King Of Prussia

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Title:     King Of Prussia
Author: Samuel Johnson [More Titles by Johnson]

Charles Frederick, the present king of Prussia, whose actions and designs now keep Europe in attention, is the eldest son of Frederick William, by Sophia Dorothea, daughter of George the first, king of England. He was born January 24, 1711-12. Of his early years nothing remarkable has been transmitted to us. As he advanced towards manhood, he became remarkable by his disagreement with his father.

The late king of Prussia was of a disposition violent and arbitrary, of narrow views, and vehement passions, earnestly engaged in little pursuits, or in schemes terminating in some speedy consequence, without any plan of lasting advantage to himself or his subjects, or any prospect of distant events. He was, therefore, always busy, though no effects of his activity ever appeared, and always eager, though he had nothing to gain. His behaviour was, to the last degree, rough and savage. The least provocation, whether designed or accidental, was returned by blows, which he did not always forbear to the queen and princesses.

From such a king and such a father it was not any enormous violation of duty in the immediate heir of a kingdom, sometimes to differ in opinion, and to maintain that difference with decent pertinacity. A prince of a quick sagacity and comprehensive knowledge, must find many practices in the conduct of affairs which he could not approve, and some which he could scarcely forbear to oppose.

The chief pride of the old king was to be master of the tallest regiment in Europe. He, therefore, brought together, from all parts, men above the common military standard. To exceed the height of six feet, was a certain recommendation to notice, and to approach that of seven, a claim to distinction. Men will readily go where they are sure to be caressed; and he had, therefore, such a collection of giants, as, perhaps, was never seen in the world before.

To review this towering regiment was his daily pleasure, and to perpetuate it was so much his care, that when he met a tall woman, he immediately commanded one of his Titanian retinue to marry her, that they might propagate procerity, and produce heirs to the father's habiliments.

In all this there was apparent folly, but there was no crime. The tall regiment made a fine show at an expense not much greater, when once it was collected, than would have been bestowed upon common men. But the king's military pastimes were sometimes more pernicious. He maintained a numerous army, of which he made no other use than to review and to talk of it; and when he, or perhaps his emissaries, saw a boy, whose form and sprightliness promised a future soldier, he ordered a kind of badge to be put about his neck, by which he was marked out for the service, like the sons of Christian captives in Turkey; and his parents were forbidden to destine him to any other mode of life.

This was sufficiently oppressive, but this was not the utmost of his tyranny. He had learned, though otherwise perhaps no very great politician, that to be rich was to be powerful; but that the riches of a king ought to be seen in the opulence of his subjects, he wanted either ability or benevolence to understand. He, therefore, raised exorbitant taxes from every kind of commodity and possession, and piled up the money in his treasury, from which it issued no more. How the land which had paid taxes once, was to pay them a second time, how imposts could be levied without commerce, or commerce continued without money, it was not his custom to inquire. Eager to snatch at money, and delighted to count it, he felt new joy at every receipt, and thought himself enriched by the impoverishment of his dominions.

By which of these freaks of royalty the prince was offended, or whether, as perhaps more frequently happens, the offences of which he complains were of a domestick and personal kind, it is not easy to discover. But his resentment, whatever was its cause, rose so high, that he resolved not only to leave his father's court, but his territories, and to seek a refuge among the neighbouring or kindred princes. It is generally believed that his intention was to come to England, and live under the protection of his uncle, till his father's death, or change of conduct, should give him liberty to return.

His design, whatever it was, he concerted with an officer in the army, whose name was Kat, a man in whom he placed great confidence, and whom, having chosen him for the companion of his flight, he necessarily trusted with the preparatory measures. A prince cannot leave his country with the speed of a meaner fugitive. Something was to be provided, and something to be adjusted. And, whether Kat found the agency of others necessary, and, therefore, was constrained to admit some partners of the secret; whether levity or vanity incited him to disburden himself of a trust that swelled in his bosom, or to show to a friend or mistress his own importance; or whether it be in itself difficult for princes to transact any thing in secret; so it was, that the king was informed of the intended flight, and the prince, and his favourite, a little before the time settled for their departure, were arrested, and confined in different places.

The life of princes is seldom in danger, the hazard of their irregularities falls only on those whom ambition or affection combines with them. The king, after an imprisonment of some time, set his son at liberty; but poor Kat was ordered to be tried for a capital crime. The court examined the cause, and acquitted him: the king remanded him to a second trial, and obliged his judges to condemn him. In consequence of the sentence thus tyrannically extorted, he was publickly beheaded, leaving behind him some papers of reflections made in the prison, which were afterwards printed, and among others an admonition to the prince, for whose sake he suffered, not to foster in himself the opinion of destiny, for that a providence is discoverable in every thing round us.

This cruel prosecution of a man who had committed no crime, but by compliance with influence not easily to be resisted, was not the only act by which the old king irritated his son. A lady with whom the prince was suspected of intimacy, perhaps more than virtue allowed, was seized, I know not upon what accusation, and, by the king's order, notwithstanding all the reasons of decency and tenderness that operate in other countries, and other judicatures, was publickly whipped in the streets of Berlin.

At last, that the prince might feel the power of a king and a father in its utmost rigour, he was, in 1733, married against his will to the princess Elizabetha Christina of Brunswick Luneburg Beveren. He married her indeed at his father's command, but without professing for her either esteem or affection, and considering the claim of parental authority fully satisfied by the external ceremony, obstinately and perpetually, during the life of his father, refrained from her bed. The poor princess lived about seven years in the court of Berlin, in a state which the world has not often seen, a wife without a husband, married so far as to engage her person to a man who did not desire her affection, and of whom it was doubtful, whether he thought himself restrained from the power of repudiation by an act performed under evident compulsion.

Thus he lived secluded from publick business, in contention with his father, in alienation from his wife. This state of uneasiness he found the only means of softening. He diverted his mind from the scenes about him, by studies and liberal amusements. The studies of princes seldom produce great effects, for princes draw with meaner mortals the lot of understanding; and since of many students not more than one can be hoped to advance far towards perfection, it is scarcely to be expected that we should find that one a prince; that the desire of science should overpower in any mind the love of pleasure, when it is always present, or always within call; that laborious meditation should be preferred in the days of youth to amusements and festivity; or that perseverance should press forward in contempt of flattery; and that he, in whom moderate acquisitions would be extolled as prodigies, should exact from himself that excellence of which the whole world conspires to spare him the necessity.

In every great performance, perhaps in every great character, part is the gift of nature, part the contribution of accident, and part, very often not the greatest part, the effect of voluntary election, and regular design. The king of Prussia was undoubtedly born with more than common abilities; but that he has cultivated them with more than common diligence, was probably the effect of his peculiar condition, of that which he then considered as cruelty and misfortune.

In this long interval of unhappiness and obscurity, he acquired skill in the mathematical sciences, such as is said to have put him on the level with those who have made them the business of their lives. This is, probably, to say too much: the acquisitions of kings are always magnified. His skill in poetry and in the French language has been loudly praised by Voltaire, a judge without exception, if his honesty were equal to his knowledge. Musick he not only understands, but practises on the German flute, in the highest perfection; so that, according to the regal censure of Philip of Macedon, he may be ashamed to play so well.

He may be said to owe to the difficulties of his youth an advantage less frequently obtained by princes than literature and mathematicks. The necessity of passing his time without pomp, and of partaking of the pleasures and labours of a lower station, made him acquainted with the various forms of life, and with the genuine passions, interests, desires, and distresses, of mankind. Kings, without this help from temporary infelicity, see the world in a mist, which magnifies every thing near them, and bounds their view to a narrow compass, which few are able to extend by the mere force of curiosity. I have always thought that what Cromwell had more than our lawful kings, he owed to the private condition in which he first entered the world, and in which he long continued: in that state he learned his art of secret transaction, and the knowledge by which he was able to oppose zeal to zeal, and make one enthusiast destroy another.

