but all pleasant assurances notwithstanding, was there a Member of that House who had studied the map of Europe, who did not feel that there was every reason to fear that Europe was on the verge of a Crisis in the Last Quarter of the 19th century we had so nearly reached—a crisis which when it happened would be more terrible in its aspects and consequences than that which marked the corresponding period of the last century—a crisis which would inevitably leave wide-spread calamity behind it, and probably produce changes of vital importance in the political relations of those kingdoms that would be 87 involved in the struggle or be subject to its influences, nay, he might add, of a catastrophe more tremendous than had boon seen since the overthrow of the Roman Empire.