France had the whole of Europe on its hands in 1793, in consequence of the extravagant provocations of the Jacobins, and the Utopian ideas of the Girondists, who boasted that with the support of the English fleets they would defy all the kings in the world. The result of these absurd calculations was a frightful upheaval of Europe, from which France miraculously escaped. Napoleon is, to a certain degree, the only modern sovereign who has voluntarily at the same time undertaken two, and even three, formidable wars,--with Spain, with England, and with Russia; but in the last case he expected the aid of Austria and Prussia, to say nothing of that of Turkey and Sweden, upon which he counted with too much certainty; so that the enterprise was not so adventurous on his part as has been generally supposed. It will be observed that there is a great distinction between a war made against a single state which is aided by a third acting as an auxiliary, and two wars conducted at the same time against two powerful nations in opposite quarters, who employ all their forces and resources. For instance, the double contest of Napoleon in 1809 against Austria and Spain aided by England was a very different affair from a contest with Austria assisted by an auxiliary force of a given strength. These latter contests belong to ordinary wars. It follows, then, in general, that double wars should be avoided if possible, and, if cause of war be given by two states, it is more prudent to dissimulate or neglect the wrongs suffered from one of them, until a proper opportunity for redressing them shall arrive. The rule, however, is not without exception: the respective forces, the localities, the possibility of finding allies to restore, in a measure, equality of strength between the parties, are circumstances which will influence a government so threatened. We now have fulfilled our task, in noting both the danger and the means of remedying it. CHAPTER II. MILITARY POLICY. We have already explained what we understand by this title. It embraces the moral combinations relating to the operations of armies. If the political considerations which we have just discussed be also moral, there are others which influence, in a certain degree, the conduct of a war, which belong neither to diplomacy, strategy, nor tactics. We include these under the head of _Military Policy_. Military policy may be said to embrace all the combinations of any projected war, except those relating to the diplomatic art and strategy; and, as their number is considerable, a separate article cannot be assigned to each without enlarging too much the limits of this work, and without deviating from my intention,--which is, not to give a treatise on theses subjects, but to point out their relations to military operations.