The Age of Napoleon

by Will Durant

  Meanwhile Napoleon, playing all his cards, attended (July 18) a solemn Te Deum Mass at which the Milanese hierarchy expressed thanks to God for the expulsion of the Austrians. The laity celebrated the victory with parades in honor of the victor. “Bourrienne,” he asked his secretary, “do you hear the acclamations still resounding? That noise is as sweet to me as the sound of Josephine’s voice. How happy and proud I am to be loved by such a people!”45 He was still an Italian, loving the language, the passion and beauty, the garlanded orchards, the indulgent religion, the melodious ritual and transcendent arias. But he was moved, too, by the plaudits of the crowds that gathered before the Tuileries on July 3, the morning after his nocturnal return to Paris. The people of France began to think of him as God’s favorite; they drank eagerly from their cup of glory.

  And Louis XVIII, heir to centuries of strife between Bourbon France and Hapsburg Austria, could hardly be indifferent to this new victory over old foes. Perhaps the young conqueror could still be persuaded to be a kingmaker, not a king. So, at an unknown date in the summer of 1800, he addressed Napoleon again:

  You must have long since been convinced, General, that you possess my esteem. If you doubt my gratitude, fix your reward, and mark out the fortune of your friends. As to my principles, I am a Frenchman, merciful by character, and also by the dictates of reason.

  No, the victor of Lodi, Castiglione, and Arcole, the conqueror of Italy and Egypt, cannot prefer vain celebrity to real glory. But you are losing precious time. We may ensure the glory of France. I say we, because I require the aid of Bonaparte, and he can do nothing without me.

  General, Europe observes you. Glory awaits you, and I am impatient to restore peace to my people.

  Louis46

  To this, after much delay, Napoleon replied, on September 7:

  SIR:

  I have received your letter. I thank you for your kind remarks about myself. You must give up any hope of returning to France; you would have to return over a hundred thousand dead bodies. Sacrifice your private interests to the peace and happiness of France…. History will not forget. I am not untouched by the misfortunes of your family…. I will gladly do what I can to render your retirement pleasant and undisturbed.47

  Louis’ letter had come from his temporary refuge in Russia; perhaps he was there when Czar Paul I, in July, 1800, received from Napoleon a present that almost turned the course of history. During the war of 1799 some six thousand Russians had been captured by the French. Napoleon offered them to England and Austria (who had been Russia’s ally) in exchange for French prisoners; the offer was refused.48 Since France could make no legitimate use of these men, and found it expensive to maintain them, Napoleon ordered them all to be armed, clothed in new uniforms, and sent to the Czar without asking anything in return.49 Paul responded with professions of friendship with France, and by forming (December 18, 1800) the Second League of Armed Neutrality against England. On March 23, 1801, Paul was assassinated, and the Powers returned to the status quo ante donum.

  Meanwhile the Austrian Emperor rejected the Alessandria armistice, and sent 80,000 men under General von Bellegarde to hold the line along the Mincio. The French replied by driving the Austrians from Tuscany, and by attacking the Austrians in Bavaria. On December 3, 1800, Moreau’s 60,000 men fought 65,000 Austrians at Hohenlinden (near Munich), and defeated them so decisively—taking 25,000 prisoners—that the Austrian government, seeing Vienna at Moreau’s mercy, signed a general armistice (December 25, 1800), and agreed to negotiate with the French government a separate peace. On his return to Paris Moreau received an acclaim that may have stirred some conflicting emotions in Napoleon, for Moreau was the favorite candidate of both the royalists and the Jacobins to replace Napoleon as head of the state.

  Plots against Bonaparte’s life continued undiscourageably. Early in 1800 a snuffbox, closely resembling the one that the First Consul habitually used, was found on his desk at Malmaison; it contained poison amid the snuff.50 On September 14 and October 10 several Jacobins were arrested, charged with conspiring to kill Napoleon. On December 24 three Chouans, sent from Brittany by Georges Cadoudal, directed an “infernal machine,” loaded with explosives, against a group carrying the Consul and his family to the opera. Twenty-two persons were killed, fifty-six were wounded—none of Napoleon’s entourage. He went on to the opera with apparent calm; but on returning to the Tuileries he ordered a thorough investigation, the execution of the imprisoned Jacobins, and the internment or deportation of 130 more who were arrested on suspicion. Fouché, who believed that royalists, not Jacobins, were the criminals, apprehended a hundred of them, and had two of these guillotined (April 1, 1801). Napoleon had overreacted and had over ridden the law, but he felt that he was fighting a war, and that he had to put some terror into the hearts of men who themselves scorned law. He was increasingly hostile to the Jacobins and lenient with royalists.

