England's sympathies were with Austria, as against
Prussia; and yet England had been shabbily treated by Austria in respect
to the duchies, and it was impossible for her either to forget or
forgive such treatment. France had less cause to be offended; but
Napoleon III. could not have approved of action which seemed to be taken
in disregard of his high position in Europe, and was calculated to
advance the ends of Prussia,--the power least respected by the
French,--and which finally made of that power the destroyer of the
settlement of 1815,[32] a part the Emperor had intended for himself.
Having acted thus unwisely, and having no support from Russia, Austria
should have avoided war in 1866, at any cost; and it was in her power to
avoid it down to the time that she made the German Diet so proceed as to
furnish Prussia with an excellent reason for setting her well-prepared
armies in motion against the ill-prepared forces of her foe. Noting the
folly of Austria, and observing that the French government, if M. de
Lavalette's circular can be depended upon as an expression of its
sentiments, is all for peace, we can see no opening for that renewal of
warfare in Europe which the defeated party is said to desire, as an ally
of France, in the expectation that she might recover the place she so
lately lost.
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