No enterprise has more conspicuously helped to assure the position of Paris as the capital of the world's culture than Bonaparte's grouping of the nation's art treasures in a central and magnificent building.
In the first year of his Empire Napoleon gave orders for the construction of vast galleries which were to connect the northern pavilion of the Tuileries with the Louvre and form a splendid facade to the new Rue de Rivoli.

Despite the expense, the work was pushed on until it was suddenly arrested by the downfall of the Empire, and was left to the great man's nephew to complete.

Though it is possible, as Chaptal avers, that the original design aimed at the formation of a central fortress, yet to all lovers of art, above all to the hero-worshipping Heine, the new Louvre was a sure pledge of Napoleon's immortality.
Other works which combined beauty with utility were the prolongation of the quays along the left bank of the Seine, the building of three bridges over that river, the improvement of the Jardin des Plantes, together with that of other parks and open spaces, and the completion of the Conservatoire of Arts and Trades.

At a later date, the military spirit of the Empire received signal illustration in the erection of the Vendome column, the Arc de Triomphe, and the consecration, or desecration, of the Madeleine as a temple of glory.
Many of these works were subsequent to the period which we are considering; but the enterprises of the Emperor represent the designs of the First Consul; and the plans for the improvement of Paris formed during the Consulate were sufficient to inspire the Parisians with lively gratitude and to turn them from political speculations to scenes of splendour and gaiety that recalled the days of Louis XIV.

If we may believe the testimony of Romilly, who visited Paris in 1802, the new policy had even then attained its end.
"The quiet despotism, which leaves everybody who does not wish to meddle with politics (and few at present have any such wish) in the full and secure enjoyment of their property and of their pleasures, is a sort of paradise, compared with the agitation, the perpetual alarms, the scenes of infamy, of bloodshed, which accompanied the pretended liberties of France." But while acknowledging the material benefits of Bonaparte's rule, the same friend of liberty notes with concern: "That he [Bonaparte] meditates the gaining fresh laurels in war can hardly be doubted, if the accounts which one hears of his restless and impatient disposition be true." However much the populace delighted in this new _regime_, the many ardent souls who had dared and achieved so much in the sacred quest of liberty could not refrain from protesting against the innovations which were restoring personal rule.