ON HIS REFUSAL TO NEGOTIATE WITH NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. HOUSE OF COMMONS,
FEBRUARY 3, 1800.
On the day after Bonaparte was inaugurated as First Consul of
France, December 25, 1799, he addressed a personal letter to the
King of England, asking for peace. The English Government, however,
entertained a keen resentment at what they regarded the evasive
and insulting conduct of the French Directory during the last
negotiations. Accordingly, the reply of Lord Grenville, then Minister
of Foreign Affairs, rejected the proposed opening of negotiations
for peace. The Government justified its attitude by referring to the
course of the French during the war. It declared that its beginning
had been an “unprovoked attack” on the part of the French, that the
“system” which inspired the war “continued to prevail,” that England
could present “no defence but that of open and steady hostility” to
the system, that “the best and most natural pledge of the reality and
permanence of peace” had been rejected by the French, that although
the English “did not claim to prescribe to France what shall be her
form of government” yet they desired security for future peace, and
that “unhappily no such security hitherto exists, no sufficient
evidence of the principles by which the new government will be
directed, no reasonable ground by which to judge of its stability.”
To this letter Talleyrand wrote a spirited reply; and Lord Grenville
closed the correspondence with a reaffirmation of his Government’s
former position.
The correspondence was called for, and was placed before the Commons
on the 3d of February, 1800. Mr. Dundas immediately proposed an
Address to the Throne approving of the course taken by the ministry.
This opened the whole subject of the attitude of England toward
Napoleon for debate. Whitbred, Canning, and Erskine complained in
strong terms of the discourteous language used by Lord Grenville.
Pitt made no defence on this point, but took up the subject on the
broadest scale. He reviewed not only the origin of the war, but also
the atrocities of the French in overrunning a large part of Europe,
the instability of the successive French governments, his own motives
in treating with the French on a former occasion, and the character
of Bonaparte as a military commander. The speech is at once the most
important and the most elaborate ever delivered by Pitt. It expressed
and defined the policy of the nation in the great struggle which as
yet had only begun. As a parliamentary oration, designed at once to
inform and inspire, it has probably never been surpassed.
SIR,—I am induced, at this period of the debate, to offer my sentiments
to the House, both from an apprehension that at a later hour the
attention of the House must necessarily be exhausted, and because
the sentiment with which the honorable and learned gentleman [Mr.
Erskine] began his speech, and with which he has thought proper to
conclude it, places the question precisely on that ground on which I
am most desirous of discussing it. The learned gentleman seems to
assume as the foundation of his reasoning, and as the great argument
for immediate treaty, that every effort to overturn the system of the
French Revolution must be unavailing; and that it would be not only
imprudent, but almost impious, to struggle longer against that order
of things which, on I know not what principle of predestination, he
appears to consider as immortal. Little as I am inclined to accede
to this opinion, I am not sorry that the honorable gentleman has
contemplated the subject in this serious view. I do, indeed, consider
the French Revolution as the severest trial which the visitation of
Providence has ever yet inflicted upon the nations of the earth; but
I cannot help reflecting, with satisfaction, that this country, even
under such a trial, has not only been exempted from those calamities
which have covered almost every other part of Europe, but appears
to have been reserved as a refuge and asylum to those who fled from
its persecution, as a barrier to oppose its progress, and perhaps
ultimately as an instrument to deliver the world from the crimes and
miseries which have attended it.
Under this impression, I trust the House will forgive me, if I
endeavor, as far as I am able, to take a large and comprehensive view
of this important question. In doing so, I agree with my honorable
friend [Mr. Canning] that it would, in any case, be impossible to
separate the present discussion from the former crimes and atrocities
of the French Revolution; because both the papers now on the table,
and the whole of the learned gentleman’s argument, force upon our
consideration the origin of the war, and all the material facts which
have occurred during its continuance. The learned gentleman [Mr.
Erskine] has revived and retailed all those arguments from his own
pamphlet, which had before passed through thirty-seven or thirty-eight
editions in print, and now gives them to the House embellished by the
graces of his personal delivery. The First Consul has also thought fit
to revive and retail the chief arguments used by all the opposition
speakers and all the opposition publishers in this country during
the last seven years. And (what is still more material) the question
itself, which is now immediately at issue—the question whether, under
the present circumstances, there is such a prospect of security from
any treaty with France as ought to induce us to negotiate, can not be
properly decided upon without retracing, both from our own experience
and from that of other nations, the nature, the causes, and the
magnitude of the danger against which we have to guard, in order to
judge of the security which we ought to accept.
I say, then, that before any man can concur in opinion with that
learned gentleman; before any man can think that the substance of his
Majesty’s answer is any other than the safety of the country required;
before any man can be of opinion that, to the overtures made by the
enemy, at such a time and under such circumstances, it would have been
safe to return an answer concurring in the negotiation—he must come
within one of the three following descriptions: He must either believe
that the French Revolution neither does now exhibit nor has at any time
exhibited such circumstances of danger, arising out of the very nature
of the system, and the internal state and condition of France, as to
leave to foreign powers no adequate ground of security in negotiation;
or, secondly, he must be of opinion that the change which has recently
taken place has given that security which, in the former stages of the
Revolution, was wanting; or, thirdly, he must be one who, believing
that the danger exists, not undervaluing its extent nor mistaking its
nature, nevertheless thinks, from his view of the present pressure on
the country, from his view of its situation and its prospects, compared
with the situation and prospects of its enemies, that we are, with our
eyes open, bound to accept of inadequate security for every thing that
is valuable and sacred, rather than endure the pressure, or incur the
risk which would result from a farther prolongation of the contest.[1]
In discussing the last of these questions, we shall be led to consider
what inference is to be drawn from the circumstances and the result
of our own negotiations in former periods of the war; whether, in the
comparative state of this country and France, we now see the same
reason for repeating our then unsuccessful experiments; or whether
we have not thence derived the lessons of experience, added to the
deductions of reason, marking the inefficacy and danger of the very
measures which are quoted to us as precedents for our adoption.
Unwilling, sir, as I am to go into much detail on ground which has been
so often trodden before; yet, when I find the learned gentleman, after
all the information which he must have received, if he has read any of
the answers to his work (however ignorant he might be when he wrote
it), still giving the sanction of his authority to the supposition that
the order to M. Chauvelin [French minister] to depart from this kingdom
was the cause of the war between this country and France, I do feel it
necessary to say a few words on that part of the subject.
Inaccuracy in dates seems to be a sort of fatality common to all who
have written on that side of the question; for even the writer of the
note to his Majesty is not more correct, in this respect, than if
he had taken his information only from the pamphlet of the learned
gentleman. The House will recollect the first professions of the French
Republic, which are enumerated, and enumerated truly, in that note.
