THE EMPEROR’S IMAGINARY PLANS FOR THE FUTURE.—NAPOLEON LITTLE KNOWN EVEN BY HIS HOUSEHOLD—HIS RELIGIOUS OPINIONS.
From Friday 7th to Saturday 8th.—During a long private conversation, this morning, the Emperor reverted to all the horrors of our present situation, and enumerated all the chances which hope suggested of better days.
After his remarks on these topics, which I cannot repeat here, he gave the rein to his imagination, and said that the only countries in which he could reside for the future were England and America. His inclination, he added, prompted for America, because there he should be really free, and independence and repose were all he now sighed for: then followed an imaginary plan of life: he fancied himself with his brother Joseph, in the midst of a little France, &c. Yet policy, he observed, might decide for England. He was bound perhaps to remain a slave to events—he owed the sacrifice of himself to a nation which had done more for him than he had done for it in return; and then followed another imaginary plan for the future.
In the course of our subsequent conversation, the Emperor could not sufficiently express his surprise at the conviction, which he had obtained, that several of those who surrounded him and formed his Court, believed the greatest part of the many absurdities and idle reports which had been circulated respecting himself, and that they even went so far as to doubt the falsehood of the enormities with which his reputation had been stained.—Thus we believed that he wore armour in the midst of us—was addicted to the superstition of presentiments and fatality—subject to fits of madness or of epilepsy—that he had strangled Pichegru—caused a poor English captain’s throat to be cut, &c. We could not but admit that his invective against us on the occasion was merited; all we could allege in our defence was that many circumstances had concurred to leave those who formerly surrounded his person as much in ignorance on the subject as the bulk of the nation could be. We frequently saw him, I said, but we never held any communication with him: every thing remained a mystery for us. Not a voice was raised to refute, whilst many in secret, and some that were nearest to his person, either through perverseness, or with bad intentions, seemed ever busy in dealing out insinuations. As for myself, I candidly confessed that I had not formed a just idea of his disposition before I came here, although I could congratulate myself that I had certainly guessed him in part. “And yet,” he observed in reply, “you have often seen me and heard me in the Council of State.”
In the evening, after dinner, the conversation turned upon religion. The Emperor dwelt on the subject at length. The following is a faithful summary of his arguments; I give it as being quite characteristic upon a point which has probably often excited the curiosity of many.
The Emperor, after having spoken for some time with warmth and animation, said: “Every thing proclaims the existence of a God, that cannot be questioned; but all our religions are evidently the work of men. Why are there so many?—Why has ours not always existed?—Why does it consider itself exclusively the right one?—What becomes in that case of all the virtuous men who have gone before us?—Why do these religions revile, oppose, exterminate one another?—Why has this been the case ever and every where?—Because men are ever men; because priests have ever and every where introduced fraud and falsehood. However, as soon as I had power, I immediately re-established religion. I made it the ground-work and foundation upon which I built. I considered it as the support of sound principles and good morality, both in doctrine and in practice. Besides, such is the restlessness of man, that his mind requires that something undefined and marvellous which religion offers; and it is better for him to find it there, than to seek it of Cagliostro, of Mademoiselle Lenormand, or of the fortune-tellers and impostors.” Somebody having ventured to say to him that he might possibly in the end become devout, the Emperor answered, with an air of conviction, that he feared not, and that it was with regret he said it; for it was no doubt a great source of consolation; but that his incredulity did not proceed from perverseness or from licentiousness of mind, but from the strength of his reason. “Yet,” added he, “no man can answer for what will happen, particularly in his last moments. At present I certainly believe that I shall die without a confessor; and yet there is one (pointing to one of us) who will perhaps receive my confession. I am assuredly very far from being an atheist, but I cannot believe all that I am taught in spite of my reason, without being false and a hypocrite. When I became Emperor, and particularly after my marriage with Maria Louisa, every effort was made to induce me to go with great pomp, according to the custom of the Kings of France, to take the sacrament at the church of Notre Dame; but this I positively refused to do: I did not believe in the act sufficiently to derive any benefit from it, and yet I believed too much in it to run the risk of committing a profanation.” On this occasion a certain person was alluded to, who had boasted, as it were, that he had never taken the sacrament. “That is very wrong,” said the Emperor; “either he has not fulfilled the intention of his education, or his education was neglected.” Then, resuming the subject, he said, “To explain where I come from, what I am, and whither I go, is above my comprehension; and yet all that is. I am like the watch that exists, without possessing the consciousness of existence. However, the sentiment of religion is so consolatory that it must be considered as a gift of Heaven: what a resource would it not be for us here to possess it! What influence could men and events exercise over me, if, bearing my misfortunes as if inflicted by God, I expected to be compensated by him with happiness hereafter! What rewards have I not a right to expect who have run a career so extraordinary, so tempestuous, without committing a single crime, and yet how many might I not have been guilty of? I can appear before the tribunal of God, I can await his judgment without fear. He will not find my conscience stained with the thoughts of murder and poisonings, with the infliction of violent and premeditated death, events so common in the history of those whose lives have resembled mine. I have striven only for the glory, the power, the greatness of France. All my faculties, all my efforts, all my moments, were directed to the attainment of that object. These cannot be crimes; to me they appeared acts of virtue. What then would be my happiness, if the bright prospect of futurity presented itself to crown the last moments of my existence!”
