Emperor of the French, second son of
Charles Marie Bonaparte and Maria Lætitia Ramolino, b. at Ajaccio, in Corsica,
15 August, 1769; d. on the Island of St. Helena, 5 May, 1821.
His childhood was spent in Corsica; at
the end of the year 1778 he entered the college of Autun, in 1779 the military
school of Brienne, and in 1783 the military school of Paris. In 1785, when he
was in garrison at Valence, as a lieutenant, he occupied his leisure with
researches into the history of Corsica and read many of the philosophers of his
time, particularly Rousseau. These studies left him attached to a sort of
Deism, an admirer of the personality of Christ, a stranger to all religious
practices, and breathing defiance against "sacerdotalism" and
"theocracy". His attitude under the Revolution was that of a citizen
devoted to the new ideas, in testimony of which attitude we have his scolding
letter, written in 1790, to Battafuoco, a deputy from the Corsican noblesse,
whom the "patriots" regarded as a traitor, and also a work published
by Bonaparte in 1793, "Le Souper de
Beaucaire", in which he takes the side of the Mountain in the
Convention against the Federalist tendencies of the Girondins.
His military genius revealed itself in
December, 1793, when he was twenty four years of age, in his recapture of
Toulon from the English. He was made a general of brigade in the artillery, 20
December, and in 1794 contributed to Masséna's victories in Italy. The political
suspicions aroused by his friendship with the younger Robespierre after 9
Thermidor of the Year III (27 July, 1794), the intrigues which led to his being
removed from the Italian frontier and sent to command a brigade against the
Vendeans in the west, and ill health, which he used as a pretext to refuse this
post and remain in Paris, almost brought his career to an end. He contemplated
leaving France to take command of the sultan's artillery. But in 1795 when the
Convention was threatened, Bonaparte was selected for the duty of pouring
grapeshot upon its enemies from the platform of the church of Saint Roch (13
Vendémiaire, Year IV). He displayed great moderation in his hour of victory,
and managed to earn at once the gratitude of the Convention and the esteem of
its enemies.
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The Campaign in Italy
On 8 March, 1798, he contracted a civil
marriage with the widow of Alexandre de Beauharnais, Marie Joséphine Rose
Tascher de la Pagerie, who was born in Martinique, in 1763, of a family
originally belonging to the neighbourhood of Blois. In the same month Napoleon
set out for Italy, where the Directory, prompted by Carnot, had appointed him
commander in chief against the First Coalition. The victory of Montenotte, over
the Austrians commanded by Beaulieu, and those of Millesimo, Dego, Ceva, and
Mondovi, over Colle's Piedmontese troops, forced Victor Amadeus, King of
Sardinia, to conclude the armistice of Cherasco (28 April, 1796). Wishing to
effect a junction on the Danube with the Army of the Rhine, Bonaparte spent the
following May in driving Beaulieu across Northern Italy, and succeeded in
pushing him back into the Tyrol. On 7 May he was ordered by the Directory to
leave half of his troops in Lombardy, under Kellermann's command, and march
with the other half against Leghorn, Rome, and Naples. Unwilling to share the
glory with Kellermann, Bonaparte replied by tendering his resignation, and the
order was not insisted on. In a proclamation to his soldiers (20 May, 1796) he
declared his intention of leading them to the banks of the Tiber to chastise
those who had "whetted the daggers of civil war in France" and
"basely assassinated" Basseville, the French minister, to
"re-establish the Capitol, place there in honor the statues of heroes who
had made themselves famous", and to "arouse the Roman people benumbed
by many centuries of bondage".
In June he entered the Romagna, appeared at
Bologna and Ferrara, and made prisoners of several prelates. The Court of Rome
demanded an armistice, and Bonaparte, who was far from eager for this war
against the Holy See, granted it. The Peace of Bologna (23 June, 1796) obliged
the Holy See to give up Bologna and Ferrara to French occupation, to pay twenty
one million francs, to surrender 100 pictures, 500 manuscripts, and the busts
of Junius and Marcus Brutus. The Directory thought these terms too easy, and
when a prelate was sent to Paris to negotiate the treaty, he was told that as
an indispensable condition of peace, Pius VI must revoke the Briefs relating to
the Civil Constitution of the clergy and to the Inquisition. The Pope refused,
and negotiations were broken off; they failed again at Florence, where an
attempt had been made to renew them.
During these pourparlers between
Paris and Rome, Bonaparte repulsed the repeated efforts of the Austrian Wurmser
to reconquer Lombardy. Between 1 and 5 August, Wurmser was twice beaten at
Lonato and again at Castiglione; between 8 and 15 September, the battles of
Roveredo, Primolano, Bassano, and San Giorgio forced Wurmser to take refuge in
Mantua, and on 16 October Bonaparte created the Cispadan Republic at the
expense of the Duchy of Modena and of the Legations, which were pontifical
territory. Then, 24 October, he invited Cacault, the French minister at Rome,
to reopen negotiations with Pius VI "so as to catch the old
fox"; but on 28 October he wrote to the same Cacault: "You may
assure the pope that I have always been opposed to the treaty which the
Directory has offered him, and above all to the manner of negotiating it. I am
more ambitious to be called the preserver than the destroyer of the Holy See.
If they will be sensible at Rome, we will profit by it to give peace to that
beautiful part of the world and to calm the conscientious fears of many
people." Meanwhile the arrival in Venetia of the Austrian troops under
Alvinzi caused Cardinal Busca, the pope's secretary of State, to hasten the
conclusion of an alliance between the Holy See and the Court of Vienna; of this
Bonaparte learned through intercepted letters. His victories at Arcoli (17
November, 1796) and Rivoli (14 January, 1797) and the capitulation of Mantua (2
February, 1797), placed the whole of Northern Italy in his hands, and in the
spring of 1797 the Pontifical States were at his mercy.
The Directory sent him ferocious instructions.
"The Roman religion", they wrote, "will always be the
irreconcilable enemy of the Republic; first by its essence, and next, because
its servants and ministers will never forgive the blows which the Republic has
aimed at the fortune and standing of some, and the prejudices and habits of
others. The Directory requests you to do all that you deem possible, without
rekindling the torch of fanaticism, to destroy the papal Government, either by
putting Rome under some other power or" which would be still better
"by establishing some form of self government which would render the yoke
of the priests odious." But at the very moment when Bonaparte received
these instructions he knew, by his private correspondence, that a Catholic
awakening was beginning in France. Clarke wrote to him: "We have become
once more Roman Catholic in France", and explained to him that the help of
the pope might perhaps be needed before long to bring the priests in France to
accept the state of things resulting from the Revolution. Considerations such
as these must have made an impression on a statesman like Bonaparte, who,
moreover, at about this period, said to the parish priests of Milan: "A
society without religion is like a ship without a compass; there is no good
morality without religion." And in February, 1797, when he entered the
Pontifical States with his troops, he forbade any insult to religion, and
showed kindness to the priests and the monks, even to the French ecclesiastics
who had taken refuge in papal territory, and whom he might have caused to be
shot as émigrés.
He contented himself with levying a great many contributions,
and laying hands on the treasury of the Santa Casa at Loretto. The first
advances of Pius VI to his "dear son General Bonaparte" were met by
Bonaparte's declaring that he was ready to treat. "I am treating with this
rabble of priests [cette prêtraille], and for this once Saint Peter will
again save the Capitol", he wrote to Joubert, 17 February, 1797. The Peace
of Tolentino was negotiated on 19 February; the Holy See surrendered the
Legations of Bologna, Ferrara, and Ravenna, and recognized the annexation of
Avignon and the Comtat Venaissin by France. But Bonaparte had taken care not to
infringe upon the spiritual power, and had not demanded of Pius VI the
withdrawal of those Briefs which were offensive to the Directory. As soon as
the treaty was signed he wrote to Pius VI to express to him "his perfect
esteem and veneration"; on the other hand, feeling that the Directory
would be displeased, he wrote to it: "My opinion is that Rome, once
deprived of Bologna, Ferrara, the Romagna, and the thirty millions we are
taking from her, can no longer exist. The old machine will go to pieces of
itself." And he proposed that the Directory should take the necessary
steps with the pope in regard to the religious situation in France.
Then, with breathless rapidity, turning
back towards the Alps, and assisted by Joubert, Masséna, and Bernadotte, he
inflicted on Archduke Charles a series of defeats which forced Austria to sign
the preliminaries of Leoben (18 April, 1797). In May he transformed Genoa into
the Ligurian Republic; in October he imposed on the archduke the Treaty of
Campo Formio, by which France obtained Belgium, the Rhine country with Mainz,
and the Ionian Islands, while Venice was made subject to Austria. The Directory
found fault with this last stipulation; but Bonaparte had already reached the
point where he could act with independence and care little for what the
politicians at Paris might think. It was the same with his religious policy: he
now began to think of invoking the pope's assistance to restore peace in
France. A note which he addressed to the Court of Rome, 3 August, 1797, was
conceived in these terms: "The pope
will perhaps think it worthy of his wisdom, of the most holy of religions, to
execute a Bull or ordinance commanding priests to preach obedience to the
Government, and to do all in their power to strengthen the established
constitution. After the first step, it would be useful to know what others
could be taken to reconcile the constitutional priests with the non
constitutional."
While Bonaparte was expressing himself
thus, the Councils of the Five Hundred and the Ancients were passing a law to
recall, amnesty, and restore to their civil and political rights the priests
who had refused to take the oath of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy. But
Directors Barrès, Rewbell, and Lareveillère Lépeaux, considering that this act
jeopardized the Republic, employed General Augereau, Bonaparte's lieutenant, to
carry out the coup d'état of 18 Fructidor against the Councils
(4 Sept., 1797), and France was once more a prey to a Jacobin and anti-Catholic
policy. These events were immediately echoed at Rome, where Joseph Bonaparte,
the general's brother, and ambassador from the Directory, was asked by the
latter, to favour the Revolutionary party. Disturbances arose: General Duphot
was killed in Joseph Bonaparte's house (28 December, 1797), and the Directory
demanded satisfaction from the Holy See. General Bonaparte had just returned to
Paris, where he apparently confined himself to his functions as a member of the
Institute (Scientific Section). He was by no means anxious to lead the
expedition against Rome, which the Directory was projecting, and contented
himself with giving Berthier, who commanded it, certain instructions from a
distance. For this expedition for Berthier's entry into Rome and the
proclamation of the Roman Republic (10-15 February, 1798), and for the
captivity of Pius VI, who was carried off a prisoner to Valence.
The Campaign in Egypt
While in Paris, Bonaparte induced the
Directory to take up the plan of an expedition to Egypt. His object was to make
the Mediterranean a French lake, by the conquest of Malta and the Nile Valley,
and to menace England in the direction of India. He embarked on 19 May, 1798.
The taking of Malta (10 June), of Alexandria (2 July), the battle of the
Pyramids (21 July), gave Bonaparte the uncontested mastery of Cairo. At Cairo
he affected a great respect for Islam; reproached with this later on, he
replied: "It was necessary for General Bonaparte to know the principles of
Islamism, the government, the opinions of the four sects, and their relations
with Constantinople and Mecca. It was necessary, indeed, for him to be
thoroughly acquainted with both religions, for it helped him to win the
affection of the clergy in Italy and of the ulemas in Egypt."
The French troops in Egypt were in great
danger when the naval disaster of Aboukir, inflicted by Nelson, had cut them
off from Europe. Turkey took sides with England: in the spring of 1799,
Bonaparte made a campaign in Syria to strike both Turkey and England. Failing
to effect the surrender of Acre, and as his army was suffering from the plague
(May, 1799), he had to make his way back to Egypt. There he re-established
French prestige by the victory of Aboukir (25 July, 1799), then, learning that
the Second Coalition was gaining immense successes against the armies of the
Directory, he left Kléber in Egypt and returned secretly to France. He landed
at Fréjus, 9 October, 1799, and was in Paris seven days later. Besides certain
political results, the expedition to Egypt had borne fruit for science:
Egyptology dates its existence from the creation of the Institute of Egypt (Institut
d'Egypte) by Bonaparte.
