Turning to the field of general history, there are certain facts, admittedly Napoleon's doing, which quite as certainly are among the most important factors of contemporary politics. Of themselves these would suffice to give him a high place in constructive history. In the first place, he deprived England of the monopoly in what had long been essentially and peculiarly her political ideal. What was the basis of the long conflict between England and France to which Napoleon fell heir? Was the struggle of these two glorious and enlightened sister nations a struggle for territorial ascendancy in Europe? Not entirely. Was it a life-and-death struggle for ascendancy in the western world? No. The Seven Years' War had decided that question against France, and the American war for independence had in a sense evened the score in its decision against England; for the prize had been awarded to a new people. No; the conflict did not rage over this. What, then, was the cause? Nothing less than a passion for the ascendancy of one of these highest forms of civilization throughout the globe, including both Europe and America. This Anglo-Saxon political, commercial, religious, and social conception was, after the Napoleonic wars, no longer confined to Great Britain. Thence onward the great powers of Europe have been chiefly concerned, aside from their care for self-preservation, in partitioning Africa and Asia among themselves; and this process is no sooner complete than they begin to murmur about the Monroe doctrine and to cast longing eyes toward Central and South America. The state system which was once European has become coextensive with the sphere on which we live, and this notion of world-domination, so denounced when held by Napoleon, has become the motive-power of every great modern civilization.
If we consider the national politics of Europe beyond the boundaries of France, history again becomes a record of influences started by Napoleon's works, either of commission or of omission. Russia's grandeur as a European power appears to be largely due to the temporary extinction of Poland's hope for national resurrection. Had Napoleon, instead of playing his doubtful game with the grand duchy of Warsaw, turned into an autonomous permanency the scarcely known provisional government of Poland, which he actually inaugurated and which worked for a considerable time, and had he restored to its sway both the Prussian and Austrian shares in the shameless partition, we might have seen quite another result to the military migration of 1812. We can scarcely doubt, moreover, that Poland, restored under French protection, would have been a buffer state between Russia, Prussia, and Austria, rendering the crushing coalition an impossibility in 1813, while in 1814 the allies could probably never have crossed the French frontier, if indeed they had dared to go even so far in their march across Europe. But his positive achievement was quite as important. The Germany of to-day is a great federal state guided, but not dominated, by Prussia. What are its other important members? Bavaria, Würtemberg, and Baden—all three in their present extent and influence the creations of Napoleon; the nice balance of powers in the German Empire is due to his arrangement of the map. There is even a sense in which all Germany, as we know it, sprang full armed from his head. He not merely taught the peoples of central Europe their strategy, tactics, and military organization: it was he who carried the standard of enlightenment (in his own interest, of course, but still he carried it) through the length and breadth of their territories, and made its significance clear to the meanest intellect of their teeming millions. Thereafter the longings for German unity, for German fatherland, for the organization of German strength into one movement, could never be checked. The swarm of petty tyrants who had modeled their life and conduct on the example of Louis XIV, and who in struggling to vie with his villainies had debauched themselves and their peoples, was swept away by Napoleon's ruthlessness, to give place to the larger, more wholesome nationality of the nineteenth century, which was destined in the end to inspire the surrounding nations with the new concept of respect, not alone for one's own nationality, but for that of others.
What French influence effected in Italy is a topic so recondite as to require separate discussion; for the results were not so immediate or so dramatic as they were in Germany. But the destruction of petty governments was as ruthless as in the north; the ideas which marched in Bonaparte's ranks found at least a large minority of intelligent admirers among the invaded; and Italian unity, though won by a family he feared and abused, is in no doubtful sense indebted for its existence, not merely to Napoleon's age, but to the ideas he disseminated and to the efforts at a practical beginning which he made. As to Austria-Hungary, the new historical epoch which makes her essentially the empire of the lower Danube takes its rise from Napoleon's time and influence. The relaxation of her grasp on Italy has thrown her across the Adriatic for the territorial expansion essential to her position as a great power. It has been her mission to rescue by moral influence some of the fairest lands in the Balkan peninsula from waste and anarchy. Mere proximity is a powerful factor; the turbulence of Austrian local patriotism has been the seed of wholesome discontent among the Christian populations of Turkey, whose first awakening was largely due to the emissaries sent by Napoleon to fire the hearts of the oppressed and suffering subjects of that distracted land. Servia is one example of this; and in a sense the national awakening of Greece began with the hopes similarly aroused.
