World's Best Histories Part 17

It was there that Napoleon arrived on the 11th; Ma.s.sena was in advance, and a battle took place on the banks of the Taya, and after a sharp combat the bridge was forced. But already Prince John of Lichtenstein had come to ask a suspension of hostilities, announcing openly the intention of the Austrian government to begin negotiations for peace. The deliberations were carried on at the head-quarters, while the army ranged itself in the plain of Znam. The emperor recapitulated rapidly in his mind the dangers and chances of a prolonged war. The opinion of several of his generals was to follow up Austria, and crush the coalition finally. Napoleon felt the enormous burden weighing on his shoulders: he saw a difficult and lingering war in Spain, Prussia agitated, Russia cold and secretly ill- disposed, the difficulties of Rome, England for the future taking her part in the continental struggle: he cried, "Enough blood has been shed; let us make peace!" It was necessary to repeat his words several times to the hostile parties at Znam, to induce them to cease fighting. The officers whose duty it was to carry the intelligence to the field of battle were wounded before they were able to stop the combat.

The armistice was signed in the night of the 11th July, and Napoleon immediately returned to Schoenbrunn. Negotiations had commenced, but their success was by no means sure. The Austrian armies had been brilliantly vanquished, but they were neither dispersed nor destroyed, and the efforts their resistance had cost sufficiently proved the military qualities of the chief and his soldiers. The Emperor Napoleon, encamped in the centre of the Austrian monarchy--of which he occupied the capital; he could not, and durst not in any way, relax his warlike watchfulness. New bodies of men were summoned from France. The Tyrol not being comprised in the armistice, the Bavarians and Prince Eugene were ordered to reduce its two portions, German and Italian. The posts were everywhere fortified, and works of defence pursued with vigor. The greater part of the army occupied vast barracks in the suburbs of Vienna. Napoleon distributed rewards to the officers and soldiers; he even showed his displeasure to Marshal Bernadotte, who had presumed to address a personal order of the day to the corps of the army under his direction at Wagram.

"His Majesty commands his army in person," he sent word to the Prince of Pontecorvo by Major-General Berthier; "it belongs to him alone to distribute the degree of glory with each merits." Napoleon added, in a letter to the minister of war, "I am glad also that you are aware that the Prince of Pontecorvo has not always conducted himself well in this campaign. The truth is, that this column of bronze has been constantly in disorder." By thus wounding his vanity, unexpected political difficulties afterwards arose, by leaving in the heart of Bernadotte implacable resentment against the emperor.

I wished to pursue without interruption the history of the campaign of Germany during these three months, so fertile in obstinate combats, in works as vast as they were novel, in pitched battles, more sanguinary and important from the number of troops engaged than any which had preceded them. Germany was not, however, the only theatre of the struggle; and the attention of Europe, always attracted to the places where Napoleon commanded in person and carried out his own plans, was occasionally diverted towards the Spanish and Portuguese peninsula. There several of the most skilful generals of the emperor fought against populations eagerly struggling for their independence; there gradually rose to greatness the name of Sir Arthur Wellesley, and that reputation for stability and heroic perseverance which at a later date const.i.tuted his power and splendor.

Fighting was carried on in Spain, not without glory or success; the insurgents having more than once had the honor of annoying the all- powerful conqueror in the midst of his triumphs. There was no fighting at Rome, and oppression reigned there without material resistance; yet for more than a year a struggle continued between the Emperor Napoleon and the Pope, Pius VII., without all the advantages remaining on the side of force, or the conqueror feeling certain that he held the prey he had confided to the care of General Miollis. On the 6th July, 1809, the same day as the battle of Wagram, the Pope was suddenly taken away from Rome, and conducted as a prisoner out of that palace and that town which he had never previously quitted, except to visit Paris for the purpose of consecrating the very man who was to-day stripping him of his throne.

Since the month of February, 1808, the thoughts and hearts of many had still found time to seek the aged pontiff at the Quirinal, and they now followed him with sympathy into exile and captivity.