They are tests of every thing which would best recommend a government
to the esteem and confidence of foreign powers, and the reverse of
every thing which has been the system and practice of France now for
near ten years. It is there stated that their first principles were
love of peace, aversion to conquest, and respect for the independence
of other countries. In the same note it seems, indeed, admitted that
they since have violated all those principles; but it is alleged that
they have done so only in consequence of the provocation of other
powers. One of the first of those provocations is stated to have
consisted in the various outrages offered to their ministers, of which
the example is said to have been set by the King of Great Britain in
his conduct to M. Chauvelin. In answer to this supposition, it is only
necessary to remark, that before the example was given, before Austria
and Prussia are supposed to have been thus encouraged to combine in
a plan for the partition of France, that plan, if it ever existed at
all, had existed and been acted upon for above eight months. France
and Prussia had been at war eight months before the dismissal of M.
Chauvelin. So much for the accuracy of the statement.
I have been hitherto commenting on the arguments contained in the
Notes. I come now to those of the learned gentleman. I understand him
to say that the dismissal of M. Chauvelin was the real cause, I do not
say of the general war, but of the rupture between France and England;
and the learned gentleman states particularly that this dismissal
rendered all discussion of the points in dispute impossible. Now I
desire to meet distinctly every part of this assertion. I maintain,
on the contrary, that an opportunity was given for discussing every
matter in dispute between France and Great Britain as fully as if a
regular and accredited French minister had been resident here; that
the causes of war which existed at the beginning, or arose during the
course of this discussion, were such as would have justified, twenty
times over, a declaration of war on the part of this country; that all
the explanations on the part of France were evidently unsatisfactory
and inadmissible, and that M. Chauvelin had given in a peremptory
ultimatum, declaring that if these explanations were not received as
sufficient, and if we did not immediately disarm, our refusal would
be considered as a declaration of war. After this followed that scene
which no man can even now speak of without horror, or think of without
indignation; that murder and regicide from which I was sorry to hear
the learned gentleman date the beginning of the legal government of
France.
Having thus given in their ultimatum, they added, as a further
demand (while we were smarting under accumulated injuries, for which
all satisfaction was denied) that we should instantly receive M.
Chauvelin as their embassador, with new credentials, representing
them in the character which they had just derived from the murder of
their sovereign. We replied, “he came here as the representative of
a sovereign whom you have put to a cruel and illegal death; we have
no satisfaction for the injuries we have received, no security from
the danger with which we are threatened. Under these circumstances we
will not receive your new credentials. The former credentials you have
yourself recalled by the sacrifice of your King.”
What, from that moment, was the situation of M. Chauvelin? He was
reduced to the situation of a private individual, and was required
to quit the kingdom under the provisions of the Alien Act, which,
for the purpose of securing domestic tranquillity, had recently
invested his Majesty with the power of removing out of this kingdom
all foreigners suspected of revolutionary principles. Is it contended
that he was then less liable to the provisions of that act than any
other individual foreigner, whose conduct afforded to government just
ground of objection or suspicion? Did his conduct and connections here
afford no such ground? or will it be pretended that the bare act of
refusing to receive fresh credentials from an infant republic, not
then acknowledged by any one power of Europe, and in the very act of
heaping upon us injuries and insults, was of itself a cause of war?
So far from it, that even the very nations of Europe whose wisdom and
moderation have been repeatedly extolled for maintaining neutrality,
and preserving friendship with the French Republic, remained for years
subsequent to this period without receiving from it any accredited
minister, or doing any one act to acknowledge its political existence.
In answer to a representation from the belligerent powers, in December,
1793, Count Bernstorff, the minister of Denmark, officially declared
that “it was well known that the National Convention had appointed
M. Grouville Minister Plenipotentiary at Denmark, but that it was
also well known that he had neither been received nor acknowledged
in that quality.” And as late as February, 1796, when the same
minister was at length, for the first time, received in his official
capacity, Count Bernstorff, in a public note, assigned this reason
for that change of conduct: “So long as no other than a revolutionary
government existed in France, his Majesty _could_ not acknowledge the
minister of that government; but now that the French Constitution is
completely organized, and a regular government established in France,
his Majesty’s obligation ceases in that respect, and M. Grouville will
therefore be acknowledged in the usual form.” How far the Court of
Denmark was justified in the opinion that a revolutionary government
then no longer existed in France it is not now necessary to inquire;
but whatever may have been the fact in that respect, the _principle_ on
which they acted is clear and intelligible, and is a decisive instance
in favor of the proposition which I have maintained.
Is it, then, necessary to examine what were the terms of that ultimatum
with which we refused to comply? Acts of hostility had been openly
threatened against our allies; a hostility founded upon the assumption
of a right which would at once supersede the whole law of nations. The
pretended right to open the Scheldt we discussed at the time, not so
much on account of its immediate importance (though it was important
both in a maritime and commercial view) as on account of the general
principle on which it was founded.[2] On the same arbitrary notion they
soon afterward discovered that sacred law of nature which made the
Rhine and the Alps the legitimate boundaries of France, and assumed
the power, which they have affected to exercise through the whole
of the Revolution, of superseding, by a new code of their own, all
the recognized principles of the law of nations. They were, in fact,
actually advancing toward the republic of Holland, by rapid strides,
after the victory of Jemappes and they had ordered their generals to
pursue the Austrian troops into any neutral country, thereby explicitly
avowing an intention of invading Holland. They had already shown their
moderation and self-denial by incorporating Belgium with the French
Republic. These lovers of peace, who set out with a sworn aversion to
conquest, and professions of respect for the independence of other
nations; who pretend that they departed from this system only in
consequence of your aggression, themselves, in time of peace, while
you were still confessedly neutral, without the pretence or shadow
of provocation, wrested Savoy from the King of Sardinia, and had
proceeded to incorporate it likewise with France.[3] These were their
aggressions at this period, and more than these. They had issued a
universal declaration of war against all the thrones of Europe, and
they had, by their conduct, applied it particularly and specifically
to you. They had passed the decree of the 19th of November, 1792,
proclaiming the promise of French succor to all nations who should
manifest a wish to become free; they had, by all their language as
well as their example, shown what they understood to be freedom; they
had sealed their principles by the deposition of their sovereign; they
had applied them to England by inviting and encouraging the addresses
of those seditious and traitorous societies, who, from the beginning,
favored their views, and who, encouraged by your forbearance, were even
then publicly avowing French doctrines, and anticipating their success
in this country—who were hailing the progress of those proceedings in
France which led to the murder of its king; they were even then looking
to the day when they should behold a National Convention in England
formed upon similar principles.[4]
And what were the explanations they offered on these different
grounds of offence? As to Holland: they told you the Scheldt was too
insignificant for you to trouble yourselves about, and therefore it was
to be decided as they chose, in breach of positive treaty, which they
had themselves guaranteed, and which we, by our alliance, were bound
to support. If, however, after the war was over, Belgium should have
consolidated its liberty (a term of which we now know the meaning, from
the fate of every nation into which the arms of France have penetrated)
then Belgium and Holland might, if they pleased, settle the question of
the Scheldt by separate negotiation between themselves. With respect
to aggrandizement, they assured us that they would retain possession
of Belgium by arms no longer than they should find it necessary to
the purpose already stated, of consolidating its liberty. And with
respect to the decree of the 19th of November, 1792, applied as it was
pointedly to you, by all the intercourse I have stated with all the
seditious and traitorous part of this country, and particularly by the
speeches of every leading man among them, they contented themselves
with asserting that the declaration conveyed no such meaning as was
imputed to it, and that, so far from encouraging sedition, it could
apply only to countries where a great majority of the people should
have already declared itself in favor of a revolution: a supposition
which, as they asserted, necessarily implied a total absence of all
sedition.
