But this social life was to serve a personal end. It was to furnish an
added instrument of power to the autocrat who ruled, to reflect always
and everywhere the glory of Napoleon. The period which saw its cleverest
woman in hopeless exile, and its most beautiful one under a similar
ban for the crime of being her friend, was not one which favored
intellectual supremacy. The empire did not encourage literature, it
silenced philosophy, and oppressed the talent that did not glorify
itself. Its blighting touch rested upon the whole social fabric. The
finer elements which, to some extent, entered into it were lost in the
glitter of display and pretension. The true spirit of conversation was
limited to private coteries that kept themselves in the shade, and were
too small to be noted.