Beacon Lights of History Volume Ix Part 3

He had plainly rendered to his country two great services, without tarnishing his own fame, or being false to his cause. But what excuse had he to give to the bar of enlightened posterity for the invasion of Egypt? The idea originated with himself. It was not a national necessity. It was simply an unwarrantable war: it was a crime; it was a dream of conquest, without anything more to justify it than Alexander's conquests in India, or any other conquest by ambitious and restless warriors. He hoped to play the part of Alexander,--to found a new empire in the East. It was his darling scheme. It would give him power, and perhaps sovereignty. Some patriotic notions may have blended with his visions. Perhaps he would make a new route to India; perhaps cut off the empire of the English in the East; perhaps plant colonies among worn-out races; perhaps destroy the horrid empire of the Turks; perhaps make Constantinople the seat of French influence and empire in the East.

But what harm had Turkey or Syria or Egypt done to France? Did they menace the peace of Europe? Did even suffering Egyptians call upon him to free them from a Turkish yoke? No: it was a meditated conquest, on the same principles of ambition and aggrandizement which ever have animated unlawful conquests, and therefore a political crime; not to be excused because other nations have committed such crimes, ultimately overruled to the benefit of civilization, like the conquest of India by England, and Texas by the United States.

I will not dwell on this expedition, which failed through the watchfulness of the English, the naval victory of Nelson at the Nile, and the defence of Acre by Sir Sidney Smith. It was the dream of Napoleon at that time to found an empire in the East, of which he would be supreme; but he missed his destiny, and was obliged to return, foiled, baffled, and chagrined, to Paris;--his first great disappointment.

But he had lost no prestige, since he performed prodigies of valor, and covered up his disasters by lying bulletins. Here he first appeared as the arch-liar, which he was to the close of his career. In this expedition he rendered no services to his country or to civilization, except in the employment of scientific men to decipher the history of Egypt,--which showed that he had an enlightened mind.

During his absence disasters had overtaken France. Italy was torn from her grasp, her armies had been defeated, and Russia, Austria, and England were leagued for her overthrow. Insurrection was in the provinces, and dissensions raged in Paris. The Directory had utterly lost public confidence, and had shown no capacity to govern. All eyes were turned to the conqueror of Italy, and, as it was supposed, of Egypt also.

A _coup d'etat_ followed. Napoleon's soldiers drove the legislative body from the hall, and he a.s.sumed the supreme control, under the name of First Consul. Thus ended the Republic in November, 1799, after a brief existence of seven years. The usurpation of a soldier began, who trod the const.i.tution and liberty under his iron feet. He did what Caesar and Cromwell had done, on the plea of revolutionary necessity. He put back the march of liberty for nearly half-a-century. His sole excuse was that his undeniable usurpation was ratified by the votes of the French people, intoxicated by his victories, and seeing no way to escape from the perils which surrounded them than under his supreme guidance. They parted with their liberties for safety. Had Napoleon been compelled to "wade through slaughter to his throne,"--as Caesar did, as Augustus did,--there would have been no excuse for his usurpation, except the plea of Caesar, that liberty was impossible, and the people needed the strong arm of despotism to sustain law and order. But Napoleon was more adroit; he appealed to the people themselves, recognizing them as the source of power, and they confirmed his usurpation by an overwhelming majority.

Since he was thus the people's choice, I will not dwell on the usurpation. He cheated them, however; for he invoked the principles of the Revolution, and they believed him,--as they afterwards did his nephew. They wanted a better executive government, and were willing to try him, since he had proved his abilities; but they did not antic.i.p.ate the utter suppression of const.i.tutional government,--they still had faith in the principles of their Revolution. They abhorred absolutism; they abhor it still; to destroy it they had risked their Revolution. To the principles of the Revolution the great body of French people have been true, when permitted to be, from the time when they hurled Louis XVI. from the throne. Absolutism with the consent of the French nation has pa.s.sed away forever, and never can be revived, any more than the oracles of Dodona or the bulls of Mediaeval popes.

Now let us consider whether, as the executive of the French nation, he was true to the principles of the Revolution, which he invoked, and which that people have ever sought to establish.

In some respects, it must be confessed, he was, and in other respects he was not. He never sought to revive feudalism; all its abominations perished. He did not bring back the law of entail, nor unequal privileges, nor the _regime_ of n.o.bles. He ruled by the laws; rewarding merit, and encouraging what was obviously for the interests of the nation. The lives and property of the people were protected. The _idea_ of liberty was never ignored. If liberty was suppressed to augment his power and cement his rule, it was in the name of public necessity, as an expression of the interests he professed to guard. When he incited his soldiers to battle, it was always under pretence of delivering enslaved nations and spreading the principles of the Revolution, whose product he was. And until he a.s.sumed the imperial t.i.tle most of his acts were enlightened, and for the benefit of the people he ruled; there was no obvious oppression on the part of government, except to provide means to sustain the army, without which France must succ.u.mb to enemies. While he was First Consul, it would seem that the hostility of Europe was more directed towards France herself for having expelled the Bourbons, than against him as a dangerous man. Europe could not forgive France for her Revolution,--not even England; Napoleon was but the necessity which the political complications arising from the Revolution seemed to create.

Hence, the wars which Napoleon conducted while he was First Consul were virtually defensive, since all Europe aimed to put down France,--such a nest of a.s.sa.s.sins and communists and theorists!--rather than to put down Napoleon; for, although usurper, he was, strange to say, the nation's choice as well as idol. He reigned by the will of the nation, and he could not have reigned without. The nation gave him his power, to be wielded to protect France, in imminent danger from foreign powers.

And wisely and grandly did he use it at first. He turned his attention to the internal state of a distracted country, and developed its resources and promoted tranquillity; he appointed the ablest men, without distinction of party, for his ministers and prefects; he restored the credit of the country; he put a stop to forced loans; he released priests from confinement; he rebuked the fanaticism of the ultra-revolutionists, he reorganized the public bodies; he created tribunals of appeal; he ceased to confiscate the property of emigrants, and opened a way for their return; he restored the right of disposing property by will; he inst.i.tuted the Bank of France on sound financial principles; he checked all disorders; he brought to a close the desolating war of La Vendee; he retained what was of permanent value in the legislation of the Revolution; he made the distribution of the public burdens easy; he paid his army, and rewarded eminent men, whom he enlisted in his service. So stable was the government, and so wise were the laws, and so free were all channels of industry, that prosperity returned to the distracted country. The middle cla.s.ses were particularly benefited,--the shopkeepers and mechanics,--and they acquiesced in a strong rule, since it seemed beneficent. The capital was enriched and adorned and improved. A treaty with the Pope was made, by which the clergy were restored to their parishes. A new code of laws was made by great jurists, on the principles of the Justinian Code. A magnificent road was constructed over the Alps. Colonial possessions were recovered.

Navies were built, fortifications repaired, ca.n.a.ls dug, and the beet-root and tobacco cultivated.

But these internal improvements, by which France recovered prosperity, paled before the services which Napoleon rendered as a defender of his country's nationality. He had proposed a peace-policy to England in an autograph letter to the King, which was treated as an insult, and answered by the British government by a declaration of war, to last till the Bourbons were restored,--perhaps what Napoleon wanted and expected; and war was renewed with Austria and England. The consulate was now marked by the brilliant Italian campaign,--the pa.s.sage over the Alps; the battle of Marengo, gained by only thirty thousand men; the recovery of Italy, and renewed military _eclat_. The Peace of Amiens, October, 1801, placed Napoleon in the proudest position which any modern sovereign ever enjoyed. He was now thirty-three years of age,--supreme in France, and powerful throughout Europe. The French were proud of a man who was glorious both in peace and war; and his consulate had been sullied by only one crime,--the a.s.sa.s.sination of the heir of the house of Conde; a blunder, as Talleyrand said, rather than a crime, since it arrayed against him all the friends of Legitimacy in Europe.

Had Napoleon been contented with the power he then enjoyed as First Consul for life, and simply stood on the defensive, he could have made France invincible, and would have left a name comparatively reproachless. But we now see unmistakable evidence of boundless personal ambition, and a policy of unscrupulous aggrandizement. He a.s.sumes the imperial t.i.tle,--greedy for the trappings as well as the reality of power; he openly founds a new dynasty of kings; he abolishes every trace of const.i.tutional rule; he treads liberty under his feet, and mocks the very ideas by which he had inspired enthusiasm in his troops; his watchword is now not _Liberty_, but _Glory_; he centres in himself the interests of France; he surrounds himself, at the Tuileries, with the pomp and ceremonies of the ancient kings; and he even induces the Pope himself to crown him at Notre Dame. It was a proud day, December 2, 1804, when, surrounded by all that was brilliant and imposing in France, Napoleon proceeded in solemn procession to the ancient cathedral, where were a.s.sembled the magistrates, the bishops, and the t.i.tled dignitaries of the realm, and received, in his imperial robes, from the hands of the Pope, the consecrated sceptre and crown of empire, and heard from the lips of the supreme pontiff of Christendom those words which once greeted Charlemagne in the basilica of St. Peter when the Roman clergy proclaimed him Emperor of the West,--_Vivat in oeternum semper Augustus_. The venerable aisles and pillars and arches of the ancient cathedral resounded to the music of five hundred performers in a solemn _Te Deum_. The sixty prelates of France saluted the anointed soldier as their monarch, while the inspiring cry from the vast audience of _Vive l'Empereur!_ announced Napoleon's entrance into the circle of European sovereigns.

But this fresh usurpation, although confirmed by a vote of the French people, was the signal for renewed hostilities. A coalition of all governments unfriendly to France was formed. Military preparations a.s.sumed a magnitude never seen before in the history of Europe, which now speedily became one vast camp. Napoleon quit his capital to a.s.sume the conduct of armies. He had threatened England with invasion, which he knew was impossible, for England then had nearly one thousand ships of war, manned by one hundred and twenty thousand men. But when Napoleon heard of the victories of Nelson, he suddenly and rapidly marched to the Rhine, and precipitated one hundred and eighty thousand troops upon Austria, who was obliged to open her capital. Then, reinforced by Russia, Austria met the invader at Austerlitz with equal forces; but only to suffer crushing defeat. Pitt died of a broken heart when he heard of this decisive French victory, followed shortly after by the disastrous overthrow of the Prussians at Jena, and that, again, by the victory of Eylau over the Russians, which secured the peace of Tilsit, 1807,--making Napoleon supreme on the continent of Europe at the age of thirty-nine. It was deemed idle to resist further this "man of destiny,"

who in twelve years, from the condition of an unemployed officer of artillery, without friends or family or influence, had subdued in turn all the monarchies of Europe, with the exception of England and Russia, and regulated at his pleasure the affairs of distant courts. To what an eminence had he climbed! Nothing in history or romance approaches the facts of his amazing career.

And even down to this time--to the peace of Tilsit--there are no grave charges against him which history will not extenuate, aside from the egotism of his character. He claims that he fought for French nationality, in danger from the united hostilities of Europe. Certainly his own glory was thus far identified with the glory of his country. He had rescued France by a series of victories more brilliant than had been achieved for centuries. He had won a fame second to that of no conqueror in the world's history.

But these astonishing successes seem to have turned his head. He is dazzled by his own greatness, and intoxicated by the plaudits of his idolaters. He proudly and coldly says that "it is a proof of the weakness of the human understanding for any one to dream of resisting him." He now aims at a universal military monarchy; he seeks to make the kings of the earth his va.s.sals; he places the members of his family, whether worthy or unworthy, on ancient thrones; he would establish on the banks of the Seine that central authority which once emanated from Rome; he apes the imperial Caesars in the arrogance of his tone and the insolence of his demands; he looks upon Europe as belonging to himself; he becomes a tyrant of the race; he centres in the gratification of his pa.s.sions the interests of humanity; he becomes the angry Nemesis of Europe, indifferent to the sufferings of mankind and the peace of the world.

After the peace of Tilsit his whole character seems to have changed, even in little things. No longer is he affable and courteous, but silent, reserved, and sullen. His temper becomes bad; his brow is usually clouded; his manners are brusque; his egotism is transcendent.

"Your first duty," said he to his brother Louis, when he made him king of Holland, "is to _me_; your second, to France." He becomes intolerably haughty, even to the greatest personages. He insults the ladies of the court, and pinches their ears, so that they feel relieved when he has pa.s.sed them by. He no longer flatters, but expects incense from everybody. In his bursts of anger he breaks china and throws his coat into the fire. He turns himself into a master of ceremonies; he cheats at cards; he persecutes literary men.

Napoleon's career of crime is now consummated. He divorces Josephine,--the greatest mistake of his life. He invades Spain and Russia, against the expostulations of his wisest counsellors, showing that he has lost his head, that reason has toppled on her throne,--for he fancies himself more powerful than the forces of Nature. All these crimes are utterly inexcusable, except on the plea of madness. Such gigantic crimes, such a recklessness of life, such uncontrollable ambition, such a defiance of justice, such an abrogation of treaties, such a disregard of the interests of humanity, to say nothing of the welfare of France, prost.i.tuted, enslaved, down-trodden,--and all to nurse his diabolical egotism,--astonished and shocked the whole civilized world. These things more than balanced all the services he ever rendered, since they directly led to the exhaustion of his country.

They were so atrocious that they cried aloud to Heaven for vengeance.

And Heaven heard the agonizing shrieks of misery which ascended from the smoking ruins of Moscow, from the b.l.o.o.d.y battlefield of Borodino, from the river Berezina, from the homes of the murdered soldiers, from the widows and orphans of more than a million of brave men who had died to advance his glory, from the dismal abodes of twenty-five millions more whom he had cheated out of their liberties and mocked with his ironical proclamations; yea, from the millions in Prussia, Austria, and England who had been taxed to the uttermost to defeat him, and had died martyrs to the cause of nationalities, or what we call the Balance of Power, which European statesmen have ever found it necessary to maintain at any cost, since on this balance hang the interests of feeble and defenceless nations. Ay, Heaven heard,--the G.o.d whom he ignored,--and sent a retribution as signal and as prompt and as awful as his victories had been overwhelming.

I need not describe Napoleon's fall,--as clear a destiny as his rise; a lesson to all the future tyrants and conquerors of the world; a moral to be pondered as long as history shall be written. Hear, ye heavens! and give ear, O earth! to the voice of eternal justice, as it appealed to universal consciousness, and p.r.o.nounced the doom of the greatest sinner of modern times,--to be defeated by the aroused and indignant nations, to lose his military prestige, to incur unexampled and bitter humiliation, to be repudiated by the country he had raised to such a pitch of greatness, to be dethroned, to be imprisoned at Elba, to be confined on the rock of St. Helena, to be at last forced to meditate, and to die with vultures at his heart,--a chained Prometheus, rebellious and defiant to the last, with a world exultant at his fall; a hopeless and impressive fall, since it broke for fifty years the charm of military glory, and showed that imperialism cannot be endured among nations craving for liberties and rights which are the birthright of our humanity.

Did Napoleon, then, live in vain? No great man lives in vain. He is ever, whether good or bad, the instrument of Divine Providence, Gustavus Adolphus was the instrument of G.o.d in giving religious liberty to Germany. William the Silent was His instrument in achieving the independence of Holland. Washington was His instrument in giving dignity and freedom to this American nation, this home of the oppressed, this glorious theatre for the expansion of unknown energies and the adoption of unknown experiments. Napoleon was His instrument in freeing France from external enemies, and for vindicating the substantial benefits of an honest but uncontrolled Revolution. He was His instrument in arousing Italy from the sleep of centuries, and taking the first step to secure a united nation and a const.i.tutional government. He was His instrument in overthrowing despotism among the petty kings of Germany, and thus showing the necessity of a national unity,--at length realized by the genius of Bismarck. Even in his crimes Napoleon stands out on the sublime pages of history as the instrument of Providence, since his crimes were overruled in the hatred of despotism among his own subjects, and a still greater hatred of despotism as exercised by those kings who finally subdued him, and who vainly attempted to turn back the progress of liberal sentiments by their representatives at the Congress of Vienna.