  On October 20, 1800, he proposed to his aides to erase from the list of émigrés the names of those who would be allowed to return to France, and would receive such of their confiscated goods as had not been sold by the state or appropriated for governmental use. There were now approximately 100,000 emigrés, and many of them had asked for permission to come back. Over the protests of worried purchasers of confiscated property, Napoleon had 49,000 names “erased”; i.e., 49,000 of the émigrés were permitted to return. Further “erasures” were to be made from time to time, in the hope that this would reduce external hostility to France, and promote the general pacification of Europe. The royalists cheered; the Jacobins mourned.

  The principal step in this program of peace was the meeting of the French and Austrian negotiators at Lunéville (near Nancy). Napoleon sent not Talleyrand but his own brother Joseph to argue the French case there; and Joseph accomplished his mission well. He was supported at each step by the inexorable Consul, who expanded his demands with every Austrian delay. Finally, seeing that the armies of France were absorbing nearly all Italy, and were knocking at the gates of Vienna, the Austrians yielded, and signed what they understandably called the “terrible” Peace of Lunéville (February 9, 1801). Austria recognized as French territory Belgium, Luxembourg, and the terrain along the left bank of the Rhine from the North Sea to Basel; she confirmed the Treaty of Campoformio; she accepted the suzerainty of France over Italy between the Alps and Naples and between the Adige and Nice, and the protectorate of France over the Batavian Republic (Holland) and the Helvetic Republic (Switzerland). “Austria is done for,” wrote the Prussian minister Haugwitz; “it now rests with France alone to establish peace in Europe.”51 The Paris Bourse rose twenty points in a day, and Paris workers, preferring victories to votes, celebrated with cries of “Vive Bonaparte!” the achievements of Napoleon in diplomacy as well as war. Perhaps, however, Lunéville was war rather than diplomacy; it was the triumph of pride over prudence, for in it lay the seeds of many wars, ending in Waterloo.

  Other negotiations brought more power. A pact with Spain (October 1,1800) brought Louisiana to France. The Treaty of Florence (March 18,1801) with the King of Naples gave France the isle of Elba and the possessions of Naples in central Italy, and closed Neapolitan ports to British and Turkish trade. The old French claim to St.-Domingue—the western section of Hispaniola—brought Napoleon into conflict with a man who almost rivaled him in force of character. François-Dominique Toussaint—self-named L’Ouverture—had been born a Negro slave in 1743. At the supposedly cautious age of forty-eight he led the slaves of St.-Domingue in a successful revolt, and took control first of the French, then of the Spanish, section of the island. He governed ably, but found it difficult to restore productive order among the liberated Negroes, who preferred the leisurely ways that seemed dictated by the heat. Toussaint allowed many former owners to return to their plantations and establish a work discipline verging on slavery. In theory he acknowledged French sovereignty over St.-Domingue; actually, however, he assumed the title of governor general for life, with the right to
name his successor—very much as Napoleon was soon to do in France. In 1801 the First Consul sent twenty thousand troops under General Charles Leclerc to reclaim French authority in St.-Domingue. Toussaint fought valiantly, was overcome, and died in jail in France (1803). In 1803 the entire island fell to the British.

  The British fleet, supported by the staying power of British commerce, industry, and character, remained, through all but two years of Napoleon’s rule, the prime obstacle to his success. Protected by the Channel from the direct ravages of war, enriched by her unrivaled maritime trade, her colonial acquisitions and revenues, and her priority in the Industrial Revolution, England could afford to finance the armies of her Continental allies in repeated attempts to overthrow Napoleon. The merchants and manufacturers agreed with George III, the Tories, the émigrés, and Edmund Burke that the restoration of the Bourbons to the throne of France was the best means of recapturing the comfortable stability of the Old Regime. Nevertheless a strong minority in England, led by Charles James Fox, liberal Whigs, radical workingmen, and eloquent men of letters, objected that continued war would spread poverty and incite revolution, that Napoleon was now a fait accompli, and that the time had come for finding a modus vivendi with that invincible condottiere.

