Friedrich Wilhelm holds Tabagie nightly; but at Wusterhausen or wherever
he may be, there is no lack of intricate Official Labor, which, even
in the Tabagie, Friedrich Wilhelm does not forget. At the time he was
concocting those Instructions for his little Prince's Schoolmasters, and
smoking meditative under the stars, with Magdeburg "RITTER-DIENST" and
much else of his own to think of,--there is an extraneous Political
Intricacy, making noise enough in the world, much in his thoughts
withal, and no doubt occasionally murmured of amid the tobacco-clouds.
The Business of the Heidelberg Protestants; which is just coming to a
height in those Autumn months of 1719.
Indeed this Year 1719 was a particularly noisy one for him. This is
the year of the "nephritic colic," which befell at Brandenburg on some
journey of his Majesty's; with alarm of immediate death; Queen Sophie
sent for by express; testament made in her favor; and intrigues, very
black ones, Wilhelmina thinks, following thereupon. [_Memoires de
Bareith,_ i. 26-29.] And the "Affair of Clement," on which the old Books
are so profuse, falls likewise, the crisis of it falls, in 1719. Of
Clement the "Hungarian Nobleman," who was a mere Hungarian Swindler, and
Forger of Royal Letters; sowing mere discords, black suspicions, between
Friedrich Wilhelm and the neighboring Courts, Imperial and Saxon: "Your
Majesty to be snapt up, some day, by hired ruffians, and spirited away,
for behoof of those treacherous Courts:" so that Friedrich Wilhelm fell
into a gloom of melancholy, and for long weeks "never slept but with a
pair of loaded pistols under his pillow:"--of this Clement, an
adroit Phenomenon of the kind, and intensely agitating to Friedrich
Wilhelm;--whom Friedrich Wilhelm had at last to lay hold of, try, this
very year, and ultimately hang, [Had arrived in Berlin, "end of 1717;"
stayed about a year, often privately in the King's company, poisoning
the royal mind; withdrew to the Hague, suspecting Berlin might soon
grow dangerous;--is wiled out of that Territory into the Prussian, and
arrested, by one of Friedrich Wilhelm's Colonels, "end of 1718;" lies
in Spandau, getting tried, for seventeen months; hanged, with two
Accomplices, 18th April, 1720. (See, in succession, Stenzel, iii. 298,
302; Fassmann, p. 321; Forster, ii. 272, and iii. 320-324.)] amid the
rumor and wonder of mankind:--of him, noisy as he was, and still filling
many pages of the old Books, a hint shall suffice, and we will say
nothing farther. But this of the Heidelberg Protestants, though also
rather an extinct business, has still some claims on us. This, in
justice to the "inarticulate man of genius," and for other reasons, we
must endeavor to resuscitate a little.
OF KUR-PFALZ KARL PHILIP: HOW HE GOT A WIFE LONG SINCE, AND DID FEATS IN
THE WORLD.
There reigns, in these years, at Heidelberg, as Elector Palatine, a
kind-tempered but abrupt and somewhat unreasonable old gentleman, now
verging towards sixty, Karl Philip by name; who has come athwart the
Berlin Court and its affairs more than once; and will again do so, in
a singularly disturbing way. From before Friedrich Wilhelm's birth,
all through Friedrich Wilhelm's life and farther, this Karl Philip is a
stone-of-stumbling there. His first feat in life was that of running off
with a Prussian Princess from Berlin; the rumor of which was still at
its height when Friedrich Wilhelm, a fortnight after, came into the
world,--the gossips still talking of it, we may fancy, when Friedrich
Wilhelm was first swaddled. An unheard-of thing; the manner of which was
this.
Readers have perhaps forgotten, that old King Friedrich I. once had a
Brother; elder Brother, who died, to the Father's great sorrow, and made
way for Friedrich as Crown-Prince. This Brother had been married a short
time; he left a Widow without children; a beautiful Lithuanian Princess,
born Radzivil, and of great possessions in her own country: she, in her
crapes and close-cap, remained an ornament to the new Berlin Court for
some time;--not too long. The mourning-year once out, a new marriage
came on foot for the brilliant widow; the Bridegroom, a James Sobieski,
eldest Prince of the famous John, King Sobieski; Prince with fair
outlooks towards Polish Sovereignty, and handy for those Lithuanian
Possessions of hers: altogether an eligible match.
