*** Price List Free on Application. * * * * * {559} _LONDON, SATURDAY, JUNE 17, 1854._ * * * * * Notes. POLITICAL PREDICTIONS. It would be interesting, and perhaps not wholly unprofitable, to bring together the various attempts that have been made to shadow forth the approaching crisis in the political world. As literary curiosities, such things may be worth preserving; and I therefore send you a few samples as a contribution. The first is from the Abbé De la Mennais, whose words, uttered about twenty years ago, are thus given in a provincial paper: "England, like all other countries, has had her period of aggrandisement; during a whole century Europe has seen her dawning above the horizon until, having attained her highest degree of splendour, she has begun to decline, and this decline dates from the day of which the fall of Napoleon, due principally to her exertions, marked the most brilliant period of her glory. Since that time her policy has undergone a striking change, which every year becomes more evident. Instead of that vigour and promptitude of resolution of which she used to give so many proofs (though they could not all be praised alike, because there were more than one act repugnant to morality), she is now timid, she hesitates, she labours painfully through the dark and crooked paths of diplomacy, and substitutes intrigue for action; incapable, it would seem, of taking a decisive part at the right moment, even on the most momentous occasions. The English nation has evidently lost its strength, or the belief in its strength; and as to actual results, one differs not from the other. Look at this England, so haughty, so wedded to her interests, so skilful formerly in defending them, so bold in extending their influence over the whole world; look at her now in the presence of Russia. Humbled, braved by that young power, one would say that she trembles before its genius. The Czars exercise over her a species of fascination which disturbs her councils and relaxes the muscles of her robust arms. The conquests of the Russians in the East menace the possessions of England in India; they close the Dardanelles to her fleets, they shut out her commerce from the mouths of the Danube and the shores of the Black Sea. After what fashion would she have resisted these things thirty years ago?" The next quotation is from Alison's _History of Europe from the Fall of Napoleon_, published in 1852. In chap. i. p. 68., after citing some lines from Gray on _Education and Government_, he thus proceeds: