Italian Yesterdays, vol. 2

by Mrs. Hugh Fraser

On this last occasion of their meeting at Savona, the diplomatist found Pius VII in a very strange frame of mind. Not by any means inclined to withdraw the concessions he had made in the previous interview with Lebzeltern, but only regretting them bitterly; hoping they might not satisfy Napoleon and so be rejected by him. On Lebzeltern’s presenting for his consideration a written outline of the concessions in question, the Pontiff, after considering them a little while, rose suddenly from his chair and spoke as follows:

“I have made known to you, Lebzeltern, many of my most secret thoughts and sentiments which I would never have entrusted to another living man except my confessor; and I do not regret it, because I am perfectly certain that you will never abuse the confidence I have placed in you. Nevertheless, please bear in mind that I only authorise you to report of me to Napoleon and Metternich what I am now going to tell you, and which is just what you yourself have seen and heard—that I am perfectly resigned to God’s Will regarding me and that I humbly place my cause in His hands. Say that no consideration of any kind shall induce me to disobey my conscience and the Divine law. Tell them that I am calm and serene, and that all I ask of the Emperor—for whom I only hope and pray that he may be granted the grace to make his peace with our holy mother the Church—is that he will allow me the means of communicating freely with the faithful, and that he will no longer deprive them of the services of their father and servant. Tell the Emperor that I entreat him to remember that the glory of this world is in itself no passport to Heaven; that, albeit I yearn with all my heart to be reconciled with him, yet, that I will never be so at the price of my conscience. Assure him very earnestly that I have not the smallest personal feeling against him; that I forgive him with my whole heart all that he has done to me; and that nothing could hurt me more than that he should imagine me capable of harbouring resentments—which in themselves are forbidden by God and have no place either in my heart or in my inclination.”

Presently, among other things, he went on to speak of the private misgivings with which Napoleon’s character inspired him: “Between ourselves, Lebzeltern, I am convinced that Napoleon is not in good faith when he says that he wishes to become reconciled with me.... If only he would let me have some one here, at Savona, to help me in my work, which is really and truly overwhelming; moreover, there is a vast amount of specialist and technical business which I cannot possibly transact by myself without consulting my expert advisers. And, to make matters worse for me, my health and my eyesight are giving out; I do not feel that I shall be able to carry my burden of solitary labour very much longer; besides, it is bad for my temper, which I confess, frankly, I often have great difficulty in curbing.”

Nor is there anything wonderful in this when one remembers the Pope’s situation after being imprisoned nearly a year in the house of the Bishop of Savona, shut off from the Cardinals (of whom the only news he had was that they had been imprisoned and maltreated in French fortresses by order of Napoleon) and from the faithful. Alone with his doubts and difficulties and age and ill-health; and the insidious temptations put before him by the Emperor’s instruments (conscious, some of these, as was Fesch; unconscious, again, as was Lebzeltern)—what is there astonishing or blamable in this “great difficulty” so well and simply confessed by the most benignantly human Barnabo Chiaramonte?

Presently he spoke again, to utter a final warning to Napoleon:

“If Napoleon continues to make war upon religion (even although he does so under the guise of extending to it his hypocritical perfidious protection); if he attempts to have me dragged to Paris; if he goes on spreading the lie of my sacrificing the real interests of the Church to secondary matters and to worldly motives; if he persists in forcing me to more active reprisals, then—I shall have to use the last weapons that remain to me and which would make a stir in the world that he does not yet dream of. The only regret I should have in that case would be that some others—who have been less unkind to me than he—might suffer, too. As to the precise nature of those weapons, it is possible that their effect might be very different from anything you could imagine. But, make your mind easy; have no fear that I shall employ them unless I am absolutely obliged to do so. Do not be afraid of my doing anything precipitately, for I pray constantly for grace and strength sufficient to enable me to carry my cross patiently. But if you only knew the unvarying torment of my nights as well as of my days, Lebzeltern—the unceasing anguish of my solitude—you would not wonder at what must sometimes appear to you incomprehensible inconsistencies in my attitude towards many things—as must have been noticeable in the talks between us!”

And with that he dismissed Lebzeltern, who was as much moved as he; for they now shared the same conviction of the utter emptiness of Napoleon’s professions of a desire for reconciliation.

And, as it proved, the doors of Savona did not open for Pius VII until the next year, 1811—and then only to allow of his deportation to another prison at Fontainebleau, where he was to remain until Napoleon’s downfall. Once only did the Sovereign Pontiff weaken (with none but the purest of good intentions) when, in 1813, he consented, for a moment, to renounce the Temporal Power, in order that he might be allowed to go back to Rome, thence to direct the Church. But in vain, for Napoleon would not let him out of his hands, and Pius VII, perceiving the mistake he had made, announced to all whom it might concern his resumption of the inalienable dominions and Temporal Sovereignty of the Popes. And, in 1814, he returned to his rightful throne in the Vatican amid the rejoicings of his subjects.

But what must have been his reflections in regard to his oppressor during the five years (the exact duration of Napoleon’s crime against him) that were consumed in the terrific expiation of St. Helena? And his awe and amazement at the stupendous vindication of his trust in the providence of Heaven?—for, as the Italian saying has it, “God does not pay wages day by day, but only on Saturdays—and then He pays in full with interest!”

Pius VII’s own revenge on Napoleon took the form of offering safe and honoured homes, and the means to live, to his mother and his entire family after his downfall. Whereby many descendants of the Bonapartes are counted among the Roman nobles at this day.