the most unfeeling and perverse heart, possesses great talents. There is
no infamy he will not stoop to, and no crime, however execrable, that he
will hesitate to commit, if his Sovereign orders it. He is, therefore, a
most useful instrument in the hand of a despot who, notwithstanding what
is said to the contrary in France, and believed abroad, would cease to
rule the day he became just, and the reign of laws and of humanity
banished terror and tyranny.

It is reported that some person, pious or revengeful, presented some time
ago to the devout mother of Napoleon a long memorial containing some
particulars of the crimes and vices of Fouche and Talleyrand, and
required of her, if she wished to prevent the curses of Heaven from
falling on her son, to inform him of them, that he might cease to employ
men so unworthy of him, and so repugnant to a Divinity. Napoleon, after
reading through the memorial, is stated to have answered his mother, who
was always pressing him to dismiss these Ministers: The memorial, Madame,
contains nothing of what I was not previously informed. Louis XVI. did
not select any but those whom he thought the most virtuous and moral of
men for his Ministers and counsellors; and where did their virtues and
morality bring him? If the writer of the memorial will mention two
honest and irreproachable characters, with equal talents and zeal to
serve me, neither Fouche nor Talleyrand shall again be admitted into my
presence.




LETTER XV.

PARIS, August, 1805.