text:  The general alarm of the continental kings; combined them in an attempt to overthrow a government which threatened them all; the attempt was found to result only in consolidating its power; and in the first year of war France presented to the disaffected of all nations the tempting spectacle of a land in which the foremost prizes of power had fallen into the hands of men of the humblest condition; and in which those men humbled to the dust the proudest diadems of Europe