Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I | Page 9

royal
authority in favour of Monsieur de Blacas. And how much more
painful did our consternation become, when we were able to understand
the views and projects of this Mayor of the palace, and when we
ascertained the baneful extent of his ascendancy.

It was impossible that the royal government, including such elements in
its composition, could retain its hold on public opinion. It was seen too
clearly that the effects of a despicable coterie would tend either to
involve our country in a civil war, or overwhelm us again with the
wretchedness and slavery from which we had been delivered by the
revolution.
The absolute necessity of rising in opposition to these nefarious
attempts was felt by the entire country. Not a man would remain neuter.
During the earliest period of the reign of Louis, the emigrant faction
comprehended nothing but the party composed of the relics of the
ancient privileged cast. The parvenus of the imperial government alone
constituted the so called Bonapartists. Considering their private
gratification and profit as of greater importance than the public cause,
each party had hitherto only wrangled for place and power. Their war
was a matter of calculation and selfishness. But soon their disputes
involved the fate of the main interests created by the revolution the
emigrants directed their attacks not only against individuals but also
against principles, and the people, who had hitherto only looked on,
now shared the quarrel, and all France was divided into two great
hostile parties[7].
[Footnote 7: I speak only of acting and thinking beings. In all countries
there is to be found a class of cyphers, who are so careless, stupid, or
selfish, that they belong to no party, and indeed to no nation.]
The court, the courtiers, and the ministry appeared as the central
phalanx of the pure royalists. As their auxiliaries, they had the old
nobility,--the priesthood,--a certain number of apostates who had
skulked away from the imperial government,--and lastly, all those who
had been disqualified by their incapacity and disloyalty from obtaining
employment under Napoleon. It was the undisguised wish of this party
to wash out every stain of the revolution, and to effect a full and
unqualified restoration of the ancien régime in all its parts, and to all
intents and purposes.
On the other side were arrayed the party designated as that of the

Bonapartists, led on by our most honourable and most virtuous citizens,
and numbering within its ranks the great body of the people; this party
strove to withstand the impending resuscitation of the privileges and
abuses of the old government, and which was to be effected only by the
total subversion of our existing institutions.
The pure royalists endeavoured to annihilate the charter, which their
opponents defended, and thus a strange contradiction took place. The
royal charter had the royalists for its enemies, whilst its defenders were
only found amongst those who were stigmatized as the adherents of
Bonaparte.
Abortive attempts were made by the pure royalists to palliate the
treachery of the government. They tried to persuade the people that the
tranquillity and welfare of the nation depended but on the
re-establishment of an absolute monarch, of a feudal aristocracy, and of
all the trumpery of superstition. Such was the tendency of the
publications which issued from the ministerial press, owing their birth
to writers who had either sold themselves to the government, or who
had denationalized themselves by their political intolerance. But it must
not be supposed that liberty could remain in need of advocates.
Each of the earliest stages of the growth of the young government of
royalty had been marked by obscure yet decisive symptoms of bad faith,
not the less mischievous because they were restricted to signs, and
symbols, and phrases. Instead of the constitution voted by the senate,
and which the king had engaged to accept and ratify, he graciously
granted and conceded a charter, by which he gave a new form to the
government; and which, according to its tenor, emanated from the
sovereign in the full and free exercise of his royal authority. The
tricoloured cockade worn by Louis XVI. and which our armies had
rendered illustrious, was exchanged for the white, though to the mind's
eye the latter was seen drenched in the blood of the people. Louis took
the title of Louis XVIII. King of France and Navarre, and he dated his
proclamations and ordinances in the 19th year of his reign, and thus it
was to be inferred, that the nation had been in a state of rebellion during
five and twenty years. He had disdained to receive his crown from the

will of the people, and rather chose to hold it by divine right and the
good offices of the Prince Regent. These ungracious affronts wounded
the national