What would have been the effect of admitting this explanation? to
suffer a nation, and an armed nation, to preach to the inhabitants of
all the countries in the world that they themselves were slaves and
their rulers tyrants; to encourage and invite them to revolution by
a previous promise of French support to whatever might call itself a
majority, or to whatever France might declare to be so. This was their
explanation; and this, they told you, was their ultimatum.
But was this all? Even at that very moment, when they were endeavoring
to induce you to admit these explanations, to be contented with the
avowal that France offered herself as a general guaranty for every
successful revolution, and would interfere only to sanction and
confirm whatever the free and uninfluenced choice of the people might
have decided, what were their orders to their generals on the same
subject? In the midst of these amicable explanations with you came
forth a decree which I really believe must be effaced from the minds
of gentlemen opposite to me, if they can prevail upon themselves for
a moment to hint even a doubt upon the origin of this quarrel, not
only as to this country, but as to all the nations of Europe with whom
France has been subsequently engaged in hostility. I speak of the
decree of the 15th of December, 1792. This decree, more even than all
the previous transactions, amounted to a universal declaration of war
against all thrones, and against all civilized governments. It said,
wherever the armies of France shall come (whether within countries then
at war or at peace is not distinguished) in all those countries it
shall be the first care of their generals to introduce the principles
and the practice of the French Revolution; to demolish all privileged
orders, and every thing which obstructs the establishment of their new
system.[5]
If any doubt is entertained whither the armies of France were intended
to come; if it is contended that they referred only to those nations
with whom they were then at war, or with whom, in the course of this
contest, they might be driven into war; let it be remembered that at
this very moment they had actually given orders to their generals to
pursue the Austrian army from the Netherlands into Holland, with whom
they were at that time in peace. Or, even if the construction contended
for is admitted, let us see what would have been its application, let
us look at the list of their aggressions, which was read by my right
honorable friend [Mr. Dundas] near me. With whom have they been at war
since the period of this declaration? With all the nations of Europe
save two (Sweden and Denmark), and if not with these two, it is only
because, with every provocation that could justify defensive war, those
countries have hitherto acquiesced in repeated violations of their
rights rather than recur to war for their vindication. Wherever their
arms have been carried it will be a matter of short subsequent inquiry
to trace whether they have faithfully applied these principles. If in
_terms_ this decree is a denunciation of war against all governments;
if in _practice_ it has been applied against every one with which
France has come into contact; what is it but the deliberate code of
the French Revolution, from the birth of the Republic, which has never
once been departed from, which has been enforced with unremitted rigor
against all the nations that have come into their power?
If there could otherwise be any doubt whether the application of this
decree was intended to be universal, whether it applied to all nations,
and to England particularly; there is one circumstance which alone
would be decisive—that nearly at the same period it was proposed [by
M. Baraillon], in the National Convention, to declare expressly that
the decree of November 19th was confined to the nations with whom
they were _then_ at war; and that proposal was _rejected_ by a great
majority, by that very Convention from whom we were desired to receive
these explanations as satisfactory.
Such, sir, was the nature of the system. Let us examine a little
farther, whether it was from the beginning intended to be acted upon
in the extent which I have stated. At the very moment when their
threats appeared to many little else than the ravings of madmen, they
were digesting and methodizing the means of execution, as accurately
as if they had actually foreseen the extent to which they have since
been able to realize their criminal projects. They sat down coolly to
devise the most regular and effectual mode of making the application
of this system the current business of the day, and incorporating it
with the general orders of their army; for (will the House believe it!)
this confirmation of the decree of November 19th was accompanied by an
exposition and commentary addressed to the general of every army of
France, containing a schedule as coolly conceived, and as methodically
reduced, as any by which the most quiet business of a justice of peace,
or the most regular routine of any department of state in this country
could be conducted. Each commander was furnished with one general
blank formula of a letter for all the nations of the world! The people
of France to the people of ——, Greeting, “We are come to expel your
tyrants.” Even this was not all; one of the articles of the decree of
the fifteenth of December was expressly, “that those who should show
themselves so brutish and so enamored of their chains as to refuse
the restoration of their rights, to renounce liberty and equality, or
to preserve, recall, or treat with their prince or privileged orders,
were not entitled to the distinction which France, in other cases,
had justly established between government and people; and that such
a people ought to be treated according to the rigor of war, and of
conquest.” Here is their love of peace; here is their aversion to
conquest; here is their respect for the independence of other nations!
It was then, after receiving such explanations as these, after
receiving the ultimatum of France, and after M. Chauvelin’s
credentials had ceased, that he was required to depart. Even at that
period, I am almost ashamed to record it, we did not on our part shut
the door against other attempts to negotiate, but this transaction
was immediately followed by the declaration of war, proceeding not
from England in vindication of her rights, but from France, as the
completion of the injuries and insults they had offered. And on a war
thus originating, can it be doubted by an English House of Commons
whether the aggression was on the part of this country or of France?
or whether the manifest aggression on the part of France was the
result of any thing but the principles which characterize the French
Revolution?[6] * * *
I will enlarge no farther on the origin of the war. I have read and
detailed to you a system which was in itself a declaration of war
against all nations, which was so intended, and which has been so
applied, which has been exemplified in the extreme peril and hazard
of almost all who for a moment have trusted to treaty, and which has
not at this hour overwhelmed Europe in one indiscriminate mass of
ruin, only because we have not indulged, to a fatal extremity, that
disposition which we have, however, indulged too far; because we have
not consented to trust to profession and compromise, rather than to our
own valor and exertion, for security against a system from which we
never shall be delivered till either the principle is extinguished, or
till its strength is exhausted.
