Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 16.djvu/212

Rh 202 M E T M E T have absolute monarchy restored. The proceedings of the congress at Laibach were a farce. A letter was concocted by Metternich for King Ferdinand to send to his subjects, informing them that the powers would not permit the constitution to exist, and that, in default of their submission, the allied courts would employ force. The British Government, while protesting against the joint action of the three powers as an assumption of international sovereignty, was perfectly willing that Austria, as a state endangered by the Neapolitan revolution, should act on its own account. Metternich, however, continued to treat the Neapolitan question as the affair of Europe, and maintained his concert with Russia and Prussia. Early in 1821 an Austrian force, acting in the name of the allies, entered central Italy. The armies opposed to it col lapsed, and the Austrians entered Naples on March 24. But in the meantime a revolution broke out in Pied mont, which threatened to cut off the Austrians from their supports, and to raise all Italy against them. For a moment the bold action of Metternich seemed to have resulted in immense danger both to his own conservative policy and to the peace of Europe ; for it was believed that the Piedmontese revolution would be answered, not only by a general Italian movement, but by a rising against the Bourbons in France. The cloud, however, passed away. Order was quickly restored in Piedmont ; Lombardy was safely held by Austrian garrisons ; and the conclusion of the Italian difficulties, in which Metternich had played a very difficult part with great resolution and dexterity, was his complete and brilliant personal triumph. No statesman in Europe at this moment held a position that could com pare with his own. At the congress of Verona, held in 1822, the affairs of Spain were considered by the powers. In the end, the Spanish constitution was overthrown by a French invading army ; but, though the arm employed was that of France, the principle of absolutism which animated the crusade was that which Metternich had made his own. A severe check, however, now met him in another quarter. Greece had risen against Turkish rule in 1821. The movement was essentially a national and a religious one, but Metternich treated it as a Jacobinical revolt against lawful authority, confusing, or affecting to confuse, the struggle for national independence with the shallow and abortive efforts of politi cal liberalism in Italy and Spain. Metternich s attitude towards the Greeks was for some time one of unqualified hostility. If, under the pressure of the Tilsit alliance, he had once been willing that Austria should join Russia in dismembering Turkey, he had now reverted to the principle of maintaining Turkey at all costs against a Russian advance southwards ; and he attributed the Greek move ment to the efforts of Russian agitators unauthorized by the czar. His desire was that the sultan should deprive Russia of all possible cause for complaint as regarded its own separate interests, and so gain freedom to deal sum marily with the Greeks. Metternich s hopes failed, partly through the obstinacy of the Turks, partly through the wavering conduct of Alexander, and partly through the death of Castlereagh and the accession of Canning to power. It was in great part owing to Canning s moral support that Greece ultimately became an independent state ; and the extraordinary violence of Metternich s language whenever he mentions this English statesman marks only too well the opposite character of his aims. No politician has left a more damning record against himself than Metternich in his bigoted abuse of Canning. The Greek question, however, was only the first on which the judgment of events was now beginning to declare itself against Metternich and all his principles. The French revolution of 1830 shattered the moral fabric which he had so proudly inaugurated, and in great part himself raised, in 1815. The accord that grew up between England and France now made any revival of the kind of presidency that he had once held in Europe impossible. He was indeed bold and rapid in throw ing troops into the papal territory when revolutionary movements broke out there in 1831 and 1832, though war with France seemed likely to result from this step. He was as unsparing as he had been in 1819 in suppressing the agitation which after 1 830 spread from France to Germany ; and the union of the three eastern courts was once more exhibited in the meeting of the monarchs which took place at Miinchengratz in 1833, and in a declaration delivered at Paris, insisting on their right of intervention against revolution in other countries. It was, however, the new czar of Russia, Nicholas, who was now the real head of European conservatism ; and the stubborn character, the narrow, unimaginative mind, of this prince made it impossible for Metternich to shape his purposes by that delicate touch which had been so effective with his pre decessor. But in Austria itself Metternich continued without a rival. In 1835 the emperor Francis, with whom he had worked for nearly thirty years, died. Metternich, himself falling into the mental habits of old age, remained at the head of the state till 1848. The revolution of that year ended his political career. He resigned office with the dignity of demeanour which had never failed him ; his life was scarcely safe in Vienna, and the old man came for a while to England, which he had not visited since 1794. Living on till June 1859, he saw every great figure of his earlier life, and many that had ap peared on the horizon since his own prime, pass away; and a few more months of life would have enabled him to see the end of that political order which it had been his life- work to uphold ; for the army of Napoleon III. was crossing the Sardinian frontier at the moment when lie died, and before a second summer had gone Victor Emmanuel had been proclaimed king of Italy. Metternich was a diplomatist rather than a statesman. His influence was that of an expert manager of individuals, not of a man of great ideas. All his greatest work was done before fifty ; and at an age when most statesmen are in the maturity of their powers he had become tedious and pedantic. His private character was very lovable. He was an affectionate if not a faithful husband, a delightful friend, and a most tender father. The ex cessive egotism which runs through his writings gives perhaps an impression of weakness which did not really belong to his nature. Drawn by a firmer pen, the scene in which he describes himself labouring in the German conferences of 1820, while his favourite daughter was dying in an adjoining room, would have been one of the most affecting things in political biography. The man who could so have worked and felt together must have possessed no ordinary strength of character, no common force of self- control. The collection of Mettemich s writings published by his family under the title of Dcnkwurdigkcitcn, along with FYench and English editions, contains letters and despatches of great value. The autobiography is not always trustworthy, and must be read with caution. Gentz s correspondence is of first-rate importance for the years 1813-30. Original papers are also contained in various German works upon particular events or movements, as in Oncken for the negotiations of 1813 ; Welcker, Aegidi, Nauwerek for German affairs in 1819 and following years ; Prokesch von Osten for Eastern affairs. (C. A. F.) METZ, the capital of German Lorraine, and one of the strongest fortresses in Europe, is situated at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille, 80 miles to the north-west of Strasburg, and 190 miles to the east of Paris. It is the seat of a military governor, the judicial and administra tive authorities of Lorraine, a Roman Catholic bishop,