"In another age, means may be found to rescue it from chains and
misery; but such means are not put in our power. Other countries
neglect us. Whilst they reprobate the violations which a neighboring
nation is alleged to have committed against rational liberty, they
behold, not only with apathy but with approbation, the ravages which
are now desolating Poland. Posterity must avenge it. We have done. We
accede in silence, for the reasons above mentioned, to the treaty
laid before us, though we declare that it is contrary to our wishes,
to our sentiments, and to our rights."
Thus, in November, 1793, compressed to one fourth of her dimensions
by the lines of demarcation drawn by her invaders, Poland was
stripped of her rank in Europe; her "power delivered up to strangers,
and her beauty into the hands of her enemies!" Ill-fated people!
Nations will weep over your wrongs; whilst the burning blush of
shame, that their fathers witnessed such wrongs unmoved, shall cause
the tears to blister as they fall.
During these transactions, the Countess Sobieski continued in
solitude at Villanow, awaiting with awful anxiety the termination of
those portentous events which so deeply involved her own comforts
with those of her country. Her father was in prison, her son at a
distance with the army. Sick at heart, she saw the opening of that
spring which might be the commencement only of a new season of
injuries; and her fears were prophetic.
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