After the occupation of Rome by General Miollis, when the foreign cardinals had received orders to return to their respective countries, and the Pope had recalled his legate from Paris, the Emperor Napoleon, on stepping into his carriage to visit Bayonne, had ordered Champagny to transmit to Cardinal Caprara the following note:---

"The _sine qua non_ of the emperor is, that all Italy, Rome, Naples, and Milan make a league offensive and defensive, so as to remove disorder and war from the peninsula. If the holy father consents to this proposition, all is terminated; if he refuses, by that he declares war against the emperor. The first result of war is conquest, and the first result of conquest is change of government. This will not occasion any loss to the spiritual rights of the Pope; he will be Bishop of Rome, as have been all his predecessors in the eight first centuries, and under Charlemagne. It will, however, be a subject of regret, which the emperor will be the first to feel, to see foolish vanity, obstinacy and ignorance destroy the work of genius, policy and enlightenment.

"The recall of your Eminence is notified contrary to custom, against the formalities in usage, and on the eve of the Pa.s.sion week--three circ.u.mstances which sufficiently explain the charitable and entirely evangelical spirit of the holy father. No matter, his Majesty recognizes your Eminence no more as legate. From this moment the Gallican Church resumes all the integrity of its doctrine. More learned, more truly religious, than the Church of Rome, she has no want of the latter. I send to your eminence the pa.s.sports you have demanded. We are thus at war, and his Majesty has given orders in consequence. His Holiness will be satisfied--he will have the happiness of declaring war in the holy week.

The thunders of the Vatican will be all the more formidable. His Majesty fears them less than those of the castle of St. Angelo. He who curses kings, is cursed by G.o.d."

At the same time, and by order of Napoleon, a decree was prepared enumerating all the grievances of which he accused the court of Rome, and enacting that "the provinces of Urbino, Ancona, Macerata, and Camerino, should be irrevocably and forever united to the kingdom of Italy, to form three new departments." The Code Napoleon was to be proclaimed there.

The violent and arbitrary measures employed by the emperor towards the Pope naturally bore their fruits. In removing from Pius VII. the cardinals who were not natives of the Roman states, he had deprived the pontiff of the most enlightened and moderate counsels which could reach his ears, and had delivered him, in his weakness and just indignation, to all the influences against which Cardinal Consalvi had constantly struggled. From this time every despotic act of Napoleon, every rude word of the soldiers charged to execute his orders, increased the irritation of the Pope, and urged him to advance on a course of blind resistance. A prohibition to swear allegiance to the new government was addressed to the bishops and all the priests of the territories taken away from the pontifical states; this prohibition was founded upon principles of dogma and religion.

Henceforth the personal will of the Pope, his dignity as a sovereign, and his conscience as a priest, were all engaged in the struggle against the Emperor Napoleon. "Those who have succeeded in alarming the conscience of the holy father are still the strongest," Lefebvre, the charge-d'affaires of France, who had not yet quitted Rome, wrote to Champagny. "The tenor of the reply to the ultimatum that I have been instructed to remit to him has been changed twice this morning--so much did they still hesitate upon the decision to take. The theologians themselves were divided even in the Sacred College, and I doubt not that the refusal of his Holiness to agree with the emperor will throw into consternation a number of his warmest partisans."

The rupture was from this time official, and the relations of the Pope with the French authorities who occupied the pontifical city became every day more bitter. Pius VII. had chosen for his secretary of state, Cardinal Pacca, witty, amiable, devoted to the holy father, but strongly attached to the most narrow ideas as to the government of the Roman Church in the world; in other respects, prudent in his conduct towards General Miollis, and often excited to action by the Pope, who complained of his timidity.

"They pretend in Rome that we are asleep," said Pius VII. to his minister; "we must prove that we are awake, and address a vigorous note to the French general." The protest was posted everywhere in Rome, on the morning of the 24th August, 1808; eight days later, and under the pretext that the secretary of state interfered with the recruiting for the civic guard, Cardinal Pacca received the order to quit Rome in twenty-four hours. "Your Eminence will find at the gate of St. John an escort of dragoons, whose duty is to accompany you to Benevento, your native town." In the meantime a French officer was appointed to watch over the cardinal. The latter was still talking with his jailer, when Pius VII. suddenly entered the cabinet of his minister.