The king of Prussia gained the same arts, and, being born to fairer opportunities of using them, brought to the throne the knowledge of a private man, without the guilt of usurpation. Of this general acquaintance with the world there may be found some traces in his whole life. His conversation is like that of other men upon common topicks, his letters have an air of familiar elegance, and his whole conduct is that of a man who has to do with men, and who is not ignorant what motives will prevail over friends or enemies.

In 1740, the old king fell sick, and spoke and acted in his illness with his usual turbulence and roughness, reproaching his physicians, in the grossest terms, with their unskilfulness and impotence, and imputing to their ignorance or wickedness the pain which their prescriptions failed to relieve. These insults they bore with the submission which is commonly paid to despotick monarchs; till at last the celebrated Hoffman was consulted, who failing, like the rest, to give ease to his majesty, was, like the rest, treated with injurious language. Hoffman, conscious of his own merit, replied, that he could not bear reproaches which he did not deserve; that he had tried all the remedies that art could supply, or nature could admit; that he was, indeed, a professor by his majesty's bounty; but that, if his abilities or integrity were doubted, he was willing to leave, not only the university, but the kingdom; and that he could not be driven into any place where the name of Hoffman would want respect. The king, however unaccustomed to such returns, was struck with conviction of his own indecency, told Hoffman, that he had spoken well, and requested him to continue his attendance.

The king, finding his distemper gaining upon his strength, grew at last sensible that his end was approaching, and, ordering the prince to be called to his bed, laid several injunctions upon him, of which one was to perpetuate the tall regiment by continual recruits, and another, to receive his espoused wife. The prince gave him a respectful answer, but wisely avoided to diminish his own right or power by an absolute promise; and the king died uncertain of the fate of the tall regiment.

The young king began his reign with great expectations, which he has yet surpassed. His father's faults produced many advantages to the first years of his reign. He had an army of seventy thousand men well disciplined, without any imputation of severity to himself, and was master of a vast treasure without the crime or reproach of raising it. It was publickly said in our house of commons, that he had eight millions sterling of our money; but, I believe, he that said it had not considered how difficultly eight millions would be found in all the Prussian dominions. Men judge of what they do not see by that which they see. We are used to talk in England of millions with great familiarity, and imagine that there is the same affluence of money in other countries, in countries whose manufactures are few, and commerce little.

Every man's first cares are necessarily domestick. The king, being now no longer under influence, or its appearance, determined how to act towards the unhappy lady who had possessed, for seven years, the empty title of the princess of Prussia. The papers of those times exhibited the conversation of their first interview; as if the king, who plans campaigns in silence, would not accommodate a difference with his wife, but with writers of news admitted as witnesses. It is certain that he received her as queen, but whether he treats her as a wife is yet in dispute.

In a few days his resolution was known with regard to the tall regiment; for some recruits being offered him, he rejected them; and this body of giants, by continued disregard, mouldered away.

He treated his mother with great respect, ordered that she should bear the title of _queen mother_, and that, instead of addressing him as _his majesty_, she should only call him _son_.

As he was passing soon after between Berlin and Potsdam, a thousand boys, who had been marked out for military service, surrounded his coach, and cried out: "merciful king! deliver us from our slavery." He promised them their liberty, and ordered, the next day, that the badge should be taken off.

He still continued that correspondence with learned men which he began when he was prince; and the eyes of all scholars, a race of mortals formed for dependence, were upon him, as a man likely to renew the times of patronage, and to emulate the bounties of Lewis the fourteenth.

It soon appeared that he was resolved to govern with very little ministerial assistance: he took cognizance of every thing with his own eyes; declared, that in all contrarieties of interest between him and his subjects, the publick good should have the preference; and, in one of the first exertions of regal power, banished the prime minister and favourite of his father, as one that had "betrayed his master, and abused his trust."

He then declared his resolution to grant a general toleration of religion, and, among other liberalities of concession, allowed the profession of free-masonry. It is the great taint of his character, that he has given reason to doubt, whether this toleration is the effect of charity or indifference, whether he means to support good men of every religion, or considers all religions as equally good. There had subsisted, for some time, in Prussia, an order called the "order for favour," which, according to its denomination, had been conferred with very little distinction. The king instituted the "order for merit," with which he honoured those whom he considered as deserving. There were some who thought their merit not sufficiently recompensed by this new title; but he was not very ready to grant pecuniary rewards. Those who were most in his favour he sometimes presented with snuffboxes, on which was inscribed, "Amitie augmente le prix."

He was, however, charitable, if not liberal, for he ordered the magistrates of the several districts to be very attentive to the relief of the poor; and, if the funds established for that use were not sufficient, permitted that the deficiency should be supplied out of the revenues of the town.

One of his first cares was the advancement of learning. Immediately upon his accession, he wrote to Rollin and Voltaire, that he desired the continuance of their friendship; and sent for Mr. Maupertuis, the principal of the French academicians, who passed a winter in Lapland, to verify, by the mensuration of a degree near the pole, the Newtonian doctrine of the form of the earth. He requested of Maupertuis to come to Berlin, to settle an academy, in terms of great ardour and great condescension.

At the same time, he showed the world that literary amusements were not likely, as has more than once happened to royal students, to withdraw him from the care of the kingdom, or make him forget his interest. He began by reviving a claim to Herstal and Hermal, two districts in the possession of the bishop of Liege. When he sent his commissary to demand the homage of the inhabitants, they refused him admission, declaring that they acknowledged no sovereign but the bishop. The king then wrote a letter to the bishop, in which he complained of the violation of his right, and the contempt of his authority, charged the prelate with countenancing the late act of disobedience, and required an answer in two days.

In three days the answer was sent, in which the bishop founds his claim to the two lordships, upon a grant of Charles the fifth, guaranteed by France and Spain; alleges that his predecessors had enjoyed this grant above a century, and that he never intended to infringe the rights of Prussia; but as the house of Brandenburgh had always made some pretensions to that territory, he was willing to do what other bishops had offered, to purchase that claim for a hundred thousand crowns.

To every man that knows the state of the feudal countries, the intricacy of their pedigrees, the confusion of their alliances, and the different rules of inheritance that prevail in different places, it will appear evident, that of reviving antiquated claims there can be no end, and that the possession of a century is a better title than can commonly be produced. So long a prescription supposes an acquiescence in the other claimants; and that acquiescence supposes also some reason, perhaps now unknown, for which the claim was forborne. Whether this rule could be considered as valid in the controversy between these sovereigns, may, however, be doubted, for the bishop's answer seems to imply, that the title of the house of Brandenburg had been kept alive by repeated claims, though the seizure of the territory had been hitherto forborne.

The king did not suffer his claim to be subjected to any altercations, but, having published a declaration, in which he charged the bishop with violence and injustice, and remarked that the feudal laws allowed every man, whose possession was withheld from him, to enter it with an armed force, he immediately despatched two thousand soldiers into the controverted countries, where they lived without control, exercising every kind of military tyranny, till the cries of the inhabitants forced the bishop to relinquish them to the quiet government of Prussia.

This was but a petty acquisition; the time was now come when the king of Prussia was to form and execute greater designs. On the 9th of October, 1740, half Europe was thrown into confusion by the death of Charles the sixth, emperour of Germany, by whose death all the hereditary dominions of the house of Austria descended, according to the pragmatick sanction, to his eldest daughter, who was married to the duke of Lorrain, at the time of the emperour's death, duke of Tuscany.