After a pause, he resumed. "How is it possible that conviction can find its way to our hearts, when we hear the absurd language, and witness the acts of iniquity, of the greatest number of those whose business it is to preach to us? I am surrounded by priests, who repeat incessantly that their reign is not of this world, and yet they lay hands upon every thing that they can get. The Pope is the head of that religion from heaven, and he thinks only of this world. What did the present Chief Pontiff, who is undoubtedly a good, and a holy man, not offer to be allowed to return to Rome! The surrender of the government of the church, of the institution of bishops, was not too high a price for him to give, to become once more a secular prince. Even now, he is the friend of all the Protestants, who grant him every thing, because they do not fear him. He is only the enemy of catholic Austria, because her territory surrounds his own.
“Nevertheless,” he observed again, “it cannot be doubted that, as Emperor, the species of incredulity which I felt was favourable to the nations I had to govern. How could I have favoured equally sects so opposed to one another, if I had been under the influence of any one of them? How could I have preserved the independence of my thoughts, and of my actions, under the controul of a confessor, who would have governed me by the dread of hell? What power cannot a wicked man, the most stupid of mankind, thus exercise over those by whom whole nations are governed? Is it not the scene-shifter at the opera, who from behind the scenes, moves Hercules at his will? Who can doubt that the last years of Louis XIV. would have been very different, had he been directed by another confessor? I was so deeply impressed with the truth of these opinions that I promised to do all in my power to bring up my son in the same religious persuasion which I myself entertain.”
The Emperor ended the conversation by desiring my son to bring him the New Testament; and, taking it from the beginning, he read as far as the conclusion of the discourse of Jesus on the mount. He expressed himself struck with the highest admiration, of the purity, the sublimity, the beauty of the morality which it contained; and we all experienced the same feeling.
PORTRAIT OF THE DIRECTORS.—ANECDOTES.—18TH
FRUCTIDOR.
Sunday, 9th.—The Emperor spoke much of the creation of the Directory; he had installed it, being then Commander-in-chief of the Army of the Interior. This led him to review the five Directors, whose portraits and characters he drew. He gave a lively picture of their follies and their faults, and this led him to the events of Fructidor, and furnished many curious particulars. I have collected the following, partly, from some of his desultory conversations, and, partly, from his dictation of the campaigns of Italy.
“Barras,” said the Emperor, "of a good family in Provence, was an officer in the regiment of the Isle of France; at the revolution, he was chosen Deputy to the National Convention for the department of the Var. He had no talent for oratory, and no habits of business. After the 31st of May, he was, together with Freron, appointed Commissioner to the army of Italy, and to Provence, which was then the seat of civil war. On his return to Paris, he threw himself into the Thermidorian party; threatened by Robespierre, as well as Tallien and the remainder of Danton’s party, they united, and brought about the events of the 9th Thermidor. At the moment of the crisis, the Convention named him to march against the commune, which had risen in favour of Robespierre; he succeeded.
"This event gave him great celebrity. After the downfall of Robespierre, all the Thermidorians became the leading men of France.
"At the critical period of the 12th Vendemiaire, it was determined, in order to get rid at once of the three Commissioners to the Army of the Interior, to unite in the person of Barras the power of Commissioner and Commander of that army. But the circumstances in which he was placed were too much for him; they were above his powers. Barras had no experience in war, he had quitted the service when only a captain; he had no knowledge of military affairs.
"The events of Thermidor and of Vendemiaire brought him into the Directory; he did not possess the qualifications requisite to fill that situation, but he acted better than was expected from him by those who knew him.
"He kept up a splendid establishment, had a pack of hounds, and his expenses were considerable. When he quitted the Directory, on the 18th Brumaire, he had still a large fortune, and he did not attempt to conceal it. That fortune was not large enough to have contributed in the least to the derangement of the finances, but the manner in which it had been acquired, by favouring the contractors, impaired the public morals.
"Barras was tall; he spoke sometimes in moments of agitation, and his voice filled the house. His intellectual capacity did not allow him to go beyond a few sentences, but the animation with which he spoke would have produced the impression that he was a man of resolution; this however he was not; and he had no opinion of his own upon any part of the administration of public affairs.
