Eleven successive Kurfursts followed
Friedrich in Brandenburg. Of whom and their births,
deaths, wars, marriages, negotiations and continual
multitudinous stream of smaller or greater adventures,
much has been written, of a dreary confused nature;
next to nothing of which ought to be repeated here.
Some list of their Names, with what rememberable human
feature or event (if any) still speaks to us in them,
we must try to give. Their Names, well dated,
with any actions, incidents, or phases of life, which
may in this way get to adhere to them in the reader’s
memory, the reader can insert, each at its right place,
in the grand Tide of European Events, or in such Picture
as the reader may have of that. Thereby with
diligence he may produce for himself some faint twilight
notion of the Flight of Time in remote Brandenburg,-convince
himself that remote Brandenburg was present all along,
alive after its sort, and assisting, dumbly or otherwise,
in the great World-Drama as that went on.
We have to say in general, the history
of Brandenburg under the Hohenzollerns has very little
in it to excite a vulgar curiosity, though perhaps
a great deal to interest an intelligent one. Had
it found treatment duly intelligent;-which,
however, how could it, lucky beyond its neighbors,
hope to do! Commonplace Dryasdust, and voluminous
Stupidity, not worse here than elsewhere, play their
Part.
It is the history of a State, or Social
Vitality, growing from small to great; steadily growing
henceforth under guidance: and the contrast between
guidance and no-guidance, or mis-guidance, in
such matters, is again impressively illustrated there.
This we see well to be the fact; and the details of
this would be of moment, were they given us: but
they are not;-how could voluminous Dryasdust
give them? Then, on the other hand, the Phenomenon
is, for a long while, on so small a scale, wholly
without importance in European politics and affairs,
the commonplace Historian, writing of it on a large
scale, becomes unreadable and intolerable. Witness
grandiloquent Pauli our fatal friend, with his Eight
watery Quartos; which gods and men, unless driven by
necessity, have learned to avoid! [Dr. Carl Friedrich
Pauli, Allgemeine Preussische Staats-Geschichte,
often enough cited here.] The Phenomenon of Brandenburg
is small, remote; and the essential particulars, too
delicate for the eye of Dryasdust, are mostly wanting,
drowned deep in details of the unessential. So
that we are well content, my readers and I, to keep
remote from it on this occasion.
On one other point I must give the
reader warning. A rock of offence on which if
he heedlessly strike, I reckon he will split; at least
no help of mine can benefit him till he be got off
again. Alas, offences must come; and must stand,
like rocks of offence, to the shipwreck of many!
Modern Dryasdust, interpreting the mysterious ways
of Divine Providence in this Universe, or what he
calls writing History, has done uncountable havoc
upon the best interests of mankind. Hapless godless
dullard that he is; driven and driving on courses
that lead only downward, for him as for us! But
one could forgive him all things, compared with this
doctrine of devils which he has contrived to get established,
pretty generally, among his unfortunate fellow-creatures
for the time!-I must insert the following quotation, readers guess from what
author:-
“In an impudent Pamphlet, forged
by I know not whom, and published in 1766, under the
title of Matinées du Roi de Prusse, purporting
to be ‘Morning Conversations’ of Frederick
the Great with his Nephew the Heir-Apparent, every
line of which betrays itself as false and spurious
to a reader who has made any direct or effectual study
of Frederick or his manners or affairs,-it
is set forth, in the way of exordium to these pretended
royal confessions, that ’nôtre maison,’
our Family of Hohenzollern, ever since the first origin
of it among the Swabian mountains, or its first descent
therefrom into the Castle and Imperial Wardenship
of Nurnberg, some six hundred years ago or more, has
consistently travelled one road, and this a very notable
one. ’We, as I myself the royal Frederick
still do, have all along proceeded,’ namely,
’in the way of adroit Machiavelism, as skilful
gamblers in this world’s business, ardent gatherers
of this world’s goods; and in brief as devout
worshippers of Beelzebub, the grand regulator and rewarder
of mortals here below. Which creed we, the Hohenzollerns,
have found, and I still find, to be the true one;
learn it you, my prudent Nephew, and let all men learn
it. By holding steadily to that, and working late
and early in such spirit, we are come to what you
now see;-and shall advance still farther,
if it please Beelzebub, who is generally kind to those
that serve him well.’ Such is the doctrine
of this impudent Pamphlet; ‘original Manuscripts’
of which are still purchased by simple persons,-who
have then nobly offered them to me, thrice over, gratis
or nearly so, as a priceless curiosity. A new
printed edition of which, probably the fifth, has
appeared within few years. Simple persons, consider
it a curious and interesting Document; rather ambiguous
in origin perhaps, but probably authentic in substance,
and throwing unexpected light on the character of
Frederick whom men call the Great. In which new
light they are willing a meritorious Editor should
share.
“Who wrote that Pamphlet I know
not, and am in no condition to guess. A certain
snappish vivacity (very unlike the style of Frederick
whom it personates); a wearisome grimacing, gesticulating
malice and smartness, approaching or reaching the
sad dignity of what is called ‘wit’ in
modern times; in general the rottenness of matter,
and the epigrammatic unquiet graciosity of manner
in this thing, and its elaborately INhuman turn both
of expression and of thought, are visible characteristics
of it. Thought, we said,-if thought
it can be called: thought all hamstrung, shrivelled
by inveterate rheumatism, on the part of the poor
ill-thriven thinker; nay tied (so to speak, for he
is of epigrammatic turn withal), as by cross ropes,
right shoulder to left foot; and forced to advance,
hobbling and jerking along, in that sad guise:
not in the way of walk, but of saltation and dance;
and this towards a false not a true aim, rather no-whither
than some-whither:-Here were features leading
one to think of an illustrious Prince de
Ligne as perhaps concerned in the affair.