By how many securities the pragmatick sanction was fortified, and how little it was regarded when those securities became necessary; how many claimants started up at once to the several dominions of the house of Austria; how vehemently their pretensions were enforced, and how many invasions were threatened or attempted; the distresses of the emperour's daughter, known for several years by the title only of the queen of Hungary, because Hungary was the only country to which her claim had not been disputed: the firmness with which she struggled with her difficulties, and the good fortune by which she surmounted them; the narrow plan of this essay will not suffer me to relate. Let them be told by some other writer of more leisure and wider intelligence.

Upon the emperour's death, many of the German princes fell upon the Austrian territories, as upon a dead carcass, to be dismembered among them without resistance. Among these, with whatever justice, certainly with very little generosity, was the king of Prussia, who, having assembled his troops, as was imagined, to support the pragmatick sanction, on a sudden entered Silesia with thirty thousand men, publishing a declaration, in which he disclaims any design of injuring the rights of the house of Austria, but urges his claim to Silesia, as rising "from ancient conventions of family and confraternity between the house of Brandenburg and the princes of Silesia, and other honourable titles." He says, the fear of being defeated by other pretenders to the Austrian dominions, obliged him to enter Silesia without any previous expostulation with the queen, and that he shall "strenuously espouse the interests of the house of Austria."

Such a declaration was, I believe, in the opinion of all Europe, nothing less than the aggravation of hostility by insult, and was received by the Austrians with suitable indignation. The king pursued his purpose, marched forward, and in the frontiers of Silesia made a speech to his followers, in which he told them, that he considered them rather "as friends than subjects, that the troops of Brandenburg had been always eminent for their bravery, that they would always fight in his presence, and that he would recompense those who should distinguish themselves in his service, rather as a father than as a king."

The civilities of the great are never thrown away. The soldiers would naturally follow such a leader with alacrity; especially because they expected no opposition: but human expectations are frequently deceived.

Entering thus suddenly into a country which he was supposed rather likely to protect than to invade, he acted for some time with absolute authority; but, supposing that this submission would not always last, he endeavoured to persuade the queen to a cession of Silesia, imagining that she would easily be persuaded to yield what was already lost. He, therefore, ordered his minister to declare, at Vienna, "that he was ready to guarantee all the German dominions of the house of Austria; that he would conclude a treaty with Austria, Russia, and the maritime powers; that he would endeavour that the duke of Lorrain should be elected emperour, and believed that he could accomplish it; that he would immediately advance to the queen two millions of florins; that, in recompense for all this, he required Silesia to be yielded to him."

These seem not to be the offers of a prince very much convinced of his own right. He afterwards moderated his claim, and ordered his minister to hint at Vienna, that half of Silesia would content him.

The queen answered, that though the king alleged, as his reason for entering Silesia, the danger of the Austrian territories from other pretenders, and endeavoured to persuade her to give up part of her possessions for the preservation of the rest, it was evident that he was the first and only invader, and that, till he entered in a hostile manner, all her estates were unmolested.

To his promises of assistance she replied, "that she set a high value on the king of Prussia's friendship; but that he was already obliged to assist her against her invaders, both by the golden bull, and the pragmatick sanction, of which he was a guarantee, and that, if these ties were of no force she knew not what to hope from other engagements."

Of his offers of alliances with Russia and the maritime powers, she observed, that it could be never fit to alienate her dominions for the consolidation of an alliance formed only to keep them entire.

With regard to his interest in the election of an emperour, she expressed her gratitude in strong terms; but added, that the election ought to be free, and that it must be necessarily embarrassed by contentions thus raised in the heart of the empire. Of the pecuniary assistance proposed, she remarks, that no prince ever made war to oblige another to take money, and that the contributions already levied in Silesia exceed the two millions, offered as its purchase.

She concluded, that as she values the king's friendship, she was willing to purchase it by any compliance but the diminution of her dominions, and exhorted him to perform his part in support of the pragmatick sanction.

The king, finding negotiation thus ineffectual, pushed forward his inroads, and now began to show how secretly he could take his measures. When he called a council of war, he proposed the question in a few words: all his generals wrote their opinions in his presence upon separate papers, which he carried away, and, examining them in private, formed his resolution, without imparting it otherwise than by his orders.

He began not without policy, to seize first upon the estates of the clergy, an order every where necessary, and every where envied. He plundered the convents of their stores of provision; and told them, that he never had heard of any magazines erected by the apostles.

This insult was mean, because it was unjust; but those who could not resist were obliged to bear it. He proceeded in his expedition; and a detachment of his troops took Jablunca, one of the strong places of Silesia, which was soon after abandoned, for want of provisions, which the Austrian hussars, who were now in motion, were busy to interrupt.

One of the most remarkable events of the Silesia war, was the conquest of great Glogau, which was taken by an assault in the dark, headed by prince Leopold of Anhalt Dessau. They arrived at the foot of the fortifications about twelve at night, and in two hours were masters of the place. In attempts of this kind many accidents happen which cannot be heard without surprise. Four Prussian grenadiers, who had climbed the ramparts, missing their own company, met an Austrian captain with fifty-two men: they were at first frighted, and were about to retreat; but, gathering courage, commanded the Austrians to lay down their arms, and in the terrour of darkness and confusion were unexpectedly obeyed.

At the same time a conspiracy to kill or carry away the king of Prussia, was said to be discovered. The Prussians published a memorial, in which the Austrian court was accused of employing emissaries and assassins against the king; and it was alleged, in direct terms, that one of them had confessed himself obliged, by oath, to destroy him, which oath had been given him in an Aulick council, in the presence of the duke of Lorrain.

To this the Austrians answered, "that the character of the queen and duke was too well known not to destroy the force of such an accusation; that the tale of the confession was an imposture, and that no such attempt was ever made."

Each party was now inflamed, and orders were given to the Austrian general to hazard a battle. The two armies met at Molwitz, and parted without a complete victory on either side. The Austrians quitted the field in good order; and the king of Prussia rode away upon the first disorder of his troops, without waiting for the last event. This attention to his personal safety has not yet been forgotten.

After this, there was no action of much importance. But the king of Prussia, irritated by opposition, transferred his interest in the election to the duke of Bavaria; and the queen of Hungary, now attacked by France, Spain, and Bavaria, was obliged to make peace with him at the expense of half Silesia, without procuring those advantages which were once offered her.

To enlarge dominions has been the boast of many princes; to diffuse happiness and security through wide regions has been granted to few. The king of Prussia has aspired to both these honours, and endeavoured to join the praise of legislator to that of conqueror.

To settle property, to suppress false claims, and to regulate the administration of civil and criminal justice are attempts so difficult and so useful, that I shall willingly suspend or contract the history of battles and sieges, to give a larger account of this pacifick enterprise.

That the king of Prussia has considered the nature and the reasons of laws, with more attention than is common to princes, appears from his dissertation on the Reasons for enacting and repealing Laws: a piece which yet deserves notice, rather as a proof of good inclination than of great ability; for there is nothing to be found in it more than the most obvious books may supply, or the weakest intellect discover. Some of his observations are just and useful; but upon such a subject who can think without often thinking right? It is, however, not to be omitted, that he appears always propense towards the side of mercy. "If a poor man," says he, "steals in his want a watch, or a few pieces, from one to whom the loss is inconsiderable, is this a reason for condemning him to death?"

He regrets that the laws against duels have been ineffectual; and is of opinion, that they can never attain their end, unless the princes of Europe shall agree not to afford an asylum to duellists, and to punish all who shall insult their equals, either by word, deed, or writing. He seems to suspect this scheme of being chimerical. "Yet why," says he, "should not personal quarrels be submitted to judges, as well as questions of possession? and why should not a congress be appointed for the general good of mankind, as well as for so many purposes of less importance?"

