[10] Of the persons who died in Paris in the year 1800, more than two-fifths expired in the hospitals: ... from this single fact some estimate may be formed of the numbers who were ruined by the revolution.
[11] “The most serious and thinking people among all denominations begin to see something more than ordinary providence in the recent overthrow of state after state, and kingdom after kingdom, upon the continent of Europe. People without any pretensions to religion see a fatality attending almost every state that has hitherto exerted itself against the French empire.” The Gospel Magazine then compares Buonaparte to Cyrus, because having destroyed the persecuting spirit of Romish Babylon, and restored the liberty of religious worship, he had so far laid the foundations of the New Jerusalem. “It is of no avail,” says the writer, “to object to any such character that he is a man of blood, for such was David; and yet as his wars were necessary to bring in the peaceable reign of Solomon, so the present wars, and the manifest destruction of the enemies of truth, may introduce the reign of a greater than Solomon, who shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth.” This sample may suffice, one of many which might be adduced in proof of the text.
[12] Transactions of the Parisian Sanhedrim, p. xiv. 11, 104, 168, 226. There are two Hebrew Odes upon the birth-day of Buonaparte in this volume. Macpherson imitated the Scripture-poetry when he manufactured Ossian; and it is curious to observe, how much more these French Hebrew Odes resemble Macpherson, than either he or they resemble the Biblical poets.
[13] Principe del Paz, not Prince of Peace, as usually translated. The title of Prince of Peace used formerly to be given by the Emperors to the Abbots of Mount Cassino, or assumed by them.—Helyot, 5, 53.
[14] See Burke’s remarks upon this cession in his Letters on a Regicide Peace.—Vol. 8. 281, 8vo. edition.
[15] In the year 1796 Godoy was denounced to the Inquisition by three friars, as being suspected of atheism, he not having confessed or communicated in his proper church for eight years, as having two wives living, and leading a scandalous life with many other women. This was a court intrigue, planned by D. Antonio Despuig, Archbishop of Seville, and afterwards cardinal, and by D. Rafael de Murquez, queen’s confessor, and titular archbishop of Seleucia. The inquisitor-general, Lorenzana (archbishop of Toledo), was afraid to interfere; they assured him that the king would consent to the proceedings when it was shown him that Godoy was an atheist; and Despuig applied to the pope through the nuncio, that Lorenzana might be reproved for his timidity, and enjoined to act. The pope accordingly wrote to the inquisitor-general; his courier was intercepted at Genoa by the French, and Buonaparte sent the letters to Godoy, as a means of consolidating the recent friendship between the Directory and the court of Spain. The two archbishops in consequence were sent out of the kingdom under a pretext of paying a visit of condolence to the pope. These facts are stated by Llorente in his History of the Inquisition (chap. 39.) Llorente had been secretary to that abominable tribunal, and in writing its history, had none of those motives for perverting the truth which influenced him when writing under the name of M. Nellerto.
[16] No additional infamy can possibly be heaped upon Don Manuel Godoy; it ought, however, to be mentioned, that the minion who thus planned the destruction of the kingdom of Portugal, in order to obtain a new principality for himself, was, at this very time, a noble of that kingdom, by the title of Conde de Evora-Monte, and enjoyed a pension from the crown. This was conferred upon him by an Alvara of Feb. 5th, 1797, in which the Queen calls him “My Cousin.”
[17] Azanza and O’Farrill declare that when they came into office as Ferdinand’s ministers, they found no papers concerning it in their office. Cevallos says, that he was entirely ignorant of the transaction: Izquierdo indeed charges him with having approved the treaty in conversation with him, as the most advantageous which had ever been made by Spain; and with having complimented him for obtaining what France had constantly refused, while the Bourbons occupied both thrones. (Nellerto (Llorente), T. iii. p. 80.) But this does not necessarily imply that Cevallos was acquainted with the business while it was in progress. M. de Pradt affirms that Talleyrand only learnt it from Marshal Bessieres, of whom he inquired why the guards were marching towards Spain, and that Bessieres had been informed by one of the persons who signed the treaty. But M. de Pradt adds that Talleyrand immediately apprized the Conde de Lima, then charge d’affaires for Portugal, and that the Count set off instantly to give his government the alarm; this is wholly incredible. M. de Pradt is always a lively, and often a sagacious writer, but not always correct in his assertions. He makes the unaccountable mistake of supposing that the French had already occupied the North of Portugal two years before the treaty was made! (p. 26, 33.)
[18] A Portugueze, who saw their entrance, compares them to the hospital patients between Caldas and Lisbon in a wet day, and in the worst part of the road;—huma enfiada de semimortos pobretoens, verdadeira imagem da conducta das Caldas em hum dia de chuva pelo enfadonho caminho de Espinhaço de Caō. He himself picked up one who, fainting with exhaustion, had fallen upon one of the street-dunghills,—an act of compassion which he afterwards repented of as a crime.—Os Sebastianistas, P. I. p. 1, 2.
[19] The circumstance was noted in the Paris papers, and it was added, that no sooner had the French flag been hoisted, than the elements were calm, and the sun broke forth in all its splendour. This augury could not be current at Lisbon, because the French flag was not hoisted there till ten days after the storm.