The Modern Regime, Volume 1

1107 (return) [ "Correspondance de l'Empereur Napoléon I." (Letter of Bonaparte, Sept.29, 1797, in relation to Italy): "A people at bottom inimical to the French through the prejudices, character, and customs of centuries."]

1108 (return) [ Miot de Melito, I., 126, (1796): "Florence, for two centuries and a half, had lost that antique energy which, in the stormy times of the Republic, distinguished this city. Indolence was the dominant spirit of all classes.. . Almost everywhere I saw only men lulled to rest by the charms of the most exquisite climate, occupied solely with the details of a monotonous existence, and tranquilly vegetating under its beneficent sky."—(On Milan, in 1796, cf. Stendhal, introduction to the "Chartreuse de Parme.")]

1109 (return) [ "Miot de Melito," I., 131: "Having just left one of the most civilized cities in Italy, it was not without some emotion that I found myself suddenly transported to a country (Corsica) which, in its savage aspect, its rugged mountains, and its inhabitants uniformly dressed in coarse brown cloth, contrasted so strongly with the rich and smiling landscape of Tuscany, and with the comfort, I should almost say elegance, of costume worn by the happy cultivators of that fertile soil."]

1110 (return) [ Miot de Melito, II., 30: "Of a not very important family of Sartène."—II., 143. (On the canton of Sartène and the Vendettas of 1796).—Coston, I., 4: "The family of Madame Laetitia, sprung from the counts of Cotalto, came originally from Italy."]

1111 (return) [ His father, Charles Bonaparte, weak and even frivolous, "too fond of pleasure to care about his children," and to see to his affairs, tolerably learned and an indifferent head of a family, died at the age of thirty-nine of a cancer in the stomach, which seems to be the only bequest he made to his son Napoleon.—His mother, on the contrary, serious, authoritative, the true head of a family, was, said Napoleon, "hard in her affections she punished and rewarded without distinction, good or bad; she made us all feel it."—On becoming head of the household, "she was too parsimonious-even ridiculously so. This was due to excess of foresight on her part; she had known want, and her terrible sufferings were never out of her mind.... Paoli had tried persuasion with her before resorting to force... . Madame replied heroically, as a Cornelia would have done.... From 12 to 15,000 peasants poured down from the mountains of Ajaccio; our house was pillaged and burnt, our vines destroyed, and our flocks. ... In other respects, this woman, from whom it would have been so difficult to extract five francs, would have given up everything to secure my return from Elba, and after Waterloo she offered me all she possessed to restore my affairs." (" Mémorial," May 29, 1816, and "Mémoires d'Antonomarchi," Nov. 18, 1819.—On the ideas and ways of Bonaparte's mother, read her "Conversation" in "Journal et Mémoires," vol. IV., by Stanislas Girardin.) Duchesse d'Abrantès," Mémoires," II., 318, 369. "Avaricious out of all reason except on a few grave occasions.... No knowledge whatever of the usages of society.... very ignorant, not alone of our literature, but of her own."—Stendhal, "Vie de Napoleon": "The character of her son is to be explained by the perfectly Italian character of Madame Laetitia."]

1112 (return) [ The French conquest is effected by armed force between July 30, 1768, and May 22, 1769. The Bonaparte family submitted May 23, 1769, and Napoleon was born on the following 15th of August.]

1113 (return) [ Antonomarchi, "Mémoires," October 4, 1819. "Mémorial," May 29, 1816.]

1114 (return) [ "Miot de Melito," II., 33: "The day I arrived at Bocognano two men lost their lives through private vengeance. About eight years before this one of the inhabitants of the canton had killed a neighbor, the father of two children.... On reaching the age of sixteen or seventeen years these children left the country in order to dog the steps of the murderer, who kept on the watch, not daring to go far from his village.... Finding him playing cards under a tree, they fired at and killed him, and besides this accidentally shot another man who was asleep a few paces off. The relatives on both sides pronounced the act justifiable and according to rule." Ibid., I., 143: "On reaching Bastia from Ajaccio the two principal families of the place, the Peraldi and the Visuldi, fired at each other, in disputing over the honor of entertaining me."]

