“Why, if he had had as many lives as some people say a cat has, he seemed to take the very way to lose them all, and yet he always escaped.”
“A celebrated writer has said, ‘It is impossible to survey the rapid energy of Napoleon, his alert transitions from enemy to enemy, his fearless assaults on vastly superior numbers, his unwearied resolution and exhaustless invention, without the highest admiration which can attend on a master of warfare. But it is equally impossible to suppress astonishment and indignation, in following, or rather attempting to follow, the threads of obstinacy, duplicity, pride, and perfidy, which during the same period complicated, without strengthening, the tissue of his negotiations.’ It is only when we fix our eyes on the battles and marches of his wonderful campaigns, that we can hesitate to echo the adage: ‘Whom God hath doomed to destruction he first deprives of reason.’”
“Well! he is dead now, and that is a good thing. If he were Emperor of France now, we should be sure to have as much war as ever.”
“Buonaparte’s campaign in Russia was a most disastrous one, and led the way to his abdication; but it was the battle of Waterloo that deprived him of his throne for ever. This hurled him headlong from the pinnacle of his glory, proclaiming, as with the voice of a mighty trumpet, through the world, that the minion of ambition shall be trampled in the dust, and that the splendour of temporary triumph shall only increase the greatness of his fall. He was exiled to St. Helena, where, after living near six years, he expired, and was buried. His body was, however, a short time ago, removed to France, and interred, with great splendour, in the Church of the Invalids, at Paris.”
“Oh! more or less than man. In high or low,
Battling with nations, flying from the field!
Now making monarchs’ necks thy footstool! now,
More than thy meanest soldier, taught to yield.
An empire thou would’st crush, command, rebuild,
But govern not thy pettiest passion; nor,