The Sun.
London, England, 1856-11-06 00:00:00

TILE NAPOLEON DY‘ASTY AND TIJE
JUDGES OF FRANCE.

The pages of the 1129niteur were yesterday de-
voted almost entirely to the publication of the ora-
tions delivered on the previous day at the opening
of the courts of law. Ordinarily these addresses
hate little more than a professional and legal inte-
rest; the present occasion, however, has been turned •
to political account in a very remarkable manner.
The judges in a body proceeded to the Ste. Cha•
pelle and attended mass, which was performed by
the Abbe Surat, Archdeacon of Ste. Genevieve,
and after the service repaired to their respective
courts. In the Court of Cessation,. the First Presi-
dent Trciplong presiding, M. tie Royer, the Procu-
reur General, delivered the opening speech, the sub-
ject of whi -h was the judicial and legislative refornis
of LomsXIV. In the Imperial Court M. Vaisse, the
Procereur-General, delivered an address, which
the French papers state " was frequently inter-
rupted by the plaudits of the assembly." M. Vaisse
commenced thus :
Among the duties imposed on the magistracy there is
noire more essential to its institution, and more necessary
to the well-being of the state, than that which binds it and
obliges it towards the 'sovereign. The regard for the good
of the public, which everybody pretends to, is but a vain
word, or a lie, if it begin by excluding respect for him who
is "the most exalted and most legitimate representative of
the public weal.
After. maintaining that this is a truly French
sentiment, and thoroughly reconcileable with judi-
cial independence, and then condemning those
'magistrates who, in past times, have nourished a
spirit of faction 'under pretence of zeal for reform,
M. Vaisse told the judges :
The danger exists not only ie. isolated and particular
offences, in that uniform succession of transgressions which
each year brings with it ; another danger for the social
state is found in the dissolving action of party-spirit, and
in the want of conviction and intelligence as to the worth
of our political institutions. In France we too easily give
way to the spirit of criticism, and to the words of those
who speak only to blacken and blame both perseit and in-
stitutions. Let me dare, without departing from t at mode.
ration,which: becomes this assembly, to proclaim a few
whclesome truths. Let me vindicate to our government
the nationality and grandeur which are its own. The
authority of your presence will supply what is wanting to
my words, and will perhaps make what is a mere custo-
mary discourse an act useful to the public cause. We shall
not be diverted from our design by that false maxim which
more than once has fallen ou our ears, " The judges shall
not meddle with politics."
Here the Procureur-General makes a subtle dis•
tinction between the politics which are forbidden to
the judge and those with with which he may pro-
perly concern himself. Ho then proceeds :
Without reverting to the utopias of the 18th century, we
may affirm that in morality and justice the consent of a
free people i 3 the legitimate and reasonable foundation of
government: The ,will of God has laid upon us in this
matter only the law of obedience to powers regularly esta-
blished. As to the Divine choice, there has been manifested
in this contury—we ourselves have seen it—two memorable
examples of it, two great occasions ih which a man has
limn up to lay hold on abandoned power, and show
himself a true chief and leader of a nation, guiding the
bewildered generations into the promised land of obedience
and duty. The providential exigency, the consent of the
people, services rendered—such are the legitimate conse-
cration of all new power. It appears, however, that it is
neither in the destiny of man nor the will of Providence
that the same blocel, transmitted from race to race, shall
give the same nation sovereigns for the duration of its
existence. Men may persist obstinately in asserting that a
royal race should lose its original in the night of time if it
would retain its prestige; but their words will not change
the laws of Providence, nor avert the rise of dynasties
which establish themselves by great services recently per-
formed. To say of a dynasty that it is new, is only to say
that it is and 'should he so much the more dear to the
nation, as it is nearer to the time in which publicgratituds
consecrates it. • Its title is not its antiquity, but in its
work accomplished.

What work is greater in its results, more marvellous and
more worthy of a crown, than the work of Napoleon ?
What founder of a new dynasty like this ;nazi, who
held, like Caesar, the sword and the pen ; who com—
manded like Ale sander, who governed like the Auto-
nines? What glory, what prestige, surrounds this name,
el often repeated in the homes of the people and the
palaces of kings? By what sign aro we to recognise
consecration by Providence, if we deny it to this legisla-
tor, this captain, this statesman, who has given to France
laws which all nations envy, and a glory which will re-
nnin immortal, and who only sinned against humanity by
the excess of his genius ?

