[178]

The victory of action over talk, of the executive over the
legislature, of the one supremely able man over the discordant and
helpless many, was now complete. The process was startlingly swift;
yet its chief stages are not difficult to trace. The orators of the
first two National Assemblies of France, after wrecking the old royal
authority, were constrained by the pressure of events to intrust the
supervision of the executive powers to important committees, whose
functions grew with the intensity of the national danger. Amidst the
agonies of 1793, when France was menaced by the First Coalition, the
Committee of Public Safety leaped forth as the ensanguined champion of
democracy; and, as the crisis, developed in intensity, this terrible
body and the Committee of General Security virtually governed France.

After the repulse of the invaders and the fall of Robespierre, the
return to ordinary methods was marked by the institution of the
Directory, when five men, chosen by the legislature, controlled the
executive powers and the general policy of the Republic: that
compromise was forcibly ended by the stroke of Brumaire. Three Consuls
then seized the reins, and two years later a single charioteer gripped
the destinies of France. His powers were, in fact, ultimately derived
from those of the secret committees of the terrorists. But, unlike the
supremacy of Robespierre, that of Napoleon could not be disputed; for
the general, while guarding all the material boons which the
Revolution had conferred, conciliated the interests and classes
whereon the civilian had so brutally trampled. The new autocracy
therefore possessed a solid strength which that of the terrorists
could never possess. Indeed, it was more absolute than the dictatorial
power that Rousseau had outlined. The philosopher had asserted that,
while silencing the legislative power, the dictator really made it
vocal, and that he could do everything but make laws. But Napoleon,
after 1802, did far more: he suppressed debates and yet drew laws from
his subservient legislature. Whether, then, we regard its practical
importance for France and Europe, or limit our view to the mental
sagacity and indomitable will-power required for its accomplishment,
the triumph of Napoleon in the three years subsequent to his return
from Egypt is the most stupendous recorded in the history of civilized
peoples.

The populace consoled itself for the loss of political liberty by th