Thus has Bonaparte's idea crushed him and reduced him to nothing. The unhappy man has had not only the anguish of suffering historical dishonor while yet alive, but also that sharpest pang of seeing all the most celebrated works of his reign destroyed. The destruction, military, moral, political, and in part material, of France, which he hoped to raise to the summit of greatness; the destruction of the palaces of Saint Cloud and the Tuileries, embellished by him with Asiatic magnificence; the destruction of popular votes, those wings which bore him from exile to the throne; of the treaty of Paris, that crowned his Crimean victories; of the glory of the French name in Mexico with the empire founded by him; of the treaty of Prague, for which he well-nigh sweated blood in opposing the union of Germany under Prussia: in short, all his enterprises have resulted in smoke. Only one remains--the subalpine kingdom of Italy, for whose formation and support the wretched man staked crown and honor. But before closing his eyes for ever, he tasted the sweetness of his last treachery in seeing that kingdom pass from his bondage to that of the conqueror of France. If God still allows it to his soul, he may now see his beloved Italy, with a Prussian helmet on her head, bend over his tomb, and shed two crocodile's tears--the only kind of tears which he deserved. Let us see what the Napoleonic idea has lavished upon her blind idolater--the defeat at Sedan, the burning of Paris, the lonely tomb at Chiselhurst. It was an idea conceived without God and his Christ, and against them, and therefore unable to bring forth anything but ruin and death. And certain ruin and death it will bring on him who shall hope to live and grow great under its influence. FOOTNOTES: [17] This was written soon after the death of Louis Napoleon. [18] "La politique du second empire, essai d'histoire contemporaine, d'après les documents, par M. Anatole Leroy-Beaulieu"--_Revue des Deux Mondes_, April 1, 1872, pp. 552-53. [19] _Revue des Deux Mondes_, p. 554. [20] Ibid. p. 552. [21] _La Reine Hortense en Italie, en France, en Angleterre, pendant l'année 1831; fragments extraits de ses mémoires inédits, écrits par elle même_, pp. 55-56. Paris, 1834. [22] _Idées Napoléoniennes_, p. 143. [23] Psalm xlviii. 21. [24] _Univers_, Jan. 21, 1873.