Fouché's letter to Wellington, 27 June 1815

My lord,—You have just illustrated your name by new victories over the French. It is you especially who can appreciate the French nation, In the council of sovereigns united to fix the destinies of Europe, your influence and your credit cannot be less than your glory. Your law of nations has always been justice, and your conscience has always been the guide of your policy. The French nation wishes to live under a monarch, but it wishes that that monarch live under the empire of laws. The republic made us acquainted with the extreme of liberty; the empire, with the extreme of despotism. Our wish now, (and it is immoveable) is to keep at an equal distance from both these extremes. All eyes are now fixed upon England: we de not claim to be more free than she; we do not wish to be less. The representatives of the nation are incessantly employed on a social compact, of which the component powers, separated, but not divided, all contribute, by their reciprocal action, to harmony and unity. From the moment this compact shall be signed by the prince called to reign over us, the sovereign shall receive the sceptre and the crown from the hands of the nation. In the existing state of Europe, one of the greatest calamities is hostility between France and England. No man, my lord, has it more in his power than yourself to replace Europe under a better influence, and in a finer position.

Paris, June 27. "Accept," &c.