"I was then witness of a phenomenon which I had often heard spoken of,"

relates Cardinal Pacca in his memoirs. "In an access of violent anger, the hair of the holy father bristled up, and his sight was confused. Although I was dressed as a cardinal, he did not know me. 'Who is there?' he demanded, in a loud voice. 'I am the cardinal,' I replied, kissing his hand. 'Where is the officer?' demanded the holy father; and I pointed him out near me, in a respectful att.i.tude. Then the Pope, turning towards him, 'Go and tell your general that I am weary of suffering so many insults and outrages from a man who dares still to call himself a Catholic. I command my minister not to obey the injunctions of an illegitimate authority. Let your general know, that if force is employed to tear him from me it shall only be after having broken all the doors; and I declare him beforehand responsible for the consequences of such an enormous crime.' And making a sign to the cardinal to follow him, 'Let us go,' said the Pope. The officer had gone out to carry to the general the message of the holy father. The secretary of state was installed in an apartment which opened into the Pope's bedroom. The gates of the Quirinal remained closed to all the French officers, and General Miollis did not claim his prisoner."

Months had meanwhile pa.s.sed away. The emperor had quitted Spain to make preparations for the campaign of Germany. Without ever ceasing to load the Pope with unfriendly words and treatment, Napoleon had been engaged in affairs more important than his troubles with the pontifical court. Public order was maintained in Rome, thanks to the Italian prudence of the secretary of state, and the strict discipline which General Miollis knew how to maintain among his troops, and even among the auxiliaries he had recruited from the revolutionary middle-cla.s.s. The time arrived, however, when this situation, more violent in fact than in form, was suddenly to a.s.sume its real character. Napoleon was at Schoenbrunn, already victor in the five days' battle which had rendered him master of Vienna, and more certain than he was immediately after Essling of the prompt.i.tude and extent of his success. It was then that he drew up, and sent by Champagny, two decrees relating to the taking possession, pure and simple, of the States of the Pope. He explained the reasons of this to his minister in a long letter, which was to serve as a basis for Champagny's report, and which, by its singular mixture of thoughts and principles, showed the historical heredity connecting the power of Napoleon with that of Charlemagne, united to the sovereign power which disposed in the name of conquest of territories and states, were confused in the imagination of the emperor, and made him look upon the independent att.i.tude of the Pope as an act of criminal opposition.

"When Charlemagne made the popes temporal sovereigns, he wished them to remain va.s.sals of the empire; now, far from thinking themselves va.s.sals of the empire, they are not even willing to form a part of it. The aim of Charlemagne in his generosity towards the popes was the welfare of Christianity; and now they claim to ally themselves with Protestants and the enemies of Christianity. The least impropriety that results from these arrangements is to see the head of the Catholic religion negotiating with Protestants; whilst according to the laws of the Church he ought to shun them, and excommunicate them. (There is a prayer to this effect recited at Rome.)

"The interest of religion, and the interest of the peoples of France, Germany and Italy, require that an end should be made of this ridiculous temporal power--the feeble remnant of the exaggerated pretensions of the Gregories, who claimed to reign over kings, to give away crowns, and to have the direction of the affairs of earth as well as of heaven. In the absence of councils, let the popes have the direction of the affairs of the Church so far as they do not infringe on the liberties of the Gallican Church--that is all right; but they ought not to mix themselves up with armies or state policy. If they are the successors of Jesus Christ, they ought not to exercise any other dominion than that which He Himself exercised, and His 'kingdom is not of this world.'

"If your Majesty does not do that which you alone can do, you will leave in Europe the seeds of dissension and discord. Posterity, whilst praising you for having re-established religion and re-erected her altars, will blame you for having left the empire (which is in fact the major portion of Christendom) exposed to the influence of this fantastic medley, inimical to religion and the tranquillity of the empire. This obstacle can only be surmounted by separating the temporal from the spiritual authority, and by declaring that the states of the Pope form a portion of the French Empire."

It is too often an error of men, even of the first rank, to believe in the universal power and duration of their wishes and decisions. The Emperor Napoleon though he had solved forever this question of the temporal power of the popes-a question which we have so many times heard discussed by the most eloquent voices; we have seen armies upholding on fields of battle contradictory principles on this subject, and diplomacy painfully accomplis.h.i.+ng imperfect settlements.

He displayed towards Pope Pius VII. the most arrogant contempt of the rights and independence of others, and a pa.s.sionate self-will as regards all resistance. Under shelter of ancient authority, of which he retrospectively took possession, he boldly invoked the highest reasons and the most venerated names, in order to justify an arbitrary resolution, and the grasping selfishness which swayed his mind. It was the practice of the French Revolution to prop up its violent and despotic proceedings by the loftiest principles; the Emperor Napoleon had not forgotten this tradition.