"In Fructidor, he formed with Rewbel and La Reveillere Lepaux, the majority against Carnot and Barthelemy; after that event he became to all appearance the most important member of the Directory, but, in reality, it was Rewbel who possessed the greatest influence. Barras always appeared in public the warm friend of Napoleon. At the time of the 30th Prairial, he had the art to conciliate the preponderating party in the assembly, and he did not share the disgrace of his colleagues.
“La Reveillere Lepaux, born at Angers, belonged to the lower ranks of the middling class of society. He was short, and his person was as unprepossessing as can well be imagined; he was a true Æsop. He wrote tolerably well, but his mind was narrow, and he had neither habits of business nor knowledge of mankind. He was alternately governed, according to circumstances, by Carnot or Rewbel. The Jardin des Plantes, and the Theophilanthropy, a new religion of which he had the folly to become the founder, occupied all his time. In other respects, he was a patriot, warm and sincere, an honest man, and a citizen full of probity and of learning; he was poor when he became a member of the Directory, and poor when he left it. Nature had not qualified him to occupy any higher station than that of an inferior magistrate.”
Napoleon, after his return from the army of Italy, found himself, without knowing why, the object of the particular assiduity, the marked attentions and flatteries of the Director La Reveillere, who asked him one day to dine with him, strictly en famille, in order, he said, that they might be more at liberty to converse together. The young General accepted the invitation, and found, as he had promised, nobody present but the Director, his wife, and his daughter, “who, by the way,” added the Emperor, “were three paragons of ugliness.” After the dessert, the two ladies retired, and the conversation took a serious turn. La Reveillere descanted at length upon the disadvantages of our religion, upon the necessity, however, of having one, and extolled and enumerated the advantages of the religion which he wanted to establish, the Theophilanthropy. “I was beginning to find the conversation rather tedious and dull,” said the Emperor, “when, on a sudden, La Reveillere, rubbing his hands with an air of satisfaction, said to me affectedly, and with an arch look: ‘How valuable the acquisition of a man like you would be to us!—what advantage, what weight would be derived from your name!—and how glorious that circumstance would be to you!—Now what do you think of it?’”—The young General was far from expecting to receive such a proposal; however, he replied with humility, that he did not think himself worthy of such an honour; and his principles being, when treading an obscure path, to follow the track of those who had preceded him in it, he was resolved to act, in the article of religion, as his father and mother had done. This positive answer convinced the high-priest that nothing was to be done; he did not insist, but from that moment there was an end of all his attentions and flatteries towards the young General.
“Rewbel,” said the Emperor, "born in Alsace, was one of the best lawyers in the town of Colmar. He possessed that kind of intelligence which denotes a man skilled in the practice of the bar,—his influence was always felt in deliberations,—he was easily inspired with prejudices—did not believe much in the existence of virtue—and his patriotism was tinged with a degree of enthusiasm. It is problematical whether he did or did not amass a fortune, during the time he was in the Directory; he was surrounded by contractors, it is true,—but, with his turn of mind, it is possible that he only amused himself by conversing with men of activity and enterprise, and that he enjoyed their flatteries, without making them pay for the complaisance which he shewed them. He bore a particular hatred to the Germanic system—he displayed great energy in the assemblies, both before and after the period of his being a magistrate, and was fond of a life of application and activity. He had been a member of the Constituent Assembly, and of the Convention; by the latter he was appointed Commissioner at Mentz, where he gave no proofs of firmness or of military talent; he contributed to the surrender of the city, which might have held out longer. Like all lawyers, he had imbibed from his profession a prejudice against the army.
"Carnot, born in Burgundy, had entered when very young the corps of engineers, and shewed himself an advocate of the system of Montalembert. He was considered by his companions as an eccentric character, and was already a knight of the order of St. Louis at the commencement of the revolution, the principles of which he warmly espoused. He became a member of the Convention, and was one of the committee of public welfare with Robespierre, Barrère, Couthon, Saint-Juste, Billaud-Varennes, Collot-d’Herbois, &c. He was particularly inveterate against the nobility, and found himself, in consequence, frequently engaged in quarrels with Robespierre, who, towards the close of his life, had taken a great many nobles under his protection.
"Carnot was laborious, sincere on every occasion, but unaccustomed to intrigue and easily deceived. He was attached to Jourdan, as Commissioner from the Convention, at the time when Jourdan was employed in relieving the town of Mentz, which was besieged; and he rendered some services on the occasion. In the Committee of Public Welfare, he directed the operations of the war, and was found useful, but he had neither experience nor practice in the military matters. He displayed on every occasion great moral courage.
