This topic must have been mentioned between the Pope and Cardinal Consalvi; it is evident from the conduct of the latter that he and many other cardinals considered the marriage with Josephine as binding in a religious point of view. The character of Consalvi precludes the possibility of supposing any petty motives for his opposition; conscience alone could have dictated it. Evidently he yielded as far as he could; and what he withheld from duty was with manifest peril to himself, and, humanly speaking, even to the Church, whose interests were so dear to him. As to the number of cardinals holding opposite views, or at least acting as if they did, the weakness of human nature, alas, and the selfishness of human interests, too well explain that {15} circumstance. Grave historians and writers of genius do not always take sufficient account of _conscience_ in their estimate of men and things, and thence flow many errors. Those who are politicians also, from their wide knowledge of human vices, fall still more readily into this mistake. Thus Napoleon probably never believed the Pope to be in earnest, of at least his mind could not hold such an idea long together. To himself state policy was all, or nearly all. His negotiations with the Holy See, his appreciations of Consalvi, all bear the stamp of that starting-point; to him it was a trial of strength in will, or of skill in diplomacy: he ignored conscience. In the same way, a mind eminently lucid as that of M. Thiers judges facts in a very different manner than he would do if he could see that with some minds conscience is the spring of action. If this were not the case, he could not, while speaking of the Pope with due respect, pass over his motives so slightly; nor would he construe as he does Consalvi's conduct with regard to the marriage and that of the other _black cardinals_. The opinions of such men deserved to raise a doubt in the mind of the historian, and to lead to investigation that might have had other results. We purposely lay stress on this matter because M. Thiers is popular with a large class of readers, who justly admire his talent, but who erroneously consider him a fair exponent on ecclesiastical affairs. He does respect religion; but evidently fails to apprehend the idea of men constantly swayed by duty and conscience; whose judgments may err, as all things human do, but whose supernatural principle of action ever lives.