The result was that, on the 15th of February 1763, a few days
after the conclusion of the peace of Paris, the treaty of Hubertusburg
was signed, Austria confirming Prussia in the possession of
Silesia. (See Seven Years’ War.)
It would be difficult to overrate the importance of the contribution thus made by Frederick to the politics of Europe. Prussia was now universally recognized as one of the great powers of the Continent, and she definitely took her place in Germany as the rival of Austria. From this time it was inevitable that there should be a final struggle between the two nations for predominance, and that the smaller German states should group themselves around one or the other. Frederick himself acquired both in Germany and Europe the indefinable influence which springs from the recognition of great gifts that have been proved by great deeds.
His first care after the war was, as far as possible, to enable the country to recover from the terrific blows by which it had been almost destroyed; and he was never, either before or after, seen to better advantage than in the measures he adopted for this end. Although his resources had been so completely drained that he had been forced to melt the silver in his palaces and to debase the coinage, his energy soon brought back the national prosperity. Pomerania and Neumark were freed from taxation for two years, Silesia for six months. Many nobles whose lands had been wasted received corn for seed; his war horses were within a few months to be found on farms all over Prussia; and money was freely spent in the re-erection of houses which had been destroyed. The coinage was gradually restored to its proper value, and trade received a favourable impulse by the foundation of the Bank of Berlin. All these matters were carefully looked into by Frederick himself, who, while acting as generously as his circumstances would allow, insisted on everything being done in the most efficient manner at the least possible cost. Unfortunately, he adopted the French ideas of excise, and the French methods of imposing and collecting taxes—a system known as the Regie. This system secured for him a large revenue, but it led to a vast amount of petty tyranny, which was all the more intolerable because it was carried out by French officials. It was continued to the end of Frederick’s reign, and nothing did so much to injure his otherwise immense popularity. He was quite aware of the discontent the system excited, and the good-nature with which he tolerated the criticisms directed against it and him is illustrated by a well-known incident. Riding along the Jäger Strasse one day, he saw a crowd of people. “See what it is,” he said to the groom who was attending him. “They have something posted up about your Majesty,” said the groom, returning. Frederick, riding forward, saw a caricature of himself: “King in very melancholy guise,” says Preuss (as translated by Carlyle), “seated on a stool, a coffee-mill between his knees, diligently grinding with the one hand, and with the other picking up any bean that might have fallen. ‘Hang it lower,’ said the king, beckoning his groom with a wave of the finger; ‘lower, that they may not have to hurt their necks about it.’ No sooner were the words spoken, which spread instantly, than there rose from the whole crowd one universal huzzah of joy. They tore the caricature into a thousand pieces, and rolled after the king with loud ‘Lebe Hoch, our Frederick for ever,’ as he rode slowly away.” There are scores of anecdotes about Frederick, but not many so well authenticated as this.
There was nothing about which Frederick took so much trouble as the proper administration of justice. He disliked the formalities of the law, and in one instance, “the miller Arnold case,” in connexion with which he thought injustice had been done to a poor man, he dismissed the judges, condemned them to a year’s fortress arrest, and compelled them to make good out of their own pockets the loss sustained by their supposed victim—not a wise proceeding, but one springing from a generous motive. He once defined himself as “l’avocat du pauvre,” and few things gave him more pleasure than the famous answer of the miller whose windmill stood on ground which was wanted for the king’s garden. The miller sturdily refused to sell it. “Not at any price?” said the king’s agent; “could not the king take it from you for nothing, if he chose?” “Have we not the Kammergericht at Berlin?” was the answer, which became a popular saying in Germany. Soon after he came to the throne Frederick began to make preparations for a new code. In 1747 appeared the Codex Fridericianus, by which the Prussian judicial body was established. But a greater monument of Frederick’s interest in legal reform was the Allgemeines preussisches Landrecht, completed by the grand chancellor Count Johann H. C. von Carmer (1721–1801) on the basis of the Project des Corporis Juris Fridericiani, completed in the year 1749–1751 by the eminent jurist Samuel von Cocceji (1679–1755). The Landrecht, a work of vast labour and erudition, combines the two systems of German and Roman law supplemented by the law of nature; it was the first German code, but only came into force in 1794, after Frederick’s death.
Looking ahead after the Seven Years’ War, Frederick saw no means of securing himself so effectually as by cultivating the goodwill of Russia. In 1764 he accordingly concluded a treaty of alliance with the empress Catherine for eight years. Six years afterwards, unfortunately for his fame, he joined in the first partition of Poland, by which he received Polish Prussia, without Danzig and Thorn, and Great Poland as far as the river Netze. Prussia was then for the first time made continuous with Brandenburg and Pomerania.
The emperor Joseph II. greatly admired Frederick, and visited him at Neisse, in Silesia, in 1769, a visit which Frederick returned, in Moravia, in the following year. The young emperor was frank and cordial; Frederick was more cautious, for he detected under the respectful manner of Joseph a keen ambition that might one day become dangerous to Prussia. Ever after these interviews a portrait of the emperor hung conspicuously in the rooms in which Frederick lived, a circumstance on which some one remarked. “Ah yes,” said Frederick, “I am obliged to keep that young gentleman in my eye.” Nothing came of these suspicions till 1777, when, after the death of Maximilian Joseph, elector of Bavaria, without children, the emperor took possession of the greater part of his lands. The elector palatine, who lawfully inherited Bavaria, came to an arrangement, which was not admitted by his heir, Charles, duke of Zweibrücken. Under these circumstances the latter appealed to Frederick, who, resolved that Austria should gain no unnecessary advantage, took his part, and brought pressure to bear upon the emperor. Ultimately, greatly against his will, Frederick felt compelled to draw the sword, and in July 1778 crossed the Bohemian frontier at the head of a powerful army. No general engagement was fought, and after a great many delays the treaty of Teschen was signed on the 13th of May 1779. Austria received the circle of Burgau, and consented that the king of Prussia should take the Franconian principalities. Frederick never abandoned his jealousy of Austria, whose ambition he regarded as the chief danger against which Europe had to guard. He seems to have had no suspicion that evil days were coming in France. It was Austria which had given trouble in his time; and if her pride were curbed, he fancied that Prussia at least would be safe. Hence one of the last important acts of his life was to form, in 1785, a league of princes (the “Fürstenbund”) for the defence of the imperial constitution, believed to be imperilled by Joseph’s restless activity. The league came to an end after Frederick’s death; but it is of considerable historical interest, as the first open attempt of Prussia to take the lead in Germany.
Frederick’s chief trust was always in his treasury and his army. By continual economy he left in the former the immense sum of 70 million thalers; the latter, at the time of his death, numbered 200,000 men, disciplined with all the strictness to which he had throughout life accustomed his troops. He died at Sanssouci on the 17th of August 1786; his death being hastened by exposure to a storm of rain, stoically borne, during a military review. He passed away on the eve of tremendous events, which for a time obscured his fame; but now that he can be impartially estimated, he is seen to have been in many respects one of the greatest figures in modern history.
He was rather below the middle size, in youth inclined to