  Moreover, they argued, Britain’s behavior as mistress of the seas was making enemies for her and friends for France. British admirals claimed that their blockade of France required that British crews should have the right to board and search neutral vessels and confiscate goods bound for France. Resenting this practice as an infringement of their sovereignty, Russia, Sweden, Denmark, and Prussia formed (December, 1800) the Second League of Armed Neutrality, and proposed to resist any further British intrusion upon their ships. As the warmth of friction rose, the Danes seized Hamburg (which had become Britain’s chief door to the markets of Central Europe), and the Prussians took George Ill’s Hanover. Half the Continent, lately united against France, was now hostile to England. As France already controlled the mouths and left bank of the Rhine, English goods were largely kept from the markets of France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Denmark, the Baltic States, and Russia. Italy was closing its ports to British trade; Spain was clamoring for Gibraltar, Napoleon was building an army and fleet for the invasion of England.

  England fought back, and profited from some turns of fortune’s wheel. A British fleet destroyed a Danish fleet in the harbor of Copenhagen (April 2, 1801). Czar Paul I was succeeded, and his French policy revoked, by Alexander I, who denounced Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt, recognized the British capture of Malta from France, and signed a treaty with England (June 17, 1801); the Second League of Armed Neutrality faded away. Nevertheless economic setbacks in Britain, the swelling French army at Boulogne, and the collapse of Austria despite costly subsidies, inclined England to thoughts of peace. On October 1, 1801, her negotiators signed a preliminary agreement which pledged France to yield Egypt to Turkey, and Britain to turn over Malta, within three months, to the Knights of St. John; France, Holland, and Spain were to recover most of the colonies that had been taken from them; France would remove all her troops from central and southern Italy. After seven weeks of further debate Great Britain and France signed the long-awaited Peace of Amiens (March 27, 1802). When Napoleon’s representative reached London with the ratified documents, a happy crowd harnessed his horses and drew the carriage to the Foreign Office amid shouts of “Vive la République française! Vive Napoléon!”52

  The French people were stirred with gratitude to the young man—still only thirty-two—who had so brilliantly brought ten years of war to an end. All Europe had acknowledged his ability as a general; now it saw that same clear mind and steady will shine in diplomacy too. And Amiens was but a beginning; on May 23, 1802, he signed a treaty with Prussia; on the next day, with Bavaria; on October 9, with Turkey; on October 11, with Russia. When November 9 approached—anniversary of the 18th Brumaire—he arranged that it should be celebrated as a Festival of Peace. On that day he proclaimed happily the goal of his labors: “Faithful to its aspirations and its promise, the government has not yielded to lust for hazardous and extraordinary enterprises. Its duty was to restore tranquillity to humanity, and, by means of strong and lasting ties, to draw together that great European family whose mission it is to mold the destinies of the world.”53 Perhaps this was the finest moment in his history.

  III. REMAKING FRANCE: 1802–03

  “At Amiens,” said Napoleon at St. Helena, “I believed in all good faith that my own fate, and that of France, were settled. I was going to devote myself entirely to the administration of the country; and I believe that I should have done wonders.”54 This sounds like an attempt to remove the stains of a dozen campaigns; but the day after the Peace of Amiens was signed, Girolamo Lucchesini, Prussian ambassador at Paris, reported to his King that Napoleon was resolved “to turn to the benefit of agriculture, industry, commerce, and the arts all those pecuniary resources which war at once absorbs and besmirches.” Napoleon, Lucchesini continued, talked with ardor about “canals to be completed and opened, roads to be made or repaired, harbors to be dredged, towns to be embellished, places of worship and religious establishments to be endowed, public instruction … to be provided for.”55 Actually a great deal of progress was made along these lines before war again seized priority over construction (May 16, 1803). Taxes were reasonable, were collected with a minimum of chicanery and cruelty, and were poured out in government contracts that helped to keep industry flourishing and labor employed. Commerce expanded rapidly after England lifted the blockade. Religion rejoiced over Napoleon’s Concordat with the Papacy; the Institute began to establish a nationwide system of education; the law was codified and enforced; administration reached an excellence that verged on honesty.

