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188 RIESBECK’S TRAVELS THROUGH GERMANY.
fee them when they were writing profeffedly about it. This arifes from the amazing
difference that there is betwixt theory and practice, and that in all philofophical decla-
mations, people commonly only confider the end, without thinking of the means by
which it is to be brought about; nay, they often overlook the only means by which it
can be brought about at all. Hence it has appeared, that thofe who have written the
moft ftrongly again{t luxury, have not been favourable to the Pruffian fyftem of excile,
though it is the only fure dam whereby all exceffes may be reftrained. All the political
principles with refpeét to the happinefs of nations, which |’ Abbe Raynal gives us in
that famous Hiftoire Politique et Philofophique of his, in which heis fo violent againft the
King of Pruffia, without knowing any thing about him, had been adopted in Pruflia,
and perhaps-no where elfe in the wide world before the Abbé put pen to paper.
Another part of thefe declaimers find fault only for the fake of appearing fingular.
Mr. Guibert and fome others of our countrymen are among this clafs. Thefe gentle-
men took it in their heads to exhibit the King to a people, the god of whofe idolatry
he has long been, through a kind of magic lanthorn, with his head where his heels
fhould be. Doubtlefs, the indifference with which the King is accuftomed to behold
all fuch buffooneries, muft have made them vaftly pleafed with their wife work.
. The King of Pruffia and his father have folved the three moft difficult problems of
ftate that exift; and hiftory affords no example of their having been folved fo quickly, fo
happily, and fo univerfally, as they have been by thefe princes. ‘They have made a
lazy, prodigal, and ftupid people induftrious, ative, and alert; they have given to a
country, which had been entirely neglected by nature, a value which many of the moft
highly favoured countries have not, and they have placed a fmal] nation in a fituation
not only to vanquifh in @ favourable moment all the combined forces of the mightieft
monarchies of Europe united, but to be able at any time to meafure {words with either
of them fingly.
LETTER. LI.
i Berlin.
WHEN you hear the King of Pruffia mentioned in the fouthern parts of Germany,
you think they are {peaking of an angel of death, whofe employment it is to kill the peo-
ple by hundreds and thoufands, to burn cities and villages, and to be the firft general
of his day. This opinion commonly refis upon the fame ground as another, which
was very generally received by the common people during the laft Silefian war, of the
King of Pruffia’s having taken up arms again{t France and Auttria for the extirpation
of the Roman Catholic religion. Auftria had often recourfe to fuch little artifices ;
fhe was wont to appeal to the religious and pafiionate feelings of the people, whenever
her troops were beaten, and probably found fome confolation init, not that only which
arifes from exciting compaffion, but the more fubftantial one of the fupport derived
from the riches and forces of fome of the Catholic princes of Germany. Such pre-
judices in the populace are eafily produced ; but when you read in the writings of fome of
the moft famous Auftrian ftatefmen and literati that the King of Pruffia’s whole fyftem
is contrived for the purpofe of making himfelf terrible to his neighbours, of plundering
them, and of living by robbery, you donot know whether to laugh moft at their igno-
rance, or be moft afhamed at their impudence.
Out of Germany they look upon the King of Pruffia as a great general, but are not
therefore blind to his other virtues. Our countrymen, whofe impartiality and juftice
in judging of the merits of great men nobody can controvert, read his civil ordinances,
14 his
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