But it is true, the nations really are like babies; they do not become reasonable and wise, and the accursed word 'liberty,' which Bonaparte puts as a flea into their ears, maddens them still as though a tarantula had bitten them. They have seen in Italy and France what sort of liberty Napoleon brings to them, and what a yoke he intends to lay on their necks while telling them that he wishes to make freemen of them. But they do not become wise, and who knows if the Magyars will not likewise allow themselves to be fooled and believe in the liberty which Bonaparte promises to them?""No, your majesty," said Count Stadion, "the Magyars are no children; they are men who know full well what to think of Bonaparte's insidious flatteries, and will not permit him to mislead them by his deceptive promises. They received the Archduke John with genuine enthusiasm, and every day volunteers are flocking to his standards to fight against the despot who, like a demon of terror, tramples the peace and prosperity of all Europe under his bloody feet. No, Bonaparte can no longer count upon the sympathies of the nations; they are all ready to rise against him, and in the end hatred will accomplish that which love and reason were unable to bring about. The hatred of the nations will crush Bonaparte and hurl him from his throne.""Provided the princes of the Rhenish Confederation do not support him, or provided the Emperor Alexander of Russia does not catch him in his arms," said Francis, shrugging his shoulders." I have no great confidence in what you call the nations; they are really reckless and childish people. If Bonaparte is lucky again, even the Germans will idolize him before long; but if he is unlucky, they will stone him. Just look at my illustrious brother, the generalissimo. After the defeats of Landshut and Ratisbon, and the humble letter which he wrote to Bonaparte, you, Count Stadion, thought it would be good for the Archduke Charles if we gave him a successor, and if we removed him, tormented as he is by a painful disease, from the command-in-chief of the army. We, therefore, suggested to the archduke quietly to present his resignation which would be promptly accepted. But the generalissimo would not hear of it, and thought he would have first to make amends for the defeats which he had sustained at Landshut and Ratisbon. Now he has done so;he has avenged his former defeats and achieved a victory at Aspern;and after this brilliant victory he comes and offers his resignation, stating that his feeble health compels him to lay down the command and surrender if to some one else. But all at once my minister of foreign affairs has changed his mind: the victory of Aspern has converted him, and he thinks now that the generalissimo must remain at the head of the army. If so sagacious and eminent a man as Count Stadion allows success to mould his opinion, am I not right in not believing that the frivolous fellows whom you call 'the nations' have no well-settled opinions at all?""Pardon me, sire," said Count Stadion, smiling; "your majesty commits a slight error. Your majesty confounds principles with opinions. An honorable man and an honorable nation may change their opinions, but never will they change their principles. Now the firmer and more immovable their principles are, the more easily they may come to change their opinions; for they seek for instruments to carry out their principles; they profit to-day by the cervices of a tool which seems to them sufficiently sharp to perform its task, and they cast it aside to-morrow because it has become blunt, and must be replaced by another. This is what happens to the nations and to myself at this juncture. The nations are bitterly opposed to France;the whole German people, both north and south, is unanimous in its intense hatred against Napoleon. The nations do not allow him to deceive them; they see through the Caesarean mask, and perceive the face of the tyrant, despot, and intriguer, lurking behind it. They do not believe a word of his pacific protestations and promises of freedom and liberal reforms; for they see that he always means war when he prates about peace, that he means tyranny when he promises liberty, and that he gives Draconic laws instead of establishing liberal institutions. The nations hate Napoleon and abhor his despotic system. They seek for means to annihilate him and deliver at length the bloody and trembling world from him. If the princes were as unanimous in their hatred as the nations are, Germany would stand as one man, sword in hand; and this sublime and imposing spectacle would cause Napoleon to retreat with his host beyond the Rhine, the German Rhine, whose banks would be guarded by the united people of Germany." "You speak like a Utopian, my dear count," said the emperor, with a shrug. "If the united people of Germany are alone able to defeat and expel Bonaparte, he will never he defeated and expelled, for Germany will never be united; she will never stand up as one man, but always resemble a number of rats grown together by their tails, and striving to move in opposite directions. Let us speak no more of a united Germany; it was the phantom that ruined my uncle, the Emperor Joseph, whom enthusiasts call the Great Joseph.