"After the events of Thermidor, when the Convention caused all the members of the committee of Public Welfare to be arrested, with the exception of himself, Carnot insisted upon sharing their fate. This conduct was the more noble, inasmuch as public opinion had pronounced itself violently against the Committee. He was nominated a member of the Directory after Vendemiaire; but after the 9th Thermidor his mind was deeply affected by the reproaches of public opinion, which attributed to the committee all the blood which had flowed on the scaffold. He felt the necessity of gaining esteem, and, believing that he took the lead, he suffered himself to be led by some of those who directed the party from abroad. His merit was then extolled to the skies, but he did not deserve the praises of the enemies of France; he found himself placed in a critical situation, and fell in Fructidor.
"After the 18th Brumaire, Carnot was recalled by the First Consul and placed in the department of war; he had several quarrels with the Minister of the Finances and Dufrenes the Director of the Treasury, in which it is but fair to say that he was always in the wrong. At last, he left the department, persuaded that it could no longer go on for want of money.
"When a member of the Tribunate, he spoke and voted against the establishment of the Empire; but his conduct, open and manly, gave no uneasiness to the administration. At a later period, he was appointed Chief Inspector of Reviews, and received from the Emperor, on his retiring from the service, a pension of twenty thousand francs. As long as things went on prosperously, the Emperor heard nothing of him: but, after the campaign of Russia, at the time of the disasters of France, Carnot solicited to be employed: he was appointed to command the town of Antwerp, and he behaved well at his post. On his return in 1815, the Emperor, after a little hesitation, appointed him to be Minister of the Interior, and had no cause to repent of having done so; he found him faithful, laborious, full of probity, and always sincere. In the month of June, Carnot was named one of the Commission of the Provisional Government, but being unfit for the place, he was duped.
“Le Tourneur de la Manche was born in Normandy; he had been an officer of engineers before the revolution. It is difficult to explain how he came to be appointed to the Directory; it can only be from one of those unaccountable caprices of which large assemblies so often furnish examples. He was a man of narrow capacity, little learning, and of a weak mind. There were in the Convention five hundred deputies better qualified for the situation; he was however a man of strict probity, and left the Directory without any fortune.”
Le Tourneur made himself the talk and the laughing-stock of Paris; it was said that he came from his department to take possession at the Directory in a cart, with his house-keeper, his kitchen utensils, and his poultry. The wags of the capital marked him, and he was overwhelmed with ridicule. He was made, for instance, to return from the Jardin des Plantes, whither he had run immediately on his arrival in Paris, and to give an account of the rare things he had found there; and, on being asked whether he had seen Lacepede,[[19]] he was surprised that he should have passed it unobserved, declaring that la Giraffe (the camelopard) was the only thing that had been pointed out to him.[[20]]
"The Directory was hardly established before it began to lower itself in public estimation by caprices, bad morals, and false measures. The faults and absurdities which it committed daily completed its discredit, and it was lost in reputation almost at the very moment of its formation. Intoxicated with their elevation, the Directors thought it became them to adopt a certain air, and sought to acquire the appearance and manners of bon ton. In order the better to succeed, they formed each a little Court, where they received and welcomed the higher classes, hitherto in disgrace, and who were naturally their enemies, and from which they excluded the greatest part of their old acquaintances and former companions, as thenceforward too vulgar. All those who during the Revolution had shown more energy than the members of the Directory, or who had trodden in the same path with them, became odious to them and were immediately kept aloof; and the Directory thus rendered itself ridiculous to one party, and alienated the affections of the other. These five little Courts exacted a greater degree of servility in proportion as they were inferior and ridiculous; but numbers of men were found who could not bring themselves to bend and submit to formalities which the recollection of recent circumstances, the nature of the government and the character of the governors, rendered inadmissible.
"However, all the Directory could do to gain over the saloons of Paris proved of no avail: it did not succeed in acquiring any influence over them, and the Bourbon party was gaining ground. No sooner did the Directors perceive this than they hastily retraced their steps; but it was too late to recover the good-will of the republicans, whom they had estranged by their conduct. This led to a system of wavering, which looked like caprice; no course was laid down to steer by, no object was kept in view, no unity prevailed. The reigns of terror and of royalty were equally objected to; but in the mean time the road which was to lead to the goal was left untried. The Directory thought to put an end to this state of uncertainty and to avoid these perpetual waverings, by striking at one blow the two extreme parties, whether they had deserved it or not: if therefore a royalist, who had conspired or disturbed the public tranquillity, was arrested by their orders, they caused a republican, innocent or guilty, to be arrested at the same moment. This system was nicknamed The Political Seesaw, but the injustice and fraud which characterized it entirely discredited the government; every heart was closed; it was a government of lead. Every true and generous feeling was against the Directory.
