ESTABLISHMENTS FOR MENDICITY IN FRANCE.—NAPOLEON’S PROJECTS RELATIVE TO ILLYRIA.—HOSPITALS.—THE FOUNDLING.—PRISONERS OF STATE.—IDEAS OF THE EMPEROR.
20th.—The Emperor sent for me in the morning; I found him reading an English work on the poor’s rate, the immense sums raised, and the vast number of individuals maintained at the expense of their parishes; the account embraced millions of men and hundreds of millions of money.
The Emperor was apprehensive that he had not read the work correctly, or that he had mistaken the meaning. The thing, he said, seemed altogether impossible. He could not conceive by what vices and defects so many poor could be found in a country so opulent, so industrious, and so abundant in resources for labour as England. He was still less capable of comprehending, by what prodigy the proprietors, overloaded with an oppressive ordinary and extraordinary taxation, were also enabled to provide for the wants of such a multitude. “But we have nothing,” he observed, “in France to be compared to it in the proportion of a hundredth or a thousandth part. Have you not told me that I sent you into the departments on a particular mission with regard to mendicity? Let us see, what is the number of our beggars? What did they cost? How many poor-houses did I establish? What was the number they held? What effect had they in removing mendicity?”
To this crowd of questions I was compelled to answer that a considerable period of time had since elapsed, that my mind had been occupied with several other objects, and that it was impossible for me to enter into correct statements from mere recollection; but that I had the official report itself among the few papers I had preserved, and that, the first time he might be pleased to send for me, I should be enabled to satisfy him. “But,” said he, “go instantly and look for it, things are not profitable unless seasonably applied, and I shall soon run it over with my thumb, as Abbé de Pradt ingeniously said; although, to tell the truth, I don’t much like to think of such subjects; they remind me of mustard after dinner.”
In two minutes the report was in his hand. “Well!” said the Emperor to me, also, in a very few minutes, for it might be really said that he had not turned over the leaves; “well, this, in fact, is not at all like England. Our organization, however, had failed; I suspected as much, and it was on that account I entrusted you with the mission. Your report would have been in perfect conformity with my views. You took up the consideration frankly and like an honest man, without fear of exciting the displeasure of the minister, by depriving him of a great many appointments.
“I am pleased with a great number of your details. Why did you not come and converse with me about them yourself? You would have satisfied me, and I should have known how to value your services.”—“Sire, as things were then situated, it would have been impossible for me to do so; we were then involved in the confusion and embarrassment caused by our misfortunes.”—“Your observation is perfectly correct; you establish an unquestionable position. The fact is that, in the flourishing state to which I had raised the empire, no hands could any where be found destitute of employment. It was idleness and vice alone that could produce mendicants.
“You think that their complete annihilation was possible; and, for my part, I am of the same opinion.
“Your levy en masse, to build a vast and single prison in each department, was equally adapted to the tranquility of society and to the well-being of those confined in it;—your idea of making them monuments for ages would have attracted my attention. That gigantic undertaking, its utility, its importance, the permanence of its results, were all in my way.
“With respect to your university for the people, I am very apprehensive that it would have been but a beautiful chimera of philanthropy, worthy of the unsophisticated Abbé de Saint Pierre. There is, however, some merit in the aggregate of those conceptions; but energy of character, and an unbending perseverance, for which we are not generally distinguished, would be requisite to produce any good result.
“For the rest, I every day collect ideas from you in this place, of which I did not imagine you capable; but it was not at all my fault. You were near me; why did you not open your mind to me? I did not possess the gift of divination. Had you been minister, those ideas, however fantastical they might at first have appeared to me, would not have been the less attended to, because there is, in my opinion, no conception altogether unsusceptible of some positive good, and a wrong notion, when properly controlled and regulated, often leads to a right conclusion. I should have handed you over to commissioners, who would have analyzed your plans; you would have defended them by your arguments, and, after taking cognizance of the subject, I alone should have finally decided according to my own judgment. Such was my way of acting, and my intention; I gave an impulse to industry; I put it into a state of complete activity throughout Europe; I was desirous of doing as much for all the faculties of the mind, but time was not allowed me. I could not bring my plans to maturity at full gallop; and, unfortunately, I but too often wasted them upon a sandy foundation, and consigned them to unproductive hands.
