Then Wieland goes on to relate what the conversation was.  Napoleon “preferred the Romans to the Greeks.  The eternal squabbles of their petty republics were not calculated to give birth to anything grand, whereas the Romans were always occupied with great things, and it was owing to this they raised up the Colossus which bestrode the world....  He was fond only of serious poetry, the pathetic and vigorous writers, and above all, the tragic poets.”

Wieland had been put so much at his ease (so he says) that he ventured to ask how it was that the public worship Napoleon had restored in France was not more philosophical and in harmony with the spirit of the times.  “My dear Wieland,” was the reply, “religion is not meant for philosophers! they have no faith either in me or my priests.  As to those who do believe, it would be difficult to give them, or to leave them, too much of the marvellous.  If I had to frame a religion for philosophers, it would be just the reverse of that of the credulous part of mankind."[13]

Mueller, the Swiss historian’s private interview with him at this period is quite remarkable, and shows what a vast knowledge and conception of things the Emperor had.  Nothing shows more clearly his own plan of regulating and guiding the affairs of the universe for the benefit of all.  He tells Mueller that he should complete his history of Switzerland, that even the more recent times had their interest.  Then he switched from the Swiss to the old Greek constitutions and history; to the theory of constitutions; to the complete diversity of those in Asia, and the causes of this diversity in the climate, polygamy, the opposite characters of the Arabian and the Tartar races, the peculiar value of European culture, and the progress of Freedom since the sixteenth century; how everything was linked together, and in the inscrutable guidance of an invisible hand; how he himself had become great through his enemies; the great Confederation of Nations, the idea of which Henri IV. had; the foundation of all religion and its necessity; that man could not bear clear truth and required to be kept in order; admitting the possibility, however, of a more happy condition, if the numerous feuds ceased which were occasioned by too complicated Constitutions (such as the German) and the intolerable burden suffered by States from excessive armies.

These opinions clearly mark the guiding motives of Napoleon’s attempts to enforce upon different nations uniformity of the institutions and customs.  “I opposed him occasionally,” says Mueller, “and he entered into discussion.  Quite impartially and truly, as before God, I must say that the variety of his knowledge, the acuteness of his observations, the solidity of his understanding (not dazzling wit), his grand and comprehensive views, filled me with astonishment, and his manner of speaking to me with love for him.  By his genius and his disinterested goodness, he has also conquered me."[14]