The fall of Napoleon taught some awful and impressive lessons to humanity, which would have been unlearned had he continued to be successful to the end. It taught the utter vanity of military glory; that peace with neighbors is the greatest of national blessings, and war the greatest of evils; that no successes on the battlefield can compensate for the miseries of an unjust and unnecessary war; and that avenging justice will sooner or later overtake the wickedness of a heartless egotism. It taught the folly of worshipping mere outward strength, disconnected from goodness; and, finally, it taught that G.o.d will protect defenceless nations, and even guilty nations, when they shall have expiated their crimes and follies, and prove Himself the kind Father of all His children, even amid chastis.e.m.e.nts, gradually leading them, against their will, to that blessed condition when swords shall be beaten into ploughshares, and nations shall learn war no more.

What remains to-day of those grand Napoleonic ideas which intoxicated France for twenty years, and which, revived by Louis Napoleon, led to a brief glory and an infamous fall, and the humiliation and impoverishment of the most powerful state of Europe? They are synonymous with imperialism, personal government, the absolute reign of a single man, without const.i.tutional checks,--a return to Caesarism, to the unenlightened and selfish despotism of Pagan Rome. And hence they are now repudiated by France herself,--as well as by England and America,--as false, as selfish, as fatal to all true national progress, as opposed to every sentiment which gives dignity to struggling States, as irreconcilably hostile to the civilization which binds nations together, and which slowly would establish liberty, and peace, and industry, and equal privileges, and law, and education, and material prosperity, upon this fallen world.

AUTHORITIES.

So much has been written on Napoleon, that I can only select some of the standard and accessible works. Bourrienne's Memoirs of Napoleon I.; L.

P. Junot's Memoirs of Napoleon, Court, and Family; Las Casas' Napoleon at St. Helena; Thiers' History of the Consulate and the Empire; Memoirs of Prince Metternich; Segur's History of Expedition to Russia; Memoirs of Madame de Remusat; Vieusseau's Napoleon, his Sayings and Deeds; Napoleon's Confidential Correspondence with Josephine and with his Brother Joseph; Alison's History of Europe; Lockhart's and Sir Walter Scott's Lives of Napoleon; Court and Camp of Napoleon, in Murray's Family Library; W. Forsyth's Captivity at St. Helena; Dr. Channing's Essay on Napoleon; Lord Brougham's Sketch of Napoleon; J. G. Wilson's Sketch of Napoleon; Life of Napoleon, by A. H. Jomini; Headley's Napoleon and his Marshals; Napier's Peninsular War; Wellington's Despatches; Gilford's Life of Pitt; Botta's History of Italy under Napoleon; Labaume's Russian Campaign; Berthier's Histoire de l'Expedition d'Egypte.

PRINCE METTERNICH.

1773-1859.

CONSERVATISM.

In the later years of Napoleon's rule, when he had reached the summit of power, and the various German States lay prostrate at his feet, there arose in Austria a great man, on whom the eyes of Europe were speedily fixed, and who gradually became the central figure of Continental politics. This remarkable man was Count Metternich, who more than any other man set in motion the secret springs which resulted in a general confederation to shake off the degrading fetters imposed by the French conqueror. In this matter he had a powerful ally in Baron von Stein, who reorganized Prussia, and prepared her for successful resistance, when the time came, against the common enemy. In another lecture I shall attempt to show the part taken by Von Stein in the regeneration of Germany; but it is my present purpose to confine attention to the Austrian chancellor and diplomatist, his various labors, and the services he rendered, not to the cause of Freedom and Progress, but to that of Absolutism, of which he was in his day the most noted champion.

Metternich, in his character as diplomatist, is to be contemplated in two aspects: first, as aiming to enlist the great powers in armed combination against Napoleon; and secondly, as attempting to unite them and all the German States to suppress revolutionary ideas and popular insurrections, and even const.i.tutional government itself. Before presenting him in this double light, however, I will briefly sketch the events of his life until he stood out as the leading figure in European politics,--as great a figure as Bismarck later became.