“What were the other missions with which I entrusted you?”—“One in Holland, another in Illyria.”—“Have you the reports?”—“Yes, Sire.”—“Go for them.” But I had not got to the door, when he said, “Never mind, come back, spare me the trouble of reading such matters!—They are henceforth, in reality, altogether useless.”—What did not these words unfold to me!
The Emperor resumed the subject of Illyria. “In obtaining[obtaining] possession of Illyria, it was never my intention to retain it; I never entertained the idea of destroying Austria. Her existence was, on the contrary, indispensably requisite for the execution of my plans. But Illyria was, in our hands, a vanguard to the heart of Austria, calculated to keep a check upon her; a sentinel at the gates of Vienna, to keep her steady to our interests. Besides, I was desirous of introducing and establishing in that country our doctrines, our system of government, and our codes. It was an additional step to the regeneration of Europe. I had merely taken it as a pledge, and intended, at a later period, to exchange it for Gallicia, at the restoration of Poland, which I hurried on against my own opinion. I had, however, more than one project with regard to Illyria; for I frequently fluctuated in my designs, and had few ideas that were fixed on solid grounds. This arose rather from adapting myself to circumstances than from giving an impulse and direction to them, and I was every instant compelled to shift about. The consequence was that, for the greater part of the time, I came to no absolute decision, and was occupied merely with projects. My predominant idea, however, particularly after my marriage, was to give it up to Austria as an indemnity for Gallicia, on the re-establishment of Poland, at any rate, as a separate and independent kingdom. Not that I cared upon whose head, whether on that of a friend, an enemy, or an ally, the crown was placed, provided the thing was effected. The results were indifferent to me. I have, my dear Las Cases, formed vast and numerous projects, all unquestionably for the advancement of reason and the welfare of the human race. I was dreaded as a thunderbolt; I was accused of having a hand of iron; but the moment that hand had struck the last blow, every thing would have been softened down for the happiness of all. How many millions would have poured their benedictions on me, both then and in future times! But how numerous, it must be confessed, the fatal misfortunes which were accumulated and combined to effect my overthrow, at the end of my career! My unhappy marriage; the perfidies which resulted from it; that villainous affair of Spain; from which I could not disengage myself; that fatal war with Russia, which occurred through a misunderstanding; that horrible rigour of the elements, which devoured a whole army; ... and then, the whole universe against me!... Is it not wonderful that I was still able to make so long a resistance, and that I was more than once on the point of surmounting every danger and emerging from that chaos more powerful than ever!... O destiny of man!—What is human wisdom, human foresight!”—And then abruptly adverting to my report, he said, “I observed, that you travelled over a great number of departments. Did your mission last long? Was your journey agreeable? Was it of real benefit to you? Did you collect much information? Were you enabled to form a correct judgment on the state of the country, on that of public opinion?
“I now recollect that I selected you precisely because you had just returned from your mission to Illyria, and I found in your report several things which made a strong impression upon me; for it is surprising how many things at present are every day brought back to my memory, which, at the time, struck me in you, and which, by a singular fatality, were immediately afterwards completely forgotten. When any appointments were about to take place to those special and confidential missions, the decree, with blanks for the names, was laid before me, and I filled them up with persons of my own selection—I must have written your name with my own hand.”