  Paris again, as under Louis XIV, became the tourist capital of Europe. Hundreds of Englishmen, forgetting the riotous cartoons that had lampooned Napoleon in the British press, braved rough roads and the rough Channel to get a glimpse of the miniature colossus who had defied and pacified the established Powers. Several members of Parliament were introduced to him; not least—in August, 1802—the past and future Prime Minister, Charles James Fox, who had long labored for peace between the English and the French. Foreigners were astonished at the prosperity that had come so quickly after Napoleon’s rise to rule. The Duc de Broglie described the years 1800–03 as “the best and noblest pages in the annals of France.”56

  1. The Code Napoléon: 1801–04

  “My real glory,” Napoleon reminisced, “is not the forty battles I won—for my defeat at Waterloo will destroy the memory of those victories … What nothing will destroy, what will live forever, is my Civil Code.”57 “Forever” is an unphilosophical word; but the Code was his greatest achievement.

  The inexhaustible ingenuity of deviltry periodically compels a society to improve and reformulate its ways of protecting itself from violence, robbery, and deceit. Justinian had tried this in A.D. 528; but the Corpus Iuris Civilis drawn up by his jurists was a coordinated collection of existing laws rather than a new structure of law for a changing and uprooted society. The problem was multiplied for France by the legal individuality of its provinces, so that a law in one region could not be assumed to hold sway in the next. Merlin of Douai and Cambacérès had presented the outlines of a new and unified code to the Convention in 1795, but the Revolution had no time to do this work; faced with a bewildering chaos, it added to it with a thousand hasty decrees, which it left for some lucid interval to mold into consistency.

  Napoleon’s peace settlements with Austria and Britain gave him this opportunity, however brief. On August 12, 1800, the three Consuls had commissioned François Tronchet, Jean Portalis, Félix Bigot de Préameneu and Jacques de Maleville to draw up a fresh plan for a concordant national code of civil law. The preliminary draft which they offered on January 1, 1801, was sent by Bonaparte to the leaders of the law courts for their criticisms and comments; these were submitted to Napoleon three mo
nths later, and were then reviewed by the legislative committee of the Council of State, led by Portalis and Antoine Thibaudeau. Having run all these gauntlets, the Code was taken up, title by title, by the whole Council through eighty-seven sittings.

  Napoleon presided at thirty-five of these. He disclaimed any knowledge of law, but he profited from the acumen and legal learning of his fellow Consul Cambacérès. He joined in the discussions with a modesty that endeared him to the Council, and that would have surprised his later years. They were inspired by his ardor and determination, and readily accorded with his prolongation of their sessions from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. They were not enthusiastic when he convened them again in the evening. Once, at such a nocturnal meeting, some members drowsed with fatigue. Napoleon called them to consciousness with an amiable behest: “Come, gentlemen, we have not yet earned our stipends.”58 In the judgment of Vandal the Code could never have been completed had it not been for Napoleon’s persistent urging and friendly encouragement.59

  The labors of the jurists and the Council were almost aborted when the Code was subjected to debate in the Tribunate. This assembly, still warm with the Revolution, condemned the Code as a betrayal of that explosionas a return to the tyrannical rule of the husband over his wife and of the father over his children, and as the enthronement of the bourgeoisie over the French economy. These charges were largely justified. The Code accepted and applied the basic principles of the Revolution: freedom of speech, worship, and enterprise, and equality of all before the law; the right of all to public trial by jury; the end of feudal dues and ecclesiastical tithes; and the validity of purchases made, from the state, of confiscated church or seignorial property. But—following Roman law—the Code accepted the family as the unit and bastion of moral discipline and social order, and gave it a basis in power by reviving the patria potestas of ancient regimes: the father was awarded full control over his wife’s property, and full authority over his children until they came of age; he could have them imprisoned on his word alone; he could prevent the marriage of a son under twenty-six or a daughter under twenty-one. The Code violated the principle of equality before the law by ruling that in disputes about wages the word of the employer, other things equal, should be taken as against that of the employee. The Revolution’s ban on workingmen’s associations (except for purely social purposes) was renewed on April 12, 1803; and after December 1 of that year every laborer was required to carry a workbook recording his past career. The Code—Napoleon agreeing—restored slavery in the French colonies.60