s, of which almost anything in the way of
riches may be predicated, should intelligent labor be directed to the
development of its immense and various resources. Russian sovereigns
have frequently sought to do something for the people; but Alexander
II., a wiser man than any of his predecessors, is willing that the
people should do something for themselves, because he knows that all
that they shall gain, each man for himself, will be so much added to the
common stock of the empire. The many must become wealthy, in order that
one, the head of all, may become strong. Time and again has Russia found
her armies paralyzed and her victories barren because she was moneyless;
and but for the gold of foreign nations she must have halted in her
course, and never have become a European power. With a nation of freemen
all this may be, and most probably it will be, changed,--though it is
not so certain that the change will be attended with exactly that
order of results which the Czar may have arranged in his own mind. The
mightiest of monarchs are not exempt from the rule, that, while man
proposes, it is God who disposes the things of this world. Not one of
those reforming kings who broke down the power of the great nobles of
Western Europe, and so created absolute monarchies, appears to have had
any just conception of the business in which he was engaged; but all
were instruments in the hands of that mighty Power which overrules the
ambition of individuals so that it shall promote the welfare of the
world.

The two years that are set apart for the completion of the plan of
emancipation will be the trial time of Russia. They may expire, and
nothing have been done, and the condition of the peasants be no more
hopeful than it was in those years which followed the "good intentions"
of Alexander I. It is not difficult to see that there are numerous and
powerful disturbing causes to the success of the project. These causes
are of a twofold character. They are to be found in the internal state
of the empire, and in the relations which it holds to foreign
countries. There is still a powerful party in Russia who are opposed to
emancipation, and who, though repulsed for the time, are far from being
disheartened. One-half the nobility are supposed to be enemies of the
Imperial plan, and they will continue to throw every possible obstacle
in the way of its success. There is nothing so pertinacious, so
unrelenting, and so difficult to change, a