World's Best Histories — Volume 7: France

by François Guizot; Madame de Witt

"Napoleon."

The Pope had determined to set out, being convinced that resistance was impossible, and harassed by a serious inquietude the importance of which was afterwards confirmed, and by the vague fears of a sickly old man. He was offended by the contemptuous terms which the foreign ambassadors applied to the condescension of him whom they called the "French emperor's chaplain." His Italian subtilty was disturbed, and his natural kindness chafed by the dryness of the emperor's message. "This is poison which you have brought to me," said he to General Caffarelli, after reading Napoleon's letter. He set out nevertheless, obstinately refusing to take with him Cardinal Consalvi, in whose hands he had placed his abdication. "If they keep me here," said he one day in Paris, "they will find that they only have in their power a wretched monk called Barnabus Chiaramonti."

The Pope's departure had been much hastened by the repeated urgency of the emperor, and his journey was so also. The time for the ceremony was fixed without consulting him. As Cardinal Consalvi said in his Memoirs, "they made the holy father gallop from Rome to Paris like an almoner summoned by his master to say mass."

On the 25th November, 1804, about mid-day, the emperor was hunting in the forest of Fontainebleau, and went towards Croix St. Herem at the moment when the Pope's carriage just reached that spot. The carriage stopped, and "the holy father stepped out in his white dress; as the road was muddy he could not soil his silk stockings by stepping on the ground." He got out, however, whilst the emperor, leaping from his horse, advanced to him and embraced him. The meeting had been skilfully arranged in order that the new master of France might be spared the annoyance of a deference which he considered excessive. Both doors of the emperor's carriage were opened at once, and Napoleon entering by the right, Pius VII. naturally took the left. The empress and imperial family were waiting for the Pope at the great portico of the palace. The emperor seemed triumphant. The Pope was full of emotion, affected by the kind reception he had met with by the people during his journey. "I have passed through a population all on their knees," said he.

The Emperor Napoleon was not on his knees, and Pius VII. was even sensible of it. Several questions had remained undecided before the holy father's departure for France: Napoleon had resolutely disposed of them, and yielded only on one point. Still bandied about between his own uncertainty, the love which he still felt for the Empress Josephine, the intrigues of her family, who were opposed to him, and the passionate longing to have a son to inherit his crown, he had been on the point of demanding a divorce a few days previously, but on the empress making the Pope her confidant their union was confirmed, and on the eve of the coronation, with the greatest secrecy, the religious marriage of the emperor with Josephine was celebrated by Cardinal Fesch. Pius VII. declared that it was impossible for him to proceed with the ceremony of the double consecration so long as that act of reparation remained unaccomplished.

Those who had charge of the arrangements for the great spectacle, the Abbé Bernier, lately appointed Bishop of Orleans, and the Arch-chancellor Cambacérès, had frequently discussed the ceremonial of the coronation properly so-called. In France the peers, in Italy the bishops, formerly held the crown above the head of the sovereign, who then received it from the hands of the pontiff. "All the French emperors, all those of Germany who have been consecrated by the popes were at the same crowned by them. The holy father, in order to decide as to the journey, must receive from Paris the assurance that in this case there will be no innovation contrary to the honor and dignity of the sovereign pontiff." At Rome the replies bad been vague; at Paris the emperor had calmed the zeal and inquietude of his servants. "I shall arrange that myself," said he. On the 2nd December, 1804, the ceremony of consecration took place according to the solemn ceremonial, and the emperor, after being anointed with the holy oil, held out his hand towards the crown which the Pope had just taken from the altar. Pius VII., completely taken by surprise, made no resistance, and Napoleon himself placing on his head the emblem of sovereign power, then crowned with his own hands the empress, who was in tears kneeling before him. Mounting his throne whilst his brothers held up his robe, being compelled to that act of humility by his imperious will, and their sisters bore the train of the empress, the Pope pronounced the solemn formula, "Vivat in aeternum Augustus!" And under the very eyes of the holy pontiff, the Emperor Napoleon took the oath in the form which had been so much opposed in Rome. His victory was complete: he triumphed over the old revolutionary prejudices, whilst at the same time confirming in Notre Dame, in spite of the scruples of the court of Rome, the principles of liberty acquired by the French Revolution.