He declares himself with great ardour against the use of torture, and by some misinformation charges the English that they still retain it.

It is, perhaps, impossible to review the laws of any country without discovering many defects and many superfluities. Laws often continue, when their reasons have ceased. Laws made for the first state of the society continue unabolished, when the general form of life is changed. Parts of the judicial procedure, which were, at first, only accidental, become, in time, essential; and formalities are accumulated on each other, till the art of litigation requires more study than the discovery of right.

The king of Prussia, examining the institutions of his own country, thought them such as could only be amended by a general abrogation, and the establishment of a new body of law, to which he gave the name of the Code Frederique, which is comprised in one volume of no great bulk, and must, therefore, unavoidably contain general positions to be accommodated to particular cases by the wisdom and integrity of the courts. To embarrass justice by multiplicity of laws, or to hazard it by confidence in judges, seem to be the opposite rocks on which all civil institutions have been wrecked, and between which legislative wisdom has never yet found an open passage.

Of this new system of laws, contracted as it is, a full account cannot be expected in these memoirs; but, that curiosity may not be dismissed without some gratification, it has been thought proper to epitomise the king's plan for the reformation of his courts.

"The differences which arise between members of the same society, may be terminated by a voluntary agreement between the parties, by arbitration, or by a judicial process.

"The two first methods produce, more frequently, a temporary suspension of disputes than a final termination. Courts of justice are, therefore, necessary, with a settled method of procedure, of which the most simple is to cite the parties, to hear their pleas, and dismiss them with immediate decision.

"This, however, is, in many cases, impracticable, and in others is so seldom practised, that it is frequent rather to incur loss than to seek for legal reparation, by entering a labyrinth of which there is no end.

"This tediousness of suits keeps the parties in disquiet and perturbation, rouses and perpetuates animosities, exhausts the litigants by expense, retards the progress of their fortune, and discourages strangers from settling.

"These inconveniencies, with which the best-regulated polities of Europe are embarrassed, must be removed, not by the total prohibition of suits, which is impossible, but by contraction of processes; by opening an easy way for the appearance of truth, and removing all obstructions by which it is concealed.

"The ordonnance of 1667, by which Lewis the fourteenth established an uniformity of procedure through all his courts, has been considered as one of the greatest benefits of his reign.

"The king of Prussia, observing that each of his provinces had a different method of judicial procedure, proposed to reduce them all to one form; which being tried with success in Pomerania, a province remarkable for contention, he afterwards extended to all his dominions, ordering the judges to inform him of any difficulties which arose from it.

"Some settled method is necessary in judicial procedures. Small and simple causes might be decided upon the oral pleas of the two parties appearing before the judge; but many cases are so entangled and perplexed as to require all the skill and abilities of those who devote their lives to the study of the law.

"Advocates, or men who can understand and explain the question to be discussed, are, therefore, necessary. But these men, instead of endeavouring to promote justice and discover truth, have exerted their wits in the defence of bad causes, by forgeries of facts, and fallacies of argument.

"To remedy this evil, the king has ordered an inquiry into the qualifications of the advocate. All those who practise without a regular admission, or who can be convicted of disingenuous practice, are discarded. And the judges are commanded to examine which of the causes now depending have been protracted by the crimes and ignorance of the advocates, and to dismiss those who shall appear culpable.

"When advocates are too numerous to live by honest practice, they busy themselves in exciting disputes, and disturbing the community: the number of these to be employed in each court is, therefore, fixed.

"The reward of the advocates is fixed with due regard to the nature of the cause, and the labour required; but not a penny is received by them till the suit is ended, that it may be their interest, as well as that of the clients, to shorten the process.

"No advocate is admitted in petty courts, small towns, or villages; where the poverty of the people, and, for the most part, the low value of the matter contested, make despatch absolutely necessary. In those places the parties shall appear in person, and the judge make a summary decision.

"There must, likewise, be allowed a subordination of tribunals, and a power of appeal. No judge is so skilful and attentive as not sometimes to err. Few are so honest as not sometimes to be partial. Petty judges would become insupportably tyrannical if they were not restrained by the fear of a superiour judicature; and their decisions would be negligent or arbitrary if they were not in danger of seeing them examined and cancelled.

"The right of appeal must be restrained, that causes may not be transferred without end from court to court; and a peremptory decision must, at last, be made.

"When an appeal is made to a higher court, the appellant is allowed only four weeks to frame his bill, the judge of the lower court being to transmit to the higher all the evidences and informations. If, upon the first view of the cause thus opened, it shall appear that the appeal was made without just cause, the first sentence shall be confirmed without citation of the defendant. If any new evidence shall appear, or any doubts arise, both the parties shall be heard.

"In the discussion of causes altercation must be allowed; yet to altercation some limits must be put. There are, therefore, allowed a bill, an answer, a reply, and a rejoinder, to be delivered in writing.

"No cause is allowed to be heard in more than three different courts. To further the first decision, every advocate is enjoined, under severe penalties, not to begin a suit till he has collected all the necessary evidence. If the first court has decided in an unsatisfactory manner, an appeal may be made to the second, and from the second to the third. The process in each appeal is limited to six months. The third court may, indeed, pass an erroneous judgment; and then the injury is without redress. But this objection is without end, and, therefore, without force. No method can be found of preserving humanity from errour; but of contest there must sometime be an end; and he, who thinks himself injured for want of an appeal to a fourth court, must consider himself as suffering for the publick.

"There is a special advocate appointed for the poor.

"The attorneys, who had formerly the care of collecting evidence, and of adjusting all the preliminaries of a suit, are now totally dismissed; the whole affair is put into the hands of the advocates, and the office of an attorney is annulled for ever.

"If any man is hindered by some lawful impediment from attending his suit, time will be granted him upon the representation of his case."

Such is the order according to which civil justice is administered through the extensive dominions of the king of Prussia; which, if it exhibits nothing very subtle or profound, affords one proof more that the right is easily discovered, and that men do not so often want ability to find, as willingness to practise it.

We now return to the war.

The time at which the queen of Hungary was willing to purchase peace by the resignation of Silesia, though it came at last, was not come yet. She had all the spirit, though not all the power of her ancestors, and could not bear the thought of losing any part of her patrimonial dominions to the enemies which the opinion of her weakness raised every where against her.

In the beginning of the year 1742, the elector of Bavaria was invested with the imperial dignity, supported by the arms of France, master of the kingdom of Bohemia; and confederated with the elector Palatine, and the elector of Saxony, who claimed Moravia; and with the king of Prussia, who was in possession of Silesia.

Such was the state of the queen of Hungary, pressed on every side, and on every side preparing for resistance: she yet refused all offers of accommodation, for every prince set peace at a price which she was not yet so far humbled as to pay.

The king of Prussia was among the most zealous and forward in the confederacy against her. He promised to secure Bohemia to the emperour, and Moravia to the elector of Saxony; and, finding no enemy in the field able to resist him, he returned to Berlin, and left Schwerin, his general, to prosecute the conquest.

The Prussians, in the midst of winter, took Olmutz, the capital of Moravia, and laid the whole country under contribution. The cold then hindered them from action, and they only blocked up the fortresses of Brinn, and Spielberg.

In the spring, the king of Prussia came again into the field, and undertook the siege of Brinn; but, upon the approach of prince Charles of Lorrain, retired from before it, and quitted Moravia, leaving only a garrison in the capital.