This marriage was on foot, not quite completed; when Karl Philip, Cadet
of the Pfalz, came to Berlin;--a rather idle young man, once in the
clerical way; now gone into the military, with secular outlooks, his
elder Brother, Heir-Apparent of the Pfalz, "having no children:"--came
to Berlin, in the course of visiting, and roving about. The beautiful
Widow-Princess seemed very charming to Karl Philip; he wooed hard;
threw the Princess into great perplexity. She had given her Yes to James
Sobieski; inevitable wedding-day was coming on with James; and here was
Karl Philip wooing so:--in brief, the result was, she galloped off with
Karl Philip, on the eve of said wedding-day; married Karl Philip (24th
July, 1688); and left Prince James standing there, too much like Lot's
Wife, in the astonished Court of Berlin. [Michaelis, ii. 93.] Judge if
the Berlin public talked,--unintelligible to Friedrioh Wilhelm, then
safe in swaddling-clothes.
King Sobieski, the Father, famed Deliverer of Vienna, was in high
dudgeon. But Karl Philip apologized, to all lengths; made his peace at
last, giving a Sister of his own to be Wife to the injured James. This
was Karl Philip's first outbreak in life; and it was not his only one. A
man not ill-disposed, all grant; but evidently of headlong turn, with
a tendency to leap fences in this world. He has since been soldiering
about, in a loose way, governing Innspruck, fighting the Turks. But,
lately, his elder Brother died childless (year 1716); and left him
Kurfurst of the Pfalz. His fair Radzivil is dead long ago; she, and a
successor, or it may be two. Except one Daughter, whom the fair Radzivil
left him, he has no children; and in these times, I think, lives with a
third Wife, of the LEFT-HAND kind.
His scarcity of progeny is not so indifferent to my readers as they
might suppose. This new KUR-PFALZ (Elector-Palatine) Karl Philip is by
genealogy--who, thinks the reader? Pfalz-NEUBURG by line; own Grandson
of that Wolfgang Wilhelm, who got the slap on the face long since, on
account of the Cleve-Julich matter! So it has come round. The Line of
Simmern died out, Winter-King's Grandson the last of that; and then, as
right was, the Line of Neuburg took the top place, and became Kur-Pfalz.
The first of these was this Karl Philip's Father, son of the Beslapped;
an old man when he succeeded. Karl Philip is the third Kur-Pfalz of the
Neuburg Line; his childless elder Brother (he who collected the Pictures
at Dusseldorf, once notable there) was second of the Neuburgs. They now,
we say, are Electors-Palatine, Head of the House;--and, we need not
add, along with their Electorate and Neuburg Country, possess the
Cleve-Julioh Moiety of Heritage, about which there was such worrying
in time past. Nay the last Kur-Pfalz resided there, and collected the
"Dusseldorf Gallery," as we have just said; though Karl Philip prefers
Heidelberg hitherto.
To Friedrich Wilhelm the scarcity of progeny is a thrice-interesting
fact. For if this actual Neuburg should leave no male heir, as is now
humanly probable,--the Line of Neuburg too is out; and then great things
ought to follow for our Prussian House. Then, by the last Bargain, made
in 1666, with all solemnity, between the Great Elector, our Grandfather
of famous memory, and your serene Father the then Pfalz-Neuburg,
subsequently Kur-Pfalz, likewise of famous memory, son of the
Beslapped,--the whole Heritage falls to Prussia, no other Pfalz Branch
having thenceforth the least claim to it. Bargain was express; signed,
sealed, sanctioned, drawn out on the due extent of sheepskin, which can
still be read. Bargain clear enough: but will this Karl Philip incline
to keep it?
