In the letter which he wrote to Talleyrand shortly before the signature of the peace of Campo Formio occurs this suggestive passage: "The character of our nation is to be far too vivacious amidst prosperity.

If we take for the basis of all our operations true policy, which is nothing else than the calculation of combinations and chances, we shall long be _la grande nation_ and the arbiter of Europe.

I say more: we hold the balance of Europe: we will make that balance incline as we wish; and, if such is the order of fate, I think it by no means impossible that we may in a few years attain those grand results of which the heated and enthusiastic imagination catches a glimpse, and which the extremely cool, persistent, and calculating man will alone attain." This letter was written when Bonaparte was bartering away Venice to the Emperor in consideration of the acquisition by France of the Ionian Isles.

Its reference to the vivacity of the French was doubtless evoked by the orders which he then received to "revolutionize Italy." To do that, while the Directory further extorted from England Gibraltar, the Channel Islands, and her eastern conquests, was a programme dictated by excessive vivacity.

The Directory lacked the practical qualities that selected one great enterprise at a time and brought to bear on it the needful concentration of effort.