"Men of business, jobbers and intriguers, by possessing themselves of the springs of government, acquired the greatest influence; all places were given to worthless individuals, to protégés, or to relations—corruption crept into every branch of the administration. This was soon perceived, and those who had it in their power to waste the public money could act without fear; the foreign relations, the armies, the finances, the department of the Interior, all felt the pernicious effects of so vicious a system. This state of things soon gathered a storm on the political horizon, and we proceeded with rapid strides to the crisis of Fructidor.
"At that period the measures of the Directory were weak, capricious, and uncertain; emigrants returned to France, and newspapers, paid by foreigners, dared openly to stigmatize the most deserving of our patriots. The fury of the enemies of our national glory exasperated the soldiers of the army of Italy, which declared itself loudly against them; whilst the Councils, in their turn, acting the parts of real counter-revolutionists, spoke of nothing but priests, bells, and emigrants. All the officers of the army, who had distinguished themselves more or less in the departments, in the battalions of volunteers, or even in the regiments of the line, finding themselves thus attacked in their dearest interests, inflamed more and more the anger of their soldiers; the minds of all parties were in a state of effervescence. In a moment of such violent agitation, what measures could the General of the army of Italy adopt? He had the choice of three:
“1st. To side with the preponderating party in the Councils—but it was too late; the army had declared itself, and the leaders of that party, the orators of the Council, by attacking incessantly both the General and his army, had not left him the possibility of adopting that resolution.
2dly. “To embrace the party of the Directory and of the Republic. That was the plainest course, that which duty pointed out, which the army inclined to, and in which he was already engaged; for all the writers who had remained faithful to the cause of the Revolution had declared themselves, of their own accord, the ardent defenders and warm advocates of the army and its commanders.
3dly. “To overpower both factions, by stepping forward boldly and appearing openly in the contest as regulator of the Republic. But notwithstanding the strength which Napoleon felt that he derived from the support of the army, although his character was highly esteemed in France, he did not think that the spirit of the times and public opinion were such as to allow him to take so daring a step. And besides, if this third measure had been that to which he secretly inclined, he could not have adopted it immediately, and without having previously sided with one of the two parties, which appeared at that moment in the political lists. It was absolutely necessary, even in order to form a third party, to side first either with the Councils or with the Directory.
“Thus, of the three measures to be adopted, the third in its execution merged into the two first, and he was entirely debarred from adopting the first of these two by the new formation of the Councils, and by the attacks already made upon him by them.
“These considerations and conclusions,” the Emperor observed, “were the natural result of a deep meditation upon the then existing state of affairs in France. The General had therefore nothing to do but to let events take their course, and second the impulse of his troops. And this view of the subject produced the proclamation to the army of Italy, and the far-famed order of the day of its General.
“‘Soldiers!’ he said, ‘I know that your hearts are full of grief at the calamities of our country; but, if it were possible that foreign armies should triumph, we would fly from the summit of the Alps with the rapidity of the eagle, to defend once more that cause which has already cost us so much blood.’
“These words decided the question; the soldiers, in ecstasy, were for marching at once upon Paris. The rumour of the event spread immediately to the capital, and produced a most powerful sensation. The Directory, which every body considered as lost, which the moment before was tottering alone and abandoned, found itself at once supported by public opinion; it immediately assumed the attitude, and followed the course of a triumphant party, and defeated all its enemies.
“The General of the army of Italy had sent the proclamation to his soldiers to the Directory by Augereau, because he was a Parisian and strongly in favour of the prevailing notions of the day.
“Nevertheless, the politicians of the day made the following surmises: What would Napoleon have done if the Councils had triumphed; if that faction, instead of being overthrown, had, on the contrary, overthrown the Directory? In that case, it appears, that he was determined to march upon Lyons and Mirbel with fifteen thousand men, where he would have been joined by all the republicans from the south and from Burgundy. The victorious Council would not have been more than three or four days without coming to some violent rupture and division: for it is known that, if the numbers of these Councils were unanimous in their proceedings against the Directory, they were far from being so as to the further course they meant to pursue. The leaders, such as Pichegru, Imbert-Colonnes, and others, sold to foreign powers, exerted all their influence to restore royalty and bring about a counter-revolution; whilst Carnot and others sought to produce results quite opposite to these. France would therefore have become immediately a prey to confusion and anarchy, and in that case, all factions would have seen, with satisfaction, Napoleon appear as a rallying point, an anchor of safety, capable of saving them at the same time from the terror of royalty and from the terror of demagogues. Napoleon would then naturally have repaired to Paris, and found himself placed at the head of affairs by the unanimous wish and consent of all parties. The majority of the Councils was strong and positive, it is true, but it was only against the Directors; it would have been divided ad infinitum as soon as they were overturned.
