Napoleon Bonaparte - John S. C. Abbott (book club reads .txt) 📗

Las Casas,” Napoleon replied, “is more overbearing than weakness which feels itself protected by strength! Look at women for example.” This Berthier had with the utmost meanness, abandoned his benefactor, and took his place in front of the carriage of Louis XVIII. as he rode triumphantly into Paris. “The only revenge I wish on this poor Berthier,” said Napoleon at the time, “would be to see him in his costume of captain of the body-guard of Louis.”

 

Says Bourrienne, Napoleon’s rejected secretary, “The character of Napoleon was not a cruel one. He was neither rancorous nor vindictive. None but those who are blinded by fury, could have given him the name of Nero or Caligula. I think that I have stated his real fault with sufficient sincerity to be believed upon my word. I can assert that Bonaparte, apart from politics, was feeling kind, and accessible to pity. He was very fond of children, and a bad man has seldom that disposition. In the habits of private life he had and the expression is not too strong, much benevolence and great indulgence for human weakness. A contrary opinion is too firmly fixed in some minds for me to hope to remove it. I shall, I fear, have opposers; but I address myself to those who are in search of truth. I lived in the most unreserved confidence with Napoleon until the age of thirty-four years, and I advance nothing lightly.” This is the admission of one who had been ejected from office by Napoleon, and who become a courtier of the reinstated Bourbons. It is a candid admission of an enemy.

 

The ships weighed anchor in the darkness of the night, hoping before the day should dawn to escape the English cruisers which were hovering about Alexandria. Unfortunately, at midnight, the wind died away, and it became almost perfectly calm. Fearful of being captured, some were anxious to seek again the shore. “Be quiet,”

said Napoleon, “we shall pass in safety.”

 

Admiral Gantheaume wished to take the shortest route to France.

Napoleon, however, directed the admiral to sail along as near as possible the coast of Africa, and to continue that unfrequented route, till the ships should pass the Island of Sardinia. “In the mean while,” said he, “should an English fleet present itself, we will run ashore upon the sands, and march, with the handful of brave men and the few pieces of artillery we have with us, to Oran or Tunis, and there find means to re-embark.” Thus Napoleon, is this hazardous enterprise braved every peril. The most imminent and the most to be dreaded of all was captivity in an English prison.

For twenty days the wind was so invariable adverse, that the ships did not advance three hundred miles. Many were so discouraged and so apprehensive of capture that it was even proposed to return to Alexandria. Napoleon was much in the habit of peaceful submission to that which he could not remedy. During all these trying weeks he appeared perfectly serene and contented. To the murmuring of his companions he replied, “We shall arrive in France in safety. I am determined to proceed at all hazards. Fortune will not abandon us.” “People frequently speak,” says Bourrienne, who accompanied Napoleon upon this voyage, “of the good fortune which attaches to an individual, and even attends him this sort of predestination, yet, when I call to mind the numerous dangers which Bonaparte escaped in so many enterprises, the hazards he encountered, the chances he ran, I can conceive that others may have this faith.

But having for a length of time studied the ‘man of destiny’, I have remarked that what was called his fortune was, in reality, his genius; that his success was the consequence of his admirable foresight—of his calculations, rapid as lightning, and of the conviction that boldness is often the truest wisdom. If, for example, during our voyage from Egypt to France, he had not imperiously insisted upon pursuing a course different from that usually taken, and which usual course was recommended by the admiral, would he have escaped the perils which beset his path! Probably not. And was all this the effect of chance. ………. Certainly not.”

 

During these days of suspense Napoleon, apparently as serene in spirit as the calm which often silvered the unrippled surface of the sea held all the energies of his mind in perfect control. A choice library he invariably took with him wherever he went. He devoted the hours to writing study, finding recreation in solving the most difficult problems in geometry, and in investigating chemistry and other scientific subjects of practical utility. He devoted much time to conversation with the distinguished scholars whom he had selected to accompany him. His whole soul seemed engrossed in the pursuit of literary and scientific attainments. He also carefully, and with most intense interest, studied the Bible and Koran, scrutinizing, with the eye of a philosopher, the antagonistic system of the Christian and the Moslem. The limity of the Scriptures charmed him. He read again and again, with deep admiration, Christ’s sermon upon the mount and called his companions form their card-tables, to read it to them, that they might also appreciate its moral beauty and its eloquence. “You will ere long, become devout yourself,” said one of his infidel companions. “I wish I might become so,” Napoleon replied. “What a solace Christianity must be to one who has an undoubting conviction of its truth.” But practical Christianity he had only seen in the mummeries of the papal church.

Remembering the fasts, the vigils, the penances, the cloisters, the scourgings of a corrupt Christianity, and contrasting them with the voluptuous paradise and the sensual houries which inflamed the eager vision of the Moslem, he once exclaimed in phrase characteristic of his genius, “The religion of Jesus is a threat, that of Mohammed.”