“Sire,” I replied, “there never was, perhaps, a mission more agreeable and satisfactory in every point of view. I commenced it early in the spring, and proceeded from Paris to Toulon, and from Toulon to Antibes, following the line of coast and occasionally diverging into the interior. I travelled nearly thirteen hundred leagues, but unfortunately the time was short. The minister, in his instructions, had strictly limited the period to three, or at most, to four months. It would be difficult for me to give an adequate description of all the delight, enjoyments, and advantages which I derived from the journey. I was a member of your Council, an officer of your household. I was every where considered as one of your missi dominici, and was received with suitable respect. The more I behaved with discretion, moderation, and simplicity, visiting myself the high functionaries, whose attendance I was authorized to require, the more I was treated with deference and complaisance. For one, who shewed any distrust, or betrayed any symptom of ill-humour or envy; (for I afterwards learnt from themselves, that my character, as a nobleman, emigrant, and chamberlain, formed three certain grounds for reprobation;) for one, I repeat, who looked upon me with a jealous eye, I found many whose communications were altogether unreserved, even upon subjects, respecting which I should not have presumed to make inquiry. They assured me that they took pleasure in unbosoming themselves to me with perfect openness; that they viewed my situation, near the person of the sovereign, as a favourable medium; and considered me as the confessor upon whom they relied for transmitting their most secret thoughts to the Most High. The more I endeavoured to convince them that they were mistaken with regard to my situation and the nature of my mission, the more they were confirmed in the contrary opinion. In so short a period, what a lesson for me on mankind! There were none of these high functionaries who did not differ from each other with regard to the views, means, and designs of all the objects under consideration; and yet they were all men selected with care, of tried ability, and generally of great merit. Persons in private life also looked up to me as to a ray of Providence, and applied to me either publicly or in secret. How many things did I not learn! How numerous the denunciations and accusations communicated to me! What a multitude of local abuses, of petty intrigues, were disclosed to me!
“Altogether unacquainted with affairs, and until then absolutely ignorant of official proceedings, I made use of that peculiar opportunity to obtain information. I did not fail to make myself acquainted with all the objects and particular circumstances of every party. I was not apprehensive of shewing my ignorance to the first who presented themselves, for I was thus enabled to qualify myself for discussing business with the others.
“It is true, Sire, that my special mission was restricted to the mendicity establishments and the houses of correction: but feeling, as I did, all the want of a stock of knowledge, fit to render myself useful to the Council of State, and taking advantage of my appointment, I connected with it, of my own accord, the minute inspection of prisons, hospitals, and beneficent institutions, and I also took a survey of all our ports and squadrons.
“How magnificent the combination which thus presented itself to my view! I every where beheld the most perfect tranquillity and complete confidence in the government; every hand, every faculty, every branch of industry, was employed; the soil was embellished by the flourishing state of agriculture, it was the finest time of the year; the roads were excellent; public works were in progress in almost in every quarter;—the canal of Arles, the noble bridge of Bordeaux, the works of Rochefort, the canals from Nantes to Brest, to Rennes, to Saint Malo; the foundation of Napoleonville, intended to be the key of the whole peninsula of Britanny; the magnificent works of Cherbourg, those of Antwerp, sluices, moles, or other improvements in most of the towns of the Channel—such is the sketch of what I saw.
“On the other hand, the ports of Toulon, Rochefort, L’Orient, Brest, Saint Malo, Havre, and Antwerp, displayed an extraordinary degree of activity; our roads were filled with vessels, and the numbers increased daily: our crews were training in spite of every obstacle, and our young conscripts were becoming good seamen, fit for future service. I, who belonged to the old naval establishment, was astonished at every thing I saw on board, so very great were the improvements made in the art, and so far did they exceed, in every point of view, all that I had witnessed.
“The squadrons belonging to the different ports got under sail every day, and executed their regular manœuvres, like the parades of garrisons, and all this took place within sight of the English, who thought it a ridiculous farce, without foreseeing the danger with which they were threatened; for, never at any period was our navy more formidable, or our ships more numerous. We already had upwards of 100 afloat or on the stocks, and we were making daily additions to the number. The officers were excellent, and animated with zeal and ardour. I had no idea whatever of the forward state of our preparations, before I witnessed it in person, and should not have believed it, had I been told of it.
