The National Register.
London, England, 1814-01-23 00:00:00

POLITICAL InSWISInoN.

POLICY AND SITUA 1 lON OF BUONAPARTE,

Foiled in the field, and left at the close of the last cam
pain, without any force which deserved the appeilation
c.
an arms., how comes it that Napoleon still maitvaina him-
self on the throne of France, and, notwithstanding the is.-
va-ion of that country. and the approach of four hundred i
thousand enemies within 200 miles of his capital, stilt le-
ma:ns the Lord of millions, obeyed by his sunjects. and al-
most feared by his opponents ?—Because his political skill
has survived' his military fortune. The character of un-
bending firmness which he had assumed, when early suc-
cesses taught him to form unbounded hopes, and which he
supported with unyielding constancy through his hours of,
prosperity had deceived mankind. it was the child of art, and
was &Tined the Unchangeable production of nature. Hence
calculations were made on its supposed immutability s..hich
proved erroneous, as their fousolioiou was false. The Pow.
cis who saw him, after tile destruction of his whole
army in Russia, untaoled in his ambition and resolutely I
bent on !be conquest of the woold, which he nu longer
possessed the means of affecting, thought that no 4evets,
es, however great, could reduce his spirit. W hen tl!es-
afterwards be! him at Dresden, surrosndcd on t!i
sides, with a dispirited army and I/a:Mating allies, and
yet rejecting every overture to heat en other terms but his
own, they were confirmed in their belief, aod conceived
that his obstinacy might be razde the chief instrument of
his ruin. lf, aPer haying lost the second army which the
passiveness of his people had enabled him to assemble, he
should still continue his refusal to negotiate on lower con-
ditions, the publication of those, and of his rejection of
them would be sufficient to rouse his subjects to a sense of!
his insatiable ambition, and of their own danger, should
their senseless forbearance allow him to waste their lives
and substance in wars, protracted merely to gratify
tail ru-
pa,sion. He bad lately proclaimed to the world Hs re.,
y.,!ution, whatever might happen, of never sitting on a de-
graded throne. This was perhaiis a snare laid purposely to
entrap the Allies, or at least had the effect of one. It even
deceived the CROWN PRINcE, who, from his intimate ac-
gaintance. with his former Master, was considered an un-
erring judge, and who seemed to have suggested to the
Coalesced Powers the line of conduct which they adopted.
After the battle of Ham', and when no hope remained of
tiking BUONAPRRTE prisoner, we understand from good
authority, that his Royal Highness told an English gentleman
then at his bead-qtrarters " liberariermswil; be offered to NA.,
of.EUN at tt,e Rhine, wAich not accept, tiltr,
be repeatcd at Paris." We ‘v-re
.4eroaintett with t'
1.1!, Gt.'l...V.

fore the celebrated hankfoot OecAration made it: !.;:ar-
ance, and. therefore felt no surprise at its contents ; hat
stated our opinion at the time that Vie abuse lavished on
the Allies by the daily journals for the more than lihe: al
nature of their proposals to France was unfounde'l, as
they really bad no in;ention of aggrandizing her IheY)ll4
her ancient limits-, and only made the offer in the firm per-
suasion, that it would he rejected, and that its rejection
would open the eyes of the Piench people, and deprive
nt.-.,NA,pART tt of their support, We also added, that the
gre.‘test disappointment which the Allies could experience,
would be to find that their terns should be accepted, which
we fueled would Le the case, as our opinion of NA PO-
LkON9S immutability of si irit was not so strong. as to
lead us to believe he could, as a man and a politician, re-
ject such offers. As a man, we had no doubt but all hit
assumed fortitude and impa,sitpity to fear would vanish at
the presence of real danger to him and ail his eivivistv,
a.:id that he would gladly close with proposals wirris
would raise him from his desperate situation to a lof-
tier state than any French Monarch had ever enjoyed.
As a politician, we thought he would be keep enough to see
the drift of the Allies, and too raw ing not to counteract it
ar:d eint:arrp.si the whole future course of tlie,r proceedings,
by accepting the terms which they had proposed, couf.d.eut,
that if !hey shrunk from fulfili:n;, thee), they would give him
0;3 which he chiefly wanted, the uranileous good•will of
thel;r:lich in support of the war, the blame of,e,Nebwettl.4
no longer be laid to his ills con itc letya
sect, as ee anticipated, and if, in the very seat and
place of revolutions, his authority has snryived the 10. , ot.
fame, of armies, and of whole provinces, he owes it to the
imprudence of Coalesced Powers. in venturing on sm.-h
course mid issuing such a der!,oation without even consult-
ing England, and to his skill in ay,iling hitnseli of their
blunder, by adapting character to gircamitanees in a
manner totally unexpected by the bulk of maukiod. Pub-
!lc oriuion is, he knows, the prop and shield of t4tate,t. It
mai; be commuted by military force or silenced successesa
but ;he Government. which lepe..ted defeats have robbed of
its armies, must fall at once if tile p.opular assent, the "rue
Dee' also fails. That this was NAPO roN's neatest fear, is
visible front the eagerness with which he ha< scrod the or,
portanitv, unskilfully offered him, of disculoa'ing himself
itr
the eves of his subjec,s of any wish of protracting ti'e war,
It pierces through 411 his actions and displays DKR* in all the
appeals to the people with which the French papers obo•:nd.
The lofty IsIaPOLEQN. he, who clothed in scneryl
power, proclaimed himself commissioe,:d to fulfil • a
tinies of the earth, who moved over her surface as
ble in all his terrors; whose vtrillutes were
nd immutability, now defeated, Lumbled

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