Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 5.djvu/287

Rh C A V U R 275 tryir.g struggle to the honourable place she now occupies among the free nations of the earth. The years of waiting at length came to an end. Towards the end of 1847 all the provinces of Italy were in a highly-wrought state of revolutionary excitement. Pius IX., the new Pope, had put himself at the head of the movement, and, the clerical and liberal parties being thus united, the most extravagant hopes were entertained. The revolution carried everything before it, threatening only by its growing violence to defeat its own ends. Cavour saw the time for action was come, and, along with his friends Balbo and Santa Rosa, insti tuted at Turin a newspaper called the Risorgimento, as the organ of their common opinions, while, on the promulgation of the new constitution for Sardinia, which he was the first to suggest, he took his seat in the Chamber as one of the members for the capital. Having long meditated on the political situation of Italy, and being perfectly at home on all political questions, he took a decided attitude from the beginning. As a conscientious adherent of the principles of the juste milieu, he opposed in the firmest way the irregular fervour of the revolution ; and as a practical man, he was ready so far to yield to its fury, in order, by thus yielding, to command it and utilize its strength. In the same way he desired to restrain the violence of tho war party ; but after the example of Paris had encouraged the people of Milan and Venice to rise against Austria, he saw that the time for politic hesitation had gone by, and with all ardour sounded the call to arms. Again, when the reaction had regained the upper hand at Naples, and Radetzki had defeated the Sardinian forces at Custozza, he was convinced that there was no more hope of success, and counselled peace. Still more so after Novara. In the Sardinian Chamber parties rose and fell without changing the attitude of Cavour ; resolved on advocating the measures which were for the time most conducive to the good of Piedmont and of Italy, he supported the party that he deemed most likely to carry them out, without regard to its colours. For some time he was one of the most unpopular men in Turin ; the advanced party hated him for his moderation, and the conservatives for his liberalism; as a moderate liberal he often stood almost alone. But gradually the real greatness of his character began to appear above the contending elements which surrounded and obscured it. Passing on from those years of excitement and despair, when the hopes of Italy seemed again indefinitely deferred, to the beginning of 1853, when the elections after his first elevation to the premiership took place, we find the extreme left almost annihilated, and the extreme right greatly reduced in members. How had this change taken place 1 Five years of hard, adverse experience had taught his countrymen that he was right. Opposed to the excesses of the revolution, when the revolution was at its height, and to the pretensions of clericalism, when the revolution was for a time discredited, he was the real fixed point in the ever-shifting chaos, and the elements of confusion gradually gathered round him. Time, that tests all opinion and all character, had proved the soundness of his. From 1850 to 1852 Cavour was an active member of Azeglio s administration; from 1852 to his death in 1861, he was, except for a short interval, the prime minister and virtual ruler of his country. From 1850 to 1855, when Sardinia began to take part in the Crimean War, the most conspicuous feature in his career was his relation to the church. With his usual penetration he soon perceived that the pretensions of the party now dominant at Rome were utterly incompatible with the rights of a free modern society, and that the only solution of the difficulty was, that the state, while recognizing the right of the church to perfect freedom within the spiritual sphere, should assert for itself the same freedom within the civil sphere; in hia own words, he desired a free church in a free state. While an extreme party counselled the confiscation of tho church property, Cavour merely asserted the right of the state to secure a more equitable distribution of it among the clergy. On the question of civil marriage, and of the immunity of the clergy from the civil jurisdiction, he asserted the principle that the state should be absolute master within its own domain; with the spiritual rights of the church he never interfered. Those years were marked, too, by many energetic measures for the material improve ment of Sardinia. The principles of free trade were introduced as far as possible, and a more judicious taxation. Cavour s proposal to join the alliance of the Western powers against Russia met with the most violent opposition from both the extreme parties in the Sardinian Chamber, and even some of the most influential members of his own cabinet threatened to resign. But the king supported him ; the country, as a whole, trusted him ; aud in the spring of 1855 the Sardinian army was on its way to the East. This audacious step of the Sardinian minister, which engaged one of the smallest kingdoms of Europe in a con flict among the greatest empires, caused some doubtful reflections at the various courts. It was understood by all as a bold assertion of Italy; and an Austrian minister declared it a pistol-shot fired at the head of Austria. At first, too, the Sardinian army experienced a hard fortune. It was attacked by cholera, and, for a long time, no opportunity occurred for distinguishing itself on the field of battle. The worst auguries of the opposition seemed destined to be fulfilled, and their fiercest denunciations of an expensive and Quixotic expedition justified, when tidings came of the battle of the Tchernaya. The enthusiasm was universal, the opposition was silenced, and Cavour rose higher than ever in the national estimation. Then came the peace, considerably to the disappointment of Cavour, who had expected a prolonged war, and perhaps a general state of confusion, in which an adventurous state like Piedmont, that had everything to gain and little to lose, might greatly profit. It was not without great hesitation that he resolved to be present at the Congress of Paris. Yet, when there, he maintained the cause of Italy not less effectively than the Sardinian army had done in the Crimea. In all the questions that turned up he bore himself with such tact, knowing well how far the modesty of his position imposed upon him the duty of silence, and so skilfully brought forward the astonishing resources of a mind deeply versed in European questions, that he was immediately recognized as one of the ablest living diplomatists, and took a place altogether out cf proportion to the strength of the kingdom he represented. His most ardent wish -was to see the grievances of Italy brought before the Congress. Accordingly, near the end of its sittings, Count Walewski, as president, introduced the subject, pointing out the danger to the European peace of the existing state of things, and suggested that a note should be addressed to the sovereigns of Italy counselling reform. This step took the members by surprise, and as Count Buol, the representative of Austria, protested against the discus sion of the question, the matter ended, but not before Cavour had time to plead the cause of Italy. Afterwards, he followed up the advantage he had gained by a memorandum to the same effect addressed to the cabinets of London and Paris. Thus the gains of the war were not slight. The morale of the Piedmontese army had been restored, and the name of Italy, not as a geographical idea, but as a nationality, brought before assembled Europe. Above all, enlightened Italians now felt that they had found a man ; no sentimental dreamer of liberty, nor a fanatical