His Passion
For Knowledge Was Profound, And He Was The Pronounced Friend Of Every
Genuine Man Of Science, Of Every Movement Having For Its Object The
Acquisition And Diffusion Of Fresh Enlightenment.
It is an English
writer* (* Merz, History of European Thought in the Nineteenth Century 1
152 to 154.) who
Says of him that he was, "amongst the great heroes and
statesmen of his age, the first and foremost if not the only one, who
seemed thoroughly to realise the part which science was destined to play
in the immediate future"; and the same author adds that "some of the
glory of Laplace and Cuvier falls upon Napoleon." He took pleasure in the
company and conversation of men of science; and never more so than during
the period of the Consulate. Thibaudeau's memoirs show him dining one
night with Laplace, Monge, and Berthollet; and the English translator of
that delightful book* (* Dr. Fortescue, page 273. Compare also Lord
Rosebery, Napoleon, the Last Phase page 234: "In the first period of his
Consulate he was an almost ideal ruler. He was firm, sagacious,
far-seeing, energetic, just.") emphasises the contrast between the "just
and noble sanity of the First Consul of 1802 and the delirium of the
Emperor of 1812." The failure to keep that difference in mind - to
recognise that the Bonaparte of the early Consulate was capable of
exalted ideals for the general well-being that were foreign to the
Napoleon of ten years later - is fruitful of mistakes in interpreting his
activities. On April 8 he attended a seance of the Institute, and was
there instrumental in reconciling several persons who had become
estranged through events which occurred during the Revolution.* (*
Aulard, Paris sous le Consulat, 1 252.) He was therefore on good terms
with this learned body, and was himself a member of that division of it
which was devoted to the physical and mathematical sciences.* (*
Thibaudeau (English edition) page 112.)
It was quite natural, then, that when the national representatives of
scientific thought in France approached him with a proposition that was
calculated to make his era illustrious by a grand voyage of exploration
which should complete man's knowledge of the great continents, the First
Consul gave a ready consent.
The task of preparing instructions for the voyage was entrusted to a
Committee of the Institute, consisting of Fleurieu, Bougainville,
Laplace, Lacepede, Cuvier, Jussieu, Lelievre, Langles, and Camus; whilst
Degerando wrote a special memorandum upon the methods to be followed in
the observation of savage peoples - the latter probably in consequence of
the First Consul's particular direction on this subject. It was an
admirably chosen body for formulating a programme of scientific research.
A great astronomer, two eminent biologists, a famous botanist, a
practical navigator, a geographer, all men of distinction among European
savants, and two of them, Laplace and Cuvier, among the greatest men of
science of modern times, were scholars who knew what might be expected to
be gained for knowledge, and where and how the most fruitful results
might be obtained.
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