My recompense is in my conscience and in the opinion of posterity.

Believe me, that at any time of danger, I shall be the first to defend the Constitution of the Year III." The resignation was of course declined, in terms most flattering to Bonaparte; and the Directors prepared to ratify the treaty with Sardinia.
Indeed, the fit of passion once passed, the determination to dominate events again possessed him, and he decided to make peace, despite the recent instructions of the Directory that no peace would be honourable which sacrificed Venice to Austria.

There is reason to believe that he now regretted this sacrifice.

His passionate outbursts against Venice after the _Paques veronaises_, his denunciations of "that fierce and bloodstained rule," had now given place to some feelings of pity for the people whose ruin he had so artfully compassed; and the social intercourse with Venetians which he enjoyed at Passeriano, the castle of the Doge Manin, may well have inspired some regard for the proud city which he was now about to barter away to Austria.

Only so, however, could he peacefully terminate the wearisome negotiations with the Emperor.