War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [512]
As far as one can tell—if not from this muddled sentence, then from the attempts that the viceroy made to carry out the orders given him—he was to move through Borodino from the left towards the redoubt, while the divisions of Morand and Gérard were to move simultaneously from the front.
All that, like the other points of the disposition, was not and could not be carried out. Having gone through Borodino, the viceroy was driven back on the Kolocha and could go no further; the divisions of Morand and Gérard did not take the redoubt, but were repulsed, and the redoubt was taken only at the end of the battle by the cavalry (probably something unforeseen by and unheard-of for Napoleon). Thus, none of the instructions of the disposition were or could be carried out. But it was said in the disposition that after entering into combat in this way, orders will be given in accordance with the enemy’s actions, and therefore it would seem that, during the battle, Napoleon would be giving all the necessary instructions; but that was not and could not be done, because during the whole time of the battle, Napoleon was so far away from it that (as it turned out afterwards) the course of the battle could not be known to him and not one of his instructions during the battle could be carried out.
XXVIII
Many historians say that the battle of Borodino was not won by the French because Napoleon had a cold, that if he had not had a cold, his instructions before and during the battle would have been of still greater genius, and Russia would have perished, et la face du monde eut été changée.*480 For historians who accept that Russia was shaped by the will of one man—Peter the Great—and that France was turned from a republic into an empire and French troops went to Russia by the will of one man—Napoleon—such an argument, that Russia remained a power because Napoleon had a bad cold on the twenty-sixth, such an argument for such historians is inevitably consistent.
If it had depended on Napoleon’s will whether or not to fight the battle of Borodino, and if it had depended on his will whether to give this or that instruction, then it is obvious that a cold, having an influence on the expression of his will, could have caused the salvation of Russia, and therefore the valet who forgot to give Napoleon his waterproof boots on the twenty-fourth was the savior of Russia. By that way of thinking, this conclusion is indubitable—as indubitable as the conclusion which Voltaire drew jokingly (not knowing at what himself) when he said that the night of St. Bartholomew was the result of Charles IX having an upset stomach.34 But for people who do not admit that Russia was shaped by the will of one man—Peter I—and that the French empire arose and the war with Russia began by the will of one man—Napoleon—this argument seems not only incorrect, unreasonable, but also contrary to all human essence. To the question of what constitutes the cause of historical events, a different answer presents itself, which is that the course of world events is predestined from on high, depends on the coincidence of all the wills of the people participating in those events, and that Napoleon’s influence on the course of those events is only external and fictitious.
Strange as it may seem at first glance to suggest that the night of St. Bartholomew, the order for which was given by Charles IX, did not occur by his will, but that it only seemed to him that he had called for it, and that the slaughter of eighty thousand men at Borodino did not occur by the will of Napoleon (though he gave the orders for the beginning and the course of the battle), but that it only seemed to him that he called for it—strange as this suggestion may seem, human dignity, which tells me that each of us is, if not more, then certainly no less of a human