The condition of the queen of Hungary was now changed. She was, a few months before, without money, without troops, encircled with enemies. The Bavarians had entered Austria, Vienna was threatened with a siege, and the queen left it to the fate of war, and retired into Hungary, where she was received with zeal and affection, not unmingled, however, with that neglect which must always be borne by greatness in distress. She bore the disrespect of her subjects with the same firmness as the outrages of her enemies; and, at last, persuaded the English not to despair of her preservation, by not despairing herself.

Voltaire, in his late history, has asserted, that a large sum was raised for her succour, by voluntary subscriptions of the English ladies. It is the great failing of a strong imagination to catch greedily at wonders. He was misinformed, and was, perhaps, unwilling to learn, by a second inquiry, a truth less splendid and amusing. A contribution was, by news-writers, upon their own authority, fruitlessly, and, I think, illegally proposed. It ended in nothing. The parliament voted a supply, and five hundred thousand pounds were remitted to her.

It has been always the weakness of the Austrian family to spend in the magnificence of empire, those revenues which should be kept for its defence. The court is splendid, but the treasury is empty; and, at the beginning of every war, advantages are gained against them, before their armies can be assembled and equipped.

The English money was to the Austrians, as a shower to a field, where all the vegetative powers are kept unactive by a long continuance of drought. The armies, which had hitherto been hid in mountains and forests, started out of their retreats; and, wherever the queen's standard was erected, nations scarcely known by their names, swarmed immediately about it. An army, especially a defensive army, multiplies itself. The contagion of enterprise spreads from one heart to another. Zeal for a native, or detestation of a foreign sovereign, hope of sudden greatness or riches, friendship or emulation between particular men, or, what are perhaps more general and powerful, desire of novelty and impatience of inactivity, fill a camp with adventurers, add rank to rank, and squadron to squadron.

The queen had still enemies on every part, but she now, on every part, had armies ready to oppose them. Austria was immediately recovered; the plains of Bohemia were filled with her troops, though the fortresses were garrisoned by the French. The Bavarians were recalled to the defence of their own country, now wasted by the incursions of troops that were called barbarians, greedy enough of plunder, and daring, perhaps, beyond the rules of war, but otherwise not more cruel than those whom they attacked. Prince Lobkowitz, with one army, observed the motions of Broglio, the French general, in Bohemia; and prince Charles with another, put a stop to the advances of the king of Prussia.

It was now the turn of the Prussians to retire. They abandoned Olmutz, and left behind them part of their cannon and their magazines. And the king, finding that Broglio could not long oppose prince Lobkowitz, hastened into Bohemia to his assistance; and having received a reinforcement of twenty-three thousand men, and taken the castle of Glatz, which, being built upon a rock scarcely accessible, would have defied all his power, had the garrison been furnished with provisions, he purposed to join his allies, and prosecute his conquests.

Prince Charles, seeing Moravia thus evacuated by the Prussians, determined to garrison the towns which he had just recovered, and pursue the enemy, who, by the assistance of the French, would have been too powerful for prince Lobkowitz.

Success had now given confidence to the Austrians, and had proportionably abated the spirit of their enemies. The Saxons, who had cooperated with the king of Prussia in the conquest of Moravia, of which they expected the perpetual possession, seeing all hopes of sudden acquisition defeated, and the province left again to its former masters, grew weary of following a prince, whom they considered as no longer acting the part of their confederate; and when they approached the confines of Bohemia took a different road, and left the Prussians to their own fortune.

The king continued his march, and Charles his pursuit. At Czaslau the two armies came in sight of one another, and the Austrians resolved on a decisive day. On the 6th of May, about seven in the morning, the Austrians began the attack: their impetuosity was matched by the firmness of the Prussians. The animosity of the two armies was much inflamed: the Austrians were fighting for their country, and the Prussians were in a place, where defeat must inevitably end in death or captivity. The fury of the battle continued four hours: the Prussian horse were, at length, broken, and the Austrians forced their way to the camp, where the wild troops, who had fought with so much vigour and constancy, at the sight of plunder forgot their obedience, nor had any man the least thought but how to load himself with the richest spoils.

While the right wing of the Austrians was thus employed, the main body was left naked: the Prussians recovered from their confusion, and regained the day. Charles was, at last, forced to retire, and carried with him the standards of his enemies, the proofs of a victory, which, though so nearly gained, he had not been able to keep.

The victory, however, was dearly bought; the Prussian army was much weakened, and the cavalry almost totally destroyed. Peace is easily made when it is necessary to both parties; and the king of Prussia had now reason to believe that the Austrians were not his only enemies. When he found Charles advancing, he sent to Broglio for assistance, and was answered, that "he must have orders from Versailles." Such a desertion of his most powerful ally disconcerted him, but the battle was unavoidable.

When the Prussians were returned to the camp, the king, hearing that an Austrian officer was brought in mortally wounded, had the condescension to visit him. The officer, struck with this act of humanity, said, after a short conversation: "I should die, sir, contentedly after this honour, if I might first show my gratitude to your majesty by informing you with what allies you are now united, allies that have no intention but to deceive you." The king appearing to suspect this intelligence; "Sir," said the Austrian, "if you will permit me to send a messenger to Vienna, I believe the queen will not refuse to transmit an intercepted letter now in her hands, which will put my report beyond all doubt."

The messenger was sent, and the letter transmitted, which contained the order sent to Broglio, who was, first, forbidden to mix his troops on any occasion with the Prussians. Secondly, he was ordered to act always at a distance from the king. Thirdly, to keep always a body of twenty thousand men to observe the Prussian army. Fourthly, to observe very closely the motions of the king, for important reasons. Fifthly, to hazard nothing; but to pretend want of reinforcements, or the absence of Bellisle.

The king now, with great reason, considered himself as disengaged from the confederacy, being deserted by the Saxons, and betrayed by the French; he, therefore, accepted the mediation of king George, and, in three weeks after the battle of Czaslaw, made peace with the queen of Hungary, who granted to him the whole province of Silesia, a country of such extent and opulence, that he is said to receive from it one third part of his revenues. By one of the articles of this treaty it is stipulated, "that neither should assist the enemies of the other."

The queen of Hungary, thus disentangled on one side, and set free from the most formidable of her enemies, soon persuaded the Saxons to peace; took possession of Bavaria; drove the emperour, after all his imaginary conquests, to the shelter of a neutral town, where he was treated as a fugitive; and besieged the French in Prague, in the city which they had taken from her.

Having thus obtained Silesia, the king of Prussia returned to his own capital, where he reformed his laws, forbade the torture of criminals, concluded a defensive alliance with England, and applied himself to the augmentation of his army.

This treaty of peace with the queen of Hungary was one of the first proofs given by the king of Prussia, of the secrecy of his counsels. Bellisle, the French general, was with him in the camp, as a friend and coadjutor in appearance, but in truth a spy, and a writer of intelligence. Men who have great confidence in their own penetration are often by that confidence deceived; they imagine that they can pierce through all the involutions of intrigue, without the diligence necessary to weaker minds, and, therefore, sit idle and secure; they believe that none can hope to deceive them, and, therefore, that none will try. Bellisle, with all his reputation of sagacity, though he was in the Prussian camp, gave, every day, fresh assurances of the king's adherence to his allies; while Broglio, who commanded the army at a distance, discovered sufficient reason to suspect his desertion. Broglio was slighted, and Bellisle believed, till, on the 11th of June, the treaty was signed, and the king declared his resolution to keep a neutrality.

This is one of the great performances of polity which mankind seem agreed to celebrate and admire; yet, to all this nothing was necessary but the determination of a very few men to be silent.

From this time the queen of Hungary proceeded with an uninterrupted torrent of success. The French, driven from station to station, and deprived of fortress after fortress, were, at last, enclosed with their two generals, Bellisle and Broglio, in the walls of Prague, which they had stored with all provisions necessary to a town besieged, and where they defended themselves three months before any prospect appeared of relief.