Clemens Wenzel Nepomuk Lothar, Count von Metternich, was born at Coblentz, on the Rhine, May 15, 1773. His father was a n.o.bleman of ancient family. I will not go into his pedigree, reaching far back in the Middle Ages,--a matter so important in the eyes of German and even English biographers, but to us in America of no more account than the genealogy of the Dukes of Edom. The count his father was probably of more ability than an ordinary n.o.bleman in a country where n.o.bles are so numerous, since he was then, or soon after, Austrian amba.s.sador to the Netherlands. Young Metternich was first sent to the University of Strasburg, at the age of fifteen, about the time when Napoleon was completing his studies at a military academy. In 1790, a youth of seventeen, he took part in the ceremonies attending the coronation of Emperor Leopold at Frankfort, and made the acquaintance of the archduke, who two years later succeeded to the imperial dignity as Francis II. We next see him a student of law in the University of Mainz, spending his vacations at Brussels, in his father's house.

Even at that time Metternich attracted attention for his elegant manners and lively wit,--a born courtier, a favorite in high society, and so prominent for his intelligence and accomplishments that he was sent to London as an attache to the Netherlands emba.s.sy, where it seems that he became acquainted with the leading statesmen of England. There must have been something remarkable about him to draw, at the age of twenty, the attention of such men as Burke, Pitt, Fox, and Sheridan. What interested him most in England were the sittings of the English Parliament and the trial of Warren Hastings. At the early age of twenty-one he was appointed minister to the Hague, but was prevented going to his post by the war, and retired to Vienna, which he now saw for the first time.

Soon after, he married a daughter of Prince Kaunitz, eldest son of the great chancellor who under three reigns had controlled the foreign policy of the empire. He thus entered the circle of the highest n.o.bility of Austria,--the proudest and most exclusive on the face of the whole earth.

At first the young count--living with his bride at the house of her father, and occupying the highest social position, with wealth and ease and every luxury at command, fond equally of books, of music, and of art, but still fonder of the distinguished society of Vienna, and above all, enamored of the charms of his beautiful and brilliant wife--wished to spend his life in elegant leisure. But his remarkable talents and accomplishments were already too well known for the emperor to allow him to remain in his splendid retirement, especially when the empire was beset with dangers of the most critical kind. His services were required by the State, and he was sent as amba.s.sador to Dresden, after the peace of Luneville, 1801, when his diplomatic career in reality began.

Dresden, where were congregated at this time some of the ablest diplomatists of Europe, was not only an important post of observation for watching the movements of Napoleon, but it was itself a capital of great attractions, both for its works of art and for its society. Here Count Metternich resided for two years, learning much of politics, of art, and letters,--the most accomplished gentleman among all the distinguished people that he met; not as yet a man of power, but a man of influence, sending home to Count Stadion, minister of foreign affairs, reports and letters of great ability, displaying a sagacity and tact marvellous for a man of twenty-eight.

Napoleon was then engaged in making great preparations for a war with Austria, and it was important for Austria to secure the alliance of Prussia, her great rival, with whom she had never been on truly friendly terms, since both aimed at ascendency in Germany. Frederick William III.

was then on the throne of Prussia, having two great men among his ministers,--Von Stein and Hardenberg; the former at the head of financial affairs, and the latter at the head of the foreign bureau. To the more important post of Berlin, Metternich was therefore sent. He found great difficulty in managing the Prussian king, whose jealousy of Austria balanced his hatred of Napoleon, and who therefore stood aloof and inactive, indisposed for war, in strict alliance with Russia, who also wanted peace.

The Czar Alexander I., who had just succeeded his murdered father Paul, was a great admirer of Napoleon. His empire was too remote to fear French encroachments or French ideas. Indeed, he started with many liberal sentiments. By nature he was kind and affectionate; he was simple in his tastes, truthful in his character, philanthropic in his views, enthusiastic in his friendships, and refined in his intercourse,--a broad and generous sovereign. And yet there was something wanting in Alexander which prevented him from being great. He was vacillating in his policy, and his judgment was easily warped by fanciful ideas. "His life was worn out between devotion to certain systems and disappointment as to their results. He was fitful, uncertain, and unpractical. Hence he made continual mistakes. He meant well, but did evil, and the discovery of his errors broke his heart. He died of weariness of life, deceived in all his calculations," in 1825.

