I
Such for the moment was the end of the long struggle which M. de Talleyrand had maintained with a man superior to all others in the power of his faculties; but who, owing to certain faults, which were perhaps inseparable from the haughty and imaginative nature of those faculties, was finally vanquished by the patience, moderation, and tact of an adversary of far inferior genius, whose hostility he had, by a singular instinct, dreaded, and, by an unaccountable carelessness, provoked.
I have said that when M. de Talleyrand first attached himself to the destinies of Napoleon, he expected from him—first, his own advancement; secondly, the advancement of French interests.
He followed Napoleon, then, obsequiously up to the period at which he foresaw clearly that the policy of that personage was beginning to be such as would neither profit an intelligent adherent nor establish a durable empire.
It cannot be said, however, that in separating himself from this policy, after the treaty of Tilsit, he left his sovereign in a moment of adversity. France never appeared to people in general so great, nor its ruler so stable, as at that epoch. It was not at the moment of any evident decline in either, but at a moment when to a keen observer there was visible a tendency which if pursued would, a little sooner or a little later, plunge both into inextricable calamities, that the Prince de Benevent detached himself quietly from the chariot that bore the great soldier’s fortunes.
Even then he did little more than express with moderation the convictions he felt; and indeed his opposition when most provoked was never against the individual whom he had served, but against the system that individual was blindly pursuing. As the horizon grew darker, he neither shrank from giving his advice, which events proved invariably to be just, nor refused his services, if they were allowed the necessary means of being useful. His infidelity up to the last consisted in giving counsel that was rejected, and taking measures with much reserve for preserving himself and his country in some degree from the fate that was preparing for its ruler. Nor was it until Napoleon and the nation became two distinct things, and it appeared necessary to destroy the one in order to save the other, that it can be said that M. de Talleyrand conspired against the man, who, it must be added, never asked for heartfelt devotion in exacting blind obedience.
There was nothing on earth, in fact, which Napoleon himself would not have sacrificed, and did not unscrupulously sacrifice, to promote his own objects. He said, and I believe thought, that these were the happiness and glory of France. Behind his selfishness there was, all must admit, a great and noble idea; but those who felt sure that he was mistaken were not bound to subject their notions of patriotism to his: M. de Talleyrand had not been his creature, nor raised up from the dust by him. He had been a distinguished and eminent man before General Bonaparte’s career had commenced, and it is hardly fair to talk of his treachery to a man, who had of late years wearied him with affronts,—when the most intimate of that man’s favourites (Marshal Berthier) told Louis XVIII. at the commencement of the Restoration, “that France had groaned for twenty-five years under the weight of misfortunes that only disappeared at the sight of its legitimate sovereign.”
The principal if not the only question at issue concerning M. de Talleyrand in these affairs is, Whether the advice to place Louis XVIII. on the French throne was good or bad advice? What other candidates were there? Bonaparte vanquished was out of the question. He had not only become odious to M. de Talleyrand; he was equally so to all Europe and to all France,—the broken fragments of his army excepted.
There was something to say in favour of a regency with Marie-Louise; but her husband himself declared at Fontainebleau that she was incapable of acting for herself. If Napoleon was in a situation to direct her, the government was evidently still Napoleon’s. If she was placed in the hands of the marshals, the exchange was that of a military empire with order and a redoubtable chief, for a military empire with confusion and without a chief; Marie-Louise was, moreover, out of Paris.
Had she remained at Paris, had Bonaparte perished on the field of battle, or been placed anywhere in secure guardianship, the daughter of the Emperor of Austria, assisted and controlled by four or five men of eminence, moderation, and capacity, whom the allies could have joined to her, might have been a possibility more compatible perhaps with the epoch than the half-forgotten inheritor of the crown of Louis XVI.; but when the choice was to be made, this combination had gone by.
Then there was the House of Orleans. But this younger branch of the Bourbon family was personally almost as unknown to France as the elder one. The name that connected it with the Revolution was not popular, on the other hand, even with the revolutionists. A mere soldier put on Napoleon’s throne by foreigners was an evident humiliation to the French people. Louis XVIII., therefore, really seems the only person at the moment who could carry with him to the vacant place any dignity, and represent there, as M. de Talleyrand said, any principle.
This prince in early life had been supposed favourable to constitutional government. His residence of late years had been in a constitutional country. He had never been remarkable for the strength of his personal attachments, and he had, moreover, in his character, or at least in his manner, a certain authority, which rendered it probable that he would keep in order the more zealous of his partisans.
Thus, it seemed likely that he would frankly accept such a government as England possessed and France had desired in 1789, to the opinions of which period the more thinking portions of the French nation still looked back with respect.
Risks had to be run, whatever resolution might be taken; but risks in critical times have always to be run, and a man of action can only choose the least dangerous.