“With respect to the mendicity establishments, the special object of my mission, your intentions, Sire, had been ill understood, and the plan was altogether unsuccessful. In most of the departments, mendicity not only remained with all its defects, but no steps whatever had been taken for its annihilation. The fact was that several prefects, so far from making the establishments a terror to the mendicants, had merely considered them as a refuge for the poor. Instead of holding out confinement as a punishment, they caused it to be sought after as an asylum; and thus the lot of the prisoners might be envied by the hard-working peasantry of the neighbourhood. France might, in that way, have been covered with similar establishments, which might have been filled without diminishing the number of mendicants, who commonly make a trade of begging, and follow it in preference. I was, however, enabled to judge that the extirpation of the evil was possible, and the example of some departments, in which the prefects had taken a better view of the subject was sufficient to produce that conviction. There were a few in which it had entirely disappeared.
“It is an observation which makes an immediate and striking impression, that, all other things fairly averaged, mendicity is much more rare in those parts which are poor and barren, and much more common in those which are fruitful and abundant. It is also infinitely more difficult to effect its destruction in the places where the clergy have enjoyed superior wealth and power. In Belgium, for instance, mendicants were seen to derive honour from their trade, and boast of having followed it for several generations. These claims belonged peculiarly to them, and that country was accordingly the rendezvous of mendicity.” “But I am not surprised at it,” resumed the Emperor, “the difficulty of this important consideration consists entirely in discriminating accurately between the poor man who commands our respect, and the mendicant who ought to excite our indignation; besides, our religious absurdities confound these two classes so completely that they seem to make a merit, a kind of virtue, of mendicity, and to encourage it by the promise of heavenly rewards. The mendicants are, in reality, neither more nor less than monks au petit pied; so that in the list of them we even find the mendicant monks. How was it possible for such ideas not to produce confusion in the mind, and disorder in society? A great number of saints have been canonized, whose only apparent merit was mendicity. They seem to have been transplanted to Heaven for that, which, considered as a matter of sound policy, ought to have subjected them to castigation and confinement in this world. This would not, however, have prevented them from being worthy of Heaven. But go on.”—
“It was not, Sire, without emotion that I observed the details of the charitable establishments. In contemplating the anxiety, the cares, the ardent charity, of so many sympathetic hearts, I was enabled to ascertain that we were far from yielding the palm, whatever might be the consideration, to any other people, and that we merely had less ostentation and made less use of artificial means to enhance our merits. The South, above all, and Languedoc, in particular, displayed a zeal and animation of which it would be difficult to form an adequate conception. The hospitals and alms-houses were every where numerous and well attended to. The foundlings had increased tenfold since the revolution, and I instantly ascribed it to the corruption of the times; but I was desired to remark, and constant reflection convinced me of the truth, that the result was, on the contrary, to be attributed to very satisfactory causes. I was assured that formerly the foundlings were so wretchedly taken care of, and so badly fed, that the whole of them were diminutive, sickly, and short-lived, and that from seven to nine perished out of ten; while at present their food, cleanliness, and the care taken of them, in every respect are such that nearly all of them are preserved, and constitute a fine race of children. They are thus indebted for their numbers solely to their preservation. Vaccination has also contributed, in an immense proportion, to their increase. These children are now treated with such attention as to give rise to a singular abuse. Mothers, even in easy circumstances, are tempted to expose their infants; they afterwards apply at the hospital, and, under a charitable pretence, offer to bring up one themselves; it is their own which is restored to them with the benefit of a small allowance. All this is carried on through the favour of the agents themselves, and often for the purpose of obtaining a trifling pension for one of their relations. Another abuse of this kind, and not less extraordinary, was that which I observed in Belgium, of persons getting their names entered a long time before, for the purpose of entitling them to send their children to the hospital. Any young couple, on their marriage, strove to get their names entered for vacancies, which fell to them some years afterwards, as a matter of right; it was a part of the marriage settlement.”—“O Jesus! Jesus!” exclaimed the Emperor, shrugging up his shoulders and laughing, “and after this make laws and regulations!”—
