any one of Wordsworth's poems. Whether he writes of some personal friendship, or some glory of nature, or some memorial of travel, it is found to be but a variation of the motif appearing here. No one who has really mastered the "Prelude" can dip into Wordsworth anywhere without having some lines of this autobiography recalled to his memory and giving to him a clearer insight into what he is reading.

Nor is the philosophy of the poem less alluring. Huxley denied to nature all pity or tenderness; but here Wordsworth opens up to you a heart pulsating with love everywhere in the material world. His philosophy is outlined at the beginning of Book XIII and ending with these memorable lines:

"To look with feelings of fraternal love
Upon the unassuming things that hold
A silent station in this beauteous world"

That philosophy may be said to consist of deepmost faith and reverence; steadfast optimism and courage; and a conscious, personal, obedient relationship with the Deity as

"a Power

That is the visible quality and shape
And image of right reason; that matures
Her processes by steadfast laws; gives birth
To no impatient or fallacious hopes,

No heat of passion or excessive zeal.”

This is the lofty spirit pervading the entire poem and proving to the average reader grateful and contagious alike. He cannot follow Wordsworth down to its close without having a new light in his face and a greater spring and courage in his step.

When the three books of the poem that treat of the French Revolution are reached one's respect for Wordsworth's philosophy is immensely increased. The poet's contact with that strange movement at first entangled his sympathies and temporarily dimmed to his sight the star he had been following; but his faith brought him through it all with large rather than lessened sanity and optimism and made him a safer, more dependable guide to follow.

One phase of his philosophy ever coming to the surface is his favorite conception of man's preëxistence made familiar

to readers of Wordsworth by the immortal lines of his great Ode:

"Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting.

The soul that rises with us, our life's star,

Has had elsewhere its setting, and cometh from afar.
Not in entire forgetfulness,

Nor yet in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home."

Where he may have caught up this idea would be an interesting search to make. Certainly, not from Indian philosophy where it abounds, for, so far as I can make out, he had never been subjected to its influence. Better to suppose, I should say, that it sprang from an introspective scrutiny of his own subconsciousness, for could any one with Wordsworth's soul deeply study his instincts and intuitions without coming to feel that they reached far back into some other existence?

But to me the chief charm of the "Prelude" is its introduction of the reader to the great rich, vital personality of its author. No one can get back into the soul of the poem without falling in love with Wordsworth. His fine humanness everywhere comes into fascinating evidence. Friendship with him was a chaste and holy passion that quite throws its spell over you. His affectionate references to his sister, his fondness for his friend Coleridge, his well-expressed gratitude to the benefactor who befriended him in his impecunious days, carry with them a touch that is not less than a beneficent chrism and make him preeminently "the poet of the spirit of man.'

Thus charmed by its literary beauty, uplifted by its ethical ideals, broadened and deepened by its spiritual vision, cheered and steadied by its wholesome philosophy, and captivated and swayed by the wonderful personality regnant throughout the poem, I have gradually come to share the appreciation which Matthew Arnold has put into undying words:

"For there was shed

On spirits that had long been dead,
Spirits dried up and closely furl'd,
The freshness of the early world.'

JOSEPH FOUCHÉ

NAPOLEON'S MINISTER OF POLICE

1763-1820

(INTRODUCTORY NOTE)

Of all the remarkable careers produced by the French Revolution and the rise of Napoleon, none is more noteworthy than that of Fouché. Joseph Fouché, afterwards Duke of Otranto, Napoleon's famous Minister of Police, first rose to power during the French Revolution as one of the bloodiest advocates of the Republic. But he had no real sympathy with the ideals then actuating France. He was undoubtedly the cleverest egotist produced by the times, and himself declares that he determined to ride on the "whirlwind and direct the storm." He began his public career by demanding the execution of Louis XVI. Later, incurring the enmity of Robespierre, he set himself to accomplish the ruin of this new "tyrant of France." Fouché early foresaw Napoleon's greatness and embraced his cause.

He was at heart an ardent believer in strong government-provided he himself was an active part of that government. Though officially only Minister of the Police, he was an astute political schemer, and not only strengthened Napoleon's power with the French people, but guided him in foreign and domestic crises. His motto, however, was always "Fouché first, and then Napoleon;" and this fact several times led to Fouché's disgrace. Yet Napoleon, appreciating his ability, recalled him whenever affairs appeared threatening.

