History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 11. Томас Карлейль
those cheap terms;—nay almost as Houses of Parliament with Standing Committees and appendages, so many Acts of Parliament admittedly rather wise, being passed daily by his Majesty's help and theirs!—Friedrich paid them rather well; they saw no society; lived wholly to their work, and to their own families. Eichel alone of the three was mentioned at all by mankind, and that obscurely; an "abstruse, reserved, long-headed kind of man;" and "made a great deal of money in the end," insinuates Busching, [Beitrage, v. 238, &c.] no friend of Friedrich's or his.
In superficial respects, again, Friedrich finds that the Prussian King ought to have a King's Establishment, and maintain a decent splendor among his neighbors,—as is not quite the case at present. In this respect he does make changes. A certain quantity of new Pages, new Goldsticks; some considerable, not too considerable, new furbishing of the Royal Household,—as it were, a fair coat of new paint, with gilding not profuse,—brought it to the right pitch for this King, About "a hundred and fifty" new figures of the Page and Goldstick kind, is the reckoning given. [Helden Geschichte, i. 353.] So many of these; and there is an increase of 16,000 to one's Army going on: that is the proportion noticeable. In the facts as his Father left them Friedrich persisted all his life; in the semblances or outer vestures he changed, to this extent for the present.—These are the Phenomena of Friedrich's Accession, noted by us.
Readers see there is radiance enough, perhaps slightly in excess, but of intrinsically good quality, in the Aurora of this new Reign. A brilliant valiant young King; much splendor of what we could call a golden or soft nature (visible in those "New-Era" doings of his, in those strong affections to his Friends); and also, what we like almost better in him, something of a STEEL-BRIGHT or stellar splendor (meaning, clearness of eyesight, intrepidity, severe loyalty to fact),—which is a fine addition to the softer element, and will keep IT and its philanthropies and magnanimities well under rule. Such a man is rare in this world; how extremely rare such a man born King! He is swift and he is persistent; sharply discerning, fearless to resolve and perform; carries his great endowments lightly, as if they were not heavy to him. He has known hard misery, been taught by stripes; a light stoicism sits gracefully on him.
"What he will grow to?" Probably to something considerable. Very certainly to something far short of his aspirations; far different from his own hopes; and the world's concerning him. It is not we, it is Father Time that does the controlling and fulfilling of our hopes; and strange work he makes of them and us. For example, has not Friedrich's grand "New Era," inaugurated by him in a week, with the leading spirits all adoring, issued since in French Revolution and a "world well suicided,"—the leading spirits much thrown out in consequence! New Era has gone to great lengths since Friedrich's time; and the leading spirits do not now adore it, but yawn over it, or worse! Which changes to us the then aspect of Friedrich, and his epoch and his aspirations, a good deal.—On the whole, Friedrich will go his way, Time and the leading spirits going theirs; and, like the rest of us, will grow to what he can. His actual size is not great among the Kingdoms: his outward resources are rather to be called small. The Prussian Dominion at that date is, in extent, about four-fifths of an England Proper, and perhaps not one-fifth so fertile: subject Population is well under Two Millions and a Half; Revenue not much above One Million Sterling,' [The exact statistic cipher is, at Friedrich's Accession: PRUSSIAN TERRITORIES, 2,275 square miles German (56,875 English); POPULATION, 2,240,000; ANNUAL REVENUE, 7,371,707 thalers 7 groschen (1,105,756 pounds without the pence). See Prenss, Buch fur Jedermann, i. 49; Stenzel, iii. 692; &c.]—very small, were not thrift such a VECTIGAL.
This young King is magnanimous; not much to be called ambitious, or not in the vulgar sense almost at all,—strange as it may sound to readers. His hopes at this time are many;—and among them, I perceive, there is not wanting secretly, in spite of his experiences, some hope that he himself may be a good deal "happier" than formerly. Nor is there any ascetic humor, on his part, to forbid trial. He is much determined to try. Probably enough, as we guess and gather, his agreeablest anticipations, at this time, were of Reinsberg: How, in the intervals of work well done, he would live there wholly to the Muses; have his chosen spirits round him, his colloquies, his suppers of the gods. Why not? There might be a King of Intellects conceivable withal; protecting, cherishing, practically guiding the chosen Illuminative Souls of this world. A new Charlemagne, the smallest new Charlemagne of Spiritual type, with HIS Paladins round him; how glorious, how salutary in the dim generations now going!—These too were hopes which proved signally futile. Rigorous Time could not grant these at all;—granted, in his own hard way, other things instead. But, all along, the Life-element, the Epoch, though Friedrich took it kindly and never complained, was ungenial to such a man.
