agreement with Sweden
on March third, 1813; and that English diplomacy combined with the
interests of Austrian diplomacy to complete and cement the coalition
with the necessary subsidies. If we view the negotiations of
Poischwitz and Prague in connection with Napoleon's whole career, they
appear to have run in a channel prepared by his boundless ambition; if
we isolate them and scrutinize their course, we must think him the
moral victor. Whatever he may have been before, he was now eager for
peace, and sincere in his professions. Believing himself to have acted
generously when Austria was under his feet, he was outraged when he
saw that he had been duped by her subsequent course. The concessions
to which he was forced appear to have been made slowly, because what
he desired was not a continental peace in the interests of the
Hapsburgs, but a general peace in the interest of all Europe as
represented by the Empire and the dynasty which he had founded. At
this distance of time, and in the light of intervening history, some
credit should be given to his insight, which convinced him that
strengthened nationality, as well as renewed dynastic influence,
might retard the liberalizing influences of the Revolution, which he
falsely believed himself still to represent. For the duration of the
Holy Alliance this was to a certain extent true. It will be noticed
that throughout the closing negotiations no mention was made of the
"Continental System." That malign concept of the revolutionary epoch
perished in Napoleon's decline, and history knows its name no more.

END OF VOLUME III

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