PREFACE
We here present an English Translation of a small book by an eminent Polish poet, Adam Mickiewicz, whose very genius made him the object of severe persecution...For the principles which pervade this little book, there needs no apology - they are those of a POLE! Upon his nation, unprecedented calamities have been (p. iv) heaped;...Kings, who call themselves fathers of the people, have decimated the Poles. Nations, who profess to be brethren, horror-struck at the exquisite cruelties of kings, have abandoned them. What else, then, can the BLOOD of the victim - the blood of millions of fathers and of millions of innocent children - reeking up from all regions of the globe, do but, in resignation, raise its voice to the Almighty Throne of the great Author of Nature. "Father! Wherefore hast thou made me flow in the veins of that people? And wherefore didst thou create them a nation, and has thou (p. v) thus forsaken them? Howsoever inscrutable are thy ways, their agonies and their destruction cannot certainly have been thy will; but some heavy sins have vitiated the social order, which must be atoned for by some great sacrifice..."

In the beginning, there was faith in one God; and there was freedom on earth. And there were no other laws but the will of God - no masters, nor servant; but patriarchs, and their children.
But soon afterwards, men abjured the one God, and made idols to themselves, and bowed down to them, and offered bloody sacrifices to their honour, and made war for those idols.
Wherefore God visited the idolaters with the greatest punishment - slavery.
And thus, one half of mankind became the servant of the other half, although they were all the offspring of one father. For they abjured (p. 2) their origin, and feigned to themselves various parents. One fancied himself descended from the Earth, another from the Ocean, and others from the other Elements.
In this manner warring among themselves, whilst they were employing every means in their power to enslave each other, they were all subjugated to the Emperor of Rome, and became his slaves....
The Emperor of Rome called himself God, and declared to all nations on the earth that there was to be no law but his will; that henceforth every thing that pleased him should be considered as a virtue, and everything that offended him, should be called a crime.
And the whole earth was changed into an abode of slavery, of hard slavery, such as never was before seen, nor ever will be seen hereafter in the world; except in Russia in the present day.For even in Turkey, the Sultan must observe the laws of Mohammed; nor is he permitted to interpret them himself, but the Priests are the interpreters. (p. 3)
But in Russia, everything the Czar wills, must be obeyed. He is the head of the Church, and what he commands to be believed, the people must believe.

At that time the Son of God, Jesus Christ, appeared on the earth, teaching mankind that they are all brethren, and children of one God.And that he should be accounted the greatest among men, who should serve and should sacrifice all, for others. And the better any one is, the more he ought to sacrifice. And Christ being the best did sacrifice his blood for the world, in the most painful agony.
Wherefore Christ taught, that neither wisdom, nor high rank, nor riches, nor a crown, was the most estimable object; but that the sacrifice of one's-self for the welfare of others was, of all things on earth, most worthy of praise....

And all the nations that believed, whether Germans, or Italians, or French, or English, or Poles, began to account themselves as one people; and their kingdoms, though separate, were called by the name of Christendom.
And the kings of the different nations called each other brethren, and all thronged around the same standard of the Cross. And if there was any war, it was either against the Heathens, or for the defence of the oppressed Christian brethren in Asia, or for the rescuing of the tomb of the Saviour from the hands of the Infidels.
And therefore this war in Asia has been called the Crusade; and the warriors who joined in it, the Crusaders.
And although the Christians did not undertake that war, either for the sake of glory, or conquest, or booty, but with the sole view of delivering the Holy Land; nevertheless, God rewarded them with glory, land, riches, and wisdom. By this war, Europe became more enlightened, more orderly, and more powerful. This great boon was granted to Europe because she did not shrink from self-sacrifice to benefit others (p. 6)

The seeds of freedom being thus sown throughout Europe: its growth was constant, though gradual. From kings, liberty spread to lords; from the lords to the gentry; from the gentry it came to the burghers; and shortly it was to become the possession of the whole people: and the whole of Christendom was to be free, and all the Christians, like brethren, equal among themselves.