Bonaparte, First Consul
While Bonaparte was in Egypt, the
religious policy of the Directory had provoked serious troubles in France.
Deportations of priests were multiplying; Belgium, where 6000 priests were
proscribed, was disturbed; the Vendée, Normandy, and the departments of the
South were rising. France was angry and uneasy. Spurred on by his brother
Lucien, president of the Five Hundred, allied with Directors Sieyès and Roger
Ducos, Bonaparte caused Directors Gohier and Moulins to be imprisoned, and
broke up the Five Hundred (18 Brumaire; 9-10 November, 1799). The Directorial
Constitution was suppressed, and France thenceforward was ruled by three
consuls. First Consul Bonaparte put into operation the Constitution known as
that of the Year VIII, substituted for the departmental administrators elected
by the citizens, others appointed by the Executive Power, and reorganized the
judicial and financial administrations. He commissioned the Abbé Bernier to
quiet the religious disturbance of the Vendeans, and authorized the return of
the non juring priests to France on condition of their simply promising
fidelity to the laws of the republic. Then, to make an end of the Second
Coalition, he entrusted the Army of Germany to Moreau, and, himself taking
command of the Army of Italy, crossed the Great St. Bernard (13-16 May, 1800)
and, with the cooperation of Desaix, who was mortally wounded, crushed the
Austrians (14 June, 1800) between Marengo and San Giuliano at the very spot he
had marked on the map in his study in the Tuileries. The Peace of Lunéville,
concluded with Austria, 9 February, 1801, extended the territory of France to
102 departments.
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Bonaparte spent the years 1801 and 1802
effecting internal reforms in France. A commission, established in 1800,
elaborated a new code which, as the "Code Napoléon", was to be
promulgated in 1804, to formally introduce some of the "principles of
1789" into French law, and thus to complete the civil results of the
Revolution. But it was Napoleon's desire that, in the new society which was the
issue of the Revolution, the Church should have a place, and consciences should
be set at rest. The Concordat with the Holy See was signed on 17 July, 1801; it
was published, together with the Organic Articles, as a law, 16 April, 1802.
The former of these two acts established the existence of the Church in France,
while the other involved the possibility of serious interference by the State
in the life of the Church.
Napoleon never said, "The Concordat was the
great fault of my reign." On the contrary, years afterwards, at St.
Helena, he considered it his greatest achievement, and congratulated himself
upon having, by the signature of the Concordat, "raised the fallen altars,
put a stop to disorders, obliged the faithful to pray for the Republic, dissipated
the scruples of those who had acquired the national domains, and broken the
last thread by which the old dynasty maintained communication with the
country." Fox, in a conversation with Napoleon at this period, expressed
astonishment at his not having insisted upon the marriage of priests: "I
had, and still have, to accomplish peace", Napoleon replied,
"theological controversies are allayed with water, not with oil."
The
Concordat had wrecked the hopes of those who, like Mme de Staël, had wished to
make Protestantism the state religion of France; and yet the Calvinist
Jaucourt, defending the Organic Articles before the Tribunat, gloried in the
definitive recognition of the Calvinist religion by the state. The Jewish
religion was not recognized until later (17 March, 1808), after the assembly of
a certain number of Jewish delegates appointed by the prefects (29 July, 1806)
and the meeting of the Great Sanhedrim (10 February — 9 April, 1807); the
State, however, did not make itself responsible for the salaries of the rabbis.
Thus did the new master of France regulate the religious situation in that
country.
On 9 April, 1802, Caprara was received
for the first time by Bonaparte in the official capacity of Pius VI's legate a
latere, and before the first consul took an oath which, according to the
text subsequently published by the "Moniteur", bound him to observe
the constitution, the laws, statutes, and customs of the republic, and nowise
to derogate from the rights, liberties, and privileges of the Gallican Church.
This was a painful surprise for the Vatican, and Caprara declared that the
words about Gallican liberties had been interpolated in the
"Moniteur". Another painful impression was produced at the Vatican by
the attitude of eight constitutional priests whom Bonaparte had nominated to
bishoprics, and to whom Caprara had granted canonical institution, and who
afterwards boasted that they had never formally abjured their adhesion to the
Civil Constitution of the clergy.
In retaliation, the Roman curia demanded of
the constitutional parish priests a formal retractation of the Civil
Constitution, but Bonaparte opposed this and when Caprara insisted, declared
that if Rome pushed matters too far the consuls would yield to the desire of
France to become Protestant. Talleyrand spoke to Caprara in the same sense, and
the legate desisted from his demands. On the other hand, though Bonaparte had
at first been extremely irritated by the allocution of 24 May, 1802, in which
Pius VI demanded the revision of the Organic Articles, he ended by allowing it
to be published in the "Moniteur" as a diplomatic document. A spirit
of conciliation on both sides tended to promote more cordial relations between
the two powers. The proclamation of Bonaparte as consul for life (August, 1802)
increased in him the sense of his responsibility towards the religion of the
country, and in Pius VI the desire to be on good terms with a personage who was
advancing with such long strides towards omnipotence.
Bonaparte took care to gain the
attachment of the revived Church by his favours. While he dissolved the
associations of the Fathers of the Faith, the Adorers of Jesus, and the
Panarists, which looked to him like attempts to restore the Society of Jesus,
he permitted the reconstitution of the Sisters of Charity, the Sisters of St.
Thomas, the Sisters of St. Charles, and the Vatelotte Sisters, devoted to
teaching and hospital work, and made his mother, Madame Lætitia Bonaparte,
protectress of all the congregations of hospital sisters. He favoured the revival
of the Institute of the Christian Schools for the religious instruction of
boys; side by side with the lycées, he permitted secondary schools
under the supervision of the prefects, but directed by ecclesiastics. He did
not rest content with a mere strict fulfilment of the pecuniary obligations to
the Church to which the Concordat had bound the State; in 1803 and 1804 it
became the custom to pay stipends to canons and desservants of
succursal parishes.
Orders were issued to leave the Church in possession of the
ecclesiastical buildings not included in the new circumscription of parishes.
Though the State had not bound itself to endow diocesan seminaries, Bonaparte
granted the bishops national estates for the use of such seminaries and the
right to receive donations and legacies for their benefit; he even founded, in
1804, at the expense of the State, ten metropolitan seminaries, re-established,
with a government endowment, the Lazarist house for the education of
missionaries, and placed the Holy Sepulchre and the Oriental Christians under
the protection of France.
As to the temporal power of the popes
Bonaparte at this period affected a somewhat complaisant attitude towards the
Holy See. He restored Pesaro and Ancona to the pope, and brought about the restitution
of Benevento and Pontecorvo by the Court of Naples. After April, 1803, Cacault
was replaced, as his representative at Rome, by one of the five French
ecclesiastics to whom Pius VI had consented to grant the purple late in 1802.
This ambassador was no other than Bonaparte's own uncle, Cardinal Joseph Fesch,
whose secretary for a short time was Chateaubriand, recently made famous by his
"La génie du Christianisme". One of Bonaparte's grievances against
Cacault was a saying attributed to the latter: "How many sources of his
glory would cease if Bonaparte ever chose to play Henry VIII!" Even in
those days of harmony Cacault had a presentiment that the Napoleonic policy
would yet threaten the dignity of the Holy See.
The idea of a struggle with England became
more and more an imperious obsession of Bonaparte's mind. The Peace of Amiens
(25 March, 1802) was only a truce: it was broken on 22 May, 1803, by Mortier's
invasion of Hanover and the landing of the English in French Guiana. Napoleon
forthwith prepared for his gigantic effort to lay the ban of Europe on England.
The Duc d'Enghien, who was suspected of complicity with England and the French
Royalists, was carried off from Ettenheim, a village within the territory of
Baden, and shot at Vincennes, 21 March, 1804, and one of Cardinal Fesch's first
acts as ambassador at Rome was to demand the extradition of the French émigré Vernègues,
who was in the service of Russia, and whom Bonaparte regarded as a conspirator.
NAPOLEON EMPEROR
The Coronation
While the Third Coalition was forming
between England and Russia, Bonaparte caused himself to be proclaimed
hereditary emperor (30 April 18 May, 1804), and at once surrounded himself with
a brilliant Court. He created two princes imperial (his brothers Joseph and Louis),
seven permanent high dignitaries, twenty great officers, four of them ordinary
marshals, and ten marshals in active service, a number of posts at Court open
to members of the old nobility. Even before his formal proclamation as emperor,
he had given Caprara a hint of his desire to be crowned by the pope, not at
Reims, like the ancient kings, but at Notre Dame de Paris. On 10 May, 1804,
Caprara warned Pius VI of this wish, and represented that it would be necessary
to answer yes, in order to retain Napoleon's friendship. But the execution of
the Duc d'Enghien had produced a deplorable impression in Europe; Royalist
influences were at work against Bonaparte at the Vatican, and the pope was
warned against crowning an emperor who, by the Constitution of 1804, would
promise to maintain "the laws of the Concordat", in other words, the
Organic Articles. Pius VI and Consalvi tried to gain time by dilatory replies,
but these very replies were interpreted by Fesch at Rome, and by Caprara at
Paris, in a sense favourable to the emperor's wishes.
At the end of June,
Napoleon I joyfully announced, at the Tuileries, that the pope had promised to
come to Paris. Then Pius VI tried to obtain certain religious and political
advantages in exchange for the journey he was asked to make. Napoleon declared
that he would have no conditions dictated to him; at the same time he promised
to give new proofs of his respect and love for religion, and to listen to what
the pope might have to submit. At last the cleverness of Talleyrand, Napoleon's
minister of foreign affairs, conquered the scruples of Pius VI; he declared, at
the end of September, that he would accept Napoleon's invitation if it were
officially addressed to him; he asked only that the ceremony of consecration
should not be distinct from the coronation proper, and that Napoleon would
undertake not to detain him in France. Napoleon had the invitation conveyed to
Pius VI, not by two bishops, as the pope expected, but by a general; and before
setting out for France, Pius VI signed a conditional act of abdication, which
the cardinals were to publish in case Napoleon should prevent his returning to
Rome; then he began his journey to France, 2 November, 1804.
Napoleon would not accord any solemn
reception to Pius VI; surrounded by a hunting party, he met the pope in the
open country, made him get into the imperial carriage, seating himself on the
right, and in this fashion took him to Fontainebleau. Pius VI was brought to
Paris by night. The whole affair nearly fell through at the last moment. Pius
VI informed Josephine herself, on the eve of the day set for the coronation of
the empress, that she had not been married to Napoleon in accordance with the
rules of religion. To the great annoyance of the emperor, who was already contemplating
a divorce, in case no heir were born to him, and was displaying a lively
irritation against Josephine, Pius VI insisted upon the religious benediction
of the marriage; otherwise, there was to be no coronation. The religious
marriage ceremony was secretly performed at the Tuileries, on the first of
December, without witnesses, not during the night, but at about four o'clock in
the afternoon, by Fesch, grand almoner of the imperial household. As
Welschinger has proved, Fesch had previously asked the pope for the necessary
dispensations and faculties, and the marriage was canonically beyond reproach.
On 2 December the coronation took place.
Napoleon arrived at Notre Dame later
than the hour appointed. Instead of allowing the pope to crown him, he himself
placed the crown on his own head and crowned the empress, but, out of respect
for the pope, this detail was not recorded in the "Moniteur". Pius
VI, to whom Napoleon granted but few opportunities for conversation, had a long
memoranda drawn up by Antonelli and Caprara, setting forth his wishes; he
demanded that Catholicism should be recognized in France as the dominant
religion; that the divorce law should be repealed; that the religious
communities should be re-established; that the Legations should be restored to
the Holy See. Most of these demands were to no purpose: the most important of
the very moderate concessions made by the emperor was his promise to substitute
the Gregorian Calendar for that of the Revolution after 1 January, 1806. When
Pius VI left Paris, 4 April, 1805, he was displeased with the emperor.