$1“$2”$3But with regard to the prisons, Sire, they were almost uniformly the scenes of horror and real misery, the shame and disgrace of our provinces, absolute sinks of corruption and infection, which I was obliged to pass through with the utmost haste, or from which I was driven back in spite of all my efforts. I had formerly visited certain prisons in England, and indulged in a smile at the kind of luxury which I observed in them; but it was quite a different thing with respect to ours, and my indignation was excited by the contrary extreme. There are no offences, I might even say crimes, that are not sufficiently punished by such habitations, and those who leave them should not, in strict justice, have any further expiation to make. Yet after all those confined in them were merely under a simple accusation, while those who had been found guilty, the real criminals, and hardened villains, had their special prisons, their houses of correction, where they were, perhaps, too well taken care of; and even, in the latter case, the honest day-labourer might have reason to envy their lot, and make comparisons injurious to Providence and society. Another striking inconsistency was observable in these houses of correction; it was the amalgamation, the habitual mixture of all the classes upon whom sentence had been passed. Some being imprisoned for small offences only for a year, and others for fifteen, twenty years, or for life, on account of the dreadful crimes they had perpetrated, it necessarily followed that they would be all reduced to one moral level, not by the amelioration of the latter, but rather by the corruption of the former.
“What struck me also very forcibly in La Vendée and the adjacent country was that maniacs had increased there, perhaps, tenfold more than in any other part of the empire, and that persons were detained in the mendicity establishments and other places of confinement, who were treated as vagabonds, or likely to become so, and who having been taken up in their childhood, had no knowledge of their parents or origin. Some of them had marks of wounds on their persons, but were ignorant how they had been inflicted. They had, no doubt, been made in their infancy. The opportunity of employing these persons, who had not acquired a single social idea, has been suffered to pass by; they are now unfit for any purpose.”—“Ah!” exclaimed the Emperor, “this is civil war and its hideous train; its inevitable consequences and its certain fruits! If some leaders make fortunes, and extricate themselves from danger, the dregs of the population are always trodden under foot, and become the victims of every calamity!”
“With respect to other matters, I found in the aggregate of these establishments a considerable number of persons who, I was told, whether right or wrong, were prisoners of state, and were kept in custody by order of the high, the intermediate, or the low, police.
“I listened to all those prisoners, I heard their complaints, and received their petitions, certainly, without any engagement on my part; for I had no right to contract any; and besides, I was perfectly aware that, having heard their testimony only, I could not attach guilt to any person. With the exception, however, of some notorious villains, they did not really, in general, deserve more at farthest than the common punishments of the correctional police.
“I found among them, in the prisons of Rennes, a boy between twelve and fourteen, who had, when only a few months old, been taken with a band of Chauffeurs. They had been all executed, and the boy had remained there ever since, without any decision on his case. His moral capabilities may be easily appreciated. He never saw, knew, or heard any but villains; they were the only kind of people of whose existence he was able to form an idea.
“At Mont Saint-Michel, a woman, whose name I have forgotten, particularly attracted my attention. She had rather a pretty face, pleasing manners, and a modest deportment. She had been imprisoned fourteen years, having taken a very active part in the troubles of La Vendée, and constantly accompanied her husband, who was the chief of a battalion of insurgents, and whom she succeeded, after his death, in the command. The wretchedness she suffered, and the tears she shed, had sensibly impaired her charms. I assumed a severe air during the recital of her misfortunes, but it was put on for the purpose of concealing the emotions which she excited. She had, by the kindness of her manners and her other qualifications, acquired a kind of empire over the vulgar and depraved women that were about her. She had devoted herself to the care of the sick; the prison infirmary was entrusted to her, and she was beloved by every one.
