ucien heard how Bonaparte had expressed his displeasure at the
pamphlet, he also came to the Tuileries to reproach his brother with
having thrust him forward and then abandoned him. "'Tis your own fault,"
said the First Consul. "You have allowed yourself to be caught! So much
the worse for you! Fouche is too cunning for you! You are a mere fool
compared with him!" Lucien tendered his resignation, which was accepted,
and he departed for Spain. This diplomatic mission turned to his
advantage. It was necessary that one should veil the Machiavellian
invention of the 'Parallel.'
--[The 'Parallel' has been attributed to different writers; some
phrases seemed the work of Lucien, but, says Thiers (tome ii p.
210), its rare elegance of language and its classical knowledge of
history should attribute it to its real anchor, Fontanel, Joseph
Bonaparte (Erreurs tome i. p. 270) says that Fontanel wrote it, and
Lucien Bonaparte corrected it. See Meneval, tome iii. p. 105.
Whoever wrote it Napoleon certainly planned its issue. "It was,"
said he to Roederer, "a work of which he himself had given the idea,
but the last pages were by a fool" (Miot, tome i, p. 318). See also
Lanfrey, tome ii. p. 208; and compare the story in Iung's Lucien,
tome ii. p. 490. Miot, then in the confidence of Joseph, says,
that Lucien's removal from, office was the result of an angry
quarrel between him and Fouche in the presence of Napoleon, when
Fouche attacked Lucien, not only for the pamphlet, but also for the
disorder of his public and his private life; but Miot (tome i, p,
319) places the date of this as the 3d November, while Bourrienne
dates the disapproval of the pamphlet in December.]--
Lucien, among other instructions, was directed to use all his endeavours
to induce Spain to declare against Portugal in order to compel that power
to separate herself from England.
The First Consul had always regarded Portugal as an English colony, and
he conceived that to attack it was to assail England. He wished that
Portugal should no longer favour England in her commercial relations,
but that, like Spain, she should become dependent on him. Lucien was
therefore sent as ambassador to Madrid, to second the Ministers of
Charles IV. in prevailing on the King to invade Portugal. The King
declared war, but it was not of long duration, and terminated almost
without a blow being struck, by the taking of Olivenza. On
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