I might, sir, if I found it necessary, enter into much detail upon
this part of the subject; but at present I only beg leave to express
my readiness at any time to enter upon it, when either my own strength
or the patience of the House will admit of it; but I say, without
distinction, against every nation in Europe, and against some out of
Europe, the principle has been faithfully applied. You cannot look at
the map of Europe, and lay your hand upon that country against which
France has not either declared an open and aggressive war, or violated
some positive treaty, or broken some recognized principle of the law of
nations.
This subject may be divided into various periods. There were some
acts of hostility committed previous to the war with this country,
and very little, indeed, subsequent to that declaration, which
abjured the love of conquest. The attack upon the papal state, by
the seizure of Avignon, in 1791, was accompanied with specimens of
all the vile arts and perfidy that ever disgraced a revolution.
Avignon was separated from its lawful sovereign, with whom not even
the pretence of quarrel existed, and forcibly incorporated in the
tyranny of one and indivisible France.[7] The same system led, in the
same year, to an aggression against the whole German Empire, by the
seizure of Porentrui, part of the dominions of the Bishop of Basle.
Afterward, in 1792, unpreceded by any declaration of war, or any
cause of hostility,[8] and in direct violation of the solemn pledge
to abstain from conquest, they made war against the King of Sardinia,
by the seizure of Savoy, for the purpose of incorporating it, in like
manner, with France. In the same year, they had proceeded to the
declaration of war against Austria, against Prussia, and against the
German Empire, in which they have been justified only on the ground
of a rooted hostility, combination, and league of sovereigns, for the
dismemberment of France. I say that some of the documents brought to
support this pretence are spurious and false. I say that even in those
that are not so, there is not one word to prove the charge principally
relied upon, that of an intention to effect the dismemberment of
France, or to impose upon it, by force, any particular constitution.
I say that, as far as we have been able to trace what passed at
Pilnitz, the declaration there signed referred to the imprisonment of
Louis XVI.; its immediate view was to effect his deliverance, if a
concert sufficiently extensive could be formed with other sovereigns
for that purpose. It left the internal state of France to be decided
by the king restored to his liberty, with the free consent of the
states of his kingdom, and it did not contain one word relative to the
_dismemberment_ of France.[9]
In the subsequent discussions, which took place in 1792, and which
embraced at the same time all the other points of jealousy which had
arisen between the two countries, the Declaration of Pilnitz was
referred to, and explained on the part of Austria in a manner precisely
conformable to what I have now stated. The amicable explanations which
took place, both on this subject and on all the matters in dispute,
will be found in the official correspondence between the two courts
which has been made public; and it will be found, also, that as long as
the negotiation continued to be conducted through M. Delessart, then
Minister for Foreign Affairs, there was a great prospect that those
discussions would be amicably terminated; but it is notorious, and has
since been clearly proved on the authority of Brissot himself, that the
violent party in France considered such an issue of the negotiation
as likely to be fatal to their projects, and thought, to use his own
words, that “war was necessary to consolidate the Revolution.” For the
express purpose of producing the war, they excited a popular tumult in
Paris; they insisted upon and obtained the dismissal of M. Delessart. A
new minister was appointed in his room, the tone of the negotiation was
immediately changed, and an ultimatum was sent to the Emperor, similar
to that which was afterward sent to this country, affording him no
satisfaction on his just grounds of complaint, and requiring him, under
those circumstances, to disarm. The first events of the contest proved
how much more France was prepared for war than Austria, and afford
a strong confirmation of the proposition which I maintain, that no
offensive intention was entertained on the part of the latter power.
War was then declared against Austria, a war which I state to be a war
of aggression on the part of France. The King of Prussia had declared
that he should consider war against the Emperor or empire as war
against himself. He had declared that, as a coestate of the empire, he
was determined to defend their rights; that, as an ally of the Emperor,
he would support him to the utmost against any attack; and that, for
the sake of his own dominions, he felt himself called upon to resist
the progress of French principles, and to maintain the balance of power
in Europe. With this notice before them, France declared war upon the
Emperor, and the war with Prussia was the necessary consequence of this
aggression, both against the Emperor and the empire.
The war against the King of Sardinia follows next. The declaration
of that war was the seizure of Savoy by an invading army—and on what
ground? On that which has been stated already. They had found out, by
some light of nature, that the Rhine and the Alps were the natural
limits of France. Upon that ground Savoy was seized; and Savoy was also
incorporated with France.
Here finishes the history of the wars in which France was engaged
antecedent to the war with Great Britain, with Holland, and with
Spain. With respect to Spain, we have seen nothing which leads
us to suspect that either attachment to religion, or the ties of
consanguinity, or regard to the ancient system of Europe, was likely to
induce that court to connect itself in offensive war against France.
The war was evidently and incontestably begun by France against Spain.
The case of Holland is so fresh in every man’s recollection, and so
connected with the immediate causes of the war with this country, that
it cannot require one word of observation. What shall I say, then, on
the case of Portugal? I cannot, indeed, say that France ever declared
war against that country. I can hardly say even that she ever made
war, but she required them to make a treaty of peace, as if they had
been at war; she obliged them to purchase that treaty; she broke it as
soon as it was purchased; and she had originally no other ground of
complaint than this, that Portugal had performed, though inadequately,
the engagements of its ancient defensive alliance with this country in
the character of an auxiliary—a conduct which cannot of itself make any
power a principal in a war.
I have now enumerated all the nations at war at that period, with the
exception only of Naples. It can hardly be necessary to call to the
recollection of the House the characteristic feature of revolutionary
principles which was shown, even at this early period, in the personal
insult offered to the King of Naples, by the commander of a French
squadron riding uncontrolled in the Mediterranean, and (while our
fleets were yet unarmed) threatening destruction to all the coast of
Italy.
It was not till a considerably later period that almost all the
other nations of Europe found themselves equally involved in actual
hostility; but it is not a little material to the whole of my argument,
compared with the statement of the learned gentleman, and with that
contained in the French note, to examine at what period this hostility
extended itself. It extended itself, in the course of 1796, to the
States of Italy which had hitherto been exempted from it. In 1797
it had ended in the destruction of most of them; it had ended in
the virtual deposition of the King of Sardinia; it had ended in the
conversion of Genoa and Tuscany into democratic republics; it had ended
in the revolution of Venice, in the violation of treaties with the new
Venetian Republic; and, finally, in transferring that very republic,
the creature and vassal of France, to the dominion of Austria. * * *
Let these facts and these dates be compared with what we have heard.