In all the manifestly criminal acts of his powerful career--in the fatal resolves of his mistaken and culpable caprices, whether it was a question of the a.s.sa.s.sination of the Due d'Enghien or the brutal removal of the Pope from Rome--Napoleon always chose his part in the complete isolation of his soul, and by the spontaneous act of a personal decision; he made sure of the execution of his will with minute precautions: he did not the less subsequently seek to throw back the responsibility of the acts themselves upon the instruments too ready to obey him. When Europe suddenly learnt that the Pope had been removed from the states henceforth united to the French Empire, Napoleon wrote to Fouche, "I am vexed that the Pope has been arrested; it is a great folly. It was necessary to arrest Cardinal Pacca, and leave the Pope in tranquillity at Rome;" and to Cambaceres, the 28th July: "It is without my orders, and against my will, that the Pope has been made to leave Rome."

Measures had, however, been taken with that provident exact.i.tude which characterized the personal orders of the Emperor Napoleon. Immediately he had resolved upon the confiscation of the Roman States he had divined the consequence and importance of this act; the new government was organized, Murat had been charged with the command of the troops, and to hold himself ready for any event. "Since your Majesty has made me aware of your intentions as to Rome, I shall not withdraw from Naples," wrote Murat to the emperor. "Word has been sent me that the Pope wished to send forth an excommunication, but that the majority of the Consistory were opposed to it. All your orders will be fulfilled, and I hope without trouble."

This was hoping for much from the patience of the holy father, and maintaining great illusions as to the decision long since taken by the Court of Rome. The project of the spoliation of the pontifical states had not been kept so secret that the Pope and his minister had not been apprised of it; and several times Pius VII. had let it be understood that he was prepared for resistance. "We see plainly that the French wish to force us to speak Latin," he had said quite recently; "ah, well! we will do it."

General Miollis, supported and directed by the King of Naples, did not take much account of the Latin of the court of Rome when it was a question of obeying the orders of the Emperor Napoleon. The military preparations completed (the 10th June, 1809), the tricolor flag was mounted upon the castle of St. Angelo in place of the pontifical arms, and the imperial decrees were everywhere read before the population of Rome and the a.s.sembled troops. The report of these things soon reached the Quirinal. "I rushed suddenly into the apartment of the holy father," writes Cardinal Pacca, "and on meeting we both p.r.o.nounced the words of the Redeemer, _Consummatum est!_ I was in a condition difficult to describe, but the sight of the holy father, who maintained an unalterable tranquillity, much edified me, and reanimated my courage. A few minutes afterwards my nephew brought me a copy of the imperial decree. Observing the Pope attentively at the first words, I saw emotion on his countenance, and the signs of indignation only too natural. Little by little he recovered himself, and he heard the reading with much tranquillity and resignation." Cardinal Pacca was even obliged to urge the pope to promulgate the bull of excommunication, which had been prepared already since 1806. Pius VII.

still hesitated. "Raise your eyes towards heaven, Thrice Holy Father,"

said the secretary of state, "and then give me your order, and be sure that that which proceeds from your mouth will be the will of G.o.d." "Ah, well! let the bull go forth," cried the Pope; "but let those who shall execute your orders take great care, for if they are discovered they will be shot, and for that I should be inconsolable."

The bull of excommunication against the Emperor Napoleon was everywhere placarded in Rome, without the agents of Cardinal Pacca undergoing the vengeance dreaded by the Pope. Anger and fear were wrestling in a higher sphere. The instructions of the emperor had been precise: "I have confided to you the care of maintaining tranquillity in my Roman states," he wrote to General Miollis. "You are to have arrested, even in the house of the Pope himself, those who plot against public tranquillity, and against the safety of my soldiers. A priest abuses his character, and merits less indulgence than another man, when he preaches war and disobedience to temporal power, and when he sacrifices spiritual things for the interest of this world, which the Scripture declares not to be his." And to the King of Naples, in two different letters, of the 17th and 19th of June: "If the Pope wishes to form a reunion of caballers like Cardinal Pacca, it will be necessary to permit nothing of the kind, and to act at Rome as I should act towards the cardinal archbishop of Paris.... I have given you to understand that my intention was that the affairs of Rome should be quickly settled, and that no species of opposition should take place. No asylum ought to be respected, if my decrees are not submitted to; and under no pretext whatever ought any resistance to be allowed. If the Pope, in opposition to the spirit of his office and of the Gospel, preaches revolt, and wishes to make use of the immunity of his house for the printing of circulars, he ought to be arrested. The time for this sort of thing is past. Philippe le Bel caused Boniface to be arrested; and Charles V. kept Clement VII. in prison for a long time, for far less cause. The priest who to the temporal powers preaches discord and war, instead of peace, abuses his character."