But the Church of France acclaimed the
emperor. He was lauded to the skies by the bishops. The parish priests, not
only in obedience to instructions, but also out of patriotism, preached against
England, and exhorted their hearers to submit to the conscription. The
splendour of the Napoleonic victories seemed, by the enthusiasm with which it
inspired all Frenchmen, to blind the Catholics of France to Napoleon's false
view of the manner in which their Church should be governed. He had reorganized
it; he had accorded it more liberal pecuniary advantages than the Concordat had
bound him to; but he intended to dominate it. For example, in 1806 he insisted
that all periodical publications of a religious character should be
consolidated into one, the "Journal des curés", published under
police surveillance.
On 15 August, 1806, he instituted the Feast of St.
Napoleon, to commemorate the martyr Neopolis, or Neopolas, who suffered in
Egypt under Diocletian. In 1806 he decided that ecclesiastical positions of
importance, such as cures of souls of the first class, could be given only to
candidates who held degrees conferred by the university, adding that these
degrees might be refused to those who were notorious for their
"ultramontane ideas or ideas dangerous to authority". He demanded the
publication of a single catechism for the whole empire, in which catechism he
was called "the image of God upon earth," "the Lord's
anointed", and the use of which was made compulsory by a decree dated 4
April, 1806. The prisons of Vincennes, Fenestrelles, and the Island of Sainte
Marguerite received priests whom the emperor judged guilty of disobedience to
his orders.
The Great Victories; Occupation of Rome;
Imprisonment of Pius VI (1805-09).
After 1805 relations between Pius VI and
Napoleon became strained. At Milan, 26 May, 1805, when Napoleon, as King of
Italy, took the Iron Crown of Lombardy, he was offended because the pope did
not take part in the ceremony. When he asked Pius VI to annul the marriage
which his brother Jerome Bonaparte had contracted, at the age of nineteen with
Elizabeth Patterson of Baltimore, the pope replied that the decrees of the
Council of Trent against clandestine marriages applied only where they had been
recognized, and the reply constituted one more cause of displeasure for the
emperor, who afterwards, in 1806, obtained an annulment from the complaisant
ecclesiastical authorities of Paris. And when Consalvi, in 1805, complained
that the French Civil Code, and with it the divorce law, had been introduced
into Italy, Napoleon formally refused to make any concession.
The great war which the emperor was just
then commencing was destined to be an occasion of conflict with the Holy See.
Abandoning the preparations which he had made for an invasion of England (the
Camp of Boulogne), he turned against Austria, brought about the capitulation of
Ulm (20 October, 1805), made himself master of Vienna (13 November), defeated
at Austerlitz (2 December, 1805) Emperor Francis I and Tsar Alexander. The
Treaty of Presburg (26 December, 1805) united Dalmatia to the French Empire and
the territory of Venice to the Kingdom of Italy, made Bavaria and Wurtemberg
vassal kingdoms of Napoleon, enlarged the margravate of Baden, and transformed
it into a grand duchy, and reduced Austria to the valley of the Danube. The
victory of Trafalgar (21 October, 1805) had given England the mastery of the
seas, but from that time forward Napoleon was held to be the absolute master of
the Continent. He then turned to the pope, and demanded a reckoning of him.
To prevent a landing Russian and English
troops in Italy, Napoleon, in October, 1805, had ordered Gouvion Saint Cyr to
occupy the papal city of Ancona. The pope, lest the powers hostile to Napoleon
might some day reproach him with having consented to the employment of a city
of the Pontifical States as a base of operations, had protested against this
arbitrary exercise of power: he had complained, in a letter to the emperor (13
November, 1805), of this "cruel affront", declared that since his
return from Paris he had "experienced nothing but bitterness and
sorrow", and threatened to dismiss the French ambassador.
But the treaty of Presburg and the
dethronement of the Bourbons of Naples by Joseph Bonaparte and Masséna
(January, 1806), changed the European and the Italian situation. From Munich
Napoleon wrote two letters (7 January, 1806), one to Pius VI, and the other to
Fesch, touching his intentions in regard to the Holy See. He complained of the
pope's ill will, tried to justify the occupation of Ancona, and declared
himself the true protector of the Holy See. "I will be the friend of Your
Holiness", he concluded, "whenever you consult only your own heart
and the true friends of religion." His letter to Fesch was much more
violent: he complained of the refusal to annul Jerome's marriage, demanded that
there should no longer be any minister either of Sardinia or of Russia in Rome,
threatened to send a Protestant as his ambassador to the pope, to appoint a
senator to command in Rome and to reduce the pope to the status of mere Bishop
of Rome, claimed that the pope should treat him like Charlemagne, and assailed
"the pontifical camarilla which prostituted religion".
A reply from Pius
VI (29 January, 1806), asking for the return of Ancona and the Legations let
loose Napoleon's fury. In a letter to Pius VI (13 February), he declared:
"Your Holiness is the sovereign of Rome but I am its emperor; all my
enemies ought to be yours"; he insisted that the pope should drive
English, Russian, Sardinian, and Swedish subjects out of his dominions, and
close his ports to the ships of those powers with which France was at war; and
he complained of the slowness of the Curia in granting canonical institution to
bishops in France and Italy. In a letter to Fesch he declared that, unless the
pope acquiesced he would reduce the condition of the Holy See to what it had
been before Charlemagne.
An official note from Fesch to Consalvi
(2 March, 1806) defined Napoleon's demands; the cardinals were in flavor of
rejecting them, and Pius VI, in a very beautiful letter, dated 21 March, 1806,
remonstrated with Napoleon, declared that the pope had no right to embroil
himself with the other states, and must hold aloof from the war; also, that
there was no emperor of Rome. "If our words", he concluded,
"fail to touch Your Majesty's heart we will suffer with a resignation
conformable to the Gospel, we will accept every kind of calamity as coming from
God." Napoleon, more and more irritated, reproached Pius VI for having
consulted the cardinals before answering him, declared that all his relations
with the Holy See should thenceforward be conducted through Talleyrand, ordered
the latter to reiterate the demands which the pope had just rejected, and
replaced Fesch as ambassador at Rome with Alquier, a former member of the
Convention. Then the emperor proceeded from words to deeds.
On 6 May, 1806, he
caused Cività Vecchia to be occupied. Learning that the pope, before
recognizing Joseph Bonaparte as King of Naples, wished Joseph to submit to the
ancient suzerainty of the Holy See over the Neapolitan Kingdom, he talked of
"the spirit of light headedness" (esprit de vertige) which
prevailed at Rome, remarked that, when the pope thus treated a Bonaparte as a
vassal, he must be tired of wielding the temporal power, and directed
Talleyrand to tell Pius VI that the time was past when the pope disposed of
crowns. Talleyrand was informed (16 May, 1806) that, if Pius VI would not
recognize Joseph, Napoleon would no longer recognize Pius VI as a temporal
prince. "If this continues", Napoleon went on to say, "I will
have Consalvi taken away from Rome." He suspected Consalvi of having sold
himself to the English. Early in June, 1806, he seized Benevento and
Pontecorvo, two principalities which belonged to the Holy See, but which were
shut in by the Kingdom of Naples.
Yielding before the emperor's wrath,
Consalvi resigned his office: Pius VI unwillingly accepted his resignation, and
replaced him with Cardinal Casoni. But the first dispatch written by Casoni
under Pius VI's dictation confirmed the pope's resistance to the emperor's
behests. Napoleon then violently apostrophized Caprara, in the presence of the
whole court, threatening to dismember the Pontifical States, if Pius VI did not
at once, "without ambiguity or reservation", declare himself his ally
(1 July, 1806). A like ultimatum was delivered, on 8 July, to Cardinal Casoni
by Alquier. But Continental affairs were claiming Napoleon's attention, and the
only immediate result of his ultimatum was the emperor's order to his generals
occupying Ancona and Cività Vecchia, to seize the pontifical revenues in those
two cities. On the other hand, the constitution of the Imperial University
(May, 1806), preparing for a state monopoly of teaching, loomed up as a peril
to the Church's right of teaching, and gave the Holy See another cause for
uneasiness.
The Confederation of the Rhine, formed
by Napoleon out of fourteen German States (12 July, 1806), and his assertion of
a protectorate over the same, resulted in Francis II's abdication of the title
of emperor of Germany; it its place Francis took the title of emperor of
Austria. Thus ended, under the blows dealt it by Napoleon, that Holy Roman
Germanic Empire which had exerted so great an influence over Christianity in
the Middle Ages. The pope and the German emperor had long been considered as
sharing between them the government of the world in the name of God. Napoleon
had definitively annihilated one of these "two halves of God", as
Victor Hugo has termed them. Frederick William II of Prussia became alarmed,
and in October, 1806, formed, with England and Russia, the Fourth Coalition.
The stunning victories of Auerstädt, won by Davoust, and Jena, won by Napoleon
(14 October, 1806), were followed by the entry of the French into Berlin, the
king of Prussia's flight to Königsberg, and the erection of the Electorate of
Saxony into a kingdom in alliance with Napoleon. From Berlin itself Napoleon
launched a decree (21 November, 1806) by which he organized the Continental
blockade against England, aiming to close the whole Continent against English
commerce. Then, in 1807, penetrating into Russia, he induced the tsar by means
of the battles of Eylau (8 February, 1807) and Friedland (14 June, 1807), to
sign the Peace of Tilsit (8 July, 1807). The empire was at its apogee; Prussia
had been bereft of its Polish provinces, given to the King of Saxony under the
name of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw; the Kingdom of Westphalia was being formed
for Jerome Bonaparte, completing the series of kingdoms given since 1806 to the
emperor's brothers — Naples having been assigned to Joseph, and Holland to
Louis. A series of principalities and duchies, "great fiefs", created
all over Europe for his marshals, augmented the might and prestige of the
empire. At home, the emperor's personal power was becoming more and more firmly
established; the supervision of the press more rigorous; summary incarcerations
more frequent. He created an hereditary nobility as an ornament to the throne.
To him it was something of a humiliation,
which the Court of Rome persisted in holding aloof, politically, from the great
conflicts of the nations. He began to summon the pope anew. He had already,
soon after Jena, called Mgr Arezzo to him from Saxony, and in menacing fashion
had bidden him go and demand of Pius VI that he should become the ally of the
empire; once more Pius VI had replied to Arezzo that the pope could not
consider the enemies of France his enemies. Napoleon also accused the pope of
hindering the ecclesiastical reorganization of Germany, and of not making
provision for the dioceses of Venetia. His grievances were multiplying. On 22
July, 1807, he wrote to Prince Eugène, who governed Milan as his viceroy, a
letter intended to be shown to the pope: "There were kings before there
were popes", it ran. "Any pope who denounced me to Christendom would
cease to be pope in my eyes; I would look upon him as Antichrist. I would cut
my peoples off from all communication with Rome. Does the pope take me for
Louis the Pious? What the Court of Rome seeks is the disorder of the Church,
not the good of religion. I will not fear to gather the Gallican, Italian,
German and Polish Churches in a council to transact my business [pour faire
mes affaires] without any pope, and protect my peoples against the priests
of Rome. This is the last time that I will enter into any discussion with the
Roman priest rabble [la prêtraille romaine]".
On 9 August Napoleon
wrote again to Prince Eugène, that, if the pope did anything imprudent, it
would afford excellent grounds for taking the Roman States away from him. Pius
VI, driven to bay, sent Cardinal Litta to Paris to treat with Napoleon: the
pope was willing to join the Continental blockade, and suspend all intercourse
with the English, but not to declare war against them. The pope even wrote to
Napoleon (11 September, 1807) inviting him to come to Rome. The emperor, however,
was only seeking occasion for a rupture, while the pope was seeking the last
possible means of pacification.
