Various - The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 3, September 1864

Frederick William I. was the first absolute monarch of Prussia. He was a man of rough manners and coarse tastes. Caring little for the pomp of royalty, he jealously sought to maintain his hold on the essence of it. No sooner had he dried the tears shed over his deceased father, than he dismissed the larger part of the court attendants, cut off unnecessary expenses, inaugurated a simple style of living in the court, and began to direct his attention to the improvement of the military and financial condition of the country. More than any predecessor, he identified the office of king with that of commander-in-chief of the army. His domineering disposition carried him so far that he personally scolded and threatened with blows whoever seemed to him lazy and shiftless, however little the matter personally concerned him. So violent was his temper that, because his son, afterward Frederick the Great, displayed more taste for literature, and less for religion and warfare, than he had wished, he became disgusted with him, threateningly raised his cane whenever he saw him; and, when the prince, exasperated by constant abuse, formed a plan of escape to Sinsheim, the king, having discovered it before its execution, was so infuriated that, except for the intervention of bystanders, he would have run him through with his sword. As it was, at one time he beat him furiously with his cane. Frederick's confidant was executed before his eyes, and he himself condemned to a long banishment from the court; and not till he had shown signs of repentance, was he readmitted to it and to his father's favor. Frederick William is famous for the 'tobacco club' which he established, at whose sessions over the pipe and the beer he and his friends indulged in the most unrestrained mirth and freedom; also for his monomania concerning 'tall fellows'—a passion for securing as many regiments as possible of extraordinarily tall soldiers, for which he spared no pains, and often paid little regard to the personal wishes of the tall fellows themselves. To increase their number, he scoured all Europe, other monarchs being not unwilling to secure his good will by providing him with the coveted men, for whom his almost insane passion made him willing to give any price. But the real significance of his reign in relation to Prussia's subsequent history, is the impulse which he gave to her military tastes, and his success in establishing firmly the absolute authority of the monarch. The power of feudal lords had already been shattered; it required only a strong army and a strong will to destroy it altogether. These the king possessed. He reigned at a time when the obstacles to the exercise of unlimited power by the king were not what they now are, viz.: a desire on the part of the people in general for a constitutional government. The most certain way to secure the esteem of the people was to centralize the power in himself, and then exercise that power in the promotion of the people's material welfare. This the king did. He laid the foundations of the still existing system of general school education. He invited colonists from abroad to settle in the more uncultivated parts of his domains. He reformed the judiciary. He diminished the taxes, and yet by his economy increased the real revenue of the state from two and a half to seven and a half millions. Himself disinclined to become entangled in foreign wars, he raised the troops and the money without which his son could not have won the military glory which has given him the title of the Great .

Frederick William I. established the absolute monarchy by internal political changes and institutions. Frederick the Great secured for it a solid foundation in the hearts of the people. The one was thoroughly autocratic in disposition, and not seldom displayed this disposition too offensively; the other knew how to use his hereditary power without seeming to care about it. In fact, under the influence of Voltaire and the French liberalism, he himself learned to cherish very liberal opinions respecting popular rights. But practically he was absolute, and preferred to be so. By his brilliant military successes in the two Silesian wars and in the Seven Years' War he roused the national enthusiasm for the royal house to the highest pitch. He secured for Prussia the rank of a great Power in Europe. He enlarged her boundaries, and, notwithstanding his expensive wars, promoted the general prosperity of the land. Genial and kind-hearted, he won the affections of the people, so that loyalty was easy and pleasant—none the less so, the more completely the object of the loyalty was the king's person.

The reign of Frederick William II. was not characterized by any special development in the political condition of the country. Lacking in energy and decision, given to self-indulgence, controlled by courtiers and favorite women, although by the partition of Poland he increased the national domains, and by educational measures helped to promote German literature instead of the French preferred by his father, he was yet too inferior to the great Frederick to be able to uphold the glory of the royal house. By his disgraceful withdrawal from the First Coalition and the Treaty of Basle, by which he yielded to France all of Prussia lying beyond the Rhine, he prepared the way for her subsequent humiliation by Bonaparte.

The long reign of Frederick William III. is the richest period of Prussia's history. Here begins that development whose progress is now one of the most noteworthy of our time. The king, cautious, conscientious, patriotic, but timid, declined to join the Second Coalition (1799), hoping thereby to secure Prussia against the ravages of war. Prominent Prussians, moreover, were positively friendly to Napoleon; so that, even after the latter had violated his obligations by marching through Prussian territory, the king hesitated a year to declare war. This was done August 9, 1806; but two months later his army was routed at Jena; Napoleon entered Berlin; the Prussians were finally defeated at Friedland by the French, and at Tilsit, July 9, 1807, the Prussian king was forced to give up the half of his domains, and to furnish the conqueror a tribute of one hundred and forty millions of francs. For six years Prussia lay prostrate at the feet of France. In 1812 he was compelled to furnish twenty thousand men to join Napoleon's army in his invasion of Russia. Not till after the disastrous issue of this invasion did king or people dare to lift an arm in defence of the national independence. But these years compose just the period which Prussians love to call that of Prussia's regeneration. The insolence of the conqueror united the national heart. Full of the most flaming patriotism, and not doubting that deliverance would finally come, statesmen and warriors, Stein, Scharnhorst, Blücher, Schill, and others, labored unweariedly to keep up the spirits of the people, and prepare them for the coming War of Liberation. Now for the first time the cities were invested with the right to regulate their own internal affairs. Now for the first time the peasants were delivered from the serfdom under which they had hitherto suffered. In short, the whole policy of the Government was determined by the resolution to inspire the people with a healthful, unconstrained, enthusiastic devotion to the national weal, and, as a means to this end, with zeal for the king. These efforts were fully successful. When the providential time arrived, and the king issued, February 3, 1813, a call for volunteers, and, March 17, his famous Aufruf an mein Volk , all Prussia sprang to arms. In alliance with Russia, finally also assisted by Austria and Sweden, her troops were engaged in nine bloody battles with the French between April 5 and October 18, the enthusiasm of the people and the dogged intrepidity of Blücher being at length rewarded by the decisive victory at Leipsic. The immediate result of this victory for Prussia was the recovery of the territory between the Elbe and the Rhine ceded to France by the preceding king. At the congress of Vienna there were assigned to her in addition all that she had possessed before the Treaty of Tilsit, half of Saxony, and an increase of the former possessions on the Rhine. Some further acquisitions and cessions were made at the second Treaty of Paris, November 2, 1815, since which time the boundaries of Prussia have been little changed.