Why should I be ashamed of my theory, when everything, so far, has gone as I supposed it would, only a hundred times more rapidly than any body could have thought possible? What must be the residue of a series which thus far has tended but one way?--what say you of the Bartholomew-butchery in June?--what of Lamartine's fall?--what of the dictatorship of Cavaignac? If things have gone as seems probable, Louis Napoleon is president of the republic. If so, what is the instinct which has thus called him into power? The hereditary principle is abolished on paper, and instantly recognised by the first popular act done under the new constitution! But, for all we can tell in America, things may have taken another turn. Is Cavaignac elected? Then a military master is put over the republic, who can _Cromwellise_ the Assembly, and _Monk_ the state, as soon as he chooses. The republic has given itself the form of a dictatorship, and demonstrated that it does not exist, except on paper. Has there been an insurrection? Then the republic is dead already. But I shall assume that Louis has succeeded: then it is virtually an hereditary empire. To be sure, instinct has for once failed to know "the true prince,"--has accorded, to the mere shadow of a usurper, what, in a more substantial form, is due to the heir of France; but long-suspended animation must make a mistake or two in coming to life again. The events of the year have been all favourable to a restoration, because they have crushed a thousand other plans and plottings for the sovereignty, and because they must have forced upon at least as many theorists the grand practical conclusion, that there is to be no rational liberty in France until she returns to first principles, and finds the repose which old nations can only know under their legitimate kings.