“The choice of three new Directors having openly exposed the true intention of the measures of the counter-revolution, the greatest number of the citizens, in their alarm, were ready to fly to meet Napoleon with the national oriflamme[[21]] unfurled; for the true counter-revolutionists were after all few in number, and their pretensions were too ridiculous and absurd. Every thing would have given way before Napoleon. Had they called him Cæsar or Cromwell, still he would have marched with a religion, a party, whose ideas were settled and popular; he was master of his soldiers, the coffers of the army were full, and he was in possession of every other means calculated to ensure their constancy and their fidelity. If the question were now to be asked whether Napoleon, in the recesses of his own mind, would or would not have wished affairs to take this turn, we should give our opinion in the affirmative; and we are led to believe from the following fact, that his wishes and his hopes were in favour of the triumph of the majority of the Councils. At the moment of the crisis between the two factions, a secret decree, signed by the three members composing the party of the Directory, asked him for three millions to resist the attack of the Councils, but Napoleon, under various pretences, did not send them, although it would have been easy for him to do so; yet it is well known that it is not consistent with his character to hesitate in money matters.
“Therefore, when the struggle was over, and the Directory took pleasure in acknowledging openly that it owed its existence to Napoleon, it still entertained some vague suspicions that Napoleon had only espoused its cause in the hopes of seeing it overthrown, and of taking its place.
“Be that as it may, after the 18th Fructidor, the enthusiasm of the army was at its height, and the triumph of Napoleon complete. But the Directory, notwithstanding its apparent gratitude, surrounded Napoleon from that moment with numerous agents, who watched his motions and endeavoured to penetrate his thoughts.
"The situation of Napoleon was one of extreme delicacy, although his conduct was so well regulated, and so admirable, that even at this period we can only form mere conjectures on the subject; but to the delicacy of his situation it is that we think we can trace the principal reasons which led to the conclusion of the peace at Campo Formio, to his refusal to remain at the Congress of Rastadt, and finally, to the undertaking of the expedition to Egypt.
“As it always happens in France, immediately after the 18th Fructidor, the party that had been overthrown disappeared on a sudden, and the majority of the Directory triumphed without moderation. It became every thing, and reduced the Councils to nothing.
“Napoleon then felt the necessity of peace, which, putting an end to the present state of affairs, would increase his popularity: he had every thing to fear from the prolongation of war; it might furnish those who should have suspected him ready pretexts for injuring him; or the intention might be to expose him in situations of difficulty, and unite the other generals against him.
“Two[“Two] of the generals, who enjoyed the greatest reputation at that time, manifested openly their sentiments with respect to the great affair of Fructidor: these were Moreau and Hoche.
“Moreau had declared himself positively against the Directory, and by a line of conduct at once pusillanimous and culpable, he failed in his duty and compromised his honour.
“Hoche was entirely in favour of the Directory, impelled by the impetuosity of his disposition, he marched part of his army upon Paris, and failed by acting with too much precipitation. His troops were countermanded by the influence of the Councils, and he himself was obliged to leave Paris, to avoid being arrested by order of these Councils. Hoche had therefore done nothing to contribute to the success of the 18th Fructidor; on the contrary he had injured the cause by excess of zeal. But he had shown himself a man entirely devoted to the Directory, and the majority of them could rely on him without reserve, although his imprudence had nearly been the cause of their ruin.
“That same majority of the Directory entertained doubts, on the contrary, with respect to Napoleon, who had been the cause of their triumph; they still thought it possible that the General of the army of Italy had calculated that the Directory would fall in the contest with the Councils, and that he might then rise upon its ruins.
“But how could the Directory reconcile that supposition with the acts of the General, who had done every thing to ensure its triumph? for it is evident that without the order of the day of Napoleon, and the address to his army, the Directory would have been undone.
“Some persons, well informed on the subject, seem to think that Napoleon had really not formed a due estimate of the influence which he exercised in France—that he had suffered himself to be misled by the libels and the newspapers in which he was attacked,—and that he had considered the measures which he adopted calculated not to ensure the complete triumph of the Directory, but to produce precisely the effect of rendering him the deliverer and the true support of the republic. The same persons add that when the officers whom Napoleon had at Paris, and letters from every part of France, had informed him that his proclamation had in one moment changed altogether the state of public feeling in the interior, then, and then only, he saw that he had done too much. We are the more ready to adopt this opinion as we cannot understand why Napoleon should have thought of preserving three Directors whom he did not care about. The only one he esteemed (Carnot) was of the opposite party, and we know that he felt indignant at the corruptness and the weakness of the others.
