"Gentlemen of the legislature,"
he said, "you come to greet me. I accept your greetings, and will
tell you what you ought to hear. You have it in your power to do
much good, and you have done nothing but mischief. Eleven-twelfths
of you are patriotic, the rest are factious. What do you hope by
putting yourselves in opposition? To gain possession of power? But
what are your means? Are you the representatives of the people? I
am. Four times I have been invoked by the nation, and have had the
votes of four millions of men. I have a title to supreme authority,
which you have not. You are nothing but the representatives of the
departments. Your report is drawn up with an astute and perfidious
spirit, of the effects of which you are well aware. Two battles lost
in Champagne would not have done me so much mischief. I have
sacrificed my passions, my pride, my ambition, to the good of
France. I was in expectation that you would appreciate my motives,
and not urge me to what is inconsistent with the honor of the
nation. Far from that, in your report you mingle irony with
reproach: you tell me that adversity has given me salutary counsels.
How can you reproach me with my misfortunes? I have supported them
with honor, because I have received from nature a sturdy temper; and
if I had not possessed it, I would never have raised myself to the
first throne in the world.
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