"Somewhat of a rotten Epoch, this into which Friedrich has been born, to shape himself and his activities royal and other!"—exclaims Smelfungus once: "In an older earnest Time, when the eternally awful meanings of this Universe had not yet sunk into dubieties to any one, much less into levities or into mendacities, into huge hypocrisies carefully regulated,—so luminous, vivid and ingenuous a young creature had not wanted divine manna in his Pilgrimage through Life. Nor, in that case, had he come out of it in so lean a condition. But the highest man of us is born brother to his Contemporaries; struggle as he may, there is no escaping the family likeness. By spasmodic indignant contradiction of them, by stupid compliance with them,—you will inversely resemble, if you do not directly; like the starling, you can't get out!—Most surely, if there do fall manna from Heaven, in the given Generation, and nourish in us reverence and genial nobleness day by day, it is blessed and well. Failing that, in regard to our poor spiritual interests, there is sure to be one of two results: mockery, contempt, disbelief, what we may call SHORT-DIET to the length of very famine (which was Friedrich's case); or else slow-poison, carefully elaborated and provided by way of daily nourishment.
"Unhappy souls, these same! The slow-poison has gone deep into them. Instead of manna, this long while back, they have been living on mouldy corrupt meats sweetened by sugar-of-lead; or perhaps, like Voltaire, a few individuals prefer hunger, as the cleaner alternative; and in contemptuous, barren, mocking humor, not yet got the length of geniality or indignation, snuff the east-wind by way of spiritual diet. Pilgriming along on such nourishment, the best human soul fails to become very ruddy!—Tidings about Heaven are fallen so uncertain, but the Earth and her joys are still Interesting: 'Take to the Earth and her joys;—let your soul go out, since it must; let your five senses and their appetites be well alive.' That is a dreadful 'Sham-Christian Dispensation' to be born under! You wonder at the want of heroism in the Eighteenth Century. Wonder rather at the degree of heroism it had; wonder how many souls there still are to be met with in it of some effective capability, though dieting in that way,—nothing else to be had in the shops about. Carterets, Belleisles, Friedrichs, Voltaires; Chathams, Franklins, Choiseuls: there is an effective stroke of work, a fine fire of heroic pride, in this man and the other; not yet extinguished by spiritual famine or slow-poison; so robust is Nature the mighty Mother!—
"But in general, that sad Gospel, 'Souls extinct, Stomachs well alive!' is the credible one, not articulately preached, but practically believed by the abject generations, and acted on as it never was before. What immense sensualities there were, is known; and also (as some small offset, though that has not yet begun in 1740) what immense quantities of Physical Labor and contrivance were got out of mankind, in that Epoch and down to this day. As if, having lost its Heaven, it had struck desperately down into the Earth; as if it were a BEAVER-kind, and not a mankind any more. We had once a Barbaossa; and a world all grandly true. But from that to Karl VI., and HIS Holy Romish Reich in such a state of 'Holiness'—!" I here cut short my abstruse Friend.
Readers are impatient to have done with these miscellaneous preludings, and to be once definitely under way, such a Journey lying ahead. Yes, readers; a Journey indeed! And, at this point, permit me to warn you that, where the ground, where Dryasdust and the Destinies, yield anything humanly illustrative of Friedrich and his Work, one will have to linger, and carefully gather it, even as here. Large tracts occur, bestrewn with mere pedantisms, diplomatic cobwebberies, learned marine-stores, and inhuman matter, over which we shall have to skip empty-handed: this also was among the sad conditions of our Enterprise, that it has to go now too slow and again too fast; not in proportion to natural importance of objects, but to several inferior considerations withal. So busy has perverse Destiny been on it; perverse