“A man named Bottot, a private agent of Barras, was sent to Napoleon with secret instructions, to endeavour to penetrate his views and to ascertain why he had not sent the three millions of which the Directory had stood so much in need. Bottot found the French General at Passeriano, and began to intrigue right and left with those who surrounded Napoleon; but he found every one warmly attached to the party that had triumphed; and, having some concerns of his own to arrange, he at last, in the course of some private conversations, confessed the secret of his mission and the vague suspicions entertained by the Directory. He had been soon undeceived by the appearance of simplicity which distinguished Napoleon’s establishment, by the frankness of Napoleon himself; and above all by the enthusiasm of the army, and of the whole of Italy in favour of the General. But, even if the suspicion of the Directory had been well founded, it would not have been difficult, with a few marks of attention, and some frank and unaffected conversations, to remove from Bottot’s mind, surrounded as he then was, all cause of umbrage.
“He wrote to Paris that the fears which had been entertained were altogether groundless, and much less to be dreaded than the perverseness of those who wished to excite them. But the three millions, it was objected to him, why were they refused? Napoleon had proved that the order sent by the Directory was mysterious and irregular, and that, encompassed as it was by such rogues as F—— and others, who had already robbed the public exchequer, he had thought it prudent to ascertain the truth; that he had immediately dispatched Lavalette, his confidential aid-de-camp, to Paris, and that, as soon as Lavalette had informed him of the true state of affairs, he was on the point of sending off the three millions, when the fate of the day was decided.”
ENGLISH DIPLOMACY.—LORD WHITWORTH.—CHATHAM.—CASTLEREAGH.—CORNWALLIS.—FOX, &C.
Monday, 10th—The course of our conversation to-day led the Emperor to observe that nothing was so dangerous and so treacherous as official conversations with diplomatic agents of Great Britain. “The English Ministers,” said he, “never represent an affair from their nation to another, but as from themselves to their own nation. They care little what their adversaries have said or say; they boldly put forward what their diplomatic agents have said, or what they make them say, on the ground that, those agents having a public and acknowledged character, faith must be placed in their reports. It is in pursuance of this principle, Napoleon added, that the English Ministers published at the time, under the name of Lord Whitworth, a long conversation between me and Whitworth, the account of which was entirely false.”[[22]]
That ambassador had solicited an audience of the First Consul, and personal communications. The First Consul, who was himself fond of treating affairs directly, willingly assented. “But[“But] this proved for me,” said the Emperor, “a lesson which altered my method for ever. From this moment, I never treated officially of political affairs, but through the intervention of my minister for Foreign affairs. He at any rate could give a positive and formal denial; which the sovereign could not do.
“It is utterly false,” added the Emperor, "that any thing occurred in the course of our personal interview, which was not in conformity with the common rules of decorum. Lord Whitworth himself, after our conference, being in company with other Ambassadors, expressed himself perfectly satisfied, and added that he had no doubt all things would be satisfactorily settled. But what was the surprise of those same Ambassadors, when they read a short time afterwards in the English newspapers the report of Lord Whitworth, in which he charged me with having behaved in the interview with unbecoming violence! We had some warm friends amongst these Ambassadors, and some of them went so far as to express their surprise to the English diplomatist, observing to him that his report was very different from what he had said to them immediately after the conference. Lord Whitworth made the best excuse he could, but persisted in maintaining the assertions of the official document.
“The fact is,” said the Emperor, “that every political agent of Great Britain is in the habit of making two reports on the same subject; one public and false for the ministerial archives, the other confidential and true for the Ministers themselves, and for them alone; and when the responsibility of Ministers is at stake, they produce the first of these documents, which, although false, answers every purpose, and serves to exonerate them. And thus it is,” added the Emperor, "that the best institutions become vicious, when they are no longer founded on morality, and when their agents are only actuated by selfishness, pride, and insolence. Absolute power has no need of disguise; it is silent: responsible governments, being obliged to speak, have recourse to artifice, and lie with effrontery.
"It is, however, a circumstance worthy of remark, that, in my great struggle with England, the government of that country has constantly contrived to attach so much odium to my person and actions; and that they have so impudently exclaimed against my despotism, my selfishness, my ambition, and my perfidy, when they alone were guilty of all they dared to lay to my charge. A very strong prejudice must have existed against me, I must have been indeed very much to be feared, since people could suffer themselves to be thus deceived. I can understand it from Kings and Cabinets, their existence was at stake; but from the people!!...
"The British Ministers spoke incessantly of my duplicity; but could any thing be compared to their Machiavelism, their selfishness, during the existence of disorders and convulsions, which were kept alive by them?
"They sacrificed unfortunate Austria in 1805, merely to escape the invasion with which I threatened them.
"They sacrificed her again in 1809, to be more at liberty to act in the Peninsula.
"They sacrificed Prussia in 1806, in the hopes of recovering Hanover.
