| MESSAGE
FROM THE PRESIDENT |
By Eduardo
Garzón-Sobrado
President-Fundor of the Mexico-France Napoleonic
Institute, MFNI.
«
Facts speak by themselves, they shine
like the sun.
What could I be attacked for that an historian
couldn't defend me?
Shall I be accused of having loved war too
much?
He will demonstrate that I have always been
attacked! » |
Napoleon
I. |
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Constituting
the main pivot of action and geographic pole
that consolidates and consecrates the institutional
an spiritual Napoleonic presence in Latin
America, our Mexico-France Napoleonic
Institute intends to crystallize
very numerous objectives from which the most
important are, without any doubt, the diffusion
and the knowledge of the Napoleonic legacy,
as well as, principally, the defence of the
memory and, – strange term, even incomprehensible
in this beginning of the XXIst Century for
most of all – of the Honour of EMPEROR
NAPOLEON I.
Effectively, and very regrettably, the deceitful
antiphrasis, the «Napoleonic
blinkered thinking» according
to the lucid expression of French historian
Jean-Claude Damamme, have been throughout
the History constant intruders in the field
of the studies consecrated to Napoleon and
the Empire.
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Forged with as
much ruse as malice and diffused at ease by the
plutocratic oligarchs of the London Cabinet and
their henchmen after the crumbling of the Empire,
this cumulus of lies, generally known as «
the Black Legend » of the Emperor,
has been complacently diffused until the nausea
by historians and writers of bad faith, by all
kinds of opportunist authors, or in many cases
simply negligent, until getting definitively established
and anchoring in a peremptory manner in the collective
imaginary of a complacent and trustful public.
Systematically
exploited, periodically reappearing with strenght
and, in recent times, with a wickednessand and
a premeditation at the very least strange, this
aggravating tendency expresses itself essentially
through the perseverant repetition of fallacious
and vicious stereotypes constantly summoned up
to the non expert public in the subject, thus
straying its opinion and slowly transforming the
blunt lie into a supposed « truth
», allegedly incontestable, and which, although
absolutely illusory, does not get less official…
In this disconcerting context, and without looking
forward to go any further, we can per example
cite the alas typical image of the megalomaniac
slayer, the obsessive conqueror avidly
devouring the world in order to satisfy his inexhaustible
personal ambition.
Far away from
these vulgar vaudeville’s caricatures, it
is a demonstrable fact that Emperor Napoleon,
universal incarnated symbol of resistance before
the invader forces of oppression, never
declared a single war, and that he participated
in the incessant and deadly battles that
were imposed to him by the innumerable European
Coalitions only in spite of
himself and in a state of legitimate defence of
France and of his own. This is an irrefurable
reality that permits us to certify with composure
and a formal certitude that the erroneously called
« Napoleonic Wars » –
a dishonest expression that plays with a skilful
dialectic artifice, conscientiously premeditated
in order to disguise what it would be most appropriate
to call « the Coalitions Wars
» – the said «Napoleonic
Wars», were we saying, did
never exist!
In
the very contrary, during his whole fabulous
reign and until his ignominious immolation
upon a dark and distant rock in the name
of France, of its integrity, of the emancipative
values and of nascent civil rights –
angular stone of the contemporary free
world’s morale and civic foundations
– Napoleon never ceased
in its quest of a lasting peace,
he never stepped back before any sacrifice
in his efforts to establish bridges of
dialog and to appease the aggressor enemies
of France, conjured powers on a salary
of the inflexible thalasocracy of the
Pitts and the Castelreaghs, that «perfidious
Albion» and its mercantilist oligarchy
that would not tolerate that its commercial
hegemony, as well as its projects of colonial
expansion, were menaced by an antagonist
glorious, prosperous and flourishing France
of the Consulate, then of the Great Empire.
To wash
the memory and to to keep watch over the
honour of Emperor Napoleon, as well as
to introduce to the Spanish world his
true visage, that of the great creative
genius, of the unequalled legislator,
of the tireless builder, magnificent patron
and guardian of arts and sciences, constant
promoter of peace and extraordinary craftsman
of the modern world; such are both the
essential objective and central function
developped on a daily basis and in a permanent
effort by the Mexico-France Napoleonic
Institute.
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Modello
of a portrait of Emperor
Napoleon, by David.
Realized in 1807,
the definitive painting,
today lost, was exposed
in the Cassel Palace,
where King Hieronymus
of Westphalia reigned.
In this magnificent
representation, we
can see the Emperor
in an attitude of
placid majesty, with
his calm look lowered
observing his
peoples. Standing
near the imperial
throne, he has put
down Charlemagne’s
crown and
the Hand of Justice,
« staff of virtue
and Truth »,
in order to hold the
globe, symbol of the
world, ended by the
cross of the King
Saint Louis.
« It’s
fine, it is very fine,
David. You have guessed
my whole thought.
You’ve made
me a French knight
», will the
Emperor say to his
official painter. |
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August
2004. |
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