Historical voices

But the Pope, who wishes all men to be slaves—who demands, of the powerful of the earth, fetters and chains for Italians—the Pope-king does not know Christ: he lies to his religion.

I love and venerate the religion of Christ, because Christ came into the world to deliver humanity from slavery, for which God has not created it.

It is the Pope-king who retards the moment of the complete liberation of Italy.

It is personal ambitions which blind the Pope-king, and urge him to oppose this national movement, so great, so noble, so pure—yes, so pure—that it is unique in the history of the world.

The canker, the ruin of our Italy, has always been personal ambitions—and they are so still.

To a life wholly consecrated to the cause of liberty—to the thought of our nationality—nothing else have I added, nothing else do I wish to add, but the right to speak the truth—to speak it equally to the powerful and the people.

That the Two Sicilies, which owe their rescue to Italian blood, and who have freely chosen me as Dictator, form an integral part of Italy, one and indivisible, with her constitutional king, Victor Emanuel, and his descendants.

Italy one, as the people of this metropolis have expressed it, and the gallant king, be the perennial symbols of our regeneration and of the greatness and prosperity of the country.

Let us receive, in a becoming manner, him who is sent by Providence, and scatter in his path, as a pledge of our rescue and of our affection, the flower of concord, so grateful to him, so necessary to Italy.

To-morrow, Victor Emanuel, the king of Italy, the elect of the nation, will cross the line which has divided us from the rest of our country for so many centuries; and, listening to the unanimous voice of this brave population, will appear…

How must his willful calumniators turn, not only in bitter disappointment, after the defeat of their criminal efforts, but with self-loathing, from the contemplation of a character which makes their perfidy appear doubly hideous by…

The Two Sicilies, which have been redeemed by Italian blood, and which have freely elected me their dictator, form an integral part of one and indivisible Italy under her constitutional king, Victor Emanuel, and his descendants.

Truly many of the common soldiers of this patriot army might take rank beside them.

Let any man go to the hospital—what cruel wounds, what horrific sights! and how cheerfully some of the sufferers bear their troubles.

I do not come to impose upon you my will, but to cause yours to be respected.

PEOPLE OF SOUTHERN EUROPE: My troops are advancing among you to establish order.

The shame falls not on Ireland, but on those who insnared unwilling recruits to prop a bad cause.

The same ignominious disasters might, and no doubt would, have fallen to the lot of any body of men, no matter of what nation, similarly recruited, and deceived, and neglected, and sent into the field without the training and education…

It would be very unjust, however, to consider this to be in any degree a stain on the gallant Irish nation, whose impetuous courage and many excellent military qualities, every one must recognize and admire.

Till some government be established in the centre of Italy, which can be maintained without ten thousand French troops to garrison the capital, and five and twenty thousand foreign mercenaries to sack insurgent towns, it is in vain to hope…

The spectacle of a people kept down by such means is an outrage on the civilization of the age, and a danger and menace for all the rest of Italy.

The best proof of that oppression is the fact that the Pope dares not trust his own subjects with arms, but places himself, like Dionysius of Syracuse, in the hands of foreign mercenaries.

The presence of those troops was also an insult to Italy, as their express object was to oppose the movement in the free territories.

The war, in fact, was begun by the rulers and their hired butchers against the people, before the Sardinian troops crossed the frontier.