The orders were precise, and admitted of no hesitation. The confiscation of the papal states had been responded to by the papal bull; open war had broken out between Pius VII., and the Emperor Napoleon. The latter was desirous of insuring the execution of his will by sending to Rome General Radet, less honorably scrupulous than General Miollis; an instrument docile and daring, as regards the details of the general scheme. Radet has himself given an account of the removal of the Pope in a report to the minister of war, dated July 13th, 1809. In 1814, he had forgotten the existence of this letter, and vainly sought to minimize the importance of the part which he played on the 6th of July. History must preserve for General Radet his place in her annals. The man to carry out the projects of Napoleon had been well chosen.

Already for several months the Pope had been carefully guarding himself in the Quirinal; the precautions had been redoubled since the decrees, and the publication of the bull. Pius VII. and his counsellors foresaw the removal. General Radet took all possible measures to turn aside suspicion.

"On the 5th, at the break of day," he himself wrote, "I made the necessary arrangements, which I succeeded in screening from the eyes of the Romans by double patrols and measures of police. I kept the troops in the barracks all day, in order to lull the public and the inhabitants of the Quirinal into a feeling of security. From that spot the Pope governed with his finger more than we did with our bayonets. At nine o'clock, I caused the military chiefs to come to me, one after another, and gave them my orders. At ten o'clock, we were collected in the place of the Holy Apostles, and at the barracks of La Pilota, which was the centre of my operations. At eleven o'clock I myself placed my patrols, my guards, my posts, and my detachments for carrying out the operations, whilst the governor-general caused the bridges of the Tiber and the castle of St.

Angelo to be occupied by a Neapolitan battalion."

General Radet had received a written order from General Miollis, for the arrest of Cardinal Pacca. The order to arrest the Pope was not written down. n.o.body had dared to put his signature to it; verbal instructions only were given.

Three detachments of soldiers, furnished with scaling-ladders, ropes and grappling-irons, surrounded the Quirinal. At half-past ten, the sentinel who kept guard on the tower of the Quirinal disappeared. The signal was immediately given. With varying success the small battalions introduced themselves into the palace. The Swiss guard was disarmed; it had for a long time previously received orders to make no resistance. The chief anxiety of the Pope had always been that he might be up and about when they should come to arrest him. He had gone to bed late, and was roused up by the noise in the middle of his first sleep. Cardinal Pacca, however, found him completely dressed, when the former rushed precipitately into his chamber. The gate was already yielding to the efforts of the a.s.sailants. Pius VII. seated himself under a canopy; making a sign to the secretary of state, and to Cardinal Desping, to place themselves near him.

"Open the gate," said he.

General Radet had never seen the Pope; he recognized him by the att.i.tude of his guides; and immediately sending back the soldiers, he caused the officers to enter with drawn swords; a few gendarmes, with muskets in their hands, also glided into the chamber. The priest was waiting in silence; the soldier was hesitating. At length the latter, hat in hand, spoke: "I have a sorrowful mission to accomplish," said General Radet; "I am compelled by my oaths to fulfil it." Pius VII. stood up. "Who are you,"

said he, "and what is it you require of me, that you come at such an hour to trouble my repose and invade my dwelling-place?" "Most Holy Father,"

replied the General, "I come in the name of my government to reiterate to your Holiness the proposal to officially renounce your temporal power. If your holiness consents to it, I do not doubt but that affairs may be arranged, and that the emperor will treat your holiness with the greatest respect." The Pope was resting one hand upon the table placed before him.

"If you have believed yourself bound to execute such orders of the emperor by reason of your oath of fidelity and obedience, think to what an extent we feel compelled to sustain the rights of the holy see, to which we are bound by so many oaths? We can neither yield nor abandon that which belongs to it. The temporal power belongs to the Church, and we are only the administrator. The emperor may tear us in pieces, but he will not obtain from us what he demands. After all that we have done for him, ought we to expect such treatment?"