“With the exception of that woman, a few priests, and two or three old Chouan spies, the rest exhibited but a filthy compound of disgusting or extravagant depravity.
“I met with a married man, possessing an annual income of 15,000 livres, evidently confined in consequence of his wife’s intrigues, after the manner of the ancient lettres de cachet; and with prostitutes, who assured me they were detained, not as a punishment for the indiscriminate profusion of their favours, but out of spite at their want of complaisance for a single person. They told me lies, or they did not; but in either case ought they to be honoured with the title of prisoners of state, to be maintained at the expense of two francs a day, and contribute to render the government odious and ridiculous? Finally, I met with an unhappy man in a town of Belgium, who had married one of those girls for whom the municipalities provide marriage portions on great occasions. He was imprisoned on a charge of having stolen the portion, because he had neglected to earn it. He was positively required to discharge that important debt, and he as positively refused. He was, perhaps, required to do what was absolutely impossible for him.
“Immediately upon my return to Paris, I called on M. Réal, prefect of police of the district I had just visited. I considered it my duty, I said, to communicate to him, in a friendly manner, the result of my observations. I must do him justice; for whether he was far from having a bad heart, whether he was impressed with my plain dealing, or affected perhaps, Sire, by the magic influence of your uniform, he thanked me, observed that I was doing him a real service, and assured me that he would take immediate steps for relieving and redressing, such were his words, the cases I had laid before him. Meeting him, however, a few days afterwards at an assembly, he said, with apparent grief, ‘That is an unfortunate business, and very unfavourable to your Amazon (he alluded to General Mallet’s rash enterprise), which I thought myself capable of doing a few days ago of my own accord. I cannot now pretend to undertake it without an order from a superior quarter.’—I do not know how the thing ended.”
The Emperor dwelt some time on the abuses I had pointed out, and then concluded: “In the first place, in order to proceed regularly, it was incumbent upon you to ascertain whether your information was well founded, and to hear the evidence against the persons accused; and then it must be frankly admitted that abuses are inherent in every human establishment. You see that almost every thing, of which you complain, is done by the very persons who were expressly entrusted with the means of prevention. Can a remedy be provided, when it is impossible to see what passes every where? There is, as it were, a net spread over the low places, which envelops the lower classes. A mesh must be broken and discovered by a fortunate observer like you, before any thing of the matter is known in the upper regions. Accordingly, one of my dreams would have been, when the grand events of war were completely terminated, and I returned to the interior in tranquillity and at ease, to look out for half a dozen, or a dozen, of real philanthropists, of those worthy men who live but to do good. I should have distributed them through the empire, which they should have secretly inspected for the purpose of making their report to me. They would have been spies of virtue! They should have addressed themselves directly to me, and should have been my confessors, my spiritual guides, and my decisions with them should have been my good works done in secret. My grand occupation, when at full leisure, and at the height of my power, would have been the amelioration of every class of society. I should have descended to the details of individual comfort; and, had I found no motive for that conduct in my natural disposition, I should have been actuated by the spirit of calculation; for, after the acquisition of so much glory, what other means would have been left me to make any addition to it? It was because I was well aware that that swarm of abuses necessarily existed, because I wished for the preservation of my subjects, and was desirous of throwing every impediment in the way of subordinate and intermediate tyranny, that I conceived my system of state prisons, adapted to any crisis that might occur.”—“Yes, Sire, but it was far from being well received in our saloons, and contributed not a little to make you unpopular. An outcry was every where raised against the new bastiles, against the renewal of lettres de cachet.”—“I know it very well.” said the Emperor, “the outcry was echoed by all Europe, and rendered me odious. And yet, observe how powerful was the influence of words, envenomed by perfidy! The whole of the discontent was principally occasioned by the preposterous title of my decree, which escaped me from distraction, or some other cause; for, in the main, I contend that the law itself was an eminent service, and rendered individual liberty more complete and certain in France than in any other country of Europe.