That may one day be the interesting question. But that is not the
question of controversy at present: not that, but another; for Karl
Philip, it would seem, is to be a frequent stone-of-stumbling to the
Prussian House. The present question is of a Protestant-Papist matter;
into which Friedrich Wilhelm has been drawn by his public spirit alone.
KARL PHILIP AND HIS HEIDELBERG PROTESTANTS.
The Pfalz population was, from of old, Protestant-Calvinist; the
Electors-Palatine used to be distinguished for their forwardness in that
matter. So it still is with the Pfalz population; but with the Electors,
now that the House of Simmern is out, and that of Neuburg in, it is
not so. The Neuburgs, ever since that slap, on the face, have continued
Popish; a sore fact for this Protestant population, when it got them
for Sovereigns. Karl Philip's Father, an old soldier at Vienna, and the
elder Brother, a collector of Pictures at Dusseldorf, did not outwardly
much molest the creed of their subjects. Protestants, and the remnant of
Catholics (remnant naturally rather expanding now that the Court shone
on it), were allowed to live in peace, according to the Treaty of
Westphalia, or nearly so; dividing the churches and church-revenues
equitably between them, as directed there. But now that Karl Philip
is come in, there is no mistaking his procedures. He has come home to
Heidelberg with a retinue of Jesuits about him; to whom the poor old
gentleman, looking before and after on this troublous world, finds it
salutary to give ear.
His nibblings at Protestant rights, his contrivances to slide Catholics
into churches which were not theirs, and the like foul-play in that
matter, had been sorrowful to see, for some time past. The Elector of
Mainz, Chief-Priest of Germany, is busy in the same bad direction; he
and others. Indeed, ever since the Peace of Ryswick, where Louis XIV.
surreptitiously introduced a certain "Clause," which could never be got
rid of again, ["CLAUSE OF THE FOURTH ARTICLE" is the technical name
of it. FOURTH ARTICLE stipulates that King Louis XIV. shall punctually
restore all manner of towns and places, in the Palatinate &c. (much
BURNT, somewhat BE-JESUITED too, in late Wars, by the said King, during
his occupancy): CLAUSE OF FOURTH ARTICLE (added to it, by a quirk, "at
midnight," say the Books) contains merely these words, _"Religione
tamen Catholica Romana, in locis sic restitutis, in statu quo nunc est
remanente:_ Roman-Catholic religion to continue as it now is [as WE have
made it to be] in such towns and places."--Which CLAUSE gave rise to
very great but ineffectual lamenting and debating. (Scholl, _Traites
de Paix_ (Par. 1817), i. 433-438; Buchholz; Spittler, _Geschichte
Wurtembergs_; &c).] nibbling aggressions of this kind have gone on more
and more. Always too sluggishly resisted by the CORPUS EVANGELICORUM, in
the Diets or otherwise, the "United Protestant Sovereigns" not being
an active "Body" there. And now more sluggishly than ever;--said CORPUS
having August Elector of Saxony, Catholic (Sham-Catholic) King of
Poland, for its Official Head; "August the Physically Strong," a man
highly unconcerned for matters Evangelical! So that the nibblings go
on worse and worse. An offence to all Protestant Rulers who had any
conscience; at length an unbearable on to Friedrich Wilhelm, who, alone
of them all, decided to intervene effectually, and say, at whatever risk
there might be, We will not stand it!
Karl Philip, after some nibblings, took up the Heidelberg Catechism
(which candidly calls the Mass "idolatrous"), and ordered said
Catechism, an Authorized Book, to cease in his dominions. Hessen-Cassel,
a Protestant neighbor, pleaded, remonstrated, Friedrich Wilhelm glooming
in the rear; but to no purpose. Our old gentleman, his Priests
being very diligent upon him, decided next to get possession of the
HEILIGE-GEIST KIRCHE (Church of the Holy Ghost, principal Place of
Worship at Heidelberg), and make it his principal Cathedral Church
there. By Treaty of Westphalia, or peaceably otherwise, the Catholics
are already in possession of the Choir: but the whole Church would be so
much better. "Was it not Catholic once?" thought Karl Philip to himself:
"built by our noble Ancestor Kaiser Rupert of the Pfalz, Rupert KLEMM
['Pincers,' so named for his firmness of mind]:--why should these
Heretics have it? I will build them another!" These thoughts, in 1719,
the third year of Karl Philip's rule, had broken out into open action
(29th August, 4th September the consummation of it) [Mauvillon, i.
