At the period of the Revolution, the Courts of Spain and Naples still imitated the ceremony and grandeur of Louis XIV., mingled with the pomp and exaggeration of the Castilians and Moors. They were insipid and ridiculous. The court of St. Petersburg had assumed the tone and forms of the drawing-room; that of Vienna had become quite citizen-like; and there no longer remained any vestige of the wit, the grace, and the good taste of the Court of Versailles.
When, therefore, Napoleon attained the sovereign power, he found a clear road before him, and he had an opportunity of forming a Court according to his own taste. He was desirous of adopting a rational medium by accommodating the dignity of the throne to modern customs, and, particularly, by making the creation of a Court contribute to improve the manners of the great, and promote the industry of the mass of the people. It certainly was no easy matter to re-construct a throne on the very spot where a reigning monarch had been judicially executed, and where the people had constitutionally sworn hatred to kings. It was not easy to restore dignities, titles, and decorations, among a people who for the space of fifteen years had waged a war of proscription against them. Napoleon, however, who seemed always to possess the power of effecting what he wished, perhaps because he had the art of wishing for what was just and proper, after a great struggle, surmounted all these difficulties. When he became Emperor, he created a class of nobility, and formed a Court. Victory seemed all on a sudden to do her utmost to consolidate and shed a lustre over this new order of things. All Europe acknowledged the Emperor; and at one period it might have been said that all the Courts of the Continent had flocked to Paris to add to the splendour of the Tuileries, which was the most brilliant and numerous Court ever seen. There was a continued series of parties, balls, and entertainments; and the Court was always distinguished for extraordinary magnificence and grandeur. The person of the sovereign was alone remarkable for extreme simplicity, which, indeed, was a characteristic that served to distinguish him amidst the surrounding splendour. He encouraged all this magnificence, he said, from motives of policy, and not because it accorded with his own taste. It was calculated to encourage manufactures and national industry. The ceremonies and festivities which took place on the marriage of the Empress and the birth of the King of Rome, far surpassed any which had preceded them, and probably will never again be equalled.
The Emperor endeavoured to establish, in his foreign relations, every thing that was calculated to place him in harmony with the other Courts of Europe; but at home he constantly tried to adapt old forms to new manners.
He established the levers and couchers of the old kings of France; but with him they were merely nominal, and did not exist in reality, as in former times. Instead of being occupied in the most minute and indelicate details of the toilet, these hours under the Emperor were, in fact, appropriated to receiving in the morning and dismissing in the evening, such persons of his household as had to receive orders directly from him, and who were privileged to pay their court to him at those times.
The Emperor also established special presentations to his person and admission to his Court: but instead of making noble birth the only means of securing these honours, the title for obtaining them was founded solely on the combined bases of fortune, influence, and public services.
Napoleon, moreover, created titles, the qualifications for which were nearly similar to those of the old feudal system. These titles, however, possessed no real value, and were established for an object purely national. Those which were unaccompanied by any prerogatives or privileges might be enjoyed by persons of any rank or profession, and were bestowed as rewards for all kinds of services. The Emperor observed that abroad they had the useful effect of appearing to be an approximation to the old manners of Europe, while at the same time they served as a toy for amusing the vanities of many individuals at home; “for,” said he, “how many superior men are children oftener than once a day!”
The Emperor revived decorations of honour, and distributed crosses and ribands. But instead of confining them to particular and exclusive classes, he extended them to society in general as rewards for every kind of talent and public service. By a happy privilege, perhaps peculiar to Napoleon, it happened that the value of these honours was enhanced in proportion to the number distributed. He estimated that he had conferred about 25,000 decorations of the Legion of Honour; and the desire to obtain the honour, he said, increased until it became a kind of mania.
After the battle of Wagram, he sent the decoration of the Legion of Honour to the Archduke Charles, and, by a refinement in compliment, peculiar to Napoleon, he sent him merely the silver cross, which was worn by the private soldiers.
The Emperor said that it was only by acting strictly and voluntarily in conformity with these maxims that he had become the real national monarch; and an adherence to the same course would have rendered the fourth dynasty the truly constitutional one. Of these facts, said he, the people of the lowest rank frequently evinced an instinctive knowledge.
The Emperor related the following anecdote:—On returning from his coronation in Italy, as he approached the environs of Lyons, he found all the population assembled on the roads to see him pass, and he took a fancy to ascend the hill of Tarare alone. He gave orders that nobody should follow him, and, mingling with the crowd, he accosted an old woman, and asked what all the bustle was about. She replied, that the Emperor was expected. After some little conversation he said to her: “My good woman, formerly you had the tyrant Capet; now you have the tyrant Napoleon; what have you gained by the change?” The force of this argument disconcerted the old woman for a moment; but she immediately recollected herself, and replied, “Pardon me, sir, there is a great difference. We ourselves chose this one; but we got the other by chance.” “The old woman was right,” said the Emperor, “and she exhibited more instinctive good sense than many men who are possessed of great information and talent.”