Conquer and bargain as he might, he could not grapple with the impalpable forces of the era that was now dawning.

The younger generation throbbed responsive to the teachings of Fichte, the appeals of Stein, and the exploits of the Spaniards; it was blind to the splendours of Erfurt: and it heard with grief, but with no change of conviction, that Goethe and Wieland had accepted from Napoleon the cross of the Legion of Honour, and that too on the anniversary of the Battle of Jena.
After thus finally belittling the two poets, he shot a parting shaft at German idealism in his farewell to the academicians.

He bade them beware of idealogues as dangerous dreamers and disguised materialists.
Then, raising his voice, he exclaimed: "Philosophers plague themselves with weaving systems: they will never find a better one than Christianity, which, reconciling man with himself, also assures public order and repose.

Your idealogues destroy every illusion; and the time of illusions is for peoples and individuals alike the time of happiness.

I carry one away, that you will think kindly of me." He then mounted his carriage and drove away to Paris to resume his conquest of Spain.[204] The last diplomatic proceeding at Erfurt was the drawing up of a secret convention which assigned Finland and the Danubian Provinces to Russia, and promised Russia's help to Napoleon in case Austria should attack him.