When the Pope, sad and discouraged, at last set out for Rome, 4th April, 1805, he had obtained none of the favors which he thought he had a right to expect. The emperor was inflexible on the question of the "organic articles," making no concession as to their application. The statement presented by the Pope and drawn up by Cardinal Antonelli, the most enthusiastic of his councillors, was on Napoleon's orders replied to by Portalis, who was skilful in concealing the refusal under the grave phraseology of legal and Christian language. Urged to extremity, Pius VII. applied to the emperor himself to ask the restoration of the Legations. Talleyrand wrote in reply, "France has very dearly bought the power which she enjoys. It is not in the emperor's power to take anything from an empire which is the fruit of ten years' war and bloodshed, continued with an admirable courage and accompanied with the most unhappy agitation and an unexampled constancy. It is still less in his power to diminish the territory of a foreign state which, by entrusting him with the care of governing, had laid upon him the duty of protecting it." A few sentences added by the emperor to the diplomatic document left room for vague hopes of certain consolations. The illusions of Pius VII. began to disappear; without compensation or recompense, he had worked to consolidate for a short time the throne of the conqueror; the conquests which he had won were not of this world; the complete submission of the constitutional bishops, and the genuine respect with which the French people constantly surrounded him were due to the personal veneration which he inspired. When at last he crossed the mountains the Emperor Napoleon had reached Italy before him, as if to indicate more emphatically the condescension which the sovereign pontiff had shown to him. It was at Turin that he finally took leave of Pius VII., letting him return to Rome while he took in the cathedral of Milan the iron crown of the Lombard kings, and placed it on his head before an immense crowd of on-lookers, using the traditional words of the ancient Lombard monarchy, "God has given it me, who dare touch it?"

The Cisalpine Republic no longer existed, and the Emperor of the French, King of Italy, boasted of the moderation he had evinced in keeping the two crowns apart. At one time he intended raising his brother Joseph to the new throne, but the latter was afraid of compromising his right to succeed to the imperial crown. Louis Bonaparte refused to govern in the name of the child which he had by Hortense de Beauharnais, daughter of the Empress Josephine by her first marriage, whom he had married with regret. Compelled to unite, on his own head, the two crowns of France and Italy, Napoleon entrusted the care of the government to his son-in-law, Eugène de Beauharnais. His protestations of respect for the independence of the allied peoples did not prevent his annexing to the kingdom of Italy the territory of Genoa, whilst forming the domains of Lucca and Piombino into a principality in favor of his eldest sister, Elisa Baciocchi. The storm was already threatening the feeble government of Naples: the queen, obsequious in her alarm, had sent to Milan an ambassador to congratulate the emperor and king. "Tell your queen," exclaimed Napoleon, "that her intrigues are known to me, and that her children will curse her memory, for I shall not leave in her kingdom enough of land to build her tomb upon."

So much brilliance and severity in the display of his sovereign power proved of service to the irreconcilable enemies who were stirring up Europe against the already uncontrollable ambition of the new emperor. Pitt had already returned to power (19th May, 1804), though with less support in Parliament, and very infirm in health. He felt himself sustained by the breath of public opinion, and by the firm confidence of the mass of the nation. In this great duel, of which he was not to see the end, it was the consolation, as well as the honor of the illustrious minister, that he had constantly defended the principles of true liberty, as well as European independence, against the encroachments and contagion of the revolutionary powers, and those of anarchy or absolutism.

It was in the name of the same principles that the young Emperor of Russia then proposed to Europe a mediation which was soon to end in a coalition. Generously chimerical in his inexperience, Alexander dreamt of a general rearrangement of Europe, which was to secure forever the peace of every nation. Poland itself was to be reconstituted, Italy and Germany to recover their independence, and a new code of the rights of nations on sea and land was to regulate the relations of civilized states. Nowosiltzoff was entrusted to discuss this scheme with Pitt.