3793 oration of Lomono/soff- 313 
ardent zeal with which the incipient army -was at- 
tached to their sovereign, when they beheld him in 
their own ranks, at the same table, partaking of the 
common fare 5 when they saw his face covered with the 
Same sweat and dust; when they saw that he differed 
in nothing, except that in exercise he was the most afsi- 
duous, the most expert. By such extraordinary exam- 
ple, keeping pace with his subjects in promotion, this 
wise sovereign demonstrated, that monarchs can in 
ho way so much advance their own majesty, the 
glory, and height of their own dignity, as by similar 
condescension.* The Rufsian.army grew strong by 
this encouragement, and in a twelve years war wich 
the crown of Sweden, as well as afterwards in many 
other expeditions, filled the ends of the universe w th 
the victorious thunder of its arms. .True the first 
engagement at Narva was unsuccefsful ; but the su- 
periority of the enemy, and retreat of the Rufsiaas, 
have, from malice and pride, to increase their glo- 
ry, and magnify our defeat, been much exaggerat~ 
ed beyond the truth. The Rufsian troops were only 
of two years standing ; the enemy disciplined and in- 
* In every transaction of Peter’s life, when nearly examined, we dis« 
gover the amazing stretch of that man’s mind. Before his time it was 
reckoned an indelible disgrace for any man in Rufsia to serve in the 
army under a man whose father had occupied a lower military rank 
than the father of the person whom he was tocommand. This was an 
insuperable bar to military discipline and a regular army. Peter saw at 
once that the only effectual way. to de away all this, was to go into 
the army himself in the lowest station, and to obey with due submifsion 
every officer who was placed above him; as, what he did, no other 
person could think was difhonourable. Thus did he at once, by a no- 
‘ble self command, abolish a custom that no law however severe could 
have abrogated without the most violent struggles. 
VOL. xVil. RR t 