The Bibliographical Dictionaries, producing no evidence,
name quite another person, or series of persons, [A
certain ‘N. de Bonneville’ (afterwards
a Revolutionary spiritual-mountebank, for some time)
is now the favorite Name;-proves, on investigation,
to be an impossible one. Barbier (Dictionnaire
des Anonymes), in a helpless doubting manner,
gives still others.] highly unmemorable otherwise.
Whereupon you proceed to said other person’s
acknowledged works (as they are called); and
find there a style bearing no resemblance whatever;
and are left in a dubious state, if it were of any
moment. In the absence of proof, I am unwilling
to charge his Highness de Ligne with such
an action; and indeed am little careful to be acquainted
with the individual who did it, who could and would
do it. A Prince of Coxcombs I can discern him
to have been; capable of shining in the eyes of insincere
foolish persons, and of doing detriment to them, not
benefit; a man without reverence for truth or human
excellence; not knowing in fact what is true from
what is false, what is excellent from what is sham-excellent
and at the top of the mode; an apparently polite and
knowing man, but intrinsically an impudent, dark and
merely modish-insolent man;-who, if he
fell in with Rhadamanthus on his travels, would not
escape a horse-whipping, Him we will willingly leave
to that beneficial chance, which indeed seems a certain
one sooner or later; and address ourselves to consider
the theory itself, and the facts it pretends to be
grounded on.
As to the theory, I must needs say, nothing can be falser,
more heretical or more damnable. My own poor opinion, and deep conviction
on that subject is well known, this long while. And, in fact, the summary
of all I have believed, and have been trying as I could to teach mankind to
believe again, is even that same opinion and conviction, applied to all
provinces of things. Alas, in this his sad theory about the world, our
poor impudent Pamphleteer is by no means singular at present; nay rather he has
in a manner the whole practical part of mankind on his side just now; the more
is the pity for us all!-
“It is very certain, if Beelzebub
made this world, our Pamphleteer, and the huge portion
of mankind that follow him, are right. But if
God made the world; and only leads Beelzebub, as some
ugly muzzled bear is led, a longer or shorter temporary
dance in this divine world, and always draws
him home again, and peels the unjust gains off him,
and ducks him in a certain hot Lake, with sure intent
to lodge him there to all eternity at last,-then
our Pamphleteer, and the huge portion of mankind that
follow him, are wrong.
“More I will not say; being
indeed quite tired of speaking on that subject.
Not a subject which it concerns me to speak of; much
as it concerns me, and all men, to know the truth
of it, and silently in every hour and moment to do
said truth. As indeed the sacred voice of their
own soul, if they listen, will conclusively admonish
all men; and truly if it do not, there will be
little use in my logic to them. For my own share,
I want no trade with men who need to be convinced of
that fact. If I am in their premises, and discover
such a thing of them, I will quit their premises;
if they are in mine, I will, as old Samuel advised,
count my spoons. Ingenious gentlemen who believe
that Beelzebub made this world, are not a class of
gentlemen I can get profit from. Let them keep
at a distance, lest mischief fall out between us.
They are of the set deserving to be called-and
this not in the way of profane swearing, but of solemn
wrath and pity, I say of virtuous anger and inexorable
reprobation-the damned set. For, in very deed, they are doomed and damned,
by Natures oldest Act of Parliament, they, and whatsoever thing they do or say
or think; unless they can escape from that devil-element. Which I still
hope they may!-
“But with regard to the facts
themselves, ‘de notre maison,’
I take leave to say, they too are without basis of
truth. They are not so false as the theory, because
nothing can in falsity quite equal that. ’Notre
maison,’ this Pamphleteer may learn, if
he please to make study and inquiry before speaking,
did not rise by worship of Beelzebub at all in this
world; but by a quite opposite line of conduct.
It rose, in fact, by the course which all, except
fools, stockjobber stags, cheating gamblers, forging
Pamphleteers and other temporary creatures of the
damned sort, have found from of old to be the one way
of permanently rising: by steady service, namely,
of the Opposite of Beelzebub. By conforming to
the Laws of this Universe; instead of trying by pettifogging
to evade and profitably contradict them. The Hohenzollerns
too have a History still articulate to the human mind,
if you search sufficiently; and this is what, even
with some emphasis, it will teach us concerning their
adventures, and achievements of success in the field
of life. Resist the Devil, good reader, and he
will flee from you!”-So ends our
indignant friend.
How the Hohenzollerns got their big
Territories, and came to what they are in the world,
will be seen. Probably they were not, any of them,
paragons of virtue. They did not walk in altogether
speckless Sunday pumps, or much clear-starched into
consciousness of the moral sublime; but in rugged
practical boots, and by such roads as there were.
Concerning their moralities, and conformities to the
Laws of the Road and of the Universe, there will much
remain to be argued by pamphleteers and others.
Men will have their opinion, Men of more wisdom and
of less; Apes by the Dead-Sea also will have theirs.
But what man that believed in such a Universe as that
of this Dead-Sea Pamphleteer could consent to live
in it at all? Who that believed in such a Universe,
and did not design to live like a Papin’s-Digester,
or porcus EPICURI, in an extremely ugly manner in it, could avoid one of
two things: Going rapidly into Bedlam, or else blowing his brains out?
It will not do for me at any rate, this infinite Dog-house; not for me, ye
Dryasdusts, and omnipotent Dog-monsters and Mud-gods, whoever you are. One
honorable thing I can do: take leave of you and your Dog-establishment.
Enough!-