Napoleon refused to treat with Cardinal
Litta, and demanded that Pius VI should be represented by a Frenchman, Cardinal
de Bayanne. Then he pretended that Bayanne's powers from the pope were not
sufficient. And while the pope was negotiating with him in good faith,
Napoleon, without warning, caused the four pontifical Provinces of Macerata,
Spoleto, Urbino, and Foligno to be occupied by General Lemarrois (October,
1807). Pius VI then revoked Cardinal Bayanne's powers. It as evident that, not
only did Napoleon require of him an offensive alliance against England, but
that the Emperor's pretensions, and those of his new minister of foreign affairs,
Champagny, Talleyrand's successor, were now beginning to encroach upon the
domain of religion. Napoleon claimed that one third of the cardinals should
belong to the French Empire; and Champagny let it be understood that the
emperor would soon demand that the Holy see should respect the "Gallican
Liberties", and should abstain from "any act containing positive
clauses or reservations calculated to alarm consciences and spread divisions in
His Majesty's dominions". Henceforth it was the spiritual authority that
Napoleon aspired to control.
Pius VI ordered Bayanne to reject the imperial demands. Napoleon then (January, 1808) decided that Prince Eugène and King Joseph should place troops at the disposition of General Miollis, who was ordered to march on Rome. Miollis at first pretended to be covering the rear of the Neapolitan army, then he suddenly threw 10,000 troops into Rome (2 February). Napoleon wrote to Champagny that it was necessary "to accustom the people of Rome and the French troops to live side by side, so that, should the Court of Rome continue to act in an insensate way, it might insensibly cease to exist as a temporal power, without anyone noticing the change". Thus it may be said that, in the beginning of 1808, Napoleon's plan was to keep Rome.
Pius VI ordered Bayanne to reject the imperial demands. Napoleon then (January, 1808) decided that Prince Eugène and King Joseph should place troops at the disposition of General Miollis, who was ordered to march on Rome. Miollis at first pretended to be covering the rear of the Neapolitan army, then he suddenly threw 10,000 troops into Rome (2 February). Napoleon wrote to Champagny that it was necessary "to accustom the people of Rome and the French troops to live side by side, so that, should the Court of Rome continue to act in an insensate way, it might insensibly cease to exist as a temporal power, without anyone noticing the change". Thus it may be said that, in the beginning of 1808, Napoleon's plan was to keep Rome.
In a manifesto to the Christian powers,
Pius VI protested against this invasion; at the same time, he consented to
receive General Miollis and treated him with great courtesy. Champagny, on 3
February, again insisted on the pope's becoming the political ally of Napoleon,
and Pius VI refused. The instructions given to Miollis became more severe every
day: he seized printing presses, journals, post offices; he decimated the
Sacred College by having seven cardinals conducted to the frontier, because
Napoleon accused them of dealing with the Bourbons of the two Sicilies, then,
one month later, he expelled fourteen other cardinals from Rome because they
were not native subjects of the pope. Cardinal Doria Pamphili, who had been
appointed secretary of state, in February, 1808, was also expelled by Miollis;
Pius VI now had with him only twenty one cardinals, and the papal Government
was disorganized. He broke off all diplomatic relations with Napoleon, recalled
Bayanne and Caprara from Paris, and uttered his protest in a consistorial
allocution delivered in March. Napoleon, on his side, recalled Alquier from
Rome. The struggle between pope and emperor was taking on a tragic character.
On 2 April Napoleon signed two decrees:
one annexed to the Kingdom of Italy "in perpetuity" the Provinces of
Urbino, Ancona, Macerata, and Camerino; the other ordered all functionaries of
the Court of Rome who were natives of the Kingdom of Italy to return to that
kingdom, under pain of confiscation of their property. Pius VI protested before
all Europe against this decree, on 19 May, and, in an instruction addressed to
the bishops of the provinces which Napoleon was lopping off from his
possessions, he denounced the religious "indifferentism" of the
imperial Government, and forbade the faithful of those provinces to take the
oath of allegiance to Napoleon or accept any offices from him. Miollis
retaliated, 12 June, by driving Gavrielli, the new secretary of state, out of
Rome. Pius VI then replaced Gavrielli with Cardinal Pacca, reputed an opponent
of France; on 11 July he delivered a very spirited allocution, which, in spite
of the imperial police, was circulated throughout Europe; and Pacca, on 24
August, directed a note against the institution of the "Civic Guard" — an idea recently conceived by Miollis —
in which Miollis was compelling even the pope's soldiers to enroll. On 6
September, 1808, Miollis sent two officers to the Quirinal to arrest Pacca;
Pius VI interposed, declaring that they should not arrest Pacca without
arresting the pope, and that in future the secretary of state should sleep at
the Quirinal, which was closed to all the French.
The definitive execution of Napoleon's
projects against the Holy See was retarded by the wars which occupied him
during the year 1808. When he transferred his brother Joseph from the Throne of
Naples to that of Spain, Spain rose, and the English invaded Portugal. Dupont's
capitulation, at Baylen (20 July, 1808), and Junot's at Cintra (30 August,
1808), were painful reverses for French arms. Napoleon, having made an alliance
with the tsar in the celebrated interview of Erfurt (27 September — 14 October,
1808), hastened to Spain. There he found a people whose spirit of resistance
was exasperated all the more because they believed themselves to be fighting
for their liberty and the integrity of their faith as much as for their
country. In November he gained the victories of Burgos, Espinosa, Tudela, and
Somo Sierra, and reopened the gates of Madrid for Joseph; on 21 February
Saragossa was taken by the French armies after an heroic resistance. A Fifth
Coalition was formed against Napoleon: he returned from Spain and, rushing
across Bavaria, bombarded and took Vienna (11 13 May, 1809). On the day after
the victory he devoted some of his leisure hours to thinking about the pope.
For some time Murat, who in 1808 had
replaced Joseph as King of Naples, had been ready to support Miollis whenever
Napoleon should judge that the hour had come to incorporate Rome with the
empire. On 17 May, 1809, Napoleon issued from Schönbrunn two decrees in which,
reproaching the popes for the ill use they had made of the donation of
Charlemagne, his "august predecessor", he declared the Pontifical
States annexed to the empire, and organized, under Miollis, a council
extraordinary to administer them. On 10 June Miollis had the Pontifical flag,
which still floated over the castle of St. Angelo, lowered. Pius VI replied by
having Rome placarded with a Bull excommunicating Napoleon. When the emperor
received news of this (20 June) he wrote to Murat: "So the pope has aimed
an excommunication against me. No more half measures; he is a raving lunatic
who must be confined. Have Cardinal Pacca and other adherents of the pope
arrested."
In the night of 5 6 July, 1809, Radet, a general of gendarmerie, by the orders of Miollis, entered the Quirinal, arrested Pius VI and Pacca, gave them two hours to make their preparations, and took them away from Rome at four in the morning. Pius VI was taken to Savona, Pacca to Fenestrella. Meanwhile Napoleon, completing the work of crushing Austria, had been the victor at Essling (21 May, 1809) and at Wagram (6 July, 1809), and the Peace of Vienna (15 October, 1809) put the finishing touch to the mutilation of Austria by handing over Carniola, Croatia, and Friuli to France, at the same time obliging the Emperor Francis to recognize Joseph as King of Spain. The young german, Staps, who attempted to assassinate Napoleon at Schöenbrunn (13 October), died crying: "Long live Germany!"
In the night of 5 6 July, 1809, Radet, a general of gendarmerie, by the orders of Miollis, entered the Quirinal, arrested Pius VI and Pacca, gave them two hours to make their preparations, and took them away from Rome at four in the morning. Pius VI was taken to Savona, Pacca to Fenestrella. Meanwhile Napoleon, completing the work of crushing Austria, had been the victor at Essling (21 May, 1809) and at Wagram (6 July, 1809), and the Peace of Vienna (15 October, 1809) put the finishing touch to the mutilation of Austria by handing over Carniola, Croatia, and Friuli to France, at the same time obliging the Emperor Francis to recognize Joseph as King of Spain. The young german, Staps, who attempted to assassinate Napoleon at Schöenbrunn (13 October), died crying: "Long live Germany!"
Discussion with the captive Pius VI;
Second Marriage; Ecclesiastical Councils of 1809 and 1811.
The conflict with his prisoner, the
pope, was another embarrassment, a new source of anxiety to the emperor. At
first he took all possible steps to prevent the public from hearing of what had
happened at Rome: the "Moniteur" made not the slightest allusion to
it; the newspapers received orders to be silent. He also wished his
excommunication to be ignored; the newspapers must be silent on this point
also; but the Bull of Excommunication, secretly brought to Lyons, was
circulated in France by members of the Congregation, a pious association,
founded 2 February, 1801, by Père Delpuits, a former Jesuit. Alexis de Noailles
and five other members of the Congregation were arrested by the emperor's
command, and his anger extended to all the religious orders. He wrote (12
September, 1809) to Bigot de Préameneu, minister of public worship: "If on
1 October there are any missions or congregations still in France, I will hold
you responsible." The celebrated Abbé Frayssinous had to discontinue his
sermons; the Lazarists dispersed; the Sulpicians were threatened. Napoleon
consulted Bigot de Préameneu as to the expediency of laying the Bull before the
Council of State, but abstained from doing so.
It was not long, however, before he had
to face an enormous difficulty: there were more than twenty bishoprics vacant,
and Pius VI declared to Fesch, to Caprara, and to Maury that, so long as he was
a prisoner, so long as he could not communicate freely with his natural
counselors, the cardinals, he would not provide for the institution of the
bishops. Thus the life of the Church of France was partially suspended. In
November, 1809, Napoleon appointed an "ecclesiastical council" to
seek a solution of the difficulty. With Fesch as president, this council
included as members Cardinal Maury, Barral, Archbishop of Tours, Duvoisin,
Bishop of Nantes, Emery, Superior of S. Sulpice, Bishops Canaveri of Vercelli,
Bourlier of Evreux, Mannay of Trèves, and the Barnabite Fontana. Bigot de
Préameneu, in the name of the emperor, laid before the council several sets of
questions relating to the affairs of Christendom in general, then to those of
France, and lastly to those of Germany and Italy, and to the Bull of
Excommunication.
In the preamble to its replies, the
council gave voice to a petition for the absolute liberty of the pope and the
recall of the cardinals. It declared that if a general council were assembled
for the settlement of the religious questions then pending, the pope's presence
at the council would be necessary, and that a national council would not have
sufficient authority in questions affecting the whole Catholic Church. It also
declared that the pope could not complain of any essential violation of the
Concordat, that, when he advanced his temporal spoliation, as one reason for
his refusal to institute the bishops canonically, he was confounding the
temporal order with the spiritual, that the temporal sovereignty was only an
accessory of the papal authority, that the invasion of Rome was not a violation
of the Concordat, and that the national council would interpose an appeal from
the Bull of Excommunication either to the general council or to the pope better
informed. The manner in which canonical institution might be secured for the
bishops, if the pope should continue his resistance, was twice discussed. Urged
by the Government, the council admitted that, taking the circumstances into
consideration, the conciliary institution given by a metropolitan to his suffragans,
or by the senior suffragan to a new metropolitan, might possibly be recognized
by a national council as, provisionally, a substitute for pontifical Bulls.
Emery, thinking the council too lenient, refused to endorse the answers, which
were sent to Napoleon on 11 January, 1810.
