Fully impressed, however, with a sense of the peril in which he was about to embark, he sought to surround himself with all his friends.  Even Talleyrand was recalled; he was to have been sent to Warsaw, but the jealousy of a rival and an intrigue again involved him in disgrace; Napoleon, deluded by a calumny, adroitly circulated, believed that he had been betrayed by him.  His anger was extreme; its expression terrible.  Savary made vain efforts to undeceive him, which were prolonged up to the epoch of our entry into Wilna; there that minister again sent a letter of Talleyrand to the emperor; it depicted the influence of Turkey and Sweden on the Russian war, and made an offer of employing his most zealous efforts in negotiating with those two powers.

But Napoleon only replied to it by an exclamation of contempt:  “Does that man believe himself to be so necessary?  Does he expect to teach me?” He then compelled his secretary to send that letter to the very minister who stood most in dread of Talleyrand’s influence.

It would not be correct to say, that all those about Napoleon beheld the war with an anxious eye.  Inside the palace, as well as without it, many military men were found who entered with ardour into the policy of their chief.  The greater part agreed as to the possibility of the conquest of Russia, either because their hopes discerned in it a means of acquiring something, according to their position, from the lowest distinction up to a throne; or that they suffered themselves to participate in the enthusiasm of the Poles; or that the expedition, if conducted with prudence, might fairly look to success; or, to sum up all, because they conceived every thing possible to Napoleon.

Among the ministers of the emperor, several disapproved it; the greater number preserved silence:  one alone was accused of flattery, and that without any ground.  It is true he was heard to repeat, “That the emperor was not sufficiently great; that it was necessary for him to become greater still, in order to be able to stop.”  But that minister was, in reality, what so many courtiers wished to appear; he had a real and absolute faith in the genius and fortune of his sovereign.

In other respects, it is wrong to impute to his counsels a large portion of our misfortunes.  Napoleon was not a man to be influenced.  So soon as his object was marked out, and he had made advances towards its acquisition, he admitted of no farther contradiction.  He then appeared as if he would hear nothing but what flattered his determination; he repelled with ill-humour, and even with apparent incredulity, all disagreeable intelligence, as if he feared to be shaken by it.  This mode of acting changed its name according to his fortune; when fortunate, it was called force of character; when unfortunate, it was designated as infatuation.

The knowledge of such a disposition induced some subalterns to make false reports to him.  Even a minister himself felt occasionally compelled to maintain a dangerous silence.  The former inflated his hopes of success, in order to imitate the proud confidence of their chief, and in order, by their countenance, to stamp upon his mind the impression of a happy omen; the second sometimes declined communicating bad news, in order, as he said, to avoid the harsh rebuffs which he had then to encounter.