The Austrians, having been engaged chiefly in the field, and in sudden and tumultuary excursions, rather than a regular war, had no great degree of skill in attacking or defending towns. They, likewise, would naturally consider all the mischiefs done to the city, as falling, ultimately, upon themselves; and, therefore, were willing to gain it by time rather than by force.

It was apparent that, how long soever Prague might be defended, it must be yielded at last, and, therefore, all arts were tried to obtain an honourable capitulation. The messengers from the city were sent back, sometimes unheard, but always with this answer: "That no terms would be allowed, but that they should yield themselves prisoners of war."

The condition of the garrison was, in the eyes of all Europe, desperate; but the French, to whom the praise of spirit and activity cannot be denied, resolved to make an effort for the honour of their arms. Maillebois was at that time encamped with his army in Westphalia. Orders were sent him to relieve Prague. The enterprise was considered as romantick. Maillebois was a march of forty days distant from Bohemia, the passes were narrow, and the ways foul; and it was likely that Prague would be taken before he could reach it. The march was, however, begun: the army, being joined by that of count Saxe, consisted of fifty thousand men, who, notwithstanding all the difficulties which two Austrian armies could put in their way, at last entered Bohemia. The siege of Prague, though not raised, was remitted, and a communication was now opened to it with the country. But the Austrians, by perpetual intervention, hindered the garrison from joining their friends. The officers of Maillebois incited him to a battle, because the army was hourly lessening by the want of provisions; but, instead of pressing on to Prague, he retired into Bavaria, and completed the ruin of the emperour's territories.

The court of France, disappointed and offended, conferred the chief command upon Broglio, who escaped from the besiegers with very little difficulty, and kept the Austrians employed till Bellisle, by a sudden sally, quitted Prague, and without any great loss joined the main army. Broglio then retired over the Rhine into the French dominions, wasting, in his retreat, the country which he had undertaken to protect, and burning towns, and destroying magazines of corn, with such wantonness, as gave reason to believe that he expected commendation from his court for any mischiefs done, by whatever means.

The Austrians pursued their advantages, recovered all their strong places, in some of which French garrisons had been left, and made themselves masters of Bavaria, by taking not only Munich, the capital, but Ingolstadt, the strongest fortification in the elector's dominions, where they found a great number of cannon and a quantity of ammunition, intended, in the dreams of projected greatness, for the siege of Vienna, all the archives of the state, the plate and ornaments of the electoral palace, and what had been considered as most worthy of preservation. Nothing but the warlike stores were taken away. An oath of allegiance to the queen was required of the Bavarians, but without any explanation, whether temporary or perpetual.

The emperour lived at Frankfort, in the security that was allowed to neutral places, but without much respect from the German princes, except that, upon some objections made by the queen to the validity of his election, the king of Prussia declared himself determined to support him in the imperial dignity, with all his power.

This may be considered as a token of no great affection to the queen of Hungary, but it seems not to have raised much alarm. The German princes were afraid of new broils. To contest the election of an emperour, once invested and acknowledged, would be to overthrow the whole Germanick constitution. Perhaps no election by plurality of suffrages was ever made among human beings, to which it might not be objected, that voices were procured by illicit influence.

Some suspicions, however, were raised by the king's declaration, which he endeavoured to obviate by ordering his ministers to declare at London and at Vienna, that he was resolved not to violate the treaty of Breslaw. This declaration was sufficiently ambiguous, and could not satisfy those whom it might silence. But this was not a time for nice disquisitions; to distrust the king of Prussia might have provoked him, and it was most convenient to consider him as a friend, till he appeared openly as an enemy.

About the middle of the year 1744, he raised new alarms by collecting his troops and putting them in motion. The earl of Hindford about this time demanded the troops stipulated for the protection of Hanover; not, perhaps, because they were thought necessary, but that the king's designs might be guessed from his answer, which was, that troops were not granted for the defence of any country till that country was in danger, and that he could not believe the elector of Hanover to be in much dread of an invasion, since he had withdrawn the native troops, and put them into the pay of England.

He had, undoubtedly, now formed designs which made it necessary that his troops should be kept together, and the time soon came when the scene was to be opened. Prince Charles of Lorrain, having chased the French out of Bavaria, lay, for some months, encamped on the Rhine, endeavouring to gain a passage into Alsace. His attempts had long been evaded by the skill and vigilance of the French general, till, at last, June 21, 1744, he executed his design, and lodged his army in the French dominions, to the surprise and joy of a great part of Europe. It was now expected that the territories of France would, in their turn, feel the miseries of war; and the nation, which so long kept the world in alarm, be taught, at last, the value of peace.

The king of Prussia now saw the Austrian troops at a great distance from him, engaged in a foreign country against the most powerful of all their enemies. Now, therefore, was the time to discover that he had lately made a treaty at Frankfort with the emperour, by which he had engaged, "that as the court of Vienna and its allies appeared backward to reestablish the tranquillity of the empire, and more cogent methods appeared necessary; he, being animated with a desire of cooperating towards the pacification of Germany, should make an expedition for the conquest of Bohemia, and to put it into the possession of the emperour, his heirs and successours, for ever; in gratitude for which the emperour should resign to him and his successours a certain number of lordships, which are now part of the kingdom of Bohemia. His imperial majesty likewise guaranties to the king of Prussia the perpetual possession of upper Silesia; and the king guaranties to the emperour the perpetual possession of upper Austria, as soon as he shall have occupied it by conquest."

It is easy to discover that the king began the war upon other motives than zeal for peace; and that, whatever respect he was willing to show to the emperour, he did not purpose to assist him without reward. In prosecution of this treaty he put his troops in motion; and, according to his promise, while the Austrians were invading France, he invaded Bohemia.

Princes have this remaining of humanity, that they think themselves obliged not to make war without a reason. Their reasons are, indeed, not always very satisfactory.

Lewis the fourteenth seemed to think his own glory a sufficient motive for the invasion of Holland. The czar attacked Charles of Sweden, because he had not been treated with sufficient respect when he made a journey in disguise. The king of Prussia, having an opportunity of attacking his neighbour, was not long without his reasons. On July 30th, he published his declaration, in which he declares:

"That he can no longer stand an idle spectator of the troubles in Germany, but finds himself obliged to make use of force to restore the power of the laws, and the authority of the emperour.

"That the queen of Hungary has treated the emperour's hereditary dominions with inexpressible cruelty.

"That Germany has been overrun with foreign troops which have marched through neutral countries without the customary requisitions.

"That the emperour's troops have been attacked under neutral fortresses, and obliged to abandon the empire, of which their master is the head.

"That the imperial dignity has been treated with indecency by the Hungarian troops.

"The queen, declaring the election of the emperour void, and the diet of Frankfort illegal, had not only violated the imperial dignity, but injured all the princes who have the right of election.

"That he had no particular quarrel with the queen of Hungary; and that he desires nothing for himself, and only enters as an auxiliary into a war for the liberties of Germany.

"That the emperour had offered to quit his pretension to the dominions of Austria, on condition that his hereditary countries be restored to him.

"That this proposal had been made to the king of England at Hanau, and rejected in such a manner as showed, that the king of England had no intention to restore peace, but rather to make his advantage of the troubles.

"That the mediation of the Dutch had been desired; but that they declined to interpose, knowing the inflexibility of the English and Austrian courts.

"That the same terms were again offered at Vienna, and again rejected; that, therefore, the queen must impute it to her own councils, that her enemies find new allies.

