as well
as the invasion of Russia, and Metternich as well as Talleyrand knew
that this would be a great political blunder, diverting his armies from
the preservation of the conquests he had already made, and giving to the
German States the hope of shaking off their fetters at the first
misfortune which should overtake him. No man in Europe so completely
fathomed the designs of Napoleon as Metternich, or so profoundly
measured and accurately estimated his character. And I here cannot
forbear to quote his own language, both to show his sagacity and to
reproduce the portrait he drew of Napoleon.

"He became," says Metternich, "a great legislator and administrator, as
he became a great soldier, by following out his instincts. The turn of
his mind always led him toward the positive. He disliked vague ideas,
and hated equally the dreams of visionaries and the abstractions of
idealists. He treated as nonsense everything that was not clearly and
practically presented to him. He valued only those sciences which can be
verified by the senses, or which rest on experience and observation. He
had the greatest contempt for the false philosophy and false
philanthropy of the eighteenth century. Among its teachers, Voltaire was
the special object of his aversion. As a Catholic, he recognized in
religion alone the right to govern human societies. Personally
indifferent to religious practices, he respected them too much to permit
the slightest ridicule of those who followed them; and yet religion with
him was the result of an enlightened policy rather than an affair of
sentiment. He was persuaded that no man called to public life could be
guided by any other motive than that of interest.

"He was gifted with a particular tact in recognizing those men who could
be useful to him. He had a profound knowledge of the national character
of the French. In history he guessed more than he knew. As he always
made use of the same quotations, he must have drawn from a few books,
especially abridgments. His heroes were Alexander, Caesar, and
Charlemagne. He laid great stress on aristocratic birth and the
antiquity of his own family. He had no other regard for men than a
foreman in a manufactory feels for his work-people. In private, without
being amiable, he was good-natured. His sisters got from him all they
wanted. Simple and easy in private life, he showed himself to little
advantage in the great world. Nothing could be more awkward than he in a