The honorable gentleman has told us, and the author of the note from
France has told us also, that all the French conquests were produced
by the operations of the allies. It was, when they were pressed on
all sides, when their own territory was in danger, when their own
independence was in question, when the confederacy appeared too strong,
it was then they used the means with which their power and their
courage furnished them, and, “attacked upon all sides, they carried
everywhere their defensive arms.”[10] * * *
Let us look at the conduct of France immediately subsequent to this
period. She had spurned at the offers of Great Britain; she had
reduced her continental enemies to the necessity of accepting a
precarious peace; she had (in spite of those pledges repeatedly made
and uniformly violated) surrounded herself by new conquests on every
part of her frontier but one. That one was Switzerland. The first
effect of being relieved from the war with Austria, of being secured
against all fears of continental invasion on the ancient territory
of France, was their unprovoked attack against this unoffending and
devoted country. This was one of the scenes which satisfied even those
who were the most incredulous that France had thrown off the mask,
“_if indeed she had ever worn it_.” It collected, in one view, many
of the characteristic features of that revolutionary system which I
have endeavored to trace—the perfidy which alone rendered their arms
successful—the pretexts of which they availed themselves to produce
division and prepare the entrance of Jacobinism in that country—the
proposal of armistice, one of the known and regular engines of the
Revolution, which was, as usual, the immediate prelude to military
execution, attended with cruelty and barbarity, of which there are few
examples. All these are known to the world. The country they attacked
was one which had long been the faithful ally of France, which, instead
of giving cause of jealousy to any other power, had been for ages
proverbial for the simplicity and innocence of its manners, and which
had acquired and preserved the esteem of all the nations of Europe;
which had almost, by the common consent of mankind, been exempted
from the sound of war, and marked out as a land of Goshen, safe and
untouched in the midst of surrounding calamities.
Look, then, at the fate of Switzerland, at the circumstances which led
to its destruction. Add this instance to the catalogue of aggression
against all Europe, and then tell me whether the system I have
described has not been prosecuted with an unrelenting spirit, which can
not be subdued in adversity, which cannot be appeased in prosperity,
which neither solemn professions, nor the general law of nations, nor
the obligation of treaties (whether previous to the Revolution or
subsequent to it) could restrain from the subversion of every state
into which, either by force or fraud, their arms could penetrate.
Then tell me, whether the disasters of Europe are to be charged upon
the provocation of this country and its allies, or on the inherent
principle of the French Revolution, of which the natural result
produced so much misery and carnage in France, and carried desolation
and terror over so large a portion of the world.
Sir, much as I have now stated, I have not finished the catalogue.
America, almost as much as Switzerland, perhaps, contributed to that
change which has taken place in the minds of those who were originally
partial to the principles of the French Government. The hostility
against America followed a long course of neutrality adhered to under
the strongest provocations, or rather of repeated compliances to
France, with which we might well have been dissatisfied. It was on the
face of it unjust and wanton; and it was accompanied by those instances
of sordid corruption which shocked and disgusted even the enthusiastic
admirers of revolutionary purity, and threw a new light on the genius
of revolutionary government.[11]
After this, it remains only shortly to remind gentlemen of the
aggression against Egypt, not omitting, however, to notice the capture
of Malta in the way to Egypt. Inconsiderable as that island may
be thought, compared with the scenes we have witnessed, let it be
remembered that it is an island of which the government had long been
recognized by every state of Europe, against which France pretended
no cause of war, and whose independence was as dear to itself and
as sacred as that of any country in Europe. It was in fact not
unimportant, from its local situation to the other powers of Europe;
but in proportion as any man may diminish its importance, the instance
will only serve the more to illustrate and confirm the proposition
which I have maintained. The all-searching eye of the French Revolution
looks to every part of Europe, and every quarter of the world, in
which can be found an object either of acquisition or plunder. Nothing
is too great for the temerity of its ambition, nothing too small or
insignificant for the grasp of its rapacity. From hence Bonaparte and
his army proceeded to Egypt. The attack was made, pretences were held
out to the natives of that country in the name of the French King,
whom they had murdered. They pretended to have the approbation of the
Grand Seignior, whose territories they were violating; their project
was carried on under the profession of a zeal for Mohammedanism; it
was carried on by proclaiming that France had been reconciled to the
Mussulman faith, had abjured that of Christianity, or, as he in his
impious language termed it, of _the sect of the Messiah_.[12]
The only plea which they have since held out to color this atrocious
invasion of a neutral and friendly territory, is that it was the road
to attack the English power in India. It is most unquestionably true
that this was one and a principal cause of this unparalleled outrage;
but another, and an equally substantial, cause (as appears by their own
statements) was the division and partition of the territories of what
they thought a falling power. It is impossible to dismiss this subject
without observing that this attack against Egypt was accompanied
by an attack upon the British possessions in India, made on true
revolutionary principles. In Europe the propagation of the principles
of France had uniformly prepared the way for the progress of its arms.
To India the lovers of peace had sent the messengers of Jacobinism,
for the purpose of inculcating war in those distant regions on Jacobin
principles, and of forming Jacobin clubs, which they actually succeeded
in establishing; and which in most respects resembled the European
model, but which were distinguished by this peculiarity, that they were
required to swear in one breath hatred to tyranny, the love of liberty,
and the destruction of all kings and sovereigns, except the good and
faithful ally of the French Republic, _Citizen_ Tippoo![13]
What, then, was the nature of this system? Was it any thing but what
I have stated it to be? an insatiable love of aggrandizement, an
implacable spirit of destruction against all the civil and religious
institutions of every country. This is the first moving and acting
spirit of the French Revolution; this is the spirit which animated it
at its birth, and this is the spirit which will not desert it till
the moment of its dissolution, “which grew with its growth, which
strengthened with its strength,” but which has not abated under its
misfortunes, nor declined in its decay. It has been invariably the
same in every period, operating more or less, according as accident
or circumstances might assist it; but it has been inherent in the
Revolution in all its stages; it has equally belonged to Brissot, to
Robespierre, to Tallien, to Reubel, to Barras, and to every one of the
leaders of the Directory, but to none more than to Bonaparte, in whom
now all their powers are united. What are its characters? Can it be
accident that produced them? No, it is only from the alliance of the
most horrid principles, with the most horrid means, that such miseries
could have been brought upon Europe. It is this paradox which we must
always keep in mind when we are discussing any question relative to
the effects of the French Revolution. Groaning under every degree of
misery, the victim of its own crimes, and as I once before expressed
in this House, asking pardon of God and of man for the miseries which
it has brought upon itself and others, France still retains (while it
has neither left means of comfort nor almost of subsistence to its own
inhabitants) new and unexampled means of annoyance and destruction
against all the other powers of Europe.
