The life of Napoleon Buonaparte, emperor of the French. By Sir Walter Scott.

6O2 LIFE OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE.
dom, her project of assailing with-her arms the states, I in an apartment, where the air is polluted, to wish
whose subjects had been already seduced by her for the wholesome atmosphere.
doctrines. Unhappily, these justifiable desires were connectThe work of Burke raised a thousand enemies to ed with others of a description less harmless and
the French Revolution, who had before looked upon beneficial. The French Revolution had proclaimed
it with favour, or at least with indifference. A very war on castles, as well as peace to cottages. Its
large portion of the talents and aristocracy of the doctrine and practice held out the privileged classes
opposition party followed Burke into the ranks of the in every country as the natural tyrants and oppressors
ministry, who saw with pleasure a member, noted of the poor, whom it encouraged by the thousand
for his zeal in the cause of fhe Americans, beconle tongues of its declaimers to pull down their thrones,
an avowed enemy of the French Revolution, and overthrow their altars, renounce the empire of God
with equal satisfaction heard him use arguments, above, and of kings below, and arise, like regener
which might in their own mouths have assumed an ated France, alike from thraldom and fromr superobnoxious agid suspicious character. stition. And such opinions, calling upon the other
But the sweeping terms in which the author re- nations of Europe to follow them in their demoprobated all attempts at state-refobrmation, in which cratic career, were not only trumpeted fobrth in all
he had himself been at one time so powerful an affiliated clubs of the jacobins, whose influence in
agent, subjected him to the charge of inconsistency the National Assembly was formidable, but were
among his late friends, many of whom, and Fox in formally recognizod by that body itself ipon an ocparticular, declared themselves favourable to the casion, which, but for the momentous omen it preprogress of the Revolution in France, though they sented, might have been considered as the most
did not pretend to excuse its excesses. Out of ridiculous scene ever gravely acted before the leparliament it nliet more unlimited applause; for gislators of a great nation.
England, as well as France, had talent impatient of 1 There was in Paris a native of Prussia, an exile
obscurity, ardour which demnanded employment, from his country, whose brain, none of the soundest
ambition which sought distinction, and men of head- by nature, seems to have been affected by the prolong passions, who expected in a new order of things gress of the Revolution, as that of ordinary madmen
more unlimited means of indulging them. The is said to be influenced by the increase of the moon.
middling classes were open in England as elsewhere, This personage, having become disgusted with his
though not perhaps so much so, to the tempting offer baptismal name, had adopted that of the Scythian
of increased power and importance; and the popu- philosopher, and, uniting it with his own Teutonic
lace of Lonrdoin and other large towns loved license family appellation, entitled himself-" Anacharsis
as well as the sans-culottes of France. Hence the Klootz, Orator of the Human Race."
division of the country into aristocrats and demo- It could hardly be expected, that the assumption
crats, the introduction of political hatred into the of such a title should remain undistinguished by
bosom of families, and the dissolution of many a some supreme act of folly. Accordingly, tile seliband of friendship which had stood the strain of a dubbed Anacharsis set on foot a procession, which
life-time. One part of the kingdoln looked upon the was intended to exhibit the representatives of deother with the stern and relentless glance of keepers legates from all nations upon earth, to assist at the
who are restrainirng nadmen, while the others bent Feast of the Federation of the 14th July, 1790, by
on them tile furioLs glare of madmen conspiring re- which the French nation proposed to celebrate tihe
venge on their keepers. Revolution. In recruiting his troops, the orator
From this period the progress of the French easily picked up a few vagabonds of different
Revolution seenied in England like a play presented countries in Paris; but as Chaldeans, Illinois, and
upon the stage, where two contending factions divide Siberians, are not so conmmon, the delegates of those
the audience, and hiss or applaud as much from more distant tribes were chosen among the rabble
party spirit as from real critical judgment, while of tile city, and subsidized at the rate of about
every instant increases the probability that they will twelve firancs each. We are sorry we cannot tell
try the question by actual force. whether tile personage, whose dignity was much
Still, though the nation was thus divided on insisted upon as "a Miltonic Englishman," was
account of French politics, England and France genuine, or of Parisian manu:acture. If the last, lie
observed the usual rules of amity, and it seemed that must have been wvo.rth seeing.
the English were more likely to wage hostility with Anacharsis Klootz, having got his ragged reeach other than to declare war against France. giment equipped in costume at the expense of the
There was, in other kingdoms and states upon the refuse of some theatrical wardrobe, conducted
Continent, the same diversity of feeling, respecting them in solemn procession to the bar of the Nationral
the Revolution, which divided England. The favour Assermbly, presented them as the representatives
of the lower and unprivileged classes, in Germany of all the nations on earth, awakened to a sense of
especially, was the more fixed upon the progress of their debased situation by the choral voices of
the French Revolution, because they lingered un- twenty-five millions of freemen, and demanding that
der the same incapacities from which the changes the sovereignty of the people should be acknowin France had delivered the commons, or third ledged, and their oppressors destroyed, through all
estate, of that country. Thus far their partiality the universe, as well as in France.
was not only innocent, but praiseworthy. It is as So far this absurd scene was the extravagance of
natural for a man to desire the liberty from which a mere madman, and if the assembly had sent
he is unjustly excluded, as it is for those who are Anacharsis to Bedlam, and his train to Bicetre,