PRUSSIA. 



FruMia. 





Frederkk 



William 



111. 



eury replenished with 17,000,000 Sterling, notwith- 

 ' standing the expensive wars in which his predecessor 

 had been engaged. Hut though thus furnished with 

 means for pursuing the system of aggrandizement by 

 which his family had always been distinguished, 

 Frederick William was of a pacific disposition; and his 

 reign passed over in peace, except a short but brilliant 

 campaign made into the territories of Holland in 1787, 

 in support of the prerogatives of the Prince of Orange 

 and the hesitating and unsuccessful wars with France 

 during the years 1792, 1793, and 179*. Of both 

 these expeditions, the Duke of Brunswick was com- 

 mander, a general of great personal bravery and mili- 

 tary skill. Frederick William, unlike his ancestors, 

 was improvident and extravagant in his expenditure, 

 and though he accumulated no debt, he dissipated the 

 immense treasures left him by his predecessor. He 

 restored the German, the vernacular language of Prus- 

 sia, to the rank it possessed before the accession of Fre- 

 derick the Great. " Germans we are," says he, " and 

 Germans I mean we shall continue." He strictly pro- 

 hibited all publications that had a tendency to under- 

 mine the principles of Christianity, or bring it into con- 

 tempt. His death took place in 1797, when his son, 

 the present monarch, ascended the throne. In the 

 early parts of this reign, nothing happened deserving 

 of commemoration. In addition to the most sedulous 

 attention to the discipline and efficiency of his army, 

 the king was continually occupied with objects of in- 

 ternal national policy, till 1806, when his own rapacity, 

 and the circumstances of France, involved him in a 

 war which terminated in the almost total extinction 

 of his kingdom. Seeing the formidable power of 

 the French arms rapidly increasing, and taught an im- 

 portant lesson by the fall of the Austrians at Auster- 

 litz, he formed an alliance with Bonaparte, and even 

 shared in his unjust spoils (1806) by invading Hano- 

 ver, and annexing it to his dominions, and by shutting 

 the ports of the German Sea and of Lubec against the 

 British flag. The result of this proceeding may easily be 

 anticipated: the British minister immediately left Berlin, 

 and a declaration of war on the part of England was 

 soon after proclaimed. But the Prussian monarch ere 

 long ascertained that Bonaparte regarded him as little else 

 than a vassal prince, whose rights he disregarded, and 

 whom he meant to destroy when he had accomplished 

 his more grand and important enterprises. The Con- 

 federation of the Rhine also opened his eyes to the 

 dangerous and precarious nature of his situation ; and 

 accordingly, in October 1806, a declaration of war was 

 published by Prussia against the French Emperor. The 

 first result of this step was the celebrated battle of 

 Jena, in which Prussia lost 40,000 men, including 

 about 20 generals, among whom the Duke of Bruns- 

 wick was mortally wounded. This engagement took 

 place on the 14th of October; and so rapid were the 

 movements of Bonaparte, that, after having reduced 

 Erfurt, Magdeburg, and Stettin, on the 27th of the 

 same month he marched his victorious army into Ber- 

 lin. The king of Prussia, in the mean time, retreated 

 first to Custrin, and afterwards to Konigsburg. And 

 having been reinforced by an army from Russia, an- 

 other dreadful battle took place at Pultusk, (26th De- 

 cember) in which the Russians were completely de- 

 feated. The French afterwards invaded Silesia, took 

 Stralsund, Colberg, and Dantzic, and carried vic- 

 tory and devastation with them in every direction. 

 And to such a state of distress was Frederick at length 

 reduced, that with all his dominions in the hand of 



i 



the enemy, except Etat Prussia, the British minister P 

 (Tor |>eace waa now re-established between this coun- * *- 

 try and Prussia) found it necessary to advance 80,000 

 for the support of hia family and domestic household. 

 A treaty of peace, however, dated at Tilait in 1807, 

 was at length entered into with Prance, but on such 

 disadvantageous terms, that little more of a sovereign 

 waa left Frederick than the name. By this peace the 

 Prussian monarch (who had formerly ceded to France 

 the duchies of Cleves and Berg) renounced the whole 

 of his dominions situated between the Rhine and the 

 Elbe, part of Lusatia, the city of Dantzic, all the 

 provinces which formerly constituted part of Poland, 

 and agreed to shut his ports against the trade and 

 navigation of Great Britain. Nor was this all. He 

 had to support the armies of France stationed in hia 

 territories, to pay immense contributions to the 

 French Emperor and every decree issued in Holland 

 against the commerce of Britain, to promulgate and 

 enforce in his mutilated provinces. Frederick, thus 

 humbled and reduced, endeavoured to submit with as 

 much grace and patience as was possible, and to alle- 

 viate the sufferings of his subjects by effecting great 

 reductions in his civil and military establishments. 

 This peace, which may be regarded as merely nominal, 

 as Bonaparte fulfilled no part of his engagements, con- 

 tinued for six years, during which time the Prus- 

 sians underwent such unutterable calamities, and felt 

 so deeply for their oppressed and enslaved country, 

 which once held so distinguished a place among the 

 nations of Europe, that in 1813, when they threw off War with 

 the yoke of France, and in alliance with Britain, Franc*. 

 Austria, Russia, and Sweden, endeavoured to check 

 the aggressions of Bonaparte, or to accomplish his 

 overthrow, they exhibited a degree of heroism, intre- 

 pidity and skill, not surpassed in the annals of any 

 nation. Frederick, indeed, notwithstanding the thral- 

 dom under which he laboured, was not inattentive to 

 the military spirit and discipline of his army. The 

 number of his troops at any one time was remarkably 

 small, scarcely exceeding 20,000 men ; yet, by a suc- 

 cession of enlistments, and by supplying the place of 

 those who, being sufficiently drilled and accomplished, 

 were dismissed, he had almost all his subjects capable 

 of bearing arms, so trained and exercised in the mili- 

 tary art, that at the period mentioned above, he could 

 bring to the field upwards of 200,000 regularly in- 

 structed soldiers. The French had indeed robbed the 

 kingdom of arms, but this loss was promptly supplied 

 by the assistance of Britain and other powers. And this 

 numerous army, led on by the illustrious generals Blu- 

 cher and Bulow, performed prodigies of valour, particu- 

 larly at Lutzen, Juterboch, Leipsic, in the recovery of 

 Silesia, and in the invasion of France in 1813 and 

 1814. Hostilities were for a short time suspended by 

 the negotiations of Chatillon. But the bravery and the 

 military talents of the Prussians were again displayed at 

 Montmartre ; and in the following year, on the return 

 of Bonaparte from Elba, in the ever memorable battle 

 of Waterloo. The consequences of this glorious vic- 

 tory on the part of the allies, was the settlement of the 

 different nations of Europe in the circumstances in 

 which they have since continued. The congress of Oongrcn of 

 Vienna had the delicate and difficult task of assigning Vienna, 

 acquisitions and boundaries to the various powers 

 that had been engaged in the great struggle; and to 

 Prussia were secured the restitution of the provinces 

 (with the exception of part of Poland) formerly 

 wrested from her, and the addition of such new ter- 



