and fortify democratic principles. This contradiction was due to no change in Bonaparte’s opinions; these remained what they were. At the moment when talking to Marbois about “those republicans whose friendship I seek,” he was calculating on the chance that his gift would one day prove their ruin. “Perhaps it will also be objected to me,” he said,[49] “that the Americans may in two or three centuries be found too powerful for Europe; but my foresight does not embrace such remote fears. Besides, we may hereafter expect rivalries among the members of the Union. The confederations that are called perpetual last only till one of the contracting parties finds it to its interest to break them.... It is to prevent the danger to which the colossal power of England exposes us that I would provide a remedy.” The colossal power of England depended on her navy, her colonies, and her manufactures. Bonaparte proposed to overthrow it by shattering beyond repair the colonial system of France and Spain; and even this step was reasonable compared with what followed. He expected to check the power of England by giving Louisiana to the United States,--a measure which opened a new world to English commerce and manufactures, and riveted England’s grasp on the whole American continent, inviting her to do what she afterward did,--join hands with the United States in revolutionizing Mexico and South America in her own interests. As though to render these results certain, after extending this invitation to English commerce and American democracy, Bonaparte next invited a war with England, which was certain to drive from the ocean every ship belonging to France or Spain,--a war which left even the United States at England’s mercy. Every detail that could explain Bonaparte’s motives becomes interesting in a matter so important to American history. Certain points were clear. Talleyrand’s colonial and peace policy failed. Resting on the maintenance of order in Europe and the extension of French power in rivalry with the United States and England in America, it was a statesmanlike and honorable scheme, which claimed for the Latin races what Louis XIV. tried to gain for them; but it had the disadvantage of rousing hostility in the United States, and of throwing them into the arms of England. For this result Talleyrand was prepared. He knew that he could keep peace with England, and that the United States alone could not prevent him from carrying out his policy. Indeed, Madison in his conversation with Pichon invited such action, and Jefferson had no means of resisting it; but from the moment when St. Domingo prevented the success of the scheme, and Bonaparte gained an excuse for following his own military instincts, the hostility of the United States became troublesome. President Jefferson had chiefly reckoned on this possibility as his hope of getting Louisiana; and slight as the chance seemed, he was right.