The astounding magic of his name in the United States is partly due to a quality of the American mind which makes its possessor the passionate and indiscriminating adorer of greatness in every form. The Americans are more French than the French in their admiration of power. But, after all, this is not the main reason for their interest in Napoleon. They are, dimly at least, aware of certain facts which have determined their history and made them an independent nation; though already stated and discussed, we may be pardoned for recapitulating them in this connection. Their first war for independence left them tributary to the mother-country both industrially and commercially. It was Napoleon who pitilessly, though slyly and indirectly, launched them into the second war with Great Britain, from which they emerged with some glory and some sense of defeat, but, after all, with the tremendous and permanent gain of absolute commercial independence. In the second place, their purchase of Louisiana, though understood by only a few at the moment, revolutionized their national system both inside and outside. That momentous step destroyed the literal interpretation of the constitution, hitherto enslaving a congeries of jarring little commonwealths in the bondage of verbalism, because, though manifestly beneficent and necessary, it could be justified before the law only by an appeal to the spirit and not to the letter. Thenceforward Americans have steadily been enlarging their constitutional law by interpretation, and the apparent timidity of amendment which they display is simply due to the absence of necessity for revision as long as expansion by interpretation continues. But certainly quite as important as this was also the displacement, by the acquisition of that vast territory, of what may be called the national center of gravity. Until then the aspirations of Americans had been toward Europe; the public opinion of the country had, until then, demanded the largest possible intercourse with that continent compatible with freedom from political entanglement. Thereafter there was a change in their spirit: a continent of their own was open to their energies. For two generations their history has been concerned with exploration, with mechanical invention, and with solving the great problem of how to prevent an extension of slavery corresponding to the extension of territory. But nevertheless, steadily and vigorously two correlated concepts were propagating themselves: neglect of Europe, in order to expand and assimilate their recent acquisition; industrial exclusiveness, for the sake of this great home market which immigration, settlement, and the formation of new commonwealths were creating, not at the front door, but in the rear of the states stretching along the Atlantic. This resulted in a temporary "about-face" of the nation; and it is only now, when the prize of material greatness and of territorial unity has been secured, that the people turn once more toward the rising sun, in order to get from older lands everything germane to its own civilization, and to assimilate these acquisitions, if possible, in realizing its own ideals of moral grandeur.
HISTORICAL SOURCES
In making this book I had access to the following original sources:
I. Unpublished Documents: a, The papers of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs during the years of Napoleon's life, including those of the "Fonds Napoléon." b, The unpublished correspondence of Napoleon kept in the French Ministry of War, including the "Volumes Rouges" and the "Dossier de l'Empereur." This is as voluminous at least as the published correspondence, but of personal and technical rather than political interest. I have also consulted the archives of the General Staff in the same building concerning many events connected with Napoleon's career. c, The papers of Napoleon's youth known as the Ashburnham papers, but now owned by the Italian government, and kept in the Laurentian Library at Florence. Since I used them they have been published by Masson and Biagi, but the editors have corrected the text to an extent which is in our day not considered scientific. d, The despatches of American diplomatists resident abroad during Napoleon's career. e, Certain papers from the Record Office in London relating to Napoleon's surrender and his life in St. Helena. f, Certain papers of Henri Beyle containing characterizations of Napoleon and contemporary anecdotes concerning him. These were translated by Jean de Mitty from a cipher manuscript in the public library at Grenoble. g, A considerable number of Napoleon's letters, kindly put at my disposal by various collectors.
II. Published Official Papers. Within the last few years original documents concerning the Napoleonic epoch have been printed very extensively. Nearly all the important books are based on archival research, and the respective authors generally print a certain number of despatches or reports in justification of their conclusions. The following collections are the most important: a, The Correspondence of Napoleon. b, Official Papers of the Helvetic Republic. c, Diplomatic Correspondence between Prussia and France, 1795-97. d, Lord Whitworth's despatches. e, Ducasse's Supplement to Napoleon's Correspondence. f, The Papers of Gentz and Schwarzenberg. g, The Papers of Metternich. h, Napoleon's Letters to Caulaincourt. i, Napoleon's Letters to King Joseph. j, The Letters of King Jerome, Queen Catharine, and King Frederick of Würtemberg. k, The Papers of Castlereagh, Banks, Jackson, and other English statesmen of the time. l, Diplomatic Correspondence between Russia and France. m, The Archives of Count Woronzoff. n, Diplomatic Correspondence of the Sardinian ambassadors at St. Petersburg. o, Diplomatic Correspondence of the ministers of the republic and kingdom of Italy. p, Lecestre's Unpublished Letters of Napoleon. This list might be extended almost indefinitely by adding such collections as Ducasse's Memoirs of King Joseph, Napoleon's Letters to Josephine, the Correspondence of Eugène, etc., etc.; but these older books are too well known to require enumeration, and, though authentic, are only semi-official or personal publications.
III. Contemporary Memoirs. Those titles given in the bibliography are, with a few exceptions, the most valuable. The positive, literal truth of the so-called memoirs attributed to Bourrienne, Constant, Caulaincourt, Barras, Fouché, and Avrillon is very slender. They are all made by skilful patchwork and must be read with the utmost caution. In fact, it is doubtful whether, with the exception of Barras's scandalous record, they have, strictly speaking, any right to the names they bear. This much negative value they have: that they show how history can be falsified in one interest or another.
During the fourteen years which have elapsed since the book was completed for magazine publication, and the twelve since it was revised to the form of four volumes, great numbers of what were then manuscript journals, memoirs, or letters have been printed and published; of these proper use has been made in this edition, and their titles are given in the bibliography. The author may be pardoned for remarking that few details of importance have been found incorrect, wherever experts agree, and that his many critics have made no demand for the reconstruction of his characterization in its broad outlines, however opposed they may be to his portrayals or discussions.