Her soldiers came
to restore the Pope to his throne; they went as soon as he was
reseated on it. This was a chivalrous policy.
Napoleon III. also considered the restoration of the Pope to a
temporal throne necessary to the good of the Church. Perhaps he thinks
so still--though I couldn't swear to it. But his motives of action
were complicated. Simple President of the French Republic, heir to a
name which summoned him to the throne, resolved to exchange his
temporary magistracy for an imperial crown, he had the greatest
possible interest in proving to Europe how republics are put down. He
had already conceived the idea of playing that great part of champion
of order, which has since caused him to be received by all Sovereigns
first as a brother, and afterwards as an arbitrator. Lastly, he knew
that the restoration of the Pope would secure him a million of
Catholic votes towards his election to the imperial crown. But to
these motives of personal interest were added some others, if
possible, of a loftier character. The heir of Napoleon and of the
liberal Revolution of '89, the man who read his own name on the first
page of the civil code, the author of so many works breathing the
spirit of new ideas and the passionate love of progress, the silent
dreamer whose busy brain already teemed with the germs of all the
prosperity we have enjoyed for the last ten years, was incapable of
handing over three millions of Italians to reaction, lawlessness, and
misery.
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