340-345.] and precisely in the ime when Friedrich Wilhelm was penning
that first Didactic Morsel which we read, grave clouds from the
Palatinate were beginning to overshadow the royal mind more or less.
For the poor Heidelberg Consistorium, as they could not undertake to
give up their Church on request of his Serenity,--"How dare we, or can
we?" answered they,--had been driven out by compulsion and stratagem.
Partly strategic was the plan adopted, to avoid violence; smith's
picklocks being employed, and also mason's crowbars: but the end was, On
the 31st of August, 1719, Consistorium and Congregation found themselves
fairly in the street, and the HEILIGE-GEIST KIRCHE clean gone from them.
Screen of the Choir is torn down; one big Catholic edifice now; getting
decorated into a Court Church, where Serene Highness may feel his mind
comfortable.
The poor Heidelbergers, thus thrown into the street, made applications,
lamentations; but with small prospect of help: to whom apply with any
sure prospect? Remonstrances from Hessen-Cassel have proved unavailing
with his bigoted Serene Highness. CORPS EVANGELICORUM, so presided
over as at present, what can be had of such a Corpus? Long-winded
lucubrations at the utmost; real action, in such a matter; none. Or
will the Kaiser, his Jesuits advising him, interfere to do us justice?
Kur-Mainz and the rest;--it is everywhere one story. Everywhere
unhappy Protestantism getting bad usage, and ever worse; and no Corpus
Evangelicorum, or appointed Watchdog, doing other than hang its ears,
and look sorry for itself and us!--
The Heidelbergers, however, had applied to Friedrich Wilhelm among
others. Friedrich Wilhelm, who had long looked on these Anti-Protestant
phenomena with increasing anger, found now that this of the Heidelberg
Catechism and HEILIGE-GEIST KIRCHE was enough to make one's patience run
over. Your unruly Catholic bull, plunging about, and goring men in that
mad absurd manner, it will behoove that somebody take him by the horns,
or by the tail, and teach him manners. Teach him, not by vocal precepts,
it is likely, which would avail nothing on such a brute, but by
practical cudgelling and scourging to the due pitch. Pacific Friedrich
Wilhelm perceived that he himself would have to do that disagreeable
feat:--the growl of him, on coming to such resolution, must have been
consolatory to these poor Heidelbergers, when they applied!--His plan
is very simple, as the plans of genius are; but a plan leading direct to
the end desired, and probably the only one that would have done so, in
the circumstances. Cudgel in hand, he takes the Catholic bull,--shall we
say, by the horns?--more properly perhaps by the tail; and teaches him
manners.
FRIEDRICH WILHELM'S METHOD;--PROVES REMEDIAL IN HEIDELBERG.
Friedrich Wilhelm's first step, of course, was to remonstrate
pacifically with his Serene Highness on the Heidelberg-Church affair:
from this he probably expected nothing; nor did he get anything. Getting
nothing from this, and the countenance of external Protestant Powers,
especially of George I. and the Dutch, being promised him in ulterior
measures, he directed his Administrative Officials in Magdeburg, in
Minden, in Hamersleben, where are Catholic Foundations of importance,
to assemble the Catholic Canons, Abbots, chief Priests and all whom
it might concern in these three Places, and to signify to them as
follows:--
"From us, your Protestant Sovereign, you yourselves and all men will
witness, you have hitherto had the best of usage, fair-play, according
to the Laws of the REICH, and even-more. With the Protestants at
Heidelberg, on the part of the Catholic Powers, it is different. It must
cease to be different; it must become the same. And to make it do so,
you are the implement I have. Sorry for it, but there is no other handy.