"That he is not fighting for any interest of his own, that he demands nothing for himself; but is determined to exert all his powers in defence of the emperour, in vindication of the right of election, and in support of the liberties of Germany, which the queen of Hungary would enslave."

When this declaration was sent to the Prussian minister in England, it was accompanied with a remonstrance to the king, in which many of the foregoing positions were repeated; the emperour's candour and disinterestedness were magnified; the dangerous designs of the Austrians were displayed; it was imputed to them, as the most flagrant violation of the Germanick constitution, that they had driven the emperour's troops out of the empire; the publick spirit and generosity of his Prussian majesty were again heartily declared; and it was said, that this quarrel having no connexion with English interests, the English ought not to interpose.

Austria and all her allies were put into amazement by this declaration, which, at once, dismounted them from the summit of success, and obliged them to fight through the war a second time. What succours, or what promises, Prussia received from France, was never publickly known; but it is not to be doubted that a prince, so watchful of opportunity, sold assistance, when it was so much wanted, at the highest rate; nor can it be supposed that he exposed himself to so much hazard only for the freedom of Germany, and a few petty districts in Bohemia.

The French, who, from ravaging the empire at discretion, and wasting whatever they found either among enemies or friends, were now driven into their own dominions, and, in their own dominions, were insulted and pursued, were, on a sudden, by this new auxiliary, restored to their former superiority, at least were disburdened of their invaders, and delivered from their terrours. And all the enemies of the house of Bourbon saw, with indignation and amazement, the recovery of that power which they had, with so much cost and bloodshed, brought low, and which their animosity and elation had disposed them to imagine yet lower than it was.

The queen of Hungary still retained her firmness. The Prussian declaration was not long without an answer, which was transmitted to the European princes, with some observations on the Prussian minister's remonstrance to the court of Vienna, which he was ordered by his master to read to the Austrian council, but not to deliver. The same caution was practised before, when the Prussians, after the emperour's death, invaded Silesia. This artifice of political debate may, perhaps, be numbered by the admirers of greatness among the refinements of conduct; but, as it is a method of proceeding not very difficult to be contrived or practised, as it can be of very rare use to honesty or wisdom, and as it has been long known to that class of men whose safety depends upon secrecy, though hitherto applied chiefly in petty cheats and slight transactions; I do not see that it can much advance the reputation of regal understanding, or, indeed, that it can add more to the safety, than it takes away from the honour of him that shall adopt it.

The queen, in her answer, after charging the king of Prussia with breach of the treaty of Breslaw, and observing how much her enemies will exult to see the peace now the third time broken by him, declares:

"That she had no intention to injure the rights of the electors, and that she calls in question not the event, but the manner of the election.

"That she had spared the emperour's troops with great tenderness, and that they were driven out of the empire, only because they were in the service of France.

"That she is so far from disturbing the peace of the empire, that the only commotions now raised in it are the effect of the armaments of the king of Prussia."

Nothing is more tedious than publick records, when they relate to affairs which, by distance of time or place, lose their power to interest the reader. Every thing grows little, as it grows remote; and of things thus diminished, it is sufficient to survey the aggregate without a minute examination of the parts.

It is easy to perceive, that, if the king of Prussia's reasons be sufficient, ambition or animosity can never want a plea for violence and invasion. What he charges upon the queen of Hungary, the waste of country, the expulsion of the Bavarians, and the employment of foreign troops, is the unavoidable consequence of a war inflamed on either side to the utmost violence. All these grievances subsisted when he made the peace, and, therefore, they could very little justify its breach.

It is true, that every prince of the empire is obliged to support the imperial dignity, and assist the emperour, when his rights are violated. And every subsequent contract must be understood in a sense consistent with former obligations. Nor had the king power to make a peace on terms contrary to that constitution by which he held a place among the Germanick electors. But he could have easily discovered, that not the emperour, but the duke of Bavaria, was the queen's enemy; not the administrator of the imperial power, but the claimant of the Austrian dominions. Nor did his allegiance to the emperour, supposing the emperour injured, oblige him to more than a succour of ten thousand men. But ten thousand men could not conquer Bohemia, and without the conquest of Bohemia he could receive no reward for the zeal and fidelity which he so loudly professed.

The success of this enterprise he had taken all possible precaution to secure. He was to invade a country guarded only by the faith of treaties, and, therefore, left unarmed, and unprovided of all defence. He had engaged the French to attack prince Charles, before he should repass the Rhine, by which the Austrians would, at least, have been hindered from a speedy march into Bohemia: they were, likewise, to yield him such other assistance as he might want.

Relying, therefore, upon the promises of the French, he resolved to attempt the ruin of the house of Austria, and, in August, 1744, broke into Bohemia, at the head of a hundred and four thousand men. When he entered the country, he published a proclamation, promising, that his army should observe the strictest discipline, and that those who made no resistance should be suffered to remain in quiet in their habitations. He required that all arms, in the custody of whomsoever they might be placed, should be given up, and put into the hands of publick officers. He still declared himself to act only as an auxiliary to the emperour, and with no other design than to establish peace and tranquillity throughout Germany, his dear country.

In this proclamation there is one paragraph, of which I do not remember any precedent. He threatens, that, if any peasant should be found with arms, he shall be hanged without further inquiry; and that, if any lord shall connive at his vassals keeping arms in their custody, his village shall be reduced to ashes.

It is hard to find upon what pretence the king of Prussia could treat the Bohemians as criminals, for preparing to defend their native country, or maintaining their allegiance to their lawful sovereign against an invader, whether he appears principal or auxiliary, whether he professes to intend tranquillity or confusion.

His progress was such as gave great hopes to the enemies of Austria: like Caesar, he conquered as he advanced, and met with no opposition, till he reached the walls of Prague. The indignation and resentment of the queen of Hungary may be easily conceived; the alliance of Frankfort was now laid open to all Europe; and the partition of the Austrian dominions was again publickly projected. They were to be shared among the emperour, the king of Prussia, the elector Palatine, and the landgrave of Hesse. All the powers of Europe who had dreamed of controlling France, were awakened to their former terrours; all that had been done was now to be done again; and every court, from the straits of Gibraltar to the Frozen sea, was filled with exultation or terrour, with schemes of conquest, or precautions for defence.

The king, delighted with his progress, and expecting, like other mortals elated with success, that his prosperity could not be interrupted, continued his march, and began, in the latter end of September, the siege of Prague. He had gained several of the outer posts, when he was informed that the convoy, which attended his artillery, was attacked by an unexpected party of the Austrians. The king went immediately to their assistance, with the third part of his army, and found his troops put to flight, and the Austrians hasting away with his cannons: such a loss would have disabled him at once. He fell upon the Austrians, whose number would not enable them to withstand him, recovered his artillery, and, having also defeated Bathiani, raised his batteries; and, there being no artillery to be placed against him, he destroyed a great part of the city. He then ordered four attacks to be made at once, and reduced the besieged to such extremities, that in fourteen days the governour was obliged to yield the place.

At the attack, commanded by Schwerin, a grenadier is reported to have mounted the bastion alone, and to have defended himself, for some time, with his sword, till his followers mounted after him; for this act of bravery, the king made him a lieutenant, and gave him a patent of nobility.

Nothing now remained but that the Austrians should lay aside all thought of invading France, and apply their whole power to their own defence. Prince Charles, at the first news of the Prussian invasion, prepared to repass the Rhine. This the French, according to their contract with the king of Prussia, should have attempted to hinder; but they knew, by experience, the Austrians would not be beaten without resistance, and that resistance always incommodes an assailant. As the king of Prussia rejoiced in the distance of the Austrians, whom he considered as entangled in the French territories; the French rejoiced in the necessity of their return, and pleased themselves with the prospect of easy conquests, while powers, whom they considered with equal malevolence, should be employed in massacring each other.