1115 (return) [ Bourrienne, "Mémoires," I., 18, 19.]

1116 (return) [ De Ségur, "Histoire et Mémoires," I,, 74.]

1117 (return) [ Yung, I., 195. (Letter of Bonaparte to Paoli, June 12, 1789); I., 250 (Letter of Bonaparte to Buttafuoco, January 23 1790).]

1118 (return) [ Yung, I., 107 (Letter of Napoleon to his father, Sept. 12, 1784); I., 163 (Letter of Napoleon to Abbé Raynal, July, 1786); I., 197 (Letter of Napoleon to Paoli, June 12, 1789). The three letters on the history of Corsica are dedicated to Abbé Raynal in a letter of June 24, 1790, and may be found in Yung, I., 434.]

1119 (return) [ Read especially his essay "On the Truths and Sentiments most important to inculcate on Men for their Welfare" (a subject proposed by the Academy of Lyons in 1790). "Some bold men driven by genius.. .. Perfection grows out of reason as fruit out of a tree.... Reason's eyes guard man from the precipice of the passions... The spectacle of the strength of virtue was what the Lacedaemonians principally felt.... Must men then be lucky in the means by which they are led on to happiness?.... My rights (to property) are renewed along with my transpiration, circulate in my blood, are written on my nerves, on my heart.... Proclaim to the rich—your wealth is your misfortune, withdrawn within the latitude of your senses.... Let the enemies of nature at thy voice keep silence and swallow their rabid serpents' tongues.... The wretched shun the society of men, the tapestry of gayety turns to mourning.... Such, gentlemen, are the Sentiments which, in animal relations, mankind should have taught it for its welfare."]

1120 (return) [ Yung, I., 252 (Letter to Buttafuoco). "Dripping with the blood of his brethren, sullied by every species of crime, he presents himself with confidence under his vest of a general, the sole reward of his criminalities."—I., 192 (Letter to the Corsican Intendant, April 2, 1879). "Cultivation is what ruins us"—See various manuscript letters, copied by Yung, for innumerable and gross mistakes in French.—Miot de Melito, I., 84 (July, 1796). "He spoke curtly and, at this time, very incorrectly."—Madame de Rémusat, I., 104. "Whatever language he spoke it never seemed familiar to him; he appeared to force himself in expressing his ideas."—Notes par le Comte Chaptal (unpublished), councillor of state and afterwards minister of the interior under the Consulate: "At this time, Bonaparte did not blush at the slight knowledge of administrative details which he possessed; he asked a good many questions and demanded definitions and the meaning of the commonest words in use. As it very often happened with him not to clearly comprehend words which he heard for the first time, he always repeated these afterwards as he understood them; for example, he constantly used section for session, armistice for amnesty, fulminating point for culminating point, rentes voyagères for 'rentes viagères,' etc."]

1121 (return) [ De Ségur, I., 174]

1122 (return) [ Cf. the "Mémoires" of Marshal Marmont, I., 15, for the ordinary sentiments of the young nobility. "In 1792 I had a sentiment for the person of the king, difficult to define, of which I recovered the trace, and to some extent the power, twenty-two years later; a sentiment of devotion almost religious in character, an innate respect as if due to a being of a superior order. The word King then possessed a magic, a force, which nothing had changed in pure and honest breasts.... This religion of royalty still existed in the mass of the nation,, and especially amongst the well-born, who, sufficiently remote from power, were rather struck with its brilliancy than with its imperfections.... This love became a sort of worship."]

1123 (return) [ Bourrienne, "Mémoires," I. 27.—Ségur, I. 445. In 1795, at Paris, Bonaparte, being out of military employment, enters upon several commercial speculations, amongst which is a bookstore, which does not succeed. (Stated by Sebastiani and many others.)]

1124 (return) [ "Mémorial," Aug. 3, 1816.]

1125 (return) [ Bourrienne, I., 171. (Original text of the "Souper de Beaucaire.")]

