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Austrians, Republicans and Royalists. When domestic were distorted 

 to national difficulties, Joseph was the invariable mediator of concilia- 

 tion with democratic Lucien, intractable Louis, hostile Prince Berna- 

 dotte, disloyal King Murat. If France, invaded by all Europe in 

 arms, needed the Emperor abroad to fight, Joseph was the infallible 

 regent at home, proof against all assaults, temptations, and seduc- 

 tions. Before the Empire, the great works of amity were his, the 

 treaties with Austria, with the Pope, the United States, and England. 

 On all occasions, during both the republic and empire, whether am- 

 bassador, king, or regent, his predilections for peace were manifested, 

 while in many great battles he displayed the intrepid composure of a 

 valiant general. During the four years of his reign on a bed of 

 roses in Naples, and the five under a crown of thorns in Spain, he 

 was, as Lamarque, an eye witness most competent to judge, testified, 

 a philosopher on a throne. 



Many biographical and historical works describe him, from which 

 it would be easy to cull and arrange his full length portrait. But 

 within the last twelve months ten volumes of unexampled testimony, 

 published as the political and military Memoirs of King Joseph, so 

 much facilitate the task to which this Society has appointed me, con- 

 cerning our late fellow member, that little more is necessary than 

 voucher of that singular and unquestionable demonstration that, whe- 

 ther in private or public life, military commissary, member of pro- 

 vincial or national assemblies, ambassador, colonel, general, king on 

 more than one throne, or fugitive from sanguinary proscription, for 

 more than a quarter of a century, serenely and wisely philosophizing 

 on the banks of the Delaware in this neighbourhood, in the cabinet, 

 the field, the drawing-room, or family circle, Joseph Bonaparte was 

 continually and invariably an honest, humane, brave, wise, virtuous, 

 and thorough gentleman, incapable of meanness or wickedness. 



Concealed in various hiding-places till, at length, clandestinely 

 transported from Leghorn to Philadelphia, seven trunks of these pre- 

 cious documents were here deposited in a place of safety till the ap- 

 pointed time for their posthumous publication in Europe. Hundreds 

 of letters written by Napoleon and Joseph to each other, and between 

 them and many others, brothers, sisters, lovers, husbands, ministers, 

 generals, monarchs, poets, and philosophers, are thrown before this 

 malignant, invidious, and censorious world, without the suppression 

 or alteration of one single word, no matter whom they expose, from 

 the Emperor to the lowest person. From the days when Napoleon 

 and Joseph were struggling with poverty to when they were over- 



