It may be truly said that the destruction of Poland
secured the safety of the French Revolution. For when in 1795 the crime
was consummated, the Revolution had turned the corner and was in a state
to defend itself against the forces of reaction.
In the second half of the eighteenth century there were two centres of
liberal ideas on the continent of Europe: France and Poland. On an
impartial survey one may say without exaggeration that then France was
relatively every bit as weak as Poland; even, perhaps, more so. But
France's geographical position made her much less vulnerable. She had no
powerful neighbours on her frontier; a decayed Spain in the south and a
conglomeration of small German Principalities on the east were her happy
lot. The only States which dreaded the contamination of the new
principles and had enough power to combat it were Prussia, Austria, and
Russia, and they had another centre of forbidden ideas to deal with in
defenceless Poland, unprotected by nature, and offering an immediate
satisfaction to their cupidity. They made their choice, and the untold
sufferings of a nation which would not die was the price exacted by fate
for the triumph of revolutionary ideals.
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