"They did not assist Russia in 1807, because they chose rather to seize distant colonies, and because they were attempting to take possession of Egypt.
"They gave to the world the infamous spectacle of bombarding Copenhagen in time of peace, and lying in ambush to steal the Danish fleet. They had already once before exhibited a similar spectacle by seizing, like highway robbers, also in time of peace, four Spanish frigates laden with rich treasures.
"Lastly, during the war in the Peninsula, where they endeavoured to prolong the existence of anarchy and confusion, their principal object was to traffic with the wants and the blood of the Spanish nation, by obliging it to purchase their services and their supplies at the expense of gold and concessions.
"Whilst all Europe, through their intrigues and their subsidies, was bathed in blood, they were only intent upon providing for their own safety, gaining advantages for their trade, and obtaining the sovereignty of the sea and the monopoly of the world. As for myself, I had never done any thing of the kind, and, until the unfortunate business with Spain, which after all is not to be compared with the affair of Copenhagen, I can say that my morality was unimpeachable. My actions had perhaps been dictatorial and peremptory, but never disgraced by perfidy. Who can be surprised, after all this, if, in 1814, although England had really been the deliverer of Europe, not a single Englishman could show himself on the Continent without meeting at every step with maledictions, hatred, and execrations? Who can ask how this happened? Every tree bears its own fruit; we reap only what we have sown; and such was necessarily the infallible result of the misdeeds of the English Government, the tyranny and the insolence of the Ministers in London, and of their agents all over the globe.
"For the last fifty years the administrations of Great Britain have gradually declined in consideration and in public estimation. Formerly, the struggle for power was between great national parties, characterised by grand and distinct systems; but now we see only the bickerings of one and the same oligarchy, having constantly the same object in view, and whose discordant members adjust their differences by compromise and concessions: they have turned the Cabinet of St. James’s into a shop.
"The policy of Lord Chatham was marked by acts of injustice, no doubt; but at least he proclaimed them with boldness and energy; they had a certain air of grandeur. Pitt introduced into the Cabinet a system of hypocrisy and dissimulation. Lord Castlereagh, the self-styled heir of Pitt, has brought into it the extreme of every kind of turpitude and immorality. Chatham gloried in being a merchant; Lord Castlereagh, to the serious injury of his nation, has indulged himself in the satisfaction of acting the fine gentleman; he has sacrificed his country to fraternise with the great people of the continent, and from that moment has united in his person the vices of the saloon with the cupidity of the counting-house; the duplicity and obsequiousness of the courtier with the haughtiness and insolence of the upstart. The poor English constitution is in imminent danger. What a difference between such men and the Foxes, the Sheridans, and the Greys, those splendid talents, those noble characters of the Opposition, who have been the objects of the ridicule of a victorious oligarchy!
“Lord Cornwallis,” said the Emperor, "is the first Englishman who gave me, in good earnest, a favourable opinion of his nation; after him Fox, and I might add to these, if it were necessary, our present Admiral (Malcolm).
"Cornwallis was, in every sense of the word, a worthy, good, and honest man. At the time of the treaty of Amiens, the terms having been agreed upon, he had promised to sign the next day at a certain hour; something of consequence detained him at home, but he pledged his word. The evening of that same day, a courier arrived from London proscribing certain articles of the treaty, but he answered that he had signed, and immediately came and actually signed. We understood each other perfectly well; I had placed a regiment at his disposal, and he took pleasure in seeing its manœuvres. I have preserved an agreeable recollection of him in every respect, and it is certain that a request from him would have had more weight with me, perhaps, than one from a crowned head. His family appears to have guessed this to be the case; some requests have been made to me in its name, which have all been granted.
"Fox came to France immediately after the peace of Amiens. He was employed in writing a history of the Stuarts, and asked my permission to search our diplomatic archives. I gave orders that every thing should be placed at his disposal. I received him often. Fame had informed me of his talents, and I soon found that he possessed a noble character, a good heart, liberal, generous, and enlightened views. I considered him an ornament to mankind, and was very much attached to him. We often conversed together upon various topics, without the least prejudice; when I wished to engage in a little controversy, I turned the conversation upon the subject of the infernal machine; and told him that his ministers had attempted to murder me; he would then oppose my opinion with warmth, and invariably ended the conversation by saying, in his bad French, ‘First Consul, pray take that out of your head.’ But he was not convinced of the truth of the cause he undertook to advocate, and there is every reason to believe that he argued more in defence of his country, than of the morality of its ministers."
The Emperor ended the conversation, by saying: “Half a dozen such men as Fox and Cornwallis would be sufficient to establish the moral character of a nation.... With such men I should always have agreed; we should soon have settled our differences, and not only France would have been at peace with a nation at bottom most worthy of esteem, but we should have done great things together.”