"I know that the emperor is under many obligations to your holiness!"

replied Radet, more and more troubled. "Yes, more than you are aware of; but, finally, what are your orders?"--"Most Holy Father, I regret the commission with which I am charged, but I must inform you that I am ordered to take you away with me." The pontiff bent slightly towards the speaker, and said in tones of sweet compa.s.sion, "Ah! my son, your mission is one that will not draw down upon you the divine blessing." Then, turning again towards the cardinals, and appearing to speak to himself, "This, then, is the recognition which is accorded to me of all that which I have done for the emperor! This, then, is the reward for my great condescension towards him and towards the Church of France! But perhaps in this respect I have been culpable towards G.o.d. He wishes to punish me; I submit with humility."

General Radet had sent for the final orders of General Miollis. The brigadier of gendarmerie charged with this commission re-entered the chamber of the Pope. "The order of his excellency," said he, "is, that it is necessary for the holy father and Cardinal Pacca to set out at once with General Radet: the other persons in his suite will follow after." The Pope rose up; he walked with difficulty. Moved in spite of himself, Radet offered his arm to support him, proposing to retire, in order to leave the holy father free to give his orders and dispose of any valuable objects that he might have a fancy for. "When one has no hold upon life, one has no hold upon the things of this world," replied Pius VII., taking from a table at the side of his bed his breviary and his crucifix. "I am ready,"

said he.

The carriage was already at the palace gate, the postillions ready to start. The Pope stood still, giving his benediction to the city of Rome, and to the French troops ranged in order of battle on the place. It was four o'clock in the morning; the streets were deserted. The Pope got into the carriage beside Cardinal Pacca; the doors were locked by a gendarme.

General Radet and a marshal of the household got on to the box-seat; the horses set off at a quick trot along the road to Florence.

General Radet offered a purse of Gold to the Pope, which the latter refused. "Have you any money?" asked the holy father of his companion. "I have not been permitted to enter my apartment," said the cardinal; "and I did not think of bringing my purse." The Pope had a papetto, value twenty sous. "This is all that remains tome of my princ.i.p.ality," said he, smiling. "We are travelling in apostolic fas.h.i.+on," responded Pacca. "We have done well in publis.h.i.+ng the bull of the 10th of June," replied Pius VII.; "now it would be too late."

For nineteen hours the coach rattled along; the stores were getting low.

Everywhere, and in spite of a few accidents, the pa.s.sage of the Pope forestalled the news of his capture. The suite of the holy father joined him on the morrow; the Pope was suffering, he was in a fever. The populace began to be stirred up with the rumors which were circulating: they crowded round the carriages. "I disembarra.s.sed myself of them," writes Radet, "by calling out to them to place themselves on their knees on the right and left of the road, in order that the holy father might give him his benediction; then all of a sudden I ordered the postillions to dash forward. By this means the people were still on their kness whilst we were already far away, at a gallop. This plan succeeded everywhere."

Arrived on the 8th of July at the chartreuse of Florence, Pius VII.

expected to rest there a few days: but the Princess Baciocchi had not received instructions from the emperor: she hurried the departure. "I see well that they want to cause my death by their bad treatment," said the exhausted old man; "and if there is but a little more of it I feel that the end will not be far off." Cardinal Pacca was no longer with him. At Genoa the Prince Borghese, who was commanding there, was seized with the same panic as the Princess Baciocchi. After a few moments of repose at Alexandria, Pius VII. was carried, by way of Mondovi and Rivoli, towards Gren.o.ble. In the last stages, in the little Italian villages, the bells pealed forth, and the crowd who besought the benediction of the prisoner everywhere r.e.t.a.r.ded the advance. It was the same in all the districts of Savoy and Dauphiny. When the Pope made his entry into Gren.o.ble, on the 21st of July, the ardor of the population had not diminished, but the bells rang no longer; the clergy had been forbidden to present themselves before the pontiff. The prefect was absent, Fouche having been designedly detained at Paris. The orders of the emperor had at length arrived from Schoenbrunn. "I received at the same time the two letters of General Miollis and that of the Grand d.u.c.h.ess," he wrote, on the 18th of July, to Fouche. "I am vexed that the Pope has been arrested; it is a great folly.

It was needful to arrest Cardinal Pacca, and to leave the Pope quietly at Rome. But there is no remedy for it now; what is done is done. I know not what the Prince Borghese will have done, but my intention is that the Pope should not enter France. If he is still in the Riviere of Genoa, the best place at which he could be placed would be Savona. There is a house there large enough, where he would be suitably lodged until we know what course he decides upon. If his madness terminates, I have no objection to his being taken back to Rome. If he has entered France, have him taken back towards Savona and San Remo. Cause his correspondence to be examined. As to Cardinal Pacca, have him shut up at Fenestrella; and let him understand that if a single Frenchman is a.s.sa.s.sinated through his instigation, he will be the first to pay for it with his head."