On 17 February, 1810, the Act regulating
the Roman territory and future condition of the pope, introduced by Régnault de
Saint Jean d'Angély, was passed unanimously by the senate. The Papal States, in
accordance with this decree, were to form two departments; from Rome, which was
declared the first city of the empire, the prince imperial was to take his
title of king. The emperor, already crowned once at Notre Dame, was to go
within ten years to be crowned at St. Peter's. The pope was to have a revenue
of two millions. The empire was to charge itself with the maintenance of the
Sacred Congregation of Propaganda. The pope, on his accession, must promise to
do nothing contrary to the four articles of the Gallican Church. Another Act of
the Senate, of 25 February, 1810, made the Declaration of 1682 a general law of
the empire. Thus did Napoleon flatter himself that he would reduce the papacy
to servitude and bring Pius VI to live in Paris. He even prepared a
letter to Pius VI in which he told him: "I hold in execration the
principles of the Bonifaces and the Gregorys. It is my mission to govern the
West; do not meddle with it." This letter he would have had taken to the
pope by bishops who were to give notice to Pius VI that in future the popes
must swear allegiance to Napoleon, as of yore to Charlemagne, and to inform him
that he himself would be dispensed from this obligation, but that he must
undertake not to reside at Rome. Napoleon expected in this way to bend the pope
to his will. Wiser counsellors, however, prevailed upon him not to send this
insulting letter. Nevertheless, to carry out his plan of removing the papal
throne from Rome, he ordered Miollis to compel all the cardinals who were still
at Rome to set out for Paris, and to have the Vatican archives transported
thither. In 1810 there were twenty seven Roman cardinals in Paris; he lavished
gifts upon them, invited them to the court festivals, and wished them to write
and urge Pius VI to yield; but, following the advice of Consalvi, the cardinals
refused.
It was in the midst of these bitter
conflicts with the church that, Napoleon desiring an heir, resolved to divorce
Josephine. Ever since the end of 1807 Metternich had been aware of the reports
that were current about the emperor's approaching divorce. On 12 December,
1807, Lucien Bonaparte had vainly endeavored to obtain from Josephine her
consent to this divorce; some time after, Fouché had made a similar attempt
with no better success. In December, 1809, at Fontainebleau, in the presence of
Prince Eugène, Josephine's son, the emperor induced her to consent; on 15
December, this was solemnly proclaimed in the throne room, in the presence of
the Court, in an address delivered by Napoleon, and another read by the unhappy
Josephine, who was prevented by her tears from finishing it. The Act of the
Senate (16 December), based on a report of Lacépède, the naturalist, himself a
member of the Senate, ratified the divorce. Napoleon then thought of marrying
the tsar's sister. But Metternich, getting wind of this project, made Laborde
and Schwarzenberg sound the Tuileries to see if Napoleon would marry an
Austrian archduchess. The idea pleased Napoleon. The Court of Vienna, however,
first required that the spiritual bond between Napoleon and Josephine should be
severed.
This bond the pope alone was competent
to dissolve; Louis XII had had recourse to Alexander VI; Henry IV to Clement
VIII; but Napoleon, excommunicated by his prisoner Pius VI, could not apply to
him. Cambacérès, the arch chancellor, sent for the diocesan officials of Paris
and explained to them that the marriage of Napoleon and Josephine had been
invalid in consequence of the absence of the parish priest of the two parties
and of witnesses. In vain did they object that only the pope could decide such
a case; they were told to commence proceedings, and be quick about it. On 26
December, the promoter of the case, Rudemare, begged Cambacérès to submit the
matter to the ecclesiastical council over which Fesch presided.
On 2 January, 1810, Cambacérès sent a request to the official, Boislesve, for a declaration of nullity of the marriage, alleging, this time, that there had been absence of consent on Napoleon's part. On the next day the ecclesiastical council replied that if the defect of Napoleon's consent could be proved to the officiality, the marriage would be null and void. Cambacérès wished to produce Fesch, Talleyrand, Duroc, and Berthier as witnesses. The testimony of Fesch was very confused; he explained that the pope had given him the necessary dispensations to bless the marriage; that two days later he had given Josephine a marriage certificate; that the emperor had then upbraided him, declaring to him that he (the emperor) had only agreed to this marriage in order to quiet the empress, and that it was, moreover, impossible for him to renounce his hopes of direct descendants. The other two witnesses told how Napoleon had repeatedly expressed the conviction that he was not bound by this marriage and that he regarded the ceremony only as "a mere concession to circumstances [acte de pure circonstance] which ought not to have any effect in the future".
On 2 January, 1810, Cambacérès sent a request to the official, Boislesve, for a declaration of nullity of the marriage, alleging, this time, that there had been absence of consent on Napoleon's part. On the next day the ecclesiastical council replied that if the defect of Napoleon's consent could be proved to the officiality, the marriage would be null and void. Cambacérès wished to produce Fesch, Talleyrand, Duroc, and Berthier as witnesses. The testimony of Fesch was very confused; he explained that the pope had given him the necessary dispensations to bless the marriage; that two days later he had given Josephine a marriage certificate; that the emperor had then upbraided him, declaring to him that he (the emperor) had only agreed to this marriage in order to quiet the empress, and that it was, moreover, impossible for him to renounce his hopes of direct descendants. The other two witnesses told how Napoleon had repeatedly expressed the conviction that he was not bound by this marriage and that he regarded the ceremony only as "a mere concession to circumstances [acte de pure circonstance] which ought not to have any effect in the future".
On 9 January the diocesan authorities
declared the marriage null and void, on the ground of the absence of the lawful
parish priest and of witnesses; it pronounced this decision only in view of the
"difficulty in the way of having recourse to the visible head of the
Church, to whom it has always belonged in fact to pronounce upon these
extraordinary cases." The promoter Rudemare had concluded with the
recommendation that the tribunal should at least lay a precept upon the two
parties to repair the defect of form which had vitiated their marriage;
Boilesve, the official, refrained from proffering this invitation. Rudemare
then appealed to the metropolitan authorities on this point.
On 12 January, 1810, the official, Lejeas, with much greater complaisance, admitted both the grounds of nullity advanced by Cambacérès — that is, not only the defect of form, but also the defect of the emperor's consent. He alleged that the civil marriage of Napoleon and Josephine had been annulled by the decree of the Senate, that by the concordatory laws (lois concordataires) the religious marriage ought to follow the civil, and that the Church could not now ask two parties who were no longer civilly married to repair the defects of form in their religious marriage. Thus, he declared, the marriage was religiously annulled. It may be noted here that the Catholic Church cannot be held responsible for the excessive complaisance shown in this matter by the ecclesiastical council and the diocesan authorities of Paris. On 21 January, 1810, Napoleon resolved to ask for the hand of Marie Louise. The French ambassador at Vienna, at the request of the Archbishop of Vienna, gave him his word of honour that the sentence pronounced by the diocesan authorities of Paris was legal. At last all the religious obstacles to the celebration of the new marriage were disposed of.
On 12 January, 1810, the official, Lejeas, with much greater complaisance, admitted both the grounds of nullity advanced by Cambacérès — that is, not only the defect of form, but also the defect of the emperor's consent. He alleged that the civil marriage of Napoleon and Josephine had been annulled by the decree of the Senate, that by the concordatory laws (lois concordataires) the religious marriage ought to follow the civil, and that the Church could not now ask two parties who were no longer civilly married to repair the defects of form in their religious marriage. Thus, he declared, the marriage was religiously annulled. It may be noted here that the Catholic Church cannot be held responsible for the excessive complaisance shown in this matter by the ecclesiastical council and the diocesan authorities of Paris. On 21 January, 1810, Napoleon resolved to ask for the hand of Marie Louise. The French ambassador at Vienna, at the request of the Archbishop of Vienna, gave him his word of honour that the sentence pronounced by the diocesan authorities of Paris was legal. At last all the religious obstacles to the celebration of the new marriage were disposed of.
It took place on 1 April, 1810, but
thirteen of the cardinals then in Paris refused to be present. These thirteen
cardinals were turned away when they presented themselves at the Tuileries two
days later; the minister of public worship informed them that they were no
longer cardinals, that they no longer had any right to wear the purple; the
minister of police forwarded them, two by two, to small country towns; their
pensions were suppressed, their property sequestrated. People called them
"the black cardinals". The bishops and priests of the Roman States
were treated with similar violence; nineteen out of thirty two bishops refused
the oath of allegiance to the emperor, and were imprisoned, while a certain
number of non juring parochial clergy were interned in Corsica, and the emperor
announced his intention of reducing the number of dioceses and parishes in the
Roman States by three fourths. This policy of bitter persecution coincided with
fresh overtures to his prisoner, the pope, through the Austrian diplomat
Lebzeltern (May, 1810). Pius VI's reply was that, to negotiate, he must be free
and able to communicate with the cardinals. In July Napoleon sent Cardinals
Spina and Caselli to Savona, but they obtained nothing from the pope. There had
been no solution of the internal crisis of the Church of France; while Pius VI
was a prisoner the bishops were not to receive canonical institution. Bigot de
Préameneu and Maury suggested to the emperor a possible arrangement; to invite
the chapter in each diocese to designate the bishop who had been nominated, but
not yet canonically instituted, provisional administrator. Fesch refused to
lend himself to this expedient and occupy the Archbishopric of Paris; but a
certain number of nominated bishops did go to their episcopal cities in the
capacity of provisional administrators. Going one step further, Napoleon
removed Maury from the See of Montefiascone, and d'Osmond from that of Nancy,
and had them designated by the respective chapters provisional administrators
of the two vacant Archdioceses of Paris and Florence. Maury and d'Osmond, at
the emperor's bidding, left the dioceses given them by the pope to install
themselves in these archdioceses.
Despite the rigour of his captivity, Pius VI was able to make known the
pontifical commands to Cardinal di Pietro at Semur; a secret agency at Lyons,
established by certain members of the Congregation, devised ingenious ways of
facilitating these communications as well as the circulation of Bulls. In
November, 1810, the Court was stupefied with the news that two Bulls of Pius
VI, addressed to the Chapters of Florence and Paris, forbade their recognizing
D'Osmond and Maury. The imperial fury was let loose. On 1 January, 1811,
Napoleon, during an audience to Maury and the canons, demanded an explanation
from d'Astros, the vicar capitular, who had received the Bull, telling him that
there is "as much difference between the religion of Bossuet and that of
Gregory VII as between heaven and hell"; d'Astros, taken by Maury himself
to police headquarters, was imprisoned at Vincennes. At the Council of State, 4
January, 1811, Portalis, a relative of d'Astros, was openly accused of treason
by Napoleon, and immediately put out of the council chamber (with a brutality
that the emperor afterwards regretted) and was then ordered to quit Paris.
Cardinals di Pietro, Oppizzone, and Gabrielli, and the priests Fontana and
Gregori, former counsellors of the pope, were thrown into prison. Maury used
his influence with the canons of Paris to induce them to apologize to Napoleon,
who received them, told them that the pope must not treat him as a roi fainéant, and declared
that, since the pope was not acting up to the Concordat in the matter of
institution of bishops, the emperor, on his side, renounced the Concordat. The
conditions of the pope's captivity were made more severe; all his correspondence
had to pass through Paris, to be inspected by the Government; the lock of his
desk was picked; he could no longer receive visits without the presence of
witnesses; a gendarme demanded of him the ring of St. Peter, which Pius VI
surrendered after breaking it in two. Chabrol, the pope's custodian, showed him
the addresses to which some of the chapters were expressing their submission to
the emperor, but Pius VI was inflexible. A commission of jurisconsults in
Paris, after discussing the possibility of a law regulating the canonical
institution of bishops without the pope's co operation, ended by deciding that
to pass such a law was almost equivalent to schism.
Napoleon was not willing to go so far.