Metternich spent four years in Berlin, ferreting out the schemes of Napoleon, and striving to make alliances against him; but he found his only sincere and efficient ally to be England, then governed by Pitt.

The king of Prussia was timid, and leaned on Russia; he feared to offend his powerful neighbor on the north and east. Nor was Prussia then prepared for war. As for the South German States, they all had their various interests to defend, and had not yet grasped the idea of German unity. There was not a great statesman or a great general among them all. They had their petty dynastic prejudices and jealousies, and were absorbed in the routine of court etiquette and pleasures, stagnant and unenlightened. The only brilliant court life was at Weimar, where Goethe reigned in the circle of his idolaters. The great men of Germany at that time were in the universities, interested in politics, like the Humboldts at Berlin, but not taking a prominent part. Generals and diplomatists absorbed the active political field. As for orators, there were none; for there were no popular a.s.semblies,--no scope for their abilities. The able men were in the service of their sovereigns as diplomatists in the various courts of Europe, and generally were n.o.bles.

Diplomacy, in fact, was the only field in which great talents were developed and rewarded outside the realm of literature.

In this field Metternich soon became pre-eminently distinguished. He was at once the prompting genius and the agent of an absolute sovereign who ruled over the most powerful State, next to France, on the continent of Europe, and the most august. The emperor of Austria was supposed to be the heir of the Caesars and of Charlemagne. His territories were more extensive than that of France, and his subjects more numerous than those of all the other German States combined, except Prussia. But the emperor himself was a feeble man, sickly in body, weak in mind, and governed by his ministers, the chief of whom was Count Stadion, minister of foreign affairs. In Austria the aristocracy was more powerful and wealthy than the n.o.bility of any other European State. It was also the most exclusive. No one could rise by any talents into their favored circle.

They were great feudal landlords; and their ranks were not recruited, as in England, by men of genius and wealth. Hence, they were narrow, bigoted, and arrogant; but they had polished and gracious manners, and shone in the stiff though elegant society of Vienna,--not brilliant as in Paris or London, but exceedingly attractive, and devoted to pleasure, to grand hunting-parties on princely estates, to operas and b.a.l.l.s and theatres. Probably Vienna society was dull, if it was elegant, from the etiquette and ceremonies which marked German courts; for what was called society was not that of distinguished men in letters and art, but almost exclusively that of n.o.bles. A learned professor or wealthy merchant could no more get access to it than he could climb to the moon. But as Vienna was a Catholic city, great ecclesiastical dignitaries, not always of n.o.ble birth, were on an equality with counts and barons. It was only in the Church that a man of plebeian origin could rise. Indeed, there was no field for genius at all. The musician Haydn was almost the only genius that Austria at that time possessed outside of diplomatic or military ranks.

Napoleon had now been crowned emperor, and his course had been from conquering to conquer. The great battles of Austerlitz and Jena had been fought, which placed Austria and Prussia at the mercy of the conqueror.

It was necessary that some one should be sent to Paris capable of fathoming the schemes of the French emperor, and in 1806 Count Metternich was transferred from Berlin to the French capital. No abler diplomatist could be found in Europe. He was now thirty-three years of age, a n.o.bleman of the highest rank, his father being a prince of the empire. He had a large private fortune, besides his salary as amba.s.sador. His manners were perfect, and his accomplishments were great. He could speak French as well as his native tongue. His head was clear; his knowledge was accurate and varied. Calm, cold, astute, adroit, with infinite tact, he was now brought face to face with Talleyrand, Napoleon's minister of foreign affairs, his equal in astuteness and dissimulation, as well as in the charms of conversation and the graces of polished life. With this statesman Metternich had the pleasantest relations, both social and diplomatic. Yet there was a marked difference between them. Talleyrand had accepted the ideas of the Revolution, but had no sympathy with its pa.s.sions and excesses. He was the friend of law and order, and in his heart favored const.i.tutional government. On this ground he supported Napoleon as the defender of civilization, but afterward deserted him when he perceived that the Emperor was resolved to rule without const.i.tutional checks. His nature was selfish, and he made no scruple of enriching himself, whatever master he served; but he was not indifferent to the welfare and glory of France. Metternich, on the other hand, abhorred the ideas of the Revolution as much as he did its pa.s.sions. He saw in absolutism the only hope of stability, the only reign of law. He distrusted const.i.tutional government as liable to changes, and as unduly affected by popular ideas and pa.s.sions. He served faithfully and devotedly his emperor as a sacred personage, ruling by divine right, to whom were intrusted the interests of the nation. He was comparatively unselfish, and was prepared for any personal sacrifices for his country and his sovereign.