Prince Charles took the opportunity of bright moonshine to repass the Rhine; and Noailles, who had early intelligence of his motions, gave him very little disturbance, but contented himself with attacking the rearguard, and, when they retired to the main body, ceased his pursuit.

The king, upon the reduction of Prague, struck a medal, which had on one side a plan of the town, with this inscription:

"Prague taken by the king of Prussia,
September 16, 1744;
For the third time in three years."

On the other side were two verses, in which he prayed, "that his conquests might produce peace." He then marched forward with the rapidity which constitutes his military character; took possession of almost all Bohemia, and began to talk of entering Austria and besieging Vienna.

The queen was not yet wholly without resource. The elector of Saxony, whether invited or not, was not comprised in the union of Frankfort; and, as every sovereign is growing less as his next neighbour is growing greater, he could not heartily wish success to a confederacy which was to aggrandize the other powers of Germany. The Prussians gave him, likewise, a particular and immediate provocation to oppose them; for, when they departed to the conquest of Bohemia, with all the elation of imaginary success, they passed through his dominions with unlicensed and contemptuous disdain of his authority. As the approach of prince Charles gave a new prospect of events, he was easily persuaded to enter into an alliance with the queen, whom he furnished with a very large body of troops.

The king of Prussia having left a garrison in Prague, which he commanded to put the burghers to death, if they left their houses in the night, went forward to take the other towns and fortresses, expecting, perhaps, that prince Charles would be interrupted in his march; but the French, though they appeared to follow him, either could not, or would not, overtake him.

In a short time, by marches pressed on with the utmost eagerness, Charles reached Bohemia, leaving the Bavarians to regain the possession of the wasted plains of their country, which their enemies, who still kept the strong places, might again seize at will. At the approach of the Austrian army, the courage of the king of Prussia seemed to have failed him. He retired from post to post, and evacuated town after town, and fortress after fortress, without resistance, or appearance of resistance, as if he was resigning them to the rightful owners.

It might have been expected, that he should have made some effort to rescue Prague; but, after a faint attempt to dispute the passage of the Elbe, he ordered his garrison of eleven thousand men to quit the place. They left behind them their magazines and heavy artillery, among which were seven pieces of remarkable excellence, called "the seven electors." But they took with them their field cannon, and a great number of carriages, laden with stores and plunder, which they were forced to leave, in their way, to the Saxons and Austrians that harassed their march. They, at last, entered Silesia, with the loss of about a third part.

The king of Prussia suffered much in his retreat; for, besides the military stores, which he left every where behind him, even to the clothes of his troops, there was a want of provisions in his army, and, consequently, frequent desertions and many diseases; and a soldier sick or killed was equally lost to a flying army.

At last he reentered his own territories, and, having stationed his troops in places of security, returned, for a time, to Berlin, where he forbade all to speak either ill or well of the campaign.

To what end such a prohibition could conduce, it is difficult to discover: there is no country in which men can be forbidden to know what they know, and what is universally known may as well be spoken. It is true, that in popular governments seditious discourses may inflame the vulgar; but in such governments they cannot be restrained, and in absolute monarchies they are of little effect.

When the Prussians invaded Bohemia, and this whole nation was fired with resentment, the king of England gave orders in his palace, that none should mention his nephew with disrespect; by this command he maintained the decency necessary between princes, without enforcing, and, probably, without expecting obedience, but in his own presence.

The king of Prussia's edict regarded only himself, and, therefore, it is difficult to tell what was his motive, unless he intended to spare himself the mortification of absurd and illiberal flattery, which, to a mind stung with disgrace, must have been in the highest degree painful and disgusting.

Moderation in prosperity is a virtue very difficult to all mortals; forbearance of revenge, when revenge is within reach, is scarcely ever to be found among princes. Now was the time when the queen of Hungary might, perhaps, have made peace on her own terms; but keenness of resentment, and arrogance of success, withheld her from the due use of the present opportunity. It is said, that the king of Prussia, in his retreat, sent letters to prince Charles, which were supposed to contain ample concessions, but were sent back unopened. The king of England offered, likewise, to mediate between them; but his propositions were rejected at Vienna, where a resolution was taken, not only to revenge the interruption of their success on the Rhine, by the recovery of Silesia, but to reward the Saxons for their seasonable help, by giving them part of the Prussian dominions.

In the beginning of the year 1745, died the emperour Charles of Bavaria; the treaty of Frankfort was consequently at an end; and the king of Prussia, being no longer able to maintain the character of auxiliary to the emperour, and having avowed no other reason for the war, might have honourably withdrawn his forces, and, on his own principles, have complied with terms of peace; but no terms were offered him; the queen pursued him with the utmost ardour of hostility, and the French left him to his own conduct and his own destiny.

His Bohemian conquests were already lost; and he was now chased back into Silesia, where, at the beginning of the year, the war continued in an equilibration by alternate losses and advantages. In April, the elector of Bavaria, seeing his dominions overrun by the Austrians, and receiving very little succour from the French, made a peace with the queen of Hungary upon easy conditions, and the Austrians had more troops to employ against Prussia.

But the revolutions of war will not suffer human presumption to remain long unchecked. The peace with Bavaria was scarcely concluded when, the battle of Fontenoy was lost, and all the allies of Austria called upon her to exert her utmost power for the preservation of the Low Countries; and, a few days after the loss at Fontenoy, the first battle between the Prussians and the combined army of Austrians and Saxons, was fought at Niedburg in Silesia.

The particulars of this battle were variously reported by the different parties, and published in the journals of that time; to transcribe them would be tedious and useless, because accounts of battles are not easily understood, and because there are no means of determining to which of the relations credit should be given. It is sufficient that they all end in claiming or allowing a complete victory to the king of Prussia, who gained all the Austrian artillery, killed four thousand, took seven thousand prisoners, with the loss, according to the Prussian narrative, of only sixteen hundred men.

He now advanced again into Bohemia, where, however, he made no great progress. The queen of Hungary, though defeated, was not subdued. She poured in her troops from all parts to the reinforcement of prince Charles, and determined to continue the struggle with all her power. The king saw that Bohemia was an unpleasing and inconvenient theatre of war, in which he should be ruined by a miscarriage, and should get little by a victory. Saxony was left defenceless, and, if it was conquered, might be plundered.

He, therefore, published a declaration against the elector of Saxony, and, without waiting for reply, invaded his dominions. This invasion produced another battle at Standentz, which ended, as the former, to the advantage of the Prussians. The Austrians had some advantage in the beginning; and their irregular troops, who are always daring, and are always ravenous, broke into the Prussian camp, and carried away the military chest. But this was easily repaired by the spoils of Saxony.

The queen of Hungary was still inflexible, and hoped that fortune would, at last, change. She recruited once more her army, and prepared to invade the territories of Brandenburg; but the king of Prussia's activity prevented all her designs. One part of his forces seized Leipsic, and the other once more defeated the Saxons; the king of Poland fled from his dominions; prince Charles retired into Bohemia. The king of Prussia entered Dresden as a conqueror, exacted very severe contributions from the whole country, and the Austrians and Saxons were, at last, compelled to receive from him such a peace as he would grant. He imposed no severe conditions, except the payment of the contributions, made no new claim of dominions, and, with the elector Palatine, acknowledged the duke of Tuscany for emperour.

The lives of princes, like the histories of nations, have their periods. We shall here suspend our narrative of the king of Prussia, who was now at the height of human greatness, giving laws to his enemies, and courted by all the powers of Europe.

[The end]
Samuel Johnson's essay: King Of Prussia

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