He summoned the ecclesiastical council which he had already established and, 8
February, 1811, proposed to it these two questions: (1) All communication
between the pope and the emperor's subjects being interrupted, to whom must
recourse be had for the dispensations ordinarily granted by the Holy See? (2) What
canonical means is there of providing institution for bishops when the pope
reuses it? Fesch and Emery tried to sway the council towards some courses which
would save the papal prerogative. But the majority of the council answered: (1)
That recourse might be had, provisionally, to the bishops for the dispensations
in question; 2) That a clause might be added to the Concordat stipulating that
the pope must grant canonical institution within a stated time; failing which,
the right of institution would devolve upon the council of the province; and
that, if the pope rejected this amendment of the Corcordat, the Pragmatic
Sanction would have to be revived so far as concerned bishops. The council
added that, if the pope persisted in his refusal, the possibility of a public
abolition of the Concordat by the emperor would have to be considered; but that
these questions could be broached only by a national council, after one last
attempt at negotiation with the pope.
A Napoleon I Document signed 'N' as French Emperor in 1811 |
On 16 March, 1811, Napoleon summoned to
the Tuileries the members of the council and several of the great dignitaries
of the empire; inveighing bitterly against the pope, he proclaimed that the
Concordat no longer existed and that he was going to convoke a council of the
West. At this meeting Emery, who died on 28 April, boldly faced Napoleon,
quoting to him passages from Bossuet on the necessity of the pope's liberty.
Pius VI not yielding to a last summons on the part of Chabrol, the council was
convoked on 25 April to meet on 9 June. By this step Napoleon expected to
subdue the pope to his will. In pursuance of a plan outlined by the philosopher
Gerando, Archbishop Barral, and Bishops Duvoisin and Mannay were sent to Pius
VI to gain him over on the question of the Bulls of institution. They were
joined by the Bishop of Faenza, and arrived at Savona on 9 May. At first the
pope refused to discuss the matter, not being free to communicate with his
cardinals. But the bishops and Chabrol insisted, and the pope's physician added
his efforts to theirs. They represented that the Church was becoming
disorganized. At the end of nine days, the pope, who was neither eating nor
drinking anything, being very much fatigued, consented, not to ratify, but to
take as "a basis of negotiation" a note drawn up by the four bishops
to the purport that, in case of persistent refusal on his part, canonical
institution might be given to bishops after six months. On 20 May, at four
o'clock in the morning, the bishops started for Paris with this note; at seven
o'clock the pope summoned Chabrol and told him that he did not accept the note
in any definitive sense, that he considered it only a sketch, and that he had
made no formal promise. He also asked that a courier should be sent after the
bishops to warn them of this. The courier bearing this message overtook the
bishops at Turin on 24 May. Pius VII warned Chabrol that if the first note were
exploited as representing an arrangement definitely accepted by the pope, he
"would make a noise that should resound through the whole Christian world".
Napoleon, in his blindness, resolved to do without the pope and put all his
hopes in the council.
Council of 1811
The council convoked for 9 June, 1811,
was not opened at Notre Dame until 17 June, the opening being postponed on
account of the baptism of the King of Rome, just born of Marie Louise. Paternal
pride and the seemingly assured destinies of his throne rendered Napoleon still
more inflexible in regard to the pope. Only since 1905 has the truth about this
council been known, thanks to Welschinger's researches. Under the Second
Empire, when D'Haussonville wrote his work on the Roman Church and the First
Empire (see below) Marshal Vallant had refused him all access to the archives
of the council. These archives Welsinger was able to consult. Boulogne, Bishop
of Troyes, in his opening sermon affirmed the solidarity of the pope and the
bishops, while Fesch, as president of the council, made all its members swear
obedience and fidelity to Pius VII. Upon this Napoleon gave Fesch a sound
rating, on the evening of 19 June, at Saint Cloud. The emperor had packed his
council in very arbitrary fashion, choosing only 42 out of 150 Italian bishops
to mix with the French bishops, with a view to ecumenical effect. A private
bulletin sent to the emperor, 24 June, noted that the fathers of the council
themselves were generally impressed with a sense of restraint. The opposition
to the emperor was very firmly led by Broglie, Bishop of Ghent, seconded by
Aviau, Archbishop of Bordeaux, Dessole, Bishop of Chambéry, and Hirn, Bishop of
Tournai. The first general assembly of the council was held on 20 June. Bigot
de Préameneu and Marescalchi, ministers of public worship for France and Italy,
were present and read the imperial message, one draft of which had been rejected
by Napoleon as too moderate. The final version displeased all the bishops who
had any regard for the papal dignity. Napoleon in this document demanded that
bishops should be instituted in accordance with the forms which had obtained
before the Concordat, no see to be vacant for longer than three months,
"more than sufficient time for appointing a new incumbent". He wished
the council to present an address to him, and the committee that should prepare
this address to be composed of the four prelates he had sent to Savona. The
address, which was prepared in advance by Duvoisin, one of these four prelates,
was an expression of assent to Napoleon's wishes. But the council decided to
have on the committee besides these four prelates, some other bishops chosen by
secret ballot, and among the latter figured Broglie. Broglie discussed
Duvoisin's draft and had a number of changes made in it, and Fesch had some
trouble in keeping the committee from at once demanding the liberation of the
pope. The address, as voted, was nonsensical. It was not what Napoleon
expected, and the audience which he was to have given to the members of the
council on 30 June, did not take place.
Another committee was appointed by the
council to inquire into the pope's views on the institution of bishops. After a
conflict of ten days, Broglie secured against Duvoisin, by a vote of 8 to 4, a
resolution to the effect that, in this matter, nothing must be done without the
pope, and that the council ought to send him a deputation to learn what his
will was. Napoleon was furious and said to Fesch and Barral: "I will dissolve the council. You are a
pack of fools". Then, on second thought, he informed the council that
Pius VII by way of concession, had formally promised canonical institution to
the vacant bishoprics and had approved a clause enabling the metropolitans
themselves in future, after six months vacancy of any see, to give canonical
institution. Napoleon requested the council to issue a note to this effect and
sent a deputation to thank the pope. First the committee voted as the emperor
wished, then, on more mature consideration, suspecting some stratagem on the
emperor's part, it recalled its vote, and, on 10 July, Hirn, Bishop of Tournai,
speaking for the committee, proposed to the council that no decision be made
until a deputation had been sent to the pope. Then, on the morning of 11 July,
Napoleon pronounced the council dissolved. The following night Broglie, Hirn,
and Boulogne were imprisoned at Vincennes. The emperor next thought of turning
over the administration of the dioceses to the prefects, but presently took the
advice of Maury, viz., to have all the members of the council called up, one by
one, by the minister of public worship, and their personal assent to the
imperial project obtained in this way. After fifteen days devoted to
conversations between the minister and certain of the bishops, the emperor
reconvoked the council for 5 August, and the council, by a vote of 80 to 13,
passed the decree by which canonical institution was to be given within six
months, either by the pope or, if he refused, by the metropolitan. The bishops
who passed this decree tried to palliate their weakness by saying that they had
no idea of committing an act of rebellion, but formally asked for, and hoped to
obtain, the pope's assent. Napoleon believed himself victorious; he held in his
hands the means of circumventing the pope and organizing without his cooperation
the administration of French and Italian dioceses. He had brought the Sacred
College, the Dataria, the Penitentiary, and the Vatican Archives to Paris, and
had spent several millions in improving the archiepiscopal palace which he
meant to make the pontifical palace. He wished to remove the Hôtel Dieu,
install the departments of the Roman Curia in its place, and make the quarter
of Notre Dame and the Isle de Saint Louis the capital of Catholicism. But his
victory was only apparent: to make the decree of the national council valid,
the pope's ratification was needed, and once more the resistance of Pius VII
was to hold the emperor in check.
On 17 August Napoleon commissioned the
Archbishops of Tours and Mechlin, the Patriarch of Venice, the Bishops of
Evreux, Trier, Feltro, and Piacenza to go to Savona and demand of the pope his
full adhesion to the decree of 5 August; the bishops were even to be precise in
stating that the decree applied to episcopal sees in the former Papal States,
so that, in giving his assent, Pius VII should by implication assent to the
abolition of the temporal power. That Pius VII might not allege the absence of
the cardinals as a reason for postponing his decisions, Napoleon sent to Savona
five cardinals on whom he could rely (Roverella, Dugnani, Fabrizio Ruffo,
Bayanne, and Doria) with instructions to support the bishops. The emperor's
artifice was successful. On 6 September, 1811, Pius VII declared himself ready
to yield, and charged Roverella to draw up a Brief approving the Decree of 5
August, and on 20 September the pope signed the Brief. But even then, the Brief
as it was, was not what Napoleon wanted: Pius VII abstained from recognizing
the council as a national council, he treated the Church of Rome as the
mistress of all the Churches, and did not specify that the decree applied to
the bishoprics of the Roman States; he also required that, when a metropolitan
gave canonical institution, it should be given in the name of the pope.
Napoleon did not publish the Brief. On 17 October he ordered the deputation of
prelates to notify the pope that the decree applied equally to bishoprics in
the Roman States. This interpretation Pius VII then formally repudiated, and
announced once more that any further decision on his part would be postponed
until he should have with him a suitable number of cardinals. Napoleon first
wreaked his irritation on the Bishops of Ghent, Tournai, and Troyes, whom he
forced to resign their sees and caused to be deported to various towns, then,
on 3 December, he declared the Brief unacceptable, and charged the prelates to
ask for another. Pius VII refused.
On 9 January, 1812, the prelates
informed the pope, from the emperor, that, if the pope resisted any longer, the
emperor would act on his own discretion in the matter of the institution of
bishops. Pius VII sent a personal reply to the emperor, to the effect that he
(the pope) needed a more numerous council and facility of communication with
the faithful, and that he would then do, "to meet the emperor's wishes,
all that was consistent with the duties of his Apostolic ministry." By way
of rejoinder, Napoleon dictated to his minister of public worship, on 9
February, an extraordinarily vehement letter, addressed to the deputation of
prelates. In it he refused to give Pius VII his liberty or to let the
"black cardinals" go back to him; he made known that if the pope
persisted in the refusal to govern the Church, they would do without the pope;
and he advised the pope, in insulting terms, to abdicate. Chabrol, the prefect
of Montenotte, read this letter to Pius VII, and advised him to surrender the
tiara. "Never", was the pope's answer. Then on 23 February, Chabrol
notified the pope, in the emperor's name, that Napoleon considered the
Concordats abrogated, and that he would no longer permit the pope to interfere
in any way in the canonical institution of the bishops. Pius VII answered that
he would not change his attitude. Mme de Staël wrote to Henri Meister:
"What a power is religion which gives strength to the weak when all that
was strong has lost its strength!" The difference between the pope and the
emperor naturally reacted upon the feelings of the clergy towards Napoleon, and
upon the emperor's policy towards religion. From this time Napoleon refused the
seminarists any exemption from military service. He made stricter the
university monopoly of teaching, and Broglie, Bishop of Ghent, who, after
leaving the prison of Vincennes, had continued to correspond with his clergy,
was sent to the Island of Sainte Marguerite.
Last Great Wars: Concordat of
Fontainebleau
At this time Napoleon was absolutely
drunk with power. The French Empire had 130 departments; the Kingdom of Italy
240. The seven provinces of Illyria were subject to France. The rigour of the
Continental blockade was ruining English commerce and embarrassing the European
states. The tsar would have liked Napoleon, master of the West, to leave him
freedom of action in Poland and Turkey; enraged at receiving no such
concessions, he approached England. The French armies in Spain were exhausting
their strength in a savage and ineffectual war against a ceaseless uprising of
the native population; nevertheless Napoleon resolved to attack Russia also. At
Dresden, from March to June, 1812, he held a congress of kings, and prepared
for war. It was at Dresden, in May, 1812, that, under pretext of satisfying the
demands of Francis Joseph for gentler treatment of the pope, Napoleon decided
to have Pius VII removed from Savona to Fontainebleau; the fact is that he was
afraid the English would attempt a coup
de main on Savona and carry
off the pope. After a journey the painful incidents of which have been related
by d' Haussonville, following a manuscript in the British Museum, Pius VII
reached Fontainebleau on 19 June. Equipages were placed at his disposal, he was
desired to appear in public and officiate; but he refused, led a solitary life
in the interior of the palace, and gave not the least indication of being ready
to yield to Napoleon's demands.