From this day your Churches also are closed, your Public Worship ceases,
and furthermore your Revenues cease; and all makes dead halt, and falls
torpid in respect of you. From this day; and so continues, till the day
(may it be soon!) when the Heidelberg Church of the Holy Ghost is opened
again, and right done in that question. Be it yours to speed such day:
it is you that can and will, you who know those high Catholic regions,
inaccessible to your Protestant Sovereign. Till then you are as dead
men; temporarily fallen dead for a purpose. And herewith God have you in
his keeping!" [Mauvillon, i. 347, 349.]
That was Friedrich Wilhelm's plan; the simplest, but probably the one
effectual plan. Infallible this plan, if you dare stand upon it; which
Friedrich Wilhelm does. He has a formidable Army, ready for fight; a
Treasury or Army-chest in good order. George I. seconds, according to
bargain; shuts the Catholic Church at Zelle in his Luneburg Country, in
like fashion; Dutch, too, and Swiss will endorse the matter, should
it grow too serious. All which, involving some diplomacy and
correspondence, is managed with the due promptitude, moreover. [Church
of Zelle shut up, 4th November; Minden, 28th November; Monastery of
Hamersleben, 3d December, &c. (Putter, _Historische Entwickelung der
hautigen Staatsverfassung des Teutschen Reichs,_ Gottingen, 1788, ii.
384, 390).] And so certain doors are locked; and Friedrich Wilhelm's
word, unalterable as gravitation, has gone forth. In this manner is
the mad Catholic bull taken by the TAIL: keep fast hold, and apply your
cudgel duly in that attitude, he will not gore you any more!
The Magdeburg-Hamersleben people shrieked piteously; not to Friedrich
Wilhelm, whom they knew to be deaf on that side of his head, but to the
Kaiser, to the Pope, to the Serenity of Heidelberg. Serene Highness
of Heidelberg was much huffed; Kaiser dreadfully so, and wrote heavy
menacing rebukes. To which Friedrich Wilhelm listened with a minimum of
reply; keeping firm hold of the tail, in such bellowing of the animal.
The end was, Serene Highness had to comply; within three months, Kaiser,
Serene Highness and the other parties interested, found that there would
be nothing for it but to compose themselves, and do what was just.
April 16th, 1720, the Protestants are reinstated in their HEILIGE-GEIST
KIRCHE; Heidelberg Catechism goes its free course again, May 16th; and
one Baron Reck [Michaelis, ii. 95; Putter, ii. 384, 390; Buchholz, pp.
61-63.] is appointed Commissioner, from the CORPUS EVANGELICORUM, to
Heidelberg; who continues rigorously inspecting Church matters there for
a considerable time, much to the grief of Highness and Jesuits, till he
can report that all is as it should be on that head. Karl Philip felt so
disgusted with these results, he removed his Court, that same year, to
Mannheim; quitted Heidelberg; to the discouragement and visible decay
of the place; and, in spite of humble petitions and remonstrances, never
would return; neither he nor those that followed him would shift from
Mannheim again, to this day.
PRUSSIAN MAJESTY HAS DISPLEASED THE KAISER AND THE KING OF POLAND.
Friedrich Wilhelm's praises from the Protestant public were great, on
this occasion. Nor can we, who lie much farther from it in every sense,
refuse him some grin of approval. Act, and manner of doing the act, are
creditably of a piece with Friedrich Wilhelm; physiognomic of the rugged
veracious man. It is one of several such acts done by him: for it was a
duty apt to recur in Germany, in his day. This duty Friedrich Wilhelm,
a solid Protestant after his sort, and convinced of the "nothingness
and nonsensicality (UNGRUND UND ABSURDITAT) of Papistry," was always
honorably prompt to do. There is an honest bacon-and-greens conscience
in the man; almost the one conscience you can find in any royal man
of that day. Promptly, without tremulous counting of costs, he always
starts up, solid as oak, on the occurrence of such a thing, and says,
"That is unjust; contrary to the Treaty of Westphalia; you will have to
put down that!"--And if words avail not, his plan is always the same:
Clap a similar thumbscrew, pressure equitably calculated, on the
Catholics of Prussia; these can complain to their Popes and Jesuit
Dignitaries: these are under thumbscrew till the Protestant pressure be
removed. Which always did rectify the matter in a little time. One other
of these instances, that of the Salzburg Protestants, the last such
instance, as this of Heidelberg was the first, will by and by claim
notice from us.