Yes, he was the founder of a dynasty ; and it were al-
most a blasphemy against the laws of Providence not to
desire for this fotinder that he might have descendants,
and enjoy, like all the great men who have preceded him,
the supreme glory of transmitting the empire to the heirs
of his name. Let us disengage ourselves for an instant
from contemporary prejudices, and ask ourselves what had
been the sentiment of posterity, astonished with the gran-.
dear of this reign, if Providence, belying itself, had no t
accorded successors to this new Charlemagne. Ah ! let us
not leave to posterity to be only just. Let us accept with
gratitude the descent of a great man, whom glory and mis-
fortune have doubly consecrated. We are yet too near
that great epoch to enable the historian who recounts it,
though fiudi,r.g Lis excuse in the severity even of his con-
temporaries, to reckon up the wounds which the war has
initiated on us, and indicate, with jealous care, the rare
weaknesses of genius. The modern taste inclines more to
memoirs than epopees. But if Providence ever accord to
Napoleon what Alexander passionately desired—a poet to
recount, or rather to celebrate, the prodigies of his reign,
never will poem more marvellous and complete have struck
the minds, and charmed the imagination of man. One
must place oneself at this distant and grand point of view,
in order justly and truly to appreciate the Napoleonic
epopee, and the prestige which must one day environ the
commencement of that dynasty.
But a great trial is imposed on the now dynasty. Its
illustrious founder dies in exile. He leaves the field
free for the two experiments of 1814 and 1830, and at tie
end of these 'trials the Franca of 1818, exhausted for
thirty years in the inanity of her internal contentions,
has no longer strength against anarchy. She is about to
perish, unless she find a saviour. To what quarter turn
the popular regards and hopes? What name, what ser-
vices, are found uppermost in the great candidatureship
submitted to the ballot of December, 1818? Politicians
who regulate in your cabinets the destinies of empires, it
is not you who shall indicate the preserver of France. The
instinct of the people turns to one who, nevertheless to tha
hour, had but the recommendation of his name. But the
prince who would show himself worthy of so high a des•
tiny must not be merely elected. His actions should jus-
tify his title.

Recall now in your memory those mournful days where-
in Franca, as if fascinated by a date, viz., that of the ex-
piration of the powers of the President, waited the crisis
of 1852, as the patient resignedly expects the mortal stroke
which terminates his existence. What was to bo done ?
The nation, through its councils-general, demanded, as a
transition to a more, assuring and stable order of things,
the prolongation of the President's authority. If the poll •
tic men who had rendered such great services in reconsti-
tuting the party of order, and resolutely placing themselves
at its head, had united without hesitating in support of the
vote of the councils-general the solution would have been
found. But the cry of France was responded to only by
irresolution and division. This was the moment marked
by socialism for letting loose its armed bands on all parts
of the country. Our intestine divisions and anticipatory
fear delivered us, without defence, to an envy so much
themoro formidable in that he had already made essay of his
strength, and had vowed that Lis prey should no longer es•
cape him. It was then that—fatally decided and morally
convinced—the executive chief believed it his duty to have
recourse to one of those great measures of national safety,
the judgment of which must boleft to posterity. Posterity, I
am firmly persuaded, will class it in her jnagment with the
coup d'etat of 18 Brumaire. The suffrages of the nation have
already forestalled the verdict of history. Nothing but
the most obstinate personal prejudice can harden itself
against the irresistible authority of eight millions of suf-
frages- Let us acknowledge that at no epoch was there
made a delegation of power more complete, unanimous,
necessary, unconstrained, and, consequently, more legiti-
mate. It remained, nevertheless, to France to consolidate
by a more stable form of government the conquest she had
made over herself. That is what she desired, what also
she accomplished with an enthusiasm and concourse of
suffrages still more considerable, in the ballot of 1852, re-
lative to the declaration of the Empire.
The orator next recounted the great things which
the first Napoleon had done for the judicial body
Looking round one, anti observing these crowded ranks,
this sovereign toga, this bar so dignified—in a word, all
the apparatus of justice, I cannot but rocal that it is the
geniusa
of Napoleon which has raised us up from the dust
and
who
after as
given
organisingu u
s titles,
shas
bequeathed
insignia,theu
-
laws which we have to apply.to
hf
:r districtty u
a ncao
who,rts,
Let the idea of Montesquieu indicate to us the part we