the will, fixed ideas and ideas that are false. These ideas are ours; therefore we hold on to them, or, rather, they have taken hold of us. To get rid of them, to impose the necessary recoil on our mind, to transport us to a distance and place us at a critical point of view, where we can study ourselves, our ideas and our institutions as scientific objects, requires a great effort on our part, many precautions, and long reflection.--Hence, the delays of this study; the reader will pardon them on considering that an ordinary opinion, caught on the wing, on such a subject, does not suffice. In any event, when one presents an opinion on such a subject one is bound to believe it. I can believe in my own only when it has become precise and seems to me proven. Menthon Saint-Bernard, September, 1890. ***** BOOK FIRST. NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. CHAPTER I. HISTORICAL IMPORTANCE OF HIS CHARACTER AND GENIUS. If you want to comprehend a building, you have to imagine the circumstances, I mean the difficulties and the means, the kind and quality of its available materials, the moment, the opportunity, and the urgency of the demand for it. But, still more important, we must consider the genius and taste of the architect, especially whether he is the proprietor, whether he built it to live in himself, and, once installed in it, whether he took pains to adapt it to how own way of living, to his own necessities, to his own use.--Such is the social edifice erected by Napoleon Bonaparte, its architect, proprietor, and principal occupant from 1799 to 1814. It is he who has made modern France; never was an individual character so profoundly stamped on any collective work, so that, to comprehend the work, we must first study the character of the Man.[1102] I. Napoleon's Past and Personality. He is of another race and another century.--Origin of his paternal family.--Transplanted to Corsica.--His maternal family.--Laetitia Ramolino.--Persistence of Corsican souvenirs in Napoleon's mind.--His youthful sentiments regarding Corsica and France.--Indications found in his early compositions and in his style.--Current monarchical or democratic ideas have no hold on him.--His impressions of the 20th of June and 10th of August after the 31st of May. --His associations with Robespierre and Barras without committing himself.--His sentiments and the side he takes Vendémiaire 13th.--The great Condottière.--His character and conduct in Italy.--Description of him morally and physically in 1798.--The early and sudden ascendancy which he exerts. Analogous in spirit and character to his Italian ancestors of the XVth century.