived to witness i Bonxlino, Leipric, Waterloo, Sedan, ; and the attrocitiea of the reign of ! terror, and of the commune in Paris j in 1S71 ? Tue Fke.wh Revolution and First Fmtiks : An historical sketch. By William O'Connor Morris; with an appendix by lion. Andrew D, White, L. L D. New York: ricabner. I Armstrong & Co. For sale by James Dft-yer, Salt Lake city. $1.00. Tnrs Bloss -Ming of an Alok. A novel. By Mrs. Cashcl Uocy, author of a "G..di.'ii Sorrow,' etc. New York : liarpor cc Uro.l.ers, For sale by James Dwyu-, Sait Lake city. Fify cenis. , TheLondou Eimincr says: This . is a most agreeable book. Mrs. Hoey j not only displays good nature and good sense, but her diction is fresh, clear and incisive. She weaves an , inteiesting plot, and her characters i arc drawn with remarkable distinctness distinct-ness and consistency. |