The religion of Jesus is not a threat. Though the wrath of God shall fall upon the children of disobedience, our Saviour invites us, in gentle accents, to the green pastures and the still waters of the Heavenly Canaan; to cities resplendent with pearls and gold; to mansions of which God is the architect; to the songs of seraphim, and the flight of cherubim, exploring on tireless pinion the wonders of infinity; to peace of conscience and rapture dwelling in pure heart and to blest companionship loving and beloved; to majesty of person and loftiness of intellect; to appear as children and as nobles in the audience-chamber of God; to an immorality of bliss. No! the religion of Jesus is not a threat, though it has too often been thus represented by its mistaken or designing advocates.

 

One evening a group of officers were conversing together, upon the quarter deck, respecting the existence of God. Many of them believed not in his being. It was a calm, cloudless, brilliant night. The heavens, the work of God’s fingers, canopied them gloriously. The moon and the stars, which God had ordained beamed down upon them with serene lustre. As they were flippantly giving utterance to the arguments of atheism. Napoleon paced to and fro upon the deck, taking no part in the conversation, and apparently absorbed in his own thoughts. Suddenly he stopped before them and said, in those tones of dignity which ever overawed, “Gentlemen, your arguments are very fine. But who made all those worlds, beaming so gloriously above us? Can you tell me that?” No one answered. Napoleon resumed his silent walk, and the officers selected another topic for conversation.

 

In these intense studies Napoleon first began to appreciate the beauty and the sublimity of Christianity. Previously to this, his own strong sense had taught him the principles of a noble toleration; and Jew, Christian, and Moslem stood equally regarded before him.

Now he began to apprehend the surpassing excellence of Christianity.

And though the cares of the busiest life through which a mortal has ever passed soon engrossed his energies, this appreciation and admiration of the gospel of Christ, visibly increased with each succeeding year. He unflinchingly braved the scoffs of infidel Europe, in re-establishing the Christian religion in paganized France. He periled his popularity with the army, and disregarded the opposition of his most influential friends, from his deep conviction of the importance of religion to the welfare of the state. With the inimitable force of his own glowing eloquence, he said to Montholon, at St. Helena, “I know men, and I tell you that Jesus Christ is not a man! The religion of Christ is a mystery, which subsists by its own force, and proceeds from a mind which is not a human mind.

We find in it a marked individuality which originated a train of words and maxims unknown before. Jesus borrowed nothing from our knowledge. He exhibited himself the perfect example of his precepts.

Jesus is not a philosopher: for his proofs are his miracles, and from the first his disciples adored him. In fact, learning and philosophy are of no use for salvation; and Jesus came into the world to reveal the mysteries of heaven and the laws of the spirit.

Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and myself have founded empires.

But upon what did we rest the creations of our genius? upon force . Jesus Christ alone founded his empire upon love. And at this moment millions of men would die for him. I die before my time, and my body will be given back to earth, to become food for worms.

Such is the fate of him who has been called the great Napoleon.

What an abyss between my deep misery and the eternal kingdom of Christ, which is proclaimed, loved, and adored, and which is extending over the whole earth! Call you this dying? Is it not living rather?

The death of Christ is the death of a God!”

 

At the time of the invasion of Egypt, Napoleon regarded all forms of religion with equal respect. And though he considered Christianity superior, in intellectuality and refinement, to all other modes of worship, he did not consider any religion as of divine origin.

At one time, speaking of the course which he pursued in Egypt, he said, “Such was the disposition of the army, that in order to induce them to listen to the bare mention of religion, I was obliged to speak very lightly on the subject; to place Jews beside Christians, and rabbis beside bishops. But after all it would not have been so very extraordinary had circumstances induced me to embrace Islamism.

But I must have had good reasons for my conversion. I must have been secure of advancing at least as far as the Euphrates. Change of religion for private interest is inexcusable. But it may be pardoned in consideration of immense political results. Henry IV.

said, Paris is well worth a mass . Will it then be said that the dominion of the East, and perhaps the subjugation of all Asia, were not worth a turban and a pair of trousers ? And in truth the whole matter was reduced to this. The sheiks had studied how to render it easy to us. They had smoothed down the great obstacles, allowed us the use of wine, and dispensed with all corporeal formalities. We should have lost only our small-clothes and hats.”

 

Of the infidel Rousseau, Napoleon ever spoke in terms of severe reprobation. “He was a bad man, a very bad man,” said he, “he caused the revolution.” “I was not aware,” another replied, “that you considered the French Revolution such an unmixed evil.” “Ah,”

Napoleon rejoined, “you wish to say that without the revolution you would not have had me. Nevertheless, without the revolution France would have been more happy.” When invited to visit the hermitage of Rousseau, to see his cap, table, great chair, &c., he exclaimed, “Bah! I have no taste for such fooleries.