To this magnanimous application for peace, the King of England did not judge it proper to return any personal answer. Lord Grenville replied in a letter full of most bitter recriminations. And all France was exasperated by the insulting declaration that if France really desired peace, "The best and most natural pledge of its reality and permanence, would be the restoration of that line of princes which, for so many centuries maintained the French nation in prosperity at home, and consideration and respect abroad. Such an event would at once remove, and will at any time remove all obstacles in the way of negotiation or peace."
This was, indeed, an irritating response to Napoleon's pacific appeal. He, however, with great dignity and moderation, replied through his minister, M. Talleyrand, in the following terms:
"So far from having provoked the war, France, from the commencement of the revolution, solemnly proclaimed her love of peace, her disinclination for conquests, and her respect for the independence of all governments. And it is not to be doubted, that occupied at that time entirely with her own internal affairs, she would have avoided taking any part in those of Europe, and would have remained faithful to her declarations.
"But from an opposite disposition, as soon as the French revolution had broken out, almost all Europe entered into a league for its destruction. The aggression was real long before it was public. Internal resistance was excited; the enemies of the revolution were favorably received, their extravagant declamations were supported, the French nation was insulted in the person of its agents, and England particularly set this example, by the dismissal of the minister of the Republic. Finally, France was attacked in her independence, her honor, and her safety, long before war was declared.
"It is to these projects of dismemberment, subjection, and dissolution, that France has a right to impute the evils which she has suffered, and those which have afflicted Europe. Assailed on all sides, the Republic could not but equally extend the efforts of her defense. And it is only for the maintenance of her own independence, that she has called into requisition her own strength and the courage of her citizens. If in the midst of the critical circumstances which the revolution and the war have brought on, France has not always shown as much moderation as the nation has shown courage, it must be imputed to the fatal and persevering animosity with which the resources of England have been lavished to accomplish the ruin of France.
"But if the wishes of his Britannic majesty are in unison with those of the French Republic, for the re-establishment of peace, why, instead of attempting apologies for the war, should not attention be directed to the means of terminating it. It can not be doubted that his Britannic Majesty must recognize the right of nations to choose their form of government, since it is from this right that he holds his crown. But the First Consul can not comprehend how, after admitting this fundamental principle, upon which rests the existence of political societies, his Majesty could annex insinuations, which tend to an interference with the internal affairs of the Republic. Such interference is no less injurious to the French nation and its government, than it would be to England and his Majesty, if an invitation were held out, in form of a return to that republican form of government which England adopted about the middle of the last century, or an exhortation to recall to the throne that family whom their birth had placed there, and whom a revolution had compelled to descend from it."
There was no possibility of parrying these home thrusts. Lord Grenville consequently entirely lost his temper. Replying in a note even more angry and bitter than the first, he declared that England was fighting for the security of all governments against French Jacobinism, and that hostilities would be immediately urged on anew without any relaxation. Napoleon was not at all disappointed or disheartened at the result of this correspondence. He earnestly desired peace. But he was not afraid of war. Conscious of the principle, "thrice is he armed who hath his quarrel just," he was happy in the conviction that the sympathies of impartial men in all nations would be with him. He knew that the arrogant tone assumed by England, would unite France as one man, in determined and undying resistance. "The answer," said he, "filled me with satisfaction. It could not have been more favorable. England wants war. She shall have it. Yes! yes! war to the death."
The throne of the King of England, the opulence of her bishops, and the enormous estates of her nobles were perhaps dependent upon the issue of this conflict. The demolition of all exclusive privileges, and the establishment of perfect equality of rights among all classes of men in France, must have shaken the throne, the aristocracy, and the hierarchy of England, with earthquake power. The government of England was mainly in the hands of the king, the bishops, and the lords. Their all was at stake. In a temptation so sore, frail human nature must not be too severely censured. For nearly ten years, the princes of France had been wandering houseless fugitives over Europe. The nobles of France, ejected from their castles, with their estates confiscated, were beggars in all lands. Bishops who had been wrapped in ermine, and who had rolled in chariots of splendor, were glad to warm their shivering limbs by the fire of the peasant, and to satiate their hunger with his black bread. To king, and bishop, and noble, in England, this was a fearful warning. It seemed to be necessary for their salvation to prevent all friendly intercourse between England and France, to hold up the principles of the French Revolution to execration, and above all, to excite, if possible, the detestation of the people of England, against Napoleon, the child and the champion of popular rights. Napoleon was the great foe to be feared, for with his resplendent genius he was enthroning himself in the hearts of the people of all lands.
But no impartial man, in either hemisphere, can question that the right was with Napoleon. It was not the duty of the thirty millions of France to ask permission of the fifteen millions of England to modify their government. The kings of Europe, led by England, had combined to force with the bayonet, upon France, a rejected and an execrated dynasty. The inexperienced Republic, distracted and impoverished by these terrific blows, was fast falling to ruin. The people invested Napoleon with almost dictatorial powers for their rescue. It was their only hope. Napoleon, though conscious of strength, in the name of bleeding humanity, pleaded for peace. His advances were met with contumely and scorn, and the trumpet notes of defiant hosts rang from the Thames to the Danube. The ports of France were blockaded by England's invincible fleet, demolishing the feeble navy of the Republic, and bombarding her cities. An army of three hundred thousand men pressed upon the frontiers of France, threatening a triumphant march to her capital, there to compel, by bayonet and bomb-shell, the French people to receive a Bourbon for their king. There was no alternative left to Napoleon but to defend his country. Most nobly he did it.
The correspondence with the British government, which redounds so much to the honor of Napoleon, vastly multiplied his friends among the masses of the people in England, and roused in parliament, a very formidable opposition to the measures of government. This opposition was headed by Fox, Sheridan, Lord Erskine, the Duke of Bedford, and Lord Holland. They did not adopt the atrocious maxim, "Our country—right or wrong," but rather the ennobling principle "Our country—when in the wrong, we will try to put her right." Never, in the history of the world, has there been a more spirited or a more eloquent opposition than this question elicited. Fox, the rival of Pitt, and the profound admirer of Napoleon, was the most prominent leader of this opposition. Napoleon, with his laconic and graphic eloquence, thus describes the antagonistic English statesmen. "In Fox, the heart warmed the genius. In Pitt the genius withered the heart."