Generous support was accorded to the savants who were desirous of exploring the artistic and literary treasures of Egypt and Mesopotamia. It has been affirmed by the biographer of Monge that the enthusiasm of this celebrated physicist first awakened Bonaparte's desire for the eastern expedition; but this seems to have been aroused earlier by Volney, who saw a good deal of Bonaparte in 1791. In truth, the desire to wrest the secrets of learning from the mysterious East seems always to have spurred on his keenly inquisitive nature. During the winter months of 1797-8 he attended the chemical lectures of the renowned Berthollet; and it was no perfunctory choice which selected him for the place in the famous institute left vacant by the exile of Carnot. The manner in which he now signed his orders and proclamations—Member of the Institute, General in Chief of the Army of the East—showed his determination to banish from the life of France that affectation of boorish ignorance by which the Terrorists had rendered themselves uniquely odious.
After long delays, caused by contrary winds, the armada set sail from Toulon. Along with the convoys from Marseilles, Genoa, and Civita Vecchia, it finally reached the grand total of 13 ships of the line, 7 frigates, several gunboats, and nearly 300 transports of various sizes, conveying 35,000 troops. Admiral Brueys was the admiral, but acting under Bonaparte. Of the generals whom the commander-in-chief took with him, the highest in command were the divisional generals Kléber, Desaix, Bon, Menou, Reynier, for the infantry: under them served 14 generals, a few of whom, as Marmont, were to achieve a wider fame. The cavalry was commanded by the stalwart mulatto, General Alexandre Dumas, under whom served Leclerc, the husband of Pauline Bonaparte, along with two men destined to world-wide renown, Murat and Davoust. The artillery was commanded by Dommartin, the engineers by Caffarelli: and the heroic Lannes was quarter-master general.
The armada appeared off Malta without meeting with any incident. This island was held by the Knights of St. John, the last of those companies of Christian warriors who had once waged war on the infidels in Palestine. Their courage had evaporated in luxurious ease, and their discipline was a prey to intestine schisms and to the intrigues carried on with the French Knights of the Order. A French fleet had appeared off Valetta in the month of March in the hope of effecting a surprise; but the admiral, Brueys, judging the effort too hazardous, sent an awkward explanation, which only served to throw the knights into the arms of Russia. One of the chivalrous dreams of the Czar Paul was that of spreading his influence in the Mediterranean by a treaty with this Order. It gratified his crusading ardour and promised to Russia a naval base for the partition of Turkey which was then being discussed with Austria: to secure the control of the island, Russia was about to expend 400,000 roubles, when Bonaparte anticipated Muscovite designs by a prompt seizure.[98] An excuse was easily found for a rupture with the Order: some companies of troops were disembarked, and hostilities commenced.
Secure within their mighty walls, the knights might have held the intruders at bay, had they not been divided by internal disputes: the French knights refused to fight against their countrymen; and a revolt of the native Maltese, long restless under the yoke of the Order, now helped to bring the Grand Master to a surrender. The evidence of the English consul, Mr. Williams, seems to show that the discontent of the natives was even more potent than the influence of French gold in bringing about this result.[99] At any rate, one of the strongest places in Europe admitted a French garrison, after so tame a defence that General Caffarelli, on viewing the fortifications, remarked to Bonaparte: "Upon my word, general, it is lucky there was some one in the town to open the gates to us."
During his stay of seven days at Malta, Bonaparte revealed the vigour of those organizing powers for which the half of Europe was soon to present all too small an arena. He abolished the Order, pensioning off those French knights who had been serviceable: he abolished the religious houses and confiscated their domains to the service of the new government: he established a governmental commission acting under a military governor: he continued provisionally the existing taxes, and provided for the imposition of customs, excise, and octroi dues: he prepared the way for the improvement of the streets, the erection of fountains, the reorganization of the hospitals and the post office. To the university he gave special attention, rearranging the curriculum on the model of the more advanced écoles centrales of France, but inclining the studies severely to the exact sciences and the useful arts. On all sides he left the imprint of his practical mind, that viewed life as a game at chess, whence bishops and knights were carefully banished, and wherein nothing was left but the heavy pieces and subservient pawns.