Metternich was treated with distinguished consideration at Paris, not only because he was the representative of the oldest and proudest sovereignty in Europe,--still powerful in the midst of disasters,--but also on account of his acknowledged abilities, independent att.i.tude, and stainless private character. All the other amba.s.sadors at Paris were directed to act in accordance with his advice. In 1807 he concluded the treaty of Fontainebleau, which was most favorable to Austrian interests.

He was the only man at court whom Napoleon could not browbeat or intimidate in his affected bursts of anger. Personally, Napoleon liked him as an accomplished and agreeable gentleman; as a diplomatist and statesman the Emperor was afraid of him, knowing that the Austrian was at the bottom of all the intrigues and cabals against him. Yet he dared not give Metternich his pa.s.sports, nor did he wish to quarrel with so powerful a man, who might defeat his schemes to marry the daughter of the Austrian emperor,--the light-headed and frivolous Marie Louise. So Metternich remained in honor at Paris for three years, studying the character and aims of Napoleon, watching his military preparations, and preparing his own imperial master for contingencies which would probably arise; for Napoleon was then meditating the conquest of Spain, as well as the invasion of Russia, and Metternich as well as Talleyrand knew that this would be a great political blunder, diverting his armies from the preservation of the conquests he had already made, and giving to the German States the hope of shaking off their fetters at the first misfortune which should overtake him. No man in Europe so completely fathomed the designs of Napoleon as Metternich, or so profoundly measured and accurately estimated his character. And I here cannot forbear to quote his own language, both to show his sagacity and to reproduce the portrait he drew of Napoleon.

"He became," says Metternich, "a great legislator and administrator, as he became a great soldier, by following out his instincts. The turn of his mind always led him toward the positive. He disliked vague ideas, and hated equally the dreams of visionaries and the abstractions of idealists. He treated as nonsense everything that was not clearly and practically presented to him. He valued only those sciences which can be verified by the senses, or which rest on experience and observation. He had the greatest contempt for the false philosophy and false philanthropy of the eighteenth century. Among its teachers, Voltaire was the special object of his aversion. As a Catholic, he recognized in religion alone the right to govern human societies. Personally indifferent to religious practices, he respected them too much to permit the slightest ridicule of those who followed them; and yet religion with him was the result of an enlightened policy rather than an affair of sentiment. He was persuaded that no man called to public life could be guided by any other motive than that of interest.

"He was gifted with a particular tact in recognizing those men who could be useful to him. He had a profound knowledge of the national character of the French. In history he guessed more than he knew. As he always made use of the same quotations, he must have drawn from a few books, especially abridgments. His heroes were Alexander, Caesar, and Charlemagne. He laid great stress on aristocratic birth and the antiquity of his own family. He had no other regard for men than a foreman in a manufactory feels for his work-people. In private, without being amiable, he was good-natured. His sisters got from him all they wanted. Simple and easy in private life, he showed himself to little advantage in the great world. Nothing could be more awkward than he in a drawing-room. He would have made great sacrifices to have added three inches to his height. He walked on tiptoe. His costumes were studied to form a contrast with the circle which surrounded him, by extreme simplicity or extreme elegance. Talma taught him att.i.tudes.

"Having but one pa.s.sion,--that of power,--he never lost either his time or his means in those objects which deviated from his aims. Master of himself, he soon became master of events. In whatever period he had appeared, he would have played a prominent part. His prodigious successes blinded him; but up to 1812 he never lost sight of the profound calculations by which he so often conquered. He never recoiled from fear of the wounds he might cause. As a war-chariot crushes everything it meets on its way, he thought of nothing but to advance. He could sympathize with family troubles; he was indifferent to political calamities.