When La Fayette was asked to vote for the decree declaring Napoleon First Consul for life, he replied:— “I cannot vote for such a magistracy until public liberty has been sufficiently guaranteed. Then I will give my vote to Napoleon Bonaparte.” [Illustration: JOSEPH BONAPARTE.] La Fayette addressed to the First Consul the following letter at this time:— “LA GRANGE, May 20, 1802. “GENERAL: When a man filled with the gratitude which he owes you, and too much alive to glory not to admire yours, has placed restrictions on his suffrage, those restrictions will be so much the less suspected when it is known that none more than himself would delight to see you chief magistrate for life of a free republic. The 18th _Brumaire_ saved France, and I felt that I was recalled by the liberal professions to which you have attached your honor. We afterwards beheld in the consular power that restorative dictatorship, which, under the auspices of your genius, has achieved such great things—less great, however, than will be the restoration to liberty. It is impossible that you, General, the first in that order of men (whom, to quote and compare, would require me to retrace every page of history) can wish that such a revolution, so many victories, so much blood and miseries, should produce to the world and to ourselves no other results than an arbitrary system. The French people know their rights too well to have entirely forgotten them. But perhaps they are better able to recover them now with advantage than in the heat of effervescence; and you, by the power of your character and the public confidence; by the superiority of your talents, your situation, and your fortune, may, by re-establishing liberty, subdue our dangers and calm our inquietudes. I have no other than patriotic and personal motives in wishing for you, as the climax of our glory, a permanent magistrative post; but it is in unity with my principles, my engagements, the actions of my whole life, to ascertain, before I vote, that liberty is established on a basis worthy of the nation and of you. I hope you will now acknowledge, General, as you have already had occasion to do, that to firmness in my political opinions are joined my sincere sentiments of my obligations to you.” This memorable letter was never answered. La Fayette, in his “Mémoires,” thus comments upon his opposition to Napoleon: “It appears that Bonaparte had for a long time preserved his good-will towards me; and even after my letter, when one had declared before him, that there had not been any opposition to the Consulate for life, except from the Jacobin votes:— “‘No,’ said he, ‘there were the enthusiasts for liberty: La Fayette, for example.’