After dragging Malta out of its mediaeval calm and plunging it into the full swirl of modern progress, Bonaparte set sail for Egypt. His exchequer was the richer by all the gold and silver, whether in bullion or in vessels, discoverable in the treasury of Malta or in the Church of St. John. Fortunately, the silver gates of this church had been coloured over, and thus escaped the fate of the other treasures.[100] On the voyage to Alexandria he studied the library of books which he had requested Bourrienne to purchase for him. The composition of this library is of interest as showing the strong trend of his thoughts towards history, though at a later date he was careful to limit its study in the university and schools which he founded. He had with him 125 volumes of historical works, among which the translations of Thucydides, Plutarch, Tacitus, and Livy represented the life of the ancient world, while in modern life he concentrated his attention chiefly on the manners and institutions of peoples and the memoirs of great generals—as Turenne, Condé, Luxembourg, Saxe, Marlborough, Eugène, and Charles XII. Of the poets he selected the so-called Ossian, Tasso, Ariosto, Homer, Virgil, and the masterpieces of the French theatre; but he especially affected the turgid and declamatory style of Ossian. In romance, English literature was strongly represented by forty volumes of novels, of course in translations. Besides a few works on arts and sciences, he also had with him twelve volumes of "Barclay's Geography," and three volumes of "Cook's Voyages," which show that his thoughts extended to the antipodes; and under the heading of Politics he included the Bible, the Koran, the Vedas, a Mythology, and Montesquieu's "Esprit des Lois"! The composition and classification of this library are equally suggestive. Bonaparte carefully searched out the weak places of the organism which he was about to attack—in the present campaign, Egypt and the British Empire. The climate and natural products, the genius of its writers and the spirit of its religion—nothing came amiss to his voracious intellect, which assimilated the most diverse materials and pressed them all into his service. Greek mythology provided allusions for the adornment of his proclamations, the Koran would dictate his behaviour towards the Moslems, and the Bible was to be his guide-book concerning the Druses and Armenians. All three were therefore grouped together under the head of Politics.
And this, on the whole, fairly well represents his mental attitude towards religion: at least, it was his work-a-day attitude. There were moments, it is true, when an overpowering sense of the majesty of the universe lifted his whole being far above this petty opportunism: and in those moments, which, in regard to the declaration of character, may surely be held to counterbalance whole months spent in tactical shifts and diplomatic wiles, he was capable of soaring to heights of imaginative reverence. Such an episode, lighting up for us the recesses of his mind, occurred during his voyage to Egypt. The savants on board his ship, "L'Orient," were discussing one of those questions which Bonaparte often propounded, in order that, as arbiter in this contest of wits, he might gauge their mental powers. Mental dexterity, rather than the Socratic pursuit after truth, was the aim of their dialectic; but on one occasion, when religion was being discussed, Bonaparte sounded a deeper note: looking up into the midnight vault of sky, he said to the philosophizing atheists: "Very ingenious, sirs, but who made all that?" As a retort to the tongue-fencers, what could be better? The appeal away from words to the star-studded canopy was irresistible: it affords a signal proof of what Carlyle has finely called his "instinct for nature" and his "ineradicable feeling for reality." This probably was the true man, lying deep under his Moslem shifts and Concordat bargainings.
That there was a tinge of superstition in Bonaparte's nature, such as usually appears in gifted scions of a coast-dwelling family, cannot be denied;[101] but his usual attitude towards religion was that of the political mechanician, not of the devotee, and even while professing the forms of fatalistic belief, he really subordinated them to his own designs. To this profound calculation of the credulity of mankind we may probably refer his allusions to his star. The present writer regards it as almost certain that his star was invoked in order to dazzle the vulgar herd. Indeed, if we may trust Miot de Melito, the First Consul once confessed as much to a circle of friends. "Cæsar," he said, "was right to cite his good fortune and to appear to believe in it. That is a means of acting on the imagination of others without offending anyone's self-love." A strange admission this; what boundless self-confidence it implies that he should have admitted the trickery. The mere acknowledgment of it is a proof that he felt himself so far above the plane of ordinary mortals that, despite the disclosure, he himself would continue to be his own star. For the rest, is it credible that this analyzing genius could ever have seriously adopted the astrologer's creed? Is there anything in his early note-books or later correspondence which warrants such a belief? Do not all his references to his star occur in proclamations and addresses intended for popular consumption?
Certainly Bonaparte's good fortune was conspicuous all through these eastern adventures, and never more so than when he escaped the pursuit of Nelson. The English admiral had divined his aim. Setting all sail, he came almost within sight of the French force near Crete, and he reached Alexandria barely two days before his foes hove in sight. Finding no hostile force there, he doubled back on his course and scoured the seas between Crete, Sicily, and the Morca, until news received from a Turkish official again sent him eastwards. On such trifles does the fate of empires sometimes depend.
Meanwhile events were crowding thick and fast upon Bonaparte. To free himself from the terrible risks which had menaced his force off the Egyptian coast, he landed his troops, 35,000 strong, with all possible expedition at Marabout near Alexandria, and, directing his columns of attack on the walls of that city, captured it by a rush (July 2nd).