Its first fundamental principle was to bribe the poor against the
rich by proposing to transfer into new hands, on the delusive notion
of equality, and in breach of every principle of justice, the whole
property of the country. The practical application of this principle
was to devote the whole of that property to indiscriminate plunder,
and to make it the foundation of a revolutionary system of finance,
productive in proportion to the misery and desolation which it created.
It has been accompanied by an unwearied spirit of proselytism,
diffusing itself over all the nations of the earth; a spirit which can
apply itself to all circumstances and all situations, which can furnish
a list of grievances and hold out a promise of redress equally to all
nations; which inspired the teachers of French liberty with the hope of
alike recommending themselves to those who live under the feudal code
of the German Empire; to the various states of Italy, under all their
different institutions; to the old republicans of Holland, and to the
new republicans of America; to the Catholic of Ireland, whom it was to
deliver from Protestant usurpation; to the Protestant of Switzerland,
whom it was to deliver from Popish superstition; and to the Mussulman
of Egypt, whom it was to deliver from Christian persecution; to the
remote Indian, blindly bigoted to his ancient institutions; and to the
natives of Great Britain, enjoying the perfection of practical freedom,
and justly attached to their Constitution, from the joint result of
habit, of reason, and of experience. The last and distinguishing
feature is a perfidy which nothing can bind, which no tie of treaty,
no sense of the principles generally received among nations, no
obligation, human or divine, can restrain. Thus qualified, thus armed
for destruction, the genius of the French Revolution marched forth, the
terror and dismay of the world. Every nation has in its turn been the
witness, many have been the victims of its principles; and it is left
for us to decide whether we will compromise with such a danger, while
we have yet resources to supply the sinews of war, while the heart and
spirit of the country is yet unbroken, and while we have the means of
calling forth and supporting a powerful co-operation in Europe.
Much more might be said on this part of the subject; but if what I
have said already is a faithful, though only an imperfect, sketch of
those excesses and outrages which even history itself will hereafter
be unable fully to represent and record, and a just representation of
the principle and source from which they originated, will any man say
that we ought to accept a precarious security against so tremendous a
danger? Much more—will he pretend, after the experience of all that has
passed in the different stages of the French Revolution, that we ought
to be deterred from probing this great question to the bottom, and from
examining, without ceremony or disguise, whether the change which has
recently taken place in France is sufficient now to give security, not
against a common danger, but against such a danger as that which I have
described?
In examining this part of the subject, let it be remembered that there
is one other characteristic of the French Revolution as striking as
its dreadful and destructive principles: I mean the instability of
its government, which has been of itself sufficient to destroy all
reliance, if any such reliance could at any time have been placed on
the good faith of any of its rulers. Such has been the incredible
rapidity with which the revolutions in France have succeeded each
other, that I believe the names of those who have successively
exercised absolute power, under the pretence of liberty, are to be
numbered by the years of the Revolution, and by each of the new
Constitutions, which, under the same pretence, has in its turn been
imposed by force on France, all of which alike were founded upon
principles which professed to be universal, and were intended to be
established and perpetuated among all the nations of the earth. Each of
these will be found, upon an average, to have had about two years as
the period of its duration.
Under this revolutionary system, accompanied with this perpetual
fluctuation and change, both in the form of the government and in the
persons of the rulers, what is the security which has hitherto existed,
and what new security is now offered? Before an answer is given to
this question, let me sum up the history of all the revolutionary
governments of France, and of their characters in relation to other
powers, in words more emphatical than any which I could use—the
memorable words pronounced, on the eve of this last Constitution, by
the orator who was selected to report to an Assembly, surrounded by a
file of grenadiers, the new form of liberty which it was destined to
enjoy under the auspices of General Bonaparte. From this reporter, the
mouth and organ of the new government, we learn this important lesson:
“It is easy to conceive why peace was not concluded before the
establishment of the constitutional government. The only government
which then existed described itself as revolutionary; it was, in fact,
only the tyranny of a few men who were soon overthrown by others, and
it consequently presented no stability of principles or of views, no
security either with respect to men or with respect to things.
“It should seem that that stability and that security ought to have
existed from the establishment, and as the effect of the constitutional
system; and yet they did not exist more, perhaps even less, than they
had done before. In truth, we did make some partial treaties; we signed
a continental peace, and a general congress was held to confirm it;
but these treaties, these diplomatic conferences, appear to have been
the source of a new war, more inveterate and more bloody than before.
“Before the 18th Fructidor (4th September) of the fifth year, the
French Government exhibited to foreign nations so uncertain an
existence that they refused to treat with it. After this great event,
the whole power was absorbed in the Directory; the legislative body
can hardly be said to have existed; treaties of peace were broken, and
war carried everywhere, without that body having any share in those
measures. The same Directory, after having intimidated all Europe, and
destroyed, at its pleasure, several governments, neither knowing how
to make peace or war, or how even to establish itself, was overturned
by a breath, on the 13th Prairial (18th June), to make room for other
men, influenced perhaps by different views, or who might be governed by
different principles.
“Judging, then, only from notorious facts, the French Government must
be considered as exhibiting nothing fixed, neither in respect to men
nor to things.”
Here, then, is the picture, down to the period of the last revolution,
of the state of France under all its successive governments!
Having taken a view of what it was, let us now examine what it is. In
the first place, we see, as has been truly stated, a change in the
description and form of the sovereign authority. A supreme power is
placed at the head of this nominal republic, with a more open avowal
of military despotism than at any former period; with a more open and
undisguised abandonment of the names and pretences under which that
despotism long attempted to conceal itself. The different institutions,
republican in their form and appearance, which were before the
instruments of that despotism, are now annihilated; they have given
way to the absolute power of one man, concentrating in himself all the
authority of the state, and differing from other monarchs only in this,
that (as my honorable friend [Mr. Canning] truly stated it) he wields
a sword instead of a sceptre. What, then, is the confidence we are to
derive either from the frame of the government, or from the character
and past conduct of the person who is now the absolute ruler of France?
