In fine, a nation weary of religious experiments and groping about for some firm anchorage in the midst of the turbid ebb-tide and its numerous backwaters.[153] Despite the absence of any deep religious belief, Bonaparte felt the need of religion as the bulwark of morality and the cement of society.
During his youth he had experienced the strength of Romanism in Corsica, and during his campaigns in Italy he saw with admiration the zeal of the French orthodox priests who had accepted exile and poverty for conscience' sake.

To these outcasts he extended more protection than was deemed compatible with correct republicanism; and he received their grateful thanks.

After Brumaire he suppressed the oath previously exacted from the clergy, and replaced it by a _promise_ of fidelity to the constitution.

Many reasons have been assigned for this conduct, but doubtless his imagination was touched by the sight of the majestic hierarchy of Rome, whose spiritual powers still prevailed, even amidst the ruin of its temporal authority, and were slowly but surely winning back the ground lost in the Revolution.

An influence so impalpable yet irresistible, that inherited from the Rome of the Caesars the gift of organization and the power of maintaining discipline, in which the Revolution was so signally lacking, might well be the ally of the man who now dominated the Latin peoples.