Fortunately  for  Napoleon,  Russia  remained  faithful  to  the
alliance  and  engagements  of  Tilsit. The  emperor  Alexander
had  at  that  time  a  fit  of  enthusiasm  and  affection  for  this
powerful  and  extraordinary  mortal. Napoleon  wishing
to  be  sure  of  the  north,  before  he  conveyed  all  his  forces  to
the  peninsula,  had  an  interview  with  Alexander  at  Erfurth,
on  the  27th  Sept.,  1808. The  two  masters  of  the  north  *>nd
west  guaranteed  to  each  other  the  repose  and  submission  of
Europe. Napoleon  marched  into  Spain,  and  Alexander
undertook  Sweden. The  presence  of  the  emperor  soon
changed  the  fortune  of  the  war  in  the  peninsula. He  brought
with  him  eighty  thousand  veteran  soldiers,  just  come  from
Germany. Several  victories  made  him  master  of  most  of  the
Spanish  provinces. He  made  his  entry  into  Madrid,  and
presented  himself  to  the  inhabitants  of  the  Peninsula,  not  as
a  master,  but  as  a  liberator. "  I  have  abolished,"  he  said  to
them,  "  the  tribunal  of  the  Inquisition,  against  which  the  age
and  Europe  protested. Priests  should  direct  the  conscience,
but  ought  not  to  exercise  any  external  or  corporal  jurisdiction
over  the  citizens. I  have  suppressed  feudal  rights;  and  every
one  may  set  up  inns,  ovens,  mills,  fisheries,  and  give  free  im-
pulse to  his  industry. The  selfishness,  wealth,  and  prosperity
of  a  few  did  more  injury  to  your  agriculture  than  the  heats
of  the  extreme  summer. As  there  is  but  one  God,  one
system  of  justice  only  should  exist  in  a  state. All  private


THE    TRENCH    REVOLUTION. 395

fciibunals  were  usurped  and  opposed  to  the  rights  of  the
nation. I  have  suppressed  them. The  present  generation
may  change  its  opinion;  too  many  passions  have  been  brought
into  play;  but  your  grandchildren  will  bless  me  as  your
regenerator;  they  will  rank  among  their  memorable  days
those  in  which  I  appeared  among  you,  and  from  those  days  will
Spain  date  its  prosperity."

Such  was  indeed  the  part  of  Napoleon  in  the  peninsula,
which  could  only  be  restored  to  a  better  state  of  things,  and
to  liberty,  by  the  revival  of  civilization. The  establishment
of  independence  cannot  be  effected  all  at  once,  any  more  than
anything  else;  and  when  a  country  is  ignorant,  poor,  and
behindhand,  covered  with  convents,  and  governed  by  monks,
its  social  condition  must  be  reconstructed  before  liberty  can
be  thought  of. 