Fifteen days later (August 6th, 1809), in the midst of his prudent and foreseeing preparations for the possible resumption of hostilities, enlightened by reflection, or by the report of the popular emotion in the provinces traversed by Pius VII., Napoleon modified his orders as to the residence of the Pope. "Monsieur Fouche, I should have preferred that only Cardinal Pacca had been arrested at Rome, and that the Pope had been left there. I should have preferred, since the Pope has not been left at Genoa, that he had been taken to Savona; but since he is at Gren.o.ble, I should be vexed that you should make him set out to be re-conducted to Savona; it would be better to guard him at Gren.o.ble, since he is there; the former course would have the appearance of making sport of the old man. I have not authorized Cardinal Fesch to send any one to his holiness; I have only had the minister of religion informed that I should desire Cardinal Maury and the other prelates to write to the Pope, to know what he wishes, and to make him understand that if he renounces the Concordat I shall regard it on my side as null and void. As to Cardinal Pacca, I suppose that you have sent him to Fenestrella, and that you have forbidden his communication with any one. I make a great difference between the Pope and him, princ.i.p.ally on account of his rank and his moral virtues. The Pope is a good man, but ignorant and fanatical. Cardinal Pacca is a man of education and a scoundrel, an enemy of France, and deserving of no regard.

Immediately I know where the Pope is located I shall see about taking definitive measures; of course if you have already caused him to set out for Savona, it is not necessary to bring him back."

The Pope was at Savona, where he was long to remain. Already the difficulties of religious administration were commencing, and the emperor's mind was engrossed with the inst.i.tution of bishops to the vacant sees. He had ordered all the prelates to chant a public _Te Deum_ with reference to the victory of Wagram. The bishops of Dalmatia alone had frankly and spiritedly replied to the statement of reasons which preceded the circular. In France the silence was still profound. The emperor had beforehand forbidden the journals to give any news from Rome. "It is a bad plan to let articles be written," he wrote to Fouche; "there is to be no speaking, either for or against, and it is not to be a matter for discussion in the journals. Well-informed men know perfectly that I have not attacked Rome. The mistaken bigots you cannot alter. Act on this principle." The _Moniteur_ held its tongue. All the journals followed its example. No one talked of the bull of excommunication. The circuits of the missionary priests were forbidden, as well as the ecclesiastical conferences of St. Sulpice. "The missionaries are for whoever pays them,"

declared the emperor, "for the English, if they are willing to employ them. I do not wish to have any missions whatever; get me ready a draft of a decree on that subject; I wish to complete it. I only know bishops, priests, and curates. I am satisfied with keeping up religion in my own country; I do not care about propagating it abroad." All the cardinals still remaining at Rome were expelled. In the depths of his soul, and in spite of the chimerical impulses of his irritated thoughts, Napoleon was already feeling the embarra.s.sments which he had himself sown along his path. The Pope a prisoner at Savona, indomitable in his conscientious resistance, might become more dangerous than the Pope at Rome, powerless and unarmed. The struggle was not terminated; a breath of revolt had pa.s.sed over Europe. Henceforth Napoleon was at war with that Catholic religion, the splendor of whose altars he had deemed it a point of honor to restore; he struggled at the same time violently against that national independence of the peoples which he had everywhere in his words invoked in opposition to the arbitrary jealousy of the monarchs. The Spanish sovereigns had succ.u.mbed to his yoke; the Spanish people, henceforth sustained by the might of England, courageously defended its liberties. At the moment when the supreme effort of the victory of Wagram was about to s.n.a.t.c.h humiliating concessions from the Emperor Francis, the captive Pope and the Spanish insurgents were presenting to Europe a salutary and striking contrast, the teachings of which she was beginning to comprehend.

Not the least significant of the lessons on the frailty of the human colossi raised by conquerors is the impossibility of tracing their history on the same canvas. For a long time Napoleon alone had filled the scene, and his brilliant track was easily kept in view. In proportion as he acc.u.mulated on his shoulders a burden too heavy, and as he extended his empire without consolidating it, the insufficiency of human will and human power made itself more painfully felt. Napoleon was no longer everywhere present, acting and controlling, in order to repair the faults he had committed, or to dazzle the spectators with new successes. In vain the prodigious activity of his spirit sought to make up for the radical defect of his universal dominion. The Emperor Napoleon was conquered by the very nature of things, before the fruits of his unmeasured ambition had had time to ripen, and before all Europe, indignant and wearied out, was at length roused up against him.