Never did any man write memoirs more boastful than those of Fouché -more boastful or more untrustworthy. He writes to defend himself to his countrymen, to justify his many changes of side. According to him, Fouché was the one all important person of the French Revolution. He ascribes Napoleon's downfall to the fact that the Emperor was jealous of the immense power and influence of his Minister of Police, and hence dismissed Fouché shortly after marrying Maria Theresa, Grand Duchess of Austria. Thereafter, says Fouché, the Emperor surrounded himself with servile flatterers, ruled entirely according to his personal desires and so incurred the enmity of his own people as well as of foreign nations. Alarmed, facing certain disaster,

he recalled Fouché. But the coalition against Napoleon was too strongly cemented by fear to be destroyed. So Fouché embraced the opportunity to intrigue for the favor of the Bourbons, whose restoration he foresaw. Failing in this, he again embraced the cause of the fugitive from Elba, only to again desert to the Bourbons; this time successfully.

Amid all the meteoric careers due to the changes in France, no man remained so long on the crest of success as Joseph Fouché. Always self-controlled and far-seeing, able to estimate the trend of public opinion far in advance, he owed his success chiefly to his egotism, his absolute indifference to right or wrong, the dictates of conscience, or the impulses of passion. Although consistently sacrificing every moral and political precept to his own personal success, he constantly appeared as the savior of France. And it is true that his power saved not only Paris, but France herself, from much of the disaster and bloodshed which would otherwise have followed the excesses of the Republic and the Empire.

A certain amount of suspicion has always been attached to the authorship of these memoirs. They did not appear until after Fouché's death, and there is no positive evidence that he wrote them. They echo, however, the true style and spirit of the man, and they follow his career with such fullness and accuracy of detail that if not actually his own they must have been prepared by some other police official who had access to Fouché's private papers and used them fully with a keen knowledge both of the man Fouché and of the methods of the French police. The difficulty of finding such an author, other than Fouché's self, has led most critics to accept the memoirs as his own. They are certainly a masterpiece of cunning and conceit, of interwoven truth and trickery, of boldness and of caution. In a word they are Fouché an intensely interesting human study.

MEMOIRS OF JOSEPH FOUCHÉ, DUKE OF OTRANTO

THE man who, in turbulent and revolutionary times, was solely indebted for the honors and power with which he was invested, and, in short, for his splendid elevation, to his own prudence and abilities; who, at first, elected a national representative, was, upon the reëstablishment of order, an ambassador, three times a minister, a senator, a duke, and one of the principal directors of state affairs; this man would degrade himself if, to answer the calumnies of libelers, he descended to apology or captious refutations: he must use other arms.

This man, then, is myself. Raised by the revolution, I fell from my grandeur, from the effects alone of a counter-revolution, which I had foreseen, and might have warded off, had I not found myself unarmed at the moment of the crisis.

This second fall has exposed me, defenseless, to the clamors of malignity and the insults of ingratitude;-me, who for a long time invested with a mysterious and terrible power, never wielded it but to calm the passions, dissolve factions, and prevent conspiracies;-me, who was never-ceasingly employed in moderating and tempering power, in conciliating and amalgamating the jarring elements and conflicting interests which divided France. No one dares deny that such was my conduct, so long as I exercised any influence in the government or in the councils of the state. What have I, an exile, to oppose to these furious enemies, to this rabble which now persecute me, after having groveled at my feet? Shall I answer them with the cold declamations of the school, or with refined and academic periods? Certainly not. I will confound them by facts and proofs, by a true exposition of my labors, and of my thoughts, both as a minister and a statesman; by the faithful recital of the political events, and the singular circumstances, through which I steered in times of turbulence and violence. This is the object I propose to myself.

From truth I think I have nothing to dread; and even were it so, I would speak it. The time for divulging it has arrived: I will speak it, cost what it may, so that when the tomb covers my mortal remains, my name shall be bequeathed to the judgment of history. It is, however, just that I should appear before its tribunal with these Memoirs in my hand.

And first, let me not be considered responsible for the revolution, neither for the misdirection of its course, nor the energy of its dictation. I was nothing, I possessed no authority when its first shocks, overturning France, shook Europe to its foundations. Besides, what was this revolution? It is notorious, that previous to the year 1789, presentiments of the destruction of empires had created uneasiness in the monarchy. Empires are not exempted from that universal law which subjects all mundane things to change and decomposition. Has there ever been one whose historical dura