Had we seen a man of whom we had no previous knowledge suddenly
invested with the sovereign authority of the country; invested with the
power of taxation, with the power of the sword, the power of war and
peace, the unlimited power of commanding the resources, of disposing
of the lives and fortunes, of every man in France; if we had seen at
the same moment all the inferior machinery of the Revolution, which,
under the variety of successive shocks, had kept the system in motion,
still remaining entire,—all that, by requisition and plunder, had given
activity to the revolutionary system of finance, and had furnished the
means of creating an army, by converting every man who was of age to
bear arms into a soldier, not for the defence of his own country, but
for the sake of carrying the war into the country of the enemy; if we
had seen all the subordinate instruments of Jacobin power subsisting in
their full force, and retaining (to use the French phrase) all their
original organization; and had then observed this single change in
the conduct of their affairs, that there was now _one man_, with no
rival to thwart his measures, no colleague to divide his powers, no
council to control his operations, no liberty of speaking or writing,
no expression of public opinion to check or influence his conduct;
under such circumstances, should we be wrong to pause, or wait for the
evidence of facts and experience, before we consented to trust our
safety to the forbearance of a single man, in such a situation, and
to relinquish those means of defence which have hitherto carried us
safe through all the storms of the Revolution, if we were to ask what
are the principles and character of this stranger, to whom fortune has
suddenly committed the concerns of a great and powerful nation?
But is this the actual state of the present question? Are we talking
of a stranger of whom we have heard nothing? No, sir, we have heard
of him; we, and Europe, and the world, have heard both of him and
of the satellites by whom he is surrounded, and it is impossible to
discuss fairly the propriety of any answer which could be returned to
his overtures of negotiation without taking into consideration the
inferences to be drawn from his personal character and conduct. I know
it is the fashion with some gentlemen to represent any reference to
topics of this nature as invidious and irritating; but the truth is,
that they rise unavoidably out of the very nature of the question.
Would it have been possible for ministers to discharge their duty,
in offering their advice to their sovereign, either for accepting or
declining negotiation, without taking into their account the reliance
to be placed on the disposition and the principles of the person on
whose disposition and principles the security to be obtained by treaty
must, in the present circumstances, principally depend? Or would they
act honestly or candidly toward Parliament and toward the country if,
having been guided by these considerations, they forbore to state,
publicly and distinctly, the real grounds which have influenced their
decision; and if, from a false delicacy and groundless timidity, they
purposely declined an examination of a point, the most essential toward
enabling Parliament to form a just determination on so important a
subject?
What opinion, then, are we led to form of the pretensions of the
Consul to those particular qualities for which, in the official note,
his personal character is represented to us as the surest pledge of
peace? We are told this is his second attempt at general pacification.
Let us see, for a moment, how his attempt has been conducted. There
is, indeed, as the learned gentleman has said, a word in the first
declaration which refers to general peace, and which states this to
be the second time in which the Consul has endeavored to accomplish
that object. We thought fit, for the reasons which have been assigned,
to decline altogether the proposal of treating, under the present
circumstances, but we, at the same time, expressly stated that,
whenever the moment for treaty should arrive, we would in no case
treat but in conjunction with our allies. Our general refusal to
negotiate at the present moment does not prevent the Consul from
renewing his overtures; but are they renewed for the purpose of general
pacification? Though he had hinted at general peace in the terms of
his first note; though we had shown by our answer that we deemed
negotiation, even for general peace, at this moment inadmissible;
though we added that, even at any future period, we would treat only
in conjunction with our allies, what was the proposal contained in his
last note? To treat for a separate peace between Great Britain and
France.
Such was the second attempt to effect _general pacification_—a proposal
for a _separate_ treaty with Great Britain. What had been the first?
The conclusion of a separate treaty with Austria; and there are two
anecdotes connected with the conclusion of this treaty, which are
sufficient to illustrate the disposition of this pacificator of Europe.
This very treaty of Campo Formio was ostentatiously professed to be
concluded with the Emperor for the purpose of enabling Bonaparte to
take the command of the army of England, and to dictate a separate
peace with this country on the banks of the Thames. But there is this
additional circumstance, singular beyond all conception, considering
that we are now referred to the treaty of Campo Formio as a proof of
the personal disposition of the Consul to general peace. He sent his
two confidential and chosen friends, Berthier and Monge, charged to
communicate to the Directory this treaty of Campo Formio; to announce
to them that one enemy was humbled, that the war with Austria was
terminated, and, therefore, that now was the moment to prosecute
their operations against this country; they used on this occasion the
memorable words: “_The kingdom of Great Britain and the French Republic
can not exist together._”[14] This, I say, was the solemn declaration
of the deputies and embassadors of Bonaparte himself, offering to
the Directory the first-fruits of this first attempt at general
pacification.
So much for his disposition toward general pacification. Let us look
next at the part he has taken in the different stages of the French
Revolution, and let us then judge whether we are to look to him as
the security against revolutionary principles. Let us determine what
reliance we can place on his engagements with other countries, when
we see how he has observed his engagements to his own. When the
Constitution of the third year was established under Barras, that
Constitution was imposed by the arms of Bonaparte, then commanding the
army of the triumvirate in Paris. To that Constitution he then swore
fidelity. How often he has repeated the same oath, I know not, but
twice, at least, we know that he has not only repeated it himself,
but tendered it to others, under circumstances too striking not to be
stated.
Sir, the House cannot have forgotten the Revolution of the 4th of
September, which produced the dismissal of Lord Malmesbury from
Lisle. How was that revolution procured? It was procured chiefly
by the promise of Bonaparte, in the name of his army, decidedly to
support the Directory in those measures which led to the infringement
and violation of every thing that the authors of the Constitution
of 1795, or its adherents, could consider as fundamental, and which
established a system of despotism inferior only to that now realized
in his own person. Immediately before this event, in the midst of the
desolation and bloodshed of Italy he had received the sacred present
of new banners from the Directory; he delivered them to his army with
this exhortation: “Let us swear, fellow-soldiers, by the names of the
patriots who have died by our side, eternal hatred to the enemies of
the Constitution of the third year,”—that very Constitution which he
soon after enabled the Directory to violate, and which at the head
of his grenadiers he has now finally destroyed. Sir, that oath was
again renewed, in the midst of that very scene to which I have last
referred; the oath of fidelity to the Constitution of the third year
was administered to all the members of the Assembly then sitting, under
the terror of the bayonet, as the solemn preparation for the business
of the day; and the morning was ushered in with swearing attachment to
the Constitution, that the evening might close with its destruction.
If we carry our views out of France, and look at the dreadful catalogue
of all the breaches of treaty, all the acts of perfidy at which I have
only glanced, and which are precisely commensurate with the number of
treaties which the Republic has made (for I have sought in vain for any
one which it has made and which it has not broken); if we trace the
history of them all from the beginning of the Revolution to the present
time, or if we select those which have been accompanied by the most
atrocious cruelty, and marked the most strongly with the characteristic
features of the Revolution, the name of Bonaparte will be found allied
to more of them than that of any other that can be handed down in the
history of the crimes and miseries of the last ten years. His name
will be recorded with the horrors committed in Italy, in the memorable
campaign of 1796 and 1797, in the Milanese, in Genoa, in Modena, in
Tuscany, in Rome, and in Venice.