1126 (return) [ Yung, II., 430, 431. (Words of Charlotte Robespierre.) Bonaparte as a souvenir of his acquaintance with her, granted her a pension, under the consulate, of 3600 francs.—Ibid. (Letter of Tilly, chargé d'affaires at Genoa, to Buchot, commissioner of foreign affairs.) Cf. in the "Mémorial," Napoleon's favorable judgment of Robespierre.]

1127 (return) [ Yung, II., 455. (Letter from Bonaparte to Tilly, Aug. 7, 1794.) Ibid., III., 120. (Memoirs of Lucien.) "Barras takes care of Josephine's dowry, which is the command of the army in Italy." Ibid., II., 477. (Grading of general officers, notes by Schérer on Bonaparte.) "He knows all about artillery, but is rather too ambitious, and too intriguing for promotion."]

1128 (return) [ De Ségur, I., 162.—La Fayette, "Mémoires," II., 215. "Mémorial" (note dictated by Napoleon). He states the reasons for and against, and adds, speaking of himself: "These sentiments, twenty-five years of age, confidence in his strength, his destiny, determined him." Bourrienne, I., 51: "It is certain that he has always bemoaned that day; he has often said to me that he would give years of his life to efface that page of his history."]

1129 (return) [ "Mémorial," I., Sept 6, 1815. "It is only after Lodi that the idea came to me that I might, after all, become a decisive actor on our political stage. Then the first spark of lofty ambition gleamed out." On his aim and conduct in the Italian campaign of Sybel, "Histoire de l'Europe pendant la Révolution Française" (Dosquet translation), vol. IV., books II. and III., especially pp.182, 199, 334, 335, 406, 420, 475, 489.]

1130 (return) [ Yung, III., 213. (Letter of M. de Sucy, August 4, 1797.)]

1131 (return) [ Ibid., III., 214. (Report of d'Entraigues to M. de Mowikinoff, Sept., 1797.) "If there was any king in France which was not himself, he would like to have been his creator, with his rights at the end of his sword, this sword never to be parted with, so that he might plunge it in the king's bosom if he ever ceased to be submissive to him."—Miot de Melito, I., 154. (Bonaparte to Montebello, before Miot and Melzi, June, 1797.) Ibid, I., 184. (Bonaparte to Miot, Nov. 18, 1797, at Turin.)]

1132 (return) [ D'Haussonville, "L'Église Romaine et la Premier Empire," I., 405. (Words of M. Cacault, signer of the Treaty of Tolentino, and French Secretary of Legation at Rome, at the commencement of negotiations for the Concordat.) M. Cacaut says that he used this expression, "After the scenes of Tolentino and of Leghorn, and the fright of Manfredini, and Matéi threatened, and so many other vivacities."]

1133 (return) [ Madame de Staël, "Considérations sur la Révolution Française," 3rd part, ch. XXVI., and 4th part, ch. XVIII.]

1134 (return) [ Portrait of Bonaparte in the "Cabinet des Etampes," "drawn by Guérin, engraved by Fiesinger, deposited in the National Library, Vendémiaire 29, year VII."]

1135 (return) [ Madame de Rémusat, "Mémoires," I., 104.—Miot de Melito, I., 84.]

1136 (return) [ Madame de Staël, "Considerations," etc., 3rd part, ch. XXV.—Madame de Rémusat, II., 77.]

1137 (return) [ Stendhal, "Mémoires sur Napoléon," narration of Admiral Decrès.—Same narration in the "Mémorial."]

1138 (return) [ De Ségur, I., 193.]

1139 (return) [ Roederer, "Oeuvres complétes," II., 560. (Conversations with General Lasalle in 1809, and Lasalle's judgment on the débuts of Napoleon).]

1140 (return) [ Another instance of this commanding influence is found in the case of General Vandamme, an old revolutionary soldier still more brutal and energetic than Augereau. In 1815, Vandamme said to Marshal d'Ornano, one day, on ascending the staircase of the Tuileries together: "My dear fellow, that devil of a man (speaking of the Emperor) fascinates me in a way I cannot account for. I, who don't fear either God or the devil, when I approach him I tremble like a child. He would make me dash through the eye of a needle into the fire!" ("Le Général Vandamme," by du Casse, II., 385).]

1141 (return) [ Roederer, III., 356. (Napoleon himself says, February 11, 1809): "I, military! I am so, because I was born so; it is my habit, my very existence. Wherever I have been I have always had command. I commanded at twenty-three, at the siege of Toulon; I commanded at Paris in Vendémiaire; I won over the soldiers in Italy the moment I presented myself. I was born for that."]

1142 (return) [ Observe the various features of the same mental and moral structure among different members of the family. (Speaking of his brothers and sisters in the "Memorial" Napoleon says): "What family as numerous presents such a splendid group?"—"Souvenirs", by PASQUIER (Etienne-Dennis, duc), chancelier de France, in VI volumes, Librarie Plon, Paris 1893. Vol. I. p. 400. (This author, a young magistrate under Louis XVI., a high functionary under the Empire, an important political personage under the restoration and the July monarchy, is probably the best informed and most judicious of eye-witnesses during the first half of our century.): "Their vices and virtues surpass ordinary proportions and have a physiognomy of their own. But what especially distinguishes them is a stubborn will, and inflexible resolution.... All possessed the instinct of their greatness." They readily accepted "the highest positions; they even got to believing that their elevation was inevitable.... Nothing in the incredible good fortune of Joseph astonished him; often in January, 1814, I heard him say over and over again that if his brother had not meddled with his affairs after the second entry into Madrid, he would still be on the throne of Spain. As to determined obstinacy we have only to refer to the resignation of Louis, the retirement of Lucien, and the resistances of Fesch; they alone could stem the will of Napoleon and sometimes break a lance with him.—Passion, sensuality, the habit of considering themselves outside of rules, and self-confidence combined with talent, super abound among the women, as in the fifteenth century. Elisa, in Tuscany, had a vigorous brain, was high spirited and a genuine sovereign, notwithstanding the disorders of her private life, in which even appearances were not sufficiently maintained." Caroline at Naples, "without being more scrupulous than her sisters," better observed the proprieties; none of the others so much resembled the Emperor; "with her, all tastes succumbed to ambition"; it was she who advised and prevailed upon her husband, Murat, to desert Napoleon in 1814. As to Pauline, the most beautiful woman of her epoch, "no wife, since that of the Emperor Claude, surpassed her in the use she dared make of her charms; nothing could stop her, not even a malady attributed to the strain of this life-style and for which we have so often seen her borne in a litter."—Jerome, "in spite of the uncommon boldness of his debaucheries, maintained his ascendancy over his wife to the last."—On the "pressing efforts and attempts" of Joseph on Maria Louise in 1814, Chancelier Pasquier, after Savary's papers and the evidence of M. de Saint-Aignan, gives extraordinary details.—"Mes souvenirs sur Napoléon, 346, by the count Chaptal: "Every member of this numerous family (Jérôme, Louis, Joseph, the Bonaparte sisters) mounted thrones as if they had recovered so much property."]

1143 (return) [ Burkhardt, "Die Renaissance in Italien," passim.—Stendhal, "Histoire de la peinture en Italie"(introduction), and" Rome, Naples, et Florence," passim.—"Notes par le Comte Chaptal": When these notes are published, many details will be found in them in support of the judgment expressed in this and the following chapters. The psychology of Napoleon as here given is largely confirmed by them.]

1144 (return) [ Roederer, III, 380 (1802).]

1145 (return) [ Napoleon uses the French word just which means both fair, justifiable, pertinent, correct, and in music true.]

1146 (return) [ "Mémorial."]

1147 (return) [ De Pradt, "Histoire de l'Ambassade dans la grande-duché de Varsovie en 1812," preface, p. X, and 5.]

1148 (return) [ Roederer, III., 544 (February 24, 1809). Cf. Meneval, "Napoléon et Marie-Louise, souvenirs historiques," I., 210-213.]