It is very observable, how Friedrich Wilhelm, hating quarrels, was ever
ready to turn out for quarrel on such an occasion; though otherwise
conspicuously a King who stayed well at home, looking after his own
affairs; meddling with no neighbor that would be at peace with him. This
properly is Friedrich Wilhelm's "sphere of political activity" among his
contemporaries; this small quasi-domestic sphere, of forbidding injury
to Protestants. A most small sphere, but then a genuine one: nor did he
seek even this, had it not forced itself upon him. And truly we might
ask, What has become of the other more considerable "spheres" in that
epoch? The supremest loud-trumpeting "political activities" which
then filled the world and its newspapers, what has the upshot of
them universally been? Zero, and oblivion; no other. While this poor
Friedrich-Wilhelm sphere is perhaps still a countable quantity. Wise is
he who stays well at home, and does the duty he finds lying there!--
Great favor from the Protestant public: but, on the other hand, his
Majesty had given offence in high places. What help for it? The thing
was a point of conscience with him; natural to the surly Royal Overseer,
going his rounds in the world, stick in hand! However, the Kaiser was
altogether gloomy of brow at such disobedience. A Kaiser unfriendly to
Friedrich Wilhelm: witness that of the RITTER-DIENST (our unreasonable
Magdeburg Ritters, countenanced by him, on such terms, in such style
too), and other offensive instances that could be given. Perhaps the
Kaiser will not always continue gloomy of brow; perhaps the thoughts of
the Imperial breast may alter, on our behalf or his own, one day?--
Nor could King August the Physically Strong be glad to see his
"Director" function virtually superseded, in this triumphant way. A year
or two ago, Friedrich Wilhelm had, with the due cautions and politic
reserves, inquired of the CORPUS EVANGELICORUM, "If they thought the
present Directorship (that of August the Physically Strong) a good one?"
and "Whether he, Friedrich Wilhelm, ought not perhaps himself to be
Director?"--To which, though the answer was clear as noonday, this poor
Corpus had only mumbled some "QUIETA NON MOVERE," or other wise-foolish
saw; and helplessly shrugged its shoulders. [1717-1719, when August's
KURPRINZ, Heir-Apparent, likewise declared himself Papist, to the horror
and astonishment of poor Saxony, and wedded the late Kaiser Joseph's
Daughter:--not to Father August's horror; who was steering towards
"popularity in Poland," "hereditary Polish Crown," &c. with the young
man. (Buchholz, i. 53-56.)] But King August himself,--though a jovial
social kind of animal, quite otherwise occupied in the world; busy
producing his three hundred and fifty-four Bastards there, and not
careful of Church matters at all,--had expressed his indignant surprise.
And now, it would seem nevertheless, though the title remains where it
was, the function has fallen to another, who actually does it: a thing
to provoke comparisons in the public.
Clement, the Hungarian forger, vender of false state-secrets, is well
hanged; went to the gallows (18th April, 1720) with much circumstance,
just two days before that Heidelberg Church was got reopened. But the
suspicions sown by Clement cannot quite be abolished by the hanging of
him: Forger indisputably; but who knows whether he had not something of
fact for his? What with Clement, what with this Heidelberg business, the
Court of Berlin has fallen wrong with Dresden, with Vienna itself, and
important clouds have risen.
