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Rh Bohemian. Whatever talent I possess is at the service of my own country. My nation is certainly a small one, but it has always maintained its historical individuality. The rulers of Bohemia have often been on terms of intimacy with the German princes, but the Bohemian people has never considered itself as German." It is a proof of the rapidity with which Palacký acquired consideration, that one of the short-lived Austrian cabinets of 1848 (that of Pillersdorf), wishing to obtain the support of the Bohemian nation, offered him the post of Minister of Public Instruction. Though his national theories prevented Palacký from taking part in the deliberations of the German National Assembly, he was a member of the Slav Congress at Prague and of the Austrian Parliament which in 1848 and 1849 met first at Vienna, then at Kremsier.

The short period of liberal government in Austria ended with the year 1849. Palacký suffered, like all the Bohemian patriots, from the German and absolutist rule, which was re-established in Bohemia in a more aggravated manner than before. A paper to which Palacký contributed was suppressed because of an article from his pen which had caused sensation, and the military authorities deliberated whether the writer should be tried by court-martial.

In 1861, when a new attempt to establish constitutional government in Austria was made, Palacký was made a life-member of the Upper Chamber of the Parliament of Vienna. He only spoke there twice, in August and September of the year that he had been named. The question of an agreement with Hungary was then