II.
Such were the contradictions, perplexities, and duplicity of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte upon the throne, that he was often believed to be a prince reigning at hap-hazard. Indeed, it is said, now that he has left the earth, that the history of his incomprehensible reign will be the most difficult work ever undertaken. This seems to us a mistake, if a distinction be made between the man and the prince, his life and his reign. The man and his life will always seem inextricable, for he used all means that suited his convenience, and in their choice gave preference to no moral rule or principle of honesty; following openly or hiddenly the mutable interest of each day. But the prince and his reign, in spite of apparent contradictions, are easily understood by the simple study of the political end which he invariably proposed to himself.
This end is not hidden. His youthful writings, and the series of his imperial documents, read by the light of the actions of his administration, make it plain. He aimed at reestablishing and consolidating in his dynasty the power of the First Empire, and at the elevation of France to the headship of Europe, reorganized in its territorial divisions according to the law of nationality, and in its institutions in accordance with the forms of Cæsarean democracy.
An author who has read his books, and confronted them with the achievements of his reign, thus sums up the new Napoleonic idea constantly pursued by Louis in his youth, middle life, and old age, in exile, in prison, and on the throne:
"Peoples distributed according to their needs and instincts, belonging each to a self-elected country, provided each with a constitution fixed yet democratic; devoted at their choice to works of civil industry destined to transform the world; Europe, free in her various nations, consolidated almost into a federated republic, with France as its centre; France aggrandized and forming the clasp in the strong chain of free intercourse; universal exhibitions to encourage nations in the exchange of reciprocal visits; European congresses, where governments, laying aside arms, could compose their differences; Paris, the imperial city par excellence, wonderfully embellished, raised to the honors of capital of the world, metropolis of wealth and wisdom, under the wing of the Napoleonic eagle, offering to the two hemispheres the rarest discoveries in science, masterpieces of art, exquisite refinements of luxury and civilization."[18]
Divisum imperium cum Jove Cæsar habet!
Such was the intoxicating dream of the life and reign of Napoleon III., the idea which he believed himself created to carry out—a combination of the designs of Henry IV. and the aspirations of Augustus, mounted on the frail pedestal of the principles of 1789.
In fact, proceeds our author, "Within and without the confines of the Empire, this idea was reduced to two words: reconstruction and reconciliation, based upon the principles of the French Revolution. Here was to be the general synthesis of all external and internal politics in France and Europe: Reconstruction of nations founded on national will within and without; effected by a single instrument—universal suffrage—applied to the determination of the nationality as well as of the sovereign and the government; reconciliation of nations among themselves, and of the divers classes composing them, thanks to an equal satisfaction of the rights and interests of all."[19]
That nothing might be wanting to the enchantment of his fair dream, the young prisoner of Ham contemplated a double mission of giving peace and glory to France. "War was to consolidate peace, imperial battles were to give repose to the world. Thus the famous device, The Empire and Peace, came to bear a sublime significance."[20]
In short, the Napoleonic idea had for its ultimate aim the aggrandizement and European omnipotence of France under the dynasty of the Bonapartes, through the universal means of popular suffrage with plébiscites, forming a basis of a new national and international right, opposed to the old historical right of peoples. The other three principles of territorial compensation, non-intervention and accomplished facts, were special means and passing aids to be used according to opportunity for carrying out intentions.