Napoleon definitely declared war against
the tsar on 22 June, 1812. The issue was soon seen to be dubious. The Russians devastated
the whole country in advance of the French armies, and avoided pitched battles
as much as possible. The victory of Borodino (7 September, 1812), an extremely
bloody one, opened to Napoleon the gates of Moscow (14 September, 1812). He had
expected to pass the winter there, but the conflagration brought about by the
Russians forced him to retrace his steps westward, and the retreat of the
"Grande Armée" so heroically covered by Marshall Ney, cost France the
lives of numberless soldiers. The passage of the Beresina was glorious. As far
as Lithuania, Napoleon shared the sufferings of his army, then he hastened to
Paris, where he suppressed General Malet's conspiracy and prepared a new war
for the year 1813. When he set out for Prussia it was his idea to extend his
march beyond that country, through Asia to India, to knock over "the scaffolding of mercantile
greatness raised by the English, and strike England to the heart".
"After this", he declared, "it
will be possible to settle everything and have done with this business of Rome
and the pope. The cathedral of Paris will become that of the Catholic world. .
. . If Bossuet were living now, he would have been Archbishop of Paris long
ago, and the pope would still be at the Vatican, which would be much better for
everybody, for then there would be no pontifical throne higher than that of
Notre Dame, and Paris could not fear Rome. With such a president, I would hold
a Council of Nicæa in Gaul."
But the failure of the Russian campaign
upset all these dreams. The emperor's haughty attitude towards the Church was
now modified. On 29 December, 1812, he wrote with his own hand an affectionate
letter to the pope expressing a desire to end the quarrel. Duvoisin was sent to
Fontainebleau to negotiate a Concordat. Napoleon's demands were these: the pope
must swear to do nothing against the four articles; he must condemn the behavior
of the black cardinals towards the emperor; he must allow the Catholic sovereigns
to choose two thirds of the cardinals, take up his residence in Paris, accept
the decree of the council on the canonical institution of bishops, and agree to
its application to the bishoprics of the Roman States. Pius VII spent ten days discussing the
matter. On 18 January, 1813, the emperor himself came to Fontainebleau and
spent many days in stormy interviews with the pope though, according to Pius
VII's own statement to Count Paul Van der Vrecken, on 27 September, 1814,
Napoleon committed no act of violence against the pope. On 25 January, 1813, a
new Concordat was signed. In it there was no mention either of the Four
Articles, or of the nomination of cardinals by the Catholic sovereigns, or of
the pope's place of residence: the six suburbican dioceses were left at the
pope's disposition, and he could moreover provide directly for ten bishoprics,
either in France or in Italy — on all these points Napoleon made concessions.
But on the other hand, the pope confirmed the decree of the Council of 1811 on
the canonical institution of bishops.
According to the very words of its
preamble, this Concordat was intended only "to
serve as basis for a definitive arrangement". But, on 13 February,
Napoleon had it published, just as it stood, as a law of the State. This was
very unfair towards Pius VII; the emperor had no right to convert
"preliminary articles" thus into a definitive act. On 9 February the
imprisoned cardinals had been liberated by Napoleon; going to Fontainebleau,
they had found Pius VII very anxious on the subject of the signature he had
given, and which he regretted. With the advice of Consalvi, he prepared to
retract the "preliminary articles". In his letter of 24 March to Napoleon
he reproached himself for having signed these articles and disavowed the
signature he had given. Napoleon had failed egregiously. He did not listen to
the advice of the Comte de Narbonne, who, in a letter drafted by young
Villemain, expressed the opinion that the pope ought to be set at liberty and
sent back to Rome. It has been claimed that Napoleon had said to his ministers
of State: "If I don't knock the head off the shoulders of some of those
priests at Fontainebleau, matters will never be arranged." This is a
legend; on the contrary, he ordered the minister of public worship to keep
secret the letter of 24 March. Immediately, acting on his own authority, he
declared the Concordat of Fontainebleau binding on the Church, and filled
twelve vacant sees. On 5 April he had Cardinal di Pietro removed from
Fontainebleau and threatened to do the same for Cardinal Pacca.
In the Dioceses of Ghent, Troyes, and
Tournai, the chapters regarded the bishops appointed by Napoleon as intruders.
The irregular measures of the emperor only exasperated the resistance of the
clergy. The Belgian clergy, warned by Count Van der Vrecken of the pope's retraction,
began to agitate against the imperial policy. Meanwhile, on 25 April, 1813,
Napoleon assumed command of the Army of Germany. The victories of Lutzen (2
May) and Bautzen (19 22 May) weakened the Prussian and Russian troops. But the
emperor made the mistakes of accepting the mediation of Austria — only a device
to gain time — and of consenting to hold the Congress of Prague (July). A
letter from Pius VII, secretly carried in the face of many dangers by Van der
Vrecken, warned the Congress of Prague that the pope formally rejected the
articles of 25 January. Napoleon continued nevertheless to send from his
headquarters with the army severe orders calculated to overcome the resistance
of the Belgian clergy; on 6 August he caused the director of the seminary of
Ghent to be imprisoned, and all the students to be taken to Magdeburg; on 14
August he had the canons of Tournai arrested. But his perils were increasing.
Joseph had been driven out of Spain. Bernadotte, King of Sweden, one of
Napoleon's own veterans, was driving the French troops out of Stralsund. Under
Schwarzenberg, Blücher and Bernadotte, three armies were forming against the
emperor. He had but 280,000 men against 500,000. He was victor at Dresden (27
August), but his generals were falling away on all sides. He was deserted by
the Bavarian contingents in the celebrated "Battle of the Nations" at
Leipzig (18 19 October), the defection of the Wurtembergers and the Saxons was
the chief cause of his defeat. The victories of Hanau (30 October) and Hocheim
(2 November) enabled his troops to get back to France, but the Allies were soon
to enter that land.
Liberation of the Pope: End of the
Empire
The liberation of the pope figured on
the programme of the Allies. In vain did the emperor send the Marchesa di
Brignoli to Consalvi, and Fallot de Beaumont, Archbishop of Bourges, to Pius
VII, to open negotiations. In vain, on 18 January, 1814, when he learned that
Murat had gone over to the Allies and occupied the Roman provinces on his own
account, did he offer to restore the Papal States to Pius VII. Pius VII
declared that such a restitution was an act of justice, and could not be made the
subject of a treaty. Meantime, Blücher and Schwarzenberg were advancing through
Burgundy. On 24 January, Lagorse, the commandant of gendarmes who had guarded
Pius VII for four years, announced to him that he was about to take him back to
Rome. The pope was conveyed by short stages through southern and central
France. Napoleon defeated the Allies at Saint Dizier and at Brienne (27 29
January, 1814), the princes offered peace on condition that Napoleon should
restore the boundaries of France to what they were in 1792. He refused. As the
Allies demanded the liberation of the pope, Napoleon sent orders to Lagorse,
who was taking him through the south of France, to let him make his way to
Italy. On 10 March the prefect of Montenotte received orders to have the pope
conducted as far as the Austrian outposts in the territory of Piacenza. The
captivity of Pius VII was at an end.
The war was resumed immediately after
the Congress of Chatillon. In five days Napoleon gave battle to Blücher four
times at Champaubert, Montmirail, Chateau Thierry, and Vauchamp, and hurled him
back on Chalons; against Schwarzenberg he fought the battles of Guiges,
Mormant, Nangis, and Méry, thus opening the way to Troyes. But Lyons was taken
by the Austrians, Bordeaux by the English. Exhausted as he was Napoleon beat
Blücher again at Craonne (7 March), retook Reims and Epernay, and contemplated
cutting off the retreat of Blücher and Schwarzenberg on the Rhine. He caused a
general levy to be decreed; but the Allies had their agents in Paris. Marmont
and Mortier capitulated. On 31 March the Allies entered Paris. On 3 April the
Senate declared Napoleon dethroned. Returning to Fontainebleau, the emperor,
determined to try one last effort, was stopped by the defection of Marmont's
corps at Essonnes. On 20 April he left Fontainebleau; on 4 May he was in Elba.
At the end of ten months, learning of
the unpopularity of the regime founded in France by Louis XVIII, Napoleon
secretly left Elba, landed at Cannes (1 March, 1815), and went in triumph from
Grenoble to Paris (20 March, 1815). Louis VIII fled to Ghent and then began the
Hundred Days. Napoleon desired to give France liberty and religious peace
forthwith. On the one hand, by the Acte
Additionnel, he guaranteed the country a constitutional Government; on the
other hand (4 April, 1815), he caused the Duke of Vicenza to write to Cardinal
Pacca, and he himself wrote to Pius VII, letters in a pacific spirit, while
Isoard, auditor of the Rota, was commissioned to treat with the pope in his
name. But the Coalition was reformed. Napoleon had 118,000 recruits against
more than 800,000 soldiers; he beat Blücher at Ligny (16 June), whilst Ney beat
Wellington at Quatre Bras; next day, at Waterloo, Napoleon was victorious over
Bülow and Wellington until seven o'clock in the evening, but the arrival of
30,000 Prussians, under Blücher, resulted in the emperor's defeat. He abdicated
in favor of his son, set out for Rochefort, and claimed the hospitality of
England. England declared him the prisoner of the Coalition and, in spite of
his protests, had him taken to the Island of St. Helena. There he remained
until his death, strictly watched by Hudson Lowe, and dictated to General
Montholon, Gourgaud, and Bertrand those "Mémoires" which entitle him
to a place among the great writers. Las Casas, at the same time, wrote day by
day, the "Mémorial de Sainte Hélène", a journal of the emperor's
conversations. In the first of his captivity, Napoleon complained to Montholon
of having no chaplain. "It would rest my soul to hear Mass", he said.
Pius VII petitioned England to accede to Napoleon's wish, and the Abbé Vignali
became his chaplain. On 20 April, 1821, Napoleon said to him: "I was born
in the Catholic religion. I wish to fulfil the duties it imposes, and receive
the succour it administers." To Montholon he affirmed his belief in God,
read aloud the Old Testament, the Gospels, and the acts of the Apostles. He
spoke of Pius VII as "an old man full of tolerance and light".
"Fatal circumstances," he added "embroiled our cabinets. I
regret it exceedingly." Lord Rosebery has attached much importance to the
paradoxes with which the emperor used to tease Gourgaud, and amused himself in
maintaining the superiority of Mohammedanism, Protestantism, or Materialism.
One day, when he had been talking in this strain, Montholon said to him:
"I know that your Majesty does not believe one word of what you have just
been saying". "You are right", said the emperor. "At any
rate it helps to pass an hour."
Napoleon was not an unbeliever; but he
would not admit that anyone was above himself, not even the pope.
"Alexander the great", he once said to Fontanes, "declared
himself the son of Jupiter. And in my time I find a priest who is more powerful
than I am." This transcendent pride dictated his religious policy and
utterly vitiated it. By the Concordat, as Talleyrand said, he had "done
not only an act of justice, but also a very clever act, for by this one deed he
had rallied to himself the sympathies of the whole Catholic world." But
the same Talleyrand declares, in his "Mémoires", that his struggle
with Rome was produced by "the most insensate ambition", and that
when he wished to deprive the pope of the institution of bishops, "he was
all the more culpable because he had had before him the errors of the
Constituent Assembly". This double judgment of the former Constitutional
bishop, later the emperor's minister of foreign affairs, will be accepted by
posterity. By a strange destiny, this emperor who travelled all over Europe,
and whose attitude towards the Catholic religion was in a measure inherited
from the old Roman emperors, never set foot in Rome; through him Rome was for
many years deprived of the presence of the remotest successor of St. Sylvester
and of Leo III; but the successor of Constantine and of Charlemagne did not see
Rome, and Rome did not see him.