“Considering the crisis from which we had emerged, the factions by which we had been divided, and the plots which had been laid, and were still contriving, imprisonment became indispensable. It was, in fact, a benefit; for it superseded the scaffold. But I was desirous of sanctioning it by legal enactments, and of placing it beyond the reach of caprice, of arbitrary power, of hatred, and of vengeance. Nobody, according to my law, could be imprisoned and detained as a prisoner of state, without the decision of my privy council, which consisted of sixteen persons; the first, the most independent and most distinguished characters of the state. What unworthy feeling would have dared to expose itself to the detection of such a tribunal? Had I not voluntarily deprived myself of the power of consigning individuals to prison? No man could be detained beyond a year, without a fresh decision of the Privy-Council, and four votes out of sixteen were sufficient to effect his release. Two councillors of state were bound to attend to the statements of the prisoners, and became from that moment their zealous advocates with the Privy Council. These prisoners were also under the protection of the Committee of individual liberty, appointed by the Senate, which was the object of public derision, merely because it made no parade of its labours and their results. Its services, however, were great; for it would argue a defective knowledge of mankind to suppose that Senators, who had nothing to expect from ministers, and who were their equals in rank, would not make use of their prerogative to oppose and attack them, whenever the importance of the case called for their interference. It must also be considered that I had assigned the superintendence of the prisoners, and of the police of the prisons, to the tribunals, which, from that instant, paralyzed the exercise of every kind of arbitrary authority by the other branches of administration and their numerous subordinate agents. After such precautions, I do not hesitate to maintain that civil liberty was as effectually secured by that law in France as it could possibly be. The public misconceived, or pretended to misconceive, that truth, for we Frenchmen must murmur at every thing and on every occasion.
“The fact is, that at the time of my downfal the state prisons scarcely contained 250 persons, and I found 9000 in them, when I became Consul. It will appear, from the list of those who were imprisoned, and upon an examination into the causes and motives of their confinement, that almost every one of them deserved death, and would have been sentenced to it by regular process of law; and it consequently follows that their imprisonment was, on my part, a benefit conferred upon them. Why is there nothing published against me on this subject at present? Where are the serious grievances to be found with which I am reproached? There are none in reality. If some of the prisoners afterwards made a merit of their sufferings with the King, on account of their exertions in his favour, did they not by that proceeding pronounce their own sentence and attest my justice? For what may seem a virtuous action in the King’s eye was incontestably a crime under me; and it was only because I was repugnant to the shedding of blood on account of political crimes, and because such trials would have but tended to the continuance of commotion and perplexity in the heart of the country, that I commuted the punishment to mere imprisonment.
“I repeat it, the French were, at my era, the freest people of all Europe, without even excepting the English; for, in England, if any extreme danger causes the suspension of the Habeas Corpus act, every individual may be sent to prison at the mere will of ministers, who are not called upon to justify their motives, or to account for their conduct. My law had very different limits.” He concluded with saying;—“And then, at last, if, in spite of my good intention, and notwithstanding my utmost care, all that you have just said, and no doubt, many other things, were well founded, it must not still be considered so easy a task as it is thought to create a beneficial establishment for a nation. It is a remarkable circumstance that the countries which have been separated from us have regretted the laws with which I governed them. This is an homage paid to their superiority. The real, the only, mode of passing a decisive sentence upon me, with regard to their defects, would be to shew the existence of a better code in any other country. New times are drawing near, it will be seen,” &c.
About five o’clock, I was told by the Grand Marshal, who had just left the Emperor, that he wished to see me. He had staid at home the whole of the day. I found him engaged in examining the new billiard-table. He was apprehensive that the weather was too damp for walking, and he played at chess until dinner. In the evening, he read us Crebillon’s Atrée et Thyeste. That piece seemed horrible to us; we found it disgusting, and by no means of a tragic cast. The Emperor could not finish it.