_There is an absurd Flame of War, blown out by Admiral Byng; and a new
Man of Genius announces himself to the dim Populations._
The poor Kaiser himself is otherwise in trouble of his own, at this
time. The Spaniards and he have fallen out, in spite of Utrecht Treaty
and Rastadt ditto; the Spaniards have taken Sicily from him; and
precisely in those days while Karl Philip took to shutting up the
HEILIGE-GEIST Church at Heidelberg, there was, loud enough in all the
Newspapers, silent as it now is, a "Siege of Messina" going on; Imperial
and Piedmontese troops doing duty by land, Admiral Byng still more
effectively by sea, for the purpose of getting Sicily back. Which
was achieved by and by, though at an extremely languid pace. [Byng's
Sea-fight, 10th August, 1718 (Campbell's _Lives of the Admirals,_
iii. 468); whereupon the Spaniards, who had hardly yet completed their
capture of Messina, are besieged in it;--29th October, 1719, Messina
retaken (this is the "Siege of Messina"): February, 1720, Peace is
clapt up (the chief article, that Alberoni shall be packed away), and
a "Congress of Cambrai" is to meet, and settle everything.] One of
the most tedious Sieges; one of the paltriest languid Wars (of extreme
virulence and extreme feebleness, neither party having any cash left),
and for an object which could not be excelled in insignificance. Object
highly interesting to Kaiser Karl VI. and Elizabeth Farnese Termagant
Queen of Spain. These two were red, or even were pale, with interest in
it; and to the rest of Adam's Posterity it was not intrinsically worth
an ounce of gunpowder, many tons of that and of better commodities as
they had to spend upon it. True, the Spanish Navy got well lamed in the
business; Spanish Fleet blown mostly to destruction,--"Roads of Messina,
10th August, 1718," by the dexterous Byng (a creditable handy figure
both in Peace and War) and his considerable Sea-fight there:--if that
was an object to Spain or mankind, that was accomplished. But the "War,"
except that many men were killed in it, and much vain babble was uttered
upon it, ranks otherwise with that of Don Quixote, for conquest of the
enchanted Helmet of Mambrino, which when looked into proved to be a
Barber's Basin.
Congress of Cambrai, and other high Gatherings and convulsive Doings,
which all proved futile, and look almost like Lapland witchcraft now
to us, will have to follow this futility of a War. It is the first of
a long series of enchanted adventures, on which Kaiser Karl,--duelling
with that Spanish Virago, Satan's Invisible World in the rear of
her,--has now embarked, to the woe of mankind, for the rest of his life.
The first of those terrifico-ludicrous paroxysms of crisis into which
he throws the European Universe; he with his Enchanted Barber's-Basin
enterprises;--as perhaps was fit enough, in an epoch presided over by
the Nightmares. Congress of Cambrai is to follow; and much else equally
spectral. About all which there will be enough to say anon! For it was a
fearful operation, though a ludicrous one, this of the poor Kaiser; and
it tormented not the big Nations only, and threw an absurd Europe into
paroxysm after paroxysm; but it whirled up, in its wide-weeping skirts,
our little Fritz and his Sister, and almost dashed the lives out of
them, as we shall see! Which last is perhaps the one claim it now has to
a cursory mention from mankind.
Byng's Sea-fight, done with due dexterity of manoeuvring, and then with
due emphasis of broadsiding, decisive of that absurd War, and almost the
one creditable action in it, dates itself 10th August, 1718. And about
three months later, on the mimic stage at Paris there came out a piece,
OEDIPE the title of it, [18th November, 1718.] by one Francois Arouet,
a young gentleman about twenty-two; and had such a run as seldom
was;--apprising the French Populations that, to all appearance, a new
man of genius had appeared among them (not intimating what work he would
do); and greatly angering old M. Arouet of the Chamber of Accouuts; who
thereby found his Son as good as cast into the whirlpools, and a solid
Law-career thenceforth impossible for the young fool.--The name of
that "M. Arouet junior" changes itself, some years hence, into M. DE
VOLTAIRE; under which latter designation he will conspicuously reappear
in this Narrative.
And now we will go to our little Crown-Prince again;--ignorant, he, of
all this that is mounting up in the distance, and that it will envelop
him one day.