His entrance into Lombardy was announced by a solemn proclamation,
issued on the 27th of April, 1796, which terminated with these words:
“Nations of Italy! the French Army is come to break your chains;
the French are the friends of the people in every country; your
religion, your property, your customs shall be respected.” This was
followed by a second proclamation, dated from Milan, 20th of May,
and signed “_Bonaparte_,” in these terms: “Respect for property and
personal security; respect for the religion of countries—these are the
sentiments of the government of the French Republic and of the army
of Italy. The French, victorious, consider the nations of Lombardy as
their brothers.” In testimony of this fraternity, and to fulfil the
solemn pledge of respecting property, this very proclamation imposed
on the Milanese a provisional contribution to the amount of twenty
millions of livres, or near one million sterling, and successive
exactions were afterward levied on that single state to the amount, in
the whole, of near six millions sterling. The regard to religion and
to the customs of the country was manifested with the same scrupulous
fidelity. The churches were given up to indiscriminate plunder. Every
religious and charitable fund, every public treasure, was confiscated.
The country was made the scene of every species of disorder and
rapine. The priests, the established form of worship, all the objects
of religious reverence, were openly insulted by the French troops; at
Pavia, particularly, the tomb of St. Augustin, which the inhabitants
were accustomed to view with peculiar veneration, was mutilated and
defaced; this last provocation having roused the resentment of the
people they flew to arms, surrounded the French garrison and took
them prisoners, but carefully abstained from offering any violence
to a single soldier. In revenge for this conduct, Bonaparte, then on
his march to the Mincio, suddenly returned, collected his troops, and
carried the extremity of military execution over the country. He burned
the town of Benasco, and massacred eight hundred of its inhabitants; he
marched to Pavia, took it by storm, and delivered it over to general
plunder, and published, at the same moment, a proclamation of the 26th
of May, ordering his troops to shoot all those who had not laid down
their arms and taken an oath of obedience, and to burn every village
where the tocsin should be sounded, and to put its inhabitants to death.
The transactions with Modena were on a smaller scale, but in the same
character. Bonaparte began by signing a treaty, by which the Duke
of Modena was to pay twelve millions of livres, and neutrality was
promised him in return; this was soon followed by the personal arrest
of the Duke, and by a fresh extortion of two hundred thousand sequins.
After this he was permitted, on the payment of a farther sum, to sign
another treaty, called a _convention de sureté_, which of course was
only the prelude to the repetition of similar exactions.
Nearly at the same period, in violation of the rights of neutrality and
of the treaty which had been concluded between the French Republic and
the Grand Duke of Tuscany in the preceding year, and in breach of a
positive promise given only a few days before, the French army forcibly
took possession of Leghorn, for the purpose of seizing the British
property which was deposited there and confiscating it as a prize; and
shortly after, when Bonaparte agreed to evacuate Leghorn, in return
for the evacuation of the island of Elba, which was in possession of
the British troops, he insisted upon a separate article, by which,
in addition to the plunder before obtained, by the infraction of the
law of nations, it was stipulated that the Grand Duke should pay the
expense which the French had incurred by this invasion of his territory.
In the proceedings toward Genoa we shall find not only a continuance
of the same system of extortion and plunder, in violation of the
solemn pledge contained in the proclamations already referred to,
but a striking instance of the revolutionary means employed for the
destruction of independent governments. A French minister was at that
time resident at Genoa, which was acknowledged by France to be in
a state of neutrality and friendship; in breach of this neutrality
Bonaparte began, in the year 1796, with the demand of a loan. He
afterward, from the month of September, required and enforced the
payment of a monthly subsidy, to the amount which he thought proper
to stipulate. These exactions were accompanied by repeated assurances
and protestations of friendship; they were followed, in May, 1797, by
a conspiracy against the government, fomented by the emissaries of the
French embassy, and conducted by the partisans of France, encouraged
and afterward protected by the French minister. The conspirators failed
in their first attempt. Overpowered by the courage and voluntary
exertions of the inhabitants, their force was dispersed, and many
of their number were arrested. Bonaparte instantly considered the
defeat of the conspirators as an act of aggression against the French
Republic; he despatched an aid-de-camp with an order to the Senate
of this independent State; first, to release all the French who were
detained; secondly, to punish those who had arrested them; thirdly, to
declare that _they had no share in the insurrection_; and fourthly,
to disarm the people. Several French prisoners were immediately
released, and a proclamation was preparing to disarm the inhabitants,
when, by a second note, Bonaparte required the arrest of the three
inquisitors of state, and immediate alterations in the Constitution. He
accompanied this with an order to the French minister to quit Genoa,
if his commands were not immediately carried into execution; at the
same moment his troops entered the territory of the Republic; and
shortly after, the councils, intimidated and overpowered, abdicated
their functions. Three deputies were then sent to Bonaparte to receive
from him a new Constitution. On the 6th of June, after the conferences
at Montebello, he signed a convention, or rather issued a decree, by
which he fixed the new form of their government; he himself named
provisionally all the members who were to compose it, and he required
the payment of seven millions of livres as the price of the subversion
of their Constitution and their independence. These transactions
require but one short comment. It is to be found in the official
account given of them at Paris; which is in these memorable words:
“General Bonaparte has pursued the only line of conduct which could be
allowed in the representative of a nation which has supported the war
only to procure the solemn acknowledgment of the right of nations to
change the form of their government. He contributed nothing toward the
revolution of Genoa, but he seized the first moment to acknowledge the
new government, as soon as he saw that it was the result of the wishes
of the people.”
It is unnecessary to dwell on the wanton attacks against Rome, under
the direction of Bonaparte himself, in the year 1796, and in the
beginning of 1797, which terminated first by the treaty of Tolentino
concluded by Bonaparte, in which, by enormous sacrifices, the Pope was
allowed to purchase the acknowledgment of his authority as a sovereign
prince; and secondly, by the violation of that very treaty, and the
subversion of the papal authority by Joseph Bonaparte, the brother and
the agent of the general, and the minister of the French Republic to
the Holy See. A transaction accompanied by outrages and insults toward
the pious and venerable Pontiff, in spite of the sanctity of his age
and the unsullied purity of his character, which even to a Protestant
seem hardly short of the guilt of sacrilege.
But of all the disgusting and tragical scenes which took place in
Italy in the course of the period I am describing, those which passed
at Venice are perhaps the most striking and the most characteristic.
In May, 1796, the French army, under Bonaparte, in the full tide of
its success against the Austrians, first approached the territories of
this Republic, which from the commencement of the war had observed a
rigid neutrality. Their entrance on these territories was, as usual,
accompanied by a solemn proclamation in the name of their general: