His self-reliance was his power in the midst of danger and difficulties. He believed God had given him a great part to play in the world’s drama, and he meant to play it well. His plans were almost the inspirations of prophetic foreknowledge.
Napoleon was also the greatest of statesmen. His conversations at St. Helena display his wonderful knowledge of men and governments and laws and administrative legislation. Nowhere else can be found such profound thoughts upon politics, war, sciences, arts, or religion. He has been accused of infidelity. But few declarations of the Divinity of Christ, ever uttered by mortal lips, have equalled in far-reaching apprehension, and also acknowledgment of the divine incomprehensibility of the mystery of the Godhead, as the sayings of Napoleon. Conversing with General Bertrand at St. Helena, Napoleon said:—
“I know men, and I tell you that Jesus Christ is not a man. Superficial minds see a resemblance between Christ and the founders of empires and the gods of other religions. That resemblance does not exist. There is between Christianity and all other religions whatsoever the distance of infinity. Paganism was never accepted as truth by the wise men of Greece, neither by Socrates, Pythagoras, Plato, Anaxagoras, nor Pericles. But on the other side, the loftiest intellects since the advent of Christianity have had faith, a living faith, a practical faith, in the mysteries and doctrines of the Gospel. Paganism is the work of man. What do these gods so boastful know more than other mortals? these legislators, Greek or Roman? this Numa? this Lycurgus? these priests of India or of Memphis? this Confucius? this Mohammed? Absolutely nothing. They have made a perfect chaos of morals. There is not one among them all who has said anything new in reference to our future destiny, to the soul, to the essence of God, to the creation. As for me, I recognize the gods and these great men as beings like myself. They have performed a lofty part in their times, as I have done. Nothing announces them divine. On the contrary, there are numerous resemblances between them and myself,—foibles and errors which ally them to me and to humanity.
“It is not so with Christ. Everything in him astonishes me. His spirit overawes me, and his will confounds me. Between him and whoever else in the world there is no possible term of comparison; his birth, and the history of his life; the profundity of his doctrine, which grapples the mightiest difficulties, and which is of those difficulties the most admirable solution; his Gospel, his apparition, his empire, his march across the ages and the realms,—everything is to me a prodigy, an insoluble mystery, which plunges me into a reverie from which I cannot escape, a mystery which is there before my eyes, a mystery which I can neither deny nor explain. Here I see nothing human.
“Jesus borrowed nothing from our sciences. His religion is a revelation from an intelligence which certainly is not that of man. One can absolutely find nowhere, but in him alone, the imitation or the example of his life. He is not a philosopher, since he advances by miracles, and from the first his disciples worshipped him. He persuades them far more by an appeal to the heart, than by any display of method and of logic. Neither did he impose upon them any preliminary studies or any knowledge of letters. All his religion consists in believing. In fact, the sciences and philosophy avail nothing for salvation. He has nothing to do but with the soul, and to that alone he brings his Gospel. The soul is sufficient for him, as he is sufficient for the soul. I search in vain in history to find a parallel to Jesus Christ, or anything which can approach the Gospel. Neither history, nor humanity, nor the ages, nor nature, can offer me anything with which I am able to compare it or explain it. The more I consider the Gospel, the more I am assured that there is nothing there which is not beyond the march of events, and above the human mind.
“You speak of Cæsar, of Alexander, of their conquests, and of the enthusiasm they enkindled in the hearts of their soldiers; but can you conceive of a dead man making conquests with an army faithful and entirely devoted to his memory? My armies have forgotten me, even while living, as the Carthaginian army forgot Hannibal. Such is our power! A single battle lost crushes us, and adversity scatters our friends.
“Can you conceive of Cæsar, the eternal emperor of the Roman Senate, from the depths of his mausoleum governing the empire, watching over the destinies of Rome? Such is the history of the invasion and conquest of the world by Christianity. Such is the power of the God of the Christians, and such is the perpetual miracle of the progress of the faith and of the government of his Church. Nations pass away, thrones crumble, but the Church remains. In every other existence but that of Christ, how many imperfections! From the first day to the last he is the same, always the same, majestic and simple, infinitely firm and infinitely gentle. Christ proved that he was the Son of the Eternal by his disregard of time. All his doctrines signify one and the same thing,—Eternity.
“The Gospel is not a book; it is a living being, with an action, a power which invades everything that opposes its extension. Behold it upon this table, this Book surpassing all others” (here he solemnly placed his hand upon it); “I never omit to read it, and every day with the same pleasure. Nowhere is to be found such a series of beautiful ideas, admirable moral maxims, which defile like the battalions of a celestial army, and which produce in our soul the same emotion which one experiences in contemplating the infinite expanse of the skies, resplendent in a summer’s night with all the brilliance of the stars. Not only is our mind absorbed; it is controlled, and the soul can never go astray with this Book for its guide. Once master of our spirit, the faithful Gospel loves us. God even is our Friend, our Father, and truly our God.
“What a proof of the divinity of Christ! With an empire so absolute, he has but one single end,—the spiritual amelioration of individuals, the purity of conscience, the union to that which is true, the holiness of the soul. So that Christ’s greatest miracle undoubtedly is the reign of charity.
“Behold the destiny near at hand of him who has been called the great Napoleon! What an abyss between my deep misery and the eternal reign of Christ, which is proclaimed, loved, adored, and which is extending over all the earth. Is this to die? Is it not rather to live? The death of Christ! It is the death of God.” Turning to General Bertrand, “If you do not perceive that Jesus Christ is God, very well; then I did wrong to make you a general.” At length came the last, though to Napoleon most welcome, summons. A few days before his death, he awoke one morning, saying, “I have just seen my good Josephine, but she would not embrace me. She disappeared at the moment when I was about to take her in my arms. She was seated there. It seemed to me that I had seen her yesterday evening. She is not changed. She is still the same, full of devotion to me. She told me that we were about to see each other again, never more to part.”