There was already, in 1809, a confused but profound instinctive feeling throughout the world that the moment for resistance and for supreme efforts had arrived. The Archduke Charles had proved it in Austria by the fury of his courage; the English cabinet were bearing witness to it by the great preparations they were displaying on their coast and in their a.r.s.enals, as well as by the ready aid lent by them to the insurgents of the Peninsula. The Emperor Napoleon on quitting Spain, in the month of January, had left behind him the certain germs of growing disorder.

Obliged of necessity to commit the chief command to King Joseph, he had been desirous of remedying the weakness and military incapacity of the monarch whom he had himself put on the throne by conferring upon the marshals charged with continuing the war an almost absolute authority over their _corps d'armee_. Each of them was to correspond directly with the minister of war, supremely directed by Napoleon himself. Deprived thus of all serious control over the direction of the war, King Joseph saw himself equally thwarted in civil and financial affairs. Spanish interests were naturally found to conflict with French interests. King Joseph defended the former; an army of imperial functionaries were charged with the protection of the second. In this mission they proceeded at times even to insult. King Joseph threatened to place in a carriage M. de Freville, administrator for the treasury of confiscated goods, and to send him directly to France. The complaints of the unfortunate monarch to his brother were frequent and well founded. "Your Majesty has not entire confidence in me," he wrote on the 17th of February to Napoleon, "and meanwhile, without that, the position is not tenable. I shall not again repeat what I have already written ten times as to the situation of the finances; I give all my faculties to business from eight o'clock in the morning to eleven o'clock in the evening; I go out once a week; I have not a sou to give to any one; I am in the fourth year of my reign, and I still see my guard with the first frock-coat which I gave it, three years ago; I am the goal of all complaints; I have all pretensions to overcome; my power does not extend beyond Madrid, and at Madrid itself I am daily thwarted. Your Majesty has ordered the sequestration of the goods of ten families, it has been extended to more than double. All the habitable houses are sealed up; 6000 domestics of the sequestrated families are in the streets. All demand charity; the boldest of them take to robbery and a.s.sa.s.sination. My officers--all those who sacrificed with me the kingdom of Naples--are still lodged by billets. Without capital, without income, without money, what can I do? All this picture, bad as it is, is not exaggerated, and, bad as it is, it will not exhaust my courage; I shall arrive at the end of all that. Heaven has given me everything needful to overcome the hindrances from circ.u.mstances or from my enemies; but that which Heaven has denied me is an organization capable of supporting the insults and contradictions of those who ought to serve me, and, above all, of contending with the dissatisfaction of a man whom I have loved too well to be ever willing to dislike him. Thus, sire, if my whole life has not given you the fullest confidence in me; if you judge it necessary to surround me with petty souls, who cause me myself to redden with shame; if I am to be insulted even in my capital; if I have not the right to appoint the governors and commandants who are always under my eyes,--I have not two choices to make. I am only King of Spain by the force of your arms. I might become so by the love of the Spaniards; but for that it would be necessary to govern in my own manner. I have often heard you say, 'Every animal has its instinct, and each one ought to follow it.' I will be such a king as the brother and friend of your Majesty ought to be, or I will return to Mortefontaine, where I shall ask for nothing but the happiness of living without humiliation, and of dying with a tranquil conscience."

Joseph Bonaparte had presumed too much on his forces and the remains of his independence. Constantly hard and severe with regard to his brothers, the emperor replied with scorn to King Joseph: "It is not ill-temper and small pa.s.sions that you need, but views cool and conformable to your position. You talk to me of the const.i.tution. Let me know if the const.i.tution forbids the King of Spain to be at the head of 300,000 Frenchmen? if the const.i.tution prohibits the garrison from being French, and the governor of Madrid a Frenchman? if the const.i.tution says that in Saragossa the houses are to be blown up one after another? You will not succeed in Spain, except by vigor and energy. This parade of goodness and clemency ends in nothing. You will be applauded so long as my armies are victorious; you will be abandoned if they are vanquished. You ought to have become acquainted with the Spanish nation in the time you have been in Spain, and after the events that you have seen. Accustom yourself to think your royal authority as a very small matter."