But the kings destroyed all this.... The kings said: "Let us try to keep the people for ever in ignorance; then shall they not know their own power; and they shall quarrel among themselves, and thus shall never unite against us." They then spake to the men of war: "Why should ye go forth on long expeditions to the Holy Land? it is too far; you had better wage war against each other." And immediately philosophers were found, who said: "It is folly to make war for faith."
The kings then, after denying Jesus Christ¸ made new gods and idols, and placed them before the eyes of the people, and commanded them to bow down to them, and to make war for them.
And thus the king made an idol for the French, which he called Honor; and this was the very idol the heathens had called the Golden Calf.
For the Spaniards again, the King made an idol, which he called Political Preponderance; or, Political Influence; that is, force and power; and this was the very idol which the Assyrians worshipped, under the name of Baal; and the Philistines, under the name of Dagon; and the Romans under the name of Jupiter (p. 8)....
And the nations forgot that they sprung up from one common father. (p. 9) And in this manner, the same people who said that it was folly to go to war for faith against the Pagans, the same people now fought for a slip of paper that was called a treaty; fought for a harbor, for a town, like peasants, who fight with clubs, for the boundaries of a territory, which is not their own, but which is the property of their masters.
And the same people who said that it was a folly to go to remote countries to defend their fellow men; the same people, at the command of the kings, made long voyages beyond the seas, and fought for a factory, or a sack of cotton, or a sack of pepper. And the kings sold them for money, to merchants beyond the sea.
And the world became corrupted...

In idolatrous Europe three Monarchs appeared; the name of the first was Frederick II of Prussia; the name of the second, Catherine II of Russia; and the name of the third, Maria-Theresa of Austria. And this was a Satanic Trinity; quite contrary to the Divine Trinity, and was as it were a counterfeit and mockery of everything that is holy. Frederick, whose name properly designates the friend of peace, contrived wars and plunder during the whole of his life; as though Satan were, in mockery, to call himself Christ, the God of peace, ... The names of these three monarchs, Frederick, Catherine, and Maria Theresa, were three blasphemies, and their lives three crimes, and their memories three maledictions.
Afterwards, this wicked trinity, seeing that the nations were not yet ignorant enough, nor sufficiently corrupted, formed another new idol, the vilest of all, and called this deity Self-interest; and the idol was unknown to the heathens.... But the only nation that did not bow before the new idol was the Polish; and the Poles had no name in their language by which to call that idol, or its votaries, whom the French designate in their language by the name of egoists. The Polish nation worshipped God, well knowing that whoever worships God, respects everything that is good. ...

And Poland at last proclaimed: "Whoever he be that comes to me, he shall be free and equal, because I am freedom." But the kings, hearing this her voice, were terrified in their hearts, and said: "We thought we had expelled Freedom from the earth, and lo! she has come back, personified in a nation which refuses to bow before our idols. Let us go and kill that nation". And they laid a scheme of treachery. The King of Prussia came, and gave a kiss to the Polish nation, and saluted it, saying: "My dear ally;" though he had just sold it for thirty towns of Great Poland, like Judas, who sold Christ for thirty silver shekels. And the two other kings seized on the Polish (p. 19) nation, and threw it into chains.
And the Polish nation was crucified, and brought into its tomb. And the kings shouted: "We have killed freedom-we have buried it." And their shouting was but folly; because, by committing this last crime, they filled up the measure of their iniquities to the brim; and their power was crumbling to pieces the most, when they were most rejoicing.
For the Polish nation is not dead! Its body, indeed, is in the tomb, but its SOUL has ascended from the surface of the earth; that is, from public life to the abyss, or domestic life - to the homes and hearths of those who endure distress and oppression in their country, and far from their country, in order to be the witness there of their suffering, and of their misery.

And on the third day, the soul shall return to its body; and the nation shall rise from the dead; and shall free all the nations of Europe from slavery. (p. 21)
And two days have already passed; the one day passed with the first capture of Warsaw; the other with the second capture of Warsaw; but the third days shall rise, and its sun shall never set.
And as with Christ's Resurrection from the dead all bloody sacrifices have ceased, thus, after the resurrection of the Polish nation, shall all warfare among Christians come to an end.