Chief Sources. Correspondence de
Napoléon premier (1858 sqq.); Lecestre, Lettres inédites de Napoléon I (Paris,
1897); OxxEuvres de Napoléon Bonaparte (Paris, 1822); Mémoires dictés a Sainte
Hélène, ed. Lacroix (Paris, 1904); Las Casas, Mémorial de Sainte Hélène
(London, 1853); Memoirs of Chateaubriand and Talleyrand.
General Works. Thiers, The Consulate and
the Empire under Napoleon (tr. London, 1893); Allison, History of Europe from
the commencement of the French Revolution to the restoration of the Bourbons
(Edinburgh, 1849 1858); Rose, The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era (Cambridge,
1907); Hazlitt, Life of Napoleon Bonaparte (London, 1894); Watson, Napoleon, a
Sketch of his Life (New York, 1902); Sloane, Life of Napoleon Bonaparte (New
York, 1896); Taine, Modern Régime, tr. Durand (London, 1904); Levy, Napoléon intime
(Paris, 1893; reprinted, Edinburgh, 1910); Masson, Napoléon dans sa jeunesse
(Paris, 1907); Idem, Napoléon et sa famille (Paris, 1897 1907); Idem, Napoléon
et son fils (Paris, 1904); Idem, Napoléon inconnu (Paris, 1895); Idem,
Josephine empress and queen, tr. Hoey (London, 1899). In France Frédéric is now
the foremost student of Napoleonic history. His numerous works are
indispensable for a knowledge of the Empire.
Special Studies. His Religious
Sentiments. Bourgine, Première communion et fin chrétienne de Napoléon (Tours,
1897); Fischer, Napoleon I, dessen Lebens und Charaktersbild mit besonderer
Rücksicht auf seine Stelling zur christlichen Religion (Leipzig, 1904).
His Youth. Chuquet, La jeunesse de
Napoléon (Paris, 1897 98); Browning, Boyhood and Youth of Napoleon, 1760 1793
(London, 1906).
The Coming of Napoleon. Vandal,
Avènement de Bonaparte (Paris, 1902 1907).
Relations with England. Coquelle,
Napoleon and England (1808 1813), tr. Knox (London, 1904); Levy, Napoléon et la
paix (Paris, 1902); Wheeler and Broadley, Napoleon and the Invasion of England,
the story of the Great Terror (London, 1908); Alger, Napoleon's British
visitors and captives (Westminster, 1904); Grand Carteret, Napoléon en images,
estampes anglaises (Paris, 1895); Ashton, English Caricature and Satire on
Napoleon I (London, 1884).
Relations with Spain. DeGrandmaison,
L'Espagne sous Napoléon (Paris, 1908).
The Divorce. Welschinger, Le divorce de
Napoléon (Paris, 1889); Rineri, Napoleone e Pio VII (1804 1813); (Turin, 1906).
Relations with Russia. Vandal, Napoléon
et Alexandre I (Paris, 1891 1894); De Ségur, Histoire de Napoléon et de la
Grande Armée pendant l'année 1812, in the Nelson collection (Edinburgh, 1910).
The End. Wolseley, Decline and Fall of
Napoleon (London, 1895); Rosebery, Napoleon, the Last Phase (London, 1900);
Browning, Fall of Napoleon (London, 1907); Houssaye, 1814 (Paris, 1888); Idem,
1815 (Paris, 1893 99); Idem, Waterloo, tr. Mann (London, 1900); Seaton,
Napoleon's captivity in relation to Sir Hudson Lowe (London, 1903).
Italian and Religious Policy. De Barral,
Fragments relatifs à l'histoire ecclésiastique du 19ième siècle (Paris, 1814);
DePradt, Les quatre concordats (Paris, 1818); Ricard, Correspondance
diplomatique et papiers inédits du cardinal Maury (Paris, 1891).
Words of Erudition. Bouvier, Bonaparte
en Italie: 1796 (Paris, 1899); Driault, Napoléon en Italie (Paris, 1906);
D'Haussonville, L'église romaine et le premier empire (Paris, 1868);
Welschinger, Le pape et l'empereur 1804 1815 (Paris, 1905); Rinieri, Napoleone
e Pio VII, 1804 1813 (Turin, 1906); Madelin, La Rome de Napoléon: la domination
française à Rome de 1809 à 1814 (Paris, 1906); Chotard, Le pape Pie VII à
Savone (Paris, 1887); Destram, La déportation des pretres sous Napoléon I in
Rev. Hist., XI (1879); De Lanzac de Laborie, Paris sous Napoleon: la religion
(Paris, 1907); Lyonnet, Histoire de Mgr d'Aviau (Paris, 1847); Meric, Histoire
de M. Emery (Paris, 1895); de Grandmaison, Napoléon et les Cardinaux noirs
(1895); Caussette, Vie du Card. d'Astros (Paris, 1853); Guillaume, Vie
épiscopale de Mgr d'Osmond (Paris, 1862); Marmottan, L'institution canonique et
Napoléon I: l'archevêque d'Osmond à Florence in Revue Historique, LXXXVI
(1904); see also bibliographies to Concordat of 1801; Articles, the Organic;
Pius VI; Pius VII. For a fuller bibliography of the subject, consult
Kirchheisen, Bibliographie de l'époque de Napoléon I (Paris, 1908); Davois,
Bibliographie Napoléonienne française jusqu'en 1908; I (Paris, 1909); Rivista
Napoleonica (1901 sqq.).
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United Colonies and States First Ladies
1774-1788
United Colonies Continental Congress | President | 18th Century Term | Age |
Elizabeth "Betty" Harrison Randolph (1745-1783) | 09/05/74 – 10/22/74 | 29 | |
Mary Williams Middleton (1741- 1761) Deceased | Henry Middleton | 10/22–26/74 | n/a |
Elizabeth "Betty" Harrison Randolph (1745–1783) | 05/20/ 75 - 05/24/75 | 30 | |
Dorothy Quincy Hancock Scott (1747-1830) | 05/25/75 – 07/01/76 | 28 | |
United States Continental Congress | President | Term | Age |
Dorothy Quincy Hancock Scott (1747-1830) | 07/02/76 – 10/29/77 | 29 | |
Eleanor Ball Laurens (1731- 1770) Deceased | Henry Laurens | 11/01/77 – 12/09/78 | n/a |
Sarah Livingston Jay (1756-1802) | 12/ 10/78 – 09/28/78 | 21 | |
Martha Huntington (1738/39–1794) | 09/29/79 – 02/28/81 | 41 | |
United States in Congress Assembled | President | Term | Age |
Martha Huntington (1738/39–1794) | 03/01/81 – 07/06/81 | 42 | |
Sarah Armitage McKean (1756-1820) | 07/10/81 – 11/04/81 | 25 | |
Jane Contee Hanson (1726-1812) | 11/05/81 - 11/03/82 | 55 | |
Hannah Stockton Boudinot (1736-1808) | 11/03/82 - 11/02/83 | 46 | |
Sarah Morris Mifflin (1747-1790) | 11/03/83 - 11/02/84 | 36 | |
Anne Gaskins Pinkard Lee (1738-1796) | 11/20/84 - 11/19/85 | 46 | |
Dorothy Quincy Hancock Scott (1747-1830) | 11/23/85 – 06/06/86 | 38 | |
Rebecca Call Gorham (1744-1812) | 06/06/86 - 02/01/87 | 42 | |
Phoebe Bayard St. Clair (1743-1818) | 02/02/87 - 01/21/88 | 43 | |
Christina Stuart Griffin (1751-1807) | 01/22/88 - 01/29/89 | 36 |
Constitution of 1787 First Ladies | President | Term | Age |
April 30, 1789 – March 4, 1797 | 57 | ||
March 4, 1797 – March 4, 1801 | 52 | ||
Martha Wayles Jefferson Deceased | September 6, 1782 (Aged 33) | n/a | |
March 4, 1809 – March 4, 1817 | 40 | ||
March 4, 1817 – March 4, 1825 | 48 | ||
March 4, 1825 – March 4, 1829 | 50 | ||
December 22, 1828 (aged 61) | n/a | ||
February 5, 1819 (aged 35) | n/a | ||
March 4, 1841 – April 4, 1841 | 65 | ||
April 4, 1841 – September 10, 1842 | 50 | ||
June 26, 1844 – March 4, 1845 | 23 | ||
March 4, 1845 – March 4, 1849 | 41 | ||
March 4, 1849 – July 9, 1850 | 60 | ||
July 9, 1850 – March 4, 1853 | 52 | ||
March 4, 1853 – March 4, 1857 | 46 | ||
n/a | n/a | ||
March 4, 1861 – April 15, 1865 | 42 | ||
February 22, 1862 – May 10, 1865 | |||
April 15, 1865 – March 4, 1869 | 54 | ||
March 4, 1869 – March 4, 1877 | 43 | ||
March 4, 1877 – March 4, 1881 | 45 | ||
March 4, 1881 – September 19, 1881 | 48 | ||
January 12, 1880 (Aged 43) | n/a | ||
June 2, 1886 – March 4, 1889 | 21 | ||
March 4, 1889 – October 25, 1892 | 56 | ||
June 2, 1886 – March 4, 1889 | 28 | ||
March 4, 1897 – September 14, 1901 | 49 | ||
September 14, 1901 – March 4, 1909 | 40 | ||
March 4, 1909 – March 4, 1913 | 47 | ||
March 4, 1913 – August 6, 1914 | 52 | ||
December 18, 1915 – March 4, 1921 | 43 | ||
March 4, 1921 – August 2, 1923 | 60 | ||
August 2, 1923 – March 4, 1929 | 44 | ||
March 4, 1929 – March 4, 1933 | 54 | ||
March 4, 1933 – April 12, 1945 | 48 | ||
April 12, 1945 – January 20, 1953 | 60 | ||
January 20, 1953 – January 20, 1961 | 56 | ||
January 20, 1961 – November 22, 1963 | 31 | ||
November 22, 1963 – January 20, 1969 | 50 | ||
January 20, 1969 – August 9, 1974 | 56 | ||
August 9, 1974 – January 20, 1977 | 56 | ||
January 20, 1977 – January 20, 1981 | 49 | ||
January 20, 1981 – January 20, 1989 | 59 | ||
January 20, 1989 – January 20, 1993 | 63 | ||
January 20, 1993 – January 20, 2001 | 45 | ||
January 20, 2001 – January 20, 2009 | 54 | ||
January 20, 2009 - January 20, 2017 January 20, 2017 - January 20, 2021 January 20, 2021 - Present | 45 46 47 |
Capitals of the United Colonies and States of America
Philadelphia | Sept. 5, 1774 to Oct. 24, 1774 | |
Philadelphia | May 10, 1775 to Dec. 12, 1776 | |
Baltimore | Dec. 20, 1776 to Feb. 27, 1777 | |
Philadelphia | March 4, 1777 to Sept. 18, 1777 | |
Lancaster | September 27, 1777 | |
York | Sept. 30, 1777 to June 27, 1778 | |
Philadelphia | July 2, 1778 to June 21, 1783 | |
Princeton | June 30, 1783 to Nov. 4, 1783 | |
Annapolis | Nov. 26, 1783 to Aug. 19, 1784 | |
Trenton | Nov. 1, 1784 to Dec. 24, 1784 | |
New York City | Jan. 11, 1785 to Nov. 13, 1788 | |
New York City | October 6, 1788 to March 3,1789 | |
New York City | March 3,1789 to August 12, 1790 | |
Philadelphia | Dec. 6,1790 to May 14, 1800 | |
Washington DC | November 17,1800 to Present |