History of Frederick II of Prussia by Thomas Carlyle

First published: 1858-1865

Type of work: Historical biography

Time of work: 1712-1786

Locale: Prussia, Austria, Poland, Hungary, Silesia, Moravia, Saxony, and Friesland

Principal Personages:

• Frederick II, called the Great, born Karl Friederich
• Friederich Wilhelm, his father, known as Frederick William I
• Sophie Dorothee Of Hanover, his mother
• WIlhelmina, his older sister
• George II, King of England, his uncle
• Elizabeth Christina, his wife
• Voltaire, his literary confidant and mentor

Analysis

Sometimes called Carlyle’s Thirteen Year War with Frederick of Prussia, the six-volume HISTORY OF FRIEDERICH II OF PRUSSIA CALLED FREDERICK THE GREAT is still a controversial masterwork, more talked about than read. Undisputably original, the work departs radically from the Gibbon-Macauley tradition which Carlyle called the Dryasdusts in order to bring back life to a great man, a hero who exercised the divine right of kings with military and diplomatic might to overcome diabolic wrongs. Such was the belief of Carlyle, a historian who found his theory of history explicit in one great man, and who then accommodated history to fit the thesis, a most objectionable practice to most of his critics, but lively and compelling both as literature of power and literature of knowledge, as De Quincey defined them.

Much of the knowledge, however, is outdated because of recent historical discoveries. Also, the historical method is suspect, Carlyle having explained the past in terms of his present and prejudices. Much of the documentation is edited, especially that concerning Voltaire, to the convenience of the historian. In addition, most of the geneology serves only to confuse without advancing the biography. Careful attention and great ingenuity, however, brings Frederick II to life in his setting, especially on the battlefields which Carlyle traversed with such care and understanding.

The power of the book cannot be overstated; the hundred-year test of a classic has been met. The quality of the framing, the immensity of the design and the execution, the ruggedness of style stand idiosyncratic but firm.

The biography of the author under the stress or the compulsion of writing this work is well known: five years of reading, traveling, and writing and rewriting, to bring out the vigorous first two volumes, the slow, tedious job of digesting and disgorging “truckloads of Dryasdusts” of battles and treaties, the neglecting of his fatally ill wife Jane who saw the hand of God in the enterprise, the fact that his conscience bothered him for the rest of his life.

Frederick II, known in history as Frederick the Great, shaped modern Europe almost single-handedly with his own great strength of character, personality, and resolve. To Carlyle, his might did mean right. No hero, however, made a less auspicious start, and in looking backward to the first volume no hero appeared less impressive in his fullest unpretentious dress. He possessed, however, an internal vigor, a sharp gray eye, and a cloak of inpenetrability learned well in youth.

The protracted opening of the biography traces the history of the Brandenberg and Hohenzollern families back to the Middle Ages, covering both sides of the inbred family.

Emerging from medieval beginnings, born to a militaristically and cruelly imperative father and a seemingly calm but conniving mother, young Frederick, the fourth in the family of ten, seemed destined to failure as a son and prince. His older sister, Princess Wilhelmina, his protector and confidante throughout life, thought him a “dull” student, probably unwilling to learn by rote and drill, and his father discovered him obstinate. He showed an early interest in music (he called the flute his mistress during his lonely and exiled hours), literature, and good conversation. Officially he was exposed to “mathematics, no Latin,” science, and military drill.

Before his majority, he revolted against his father’s stern measures and planned to flee to England, but this breach in military discipline brought death to one of the conspirators and Frederick himself barely escaped execution. Revolting also against religious conformity, he was compelled to acknowledge the doctrine of Predestination and to swear loyalty to his king before being forced to live in semi-retirement, first in Custrin, later in Ruppin, where within four years he had redeemed himself in the King’s eyes. “That their method of training-up a young soul, to do God’s will, and accomplish useful work in this world, does by no means appear to the royal mind an admirable one,” Carlyle adds and explains that this episode, though it brought Frederick to stern self-discipline, caused him to draw a curtain of reticence over all important actions later.

Both Wilhelmina and Frederick were pawns in parental matrimonial machinations, but neither of the hoped-for weddings took place. The sister enjoyed her withdrawal to reading and music; her brother studied to become a monarch, at the same time courting famous literary men by correspondence, Voltaire in particular.

Then followed four years of domestic tranquillity, in which the irascible Friederich Wilhelm had finally to admit “there is much in this Fritz.” He married his son to the “Insipidity of Brunswick,” as the sharp-tongued Carlyle called Princess Elizabeth Christian, and they lived comfortably in Reinsberg. Apparently this marriage overcame all rumors of the indiscretions of the “foppish” prince. In 1735 he became for some time the virtual ruler during his father’s illness.

In 1740 the young king took over a peaceful kingdom into which he brought culture, and Voltaire, for a brief respite. From the three-fold conquest of Silesia to the partition of Poland, King Frederick did not falter in his firm resolve to create, or re-create, an Empire, never holy, and certainly not Roman. The latter three volumes are history: accounts of treaties, battles, entertainments, aggrandizements, pomp and circumstance. With the exception of masterful descriptions of topography and scenes of battle, Carlyle falls into his own dryasdust bin. The affluent and powerful ruler has not the charm of the young prince, though he is vividly portrayed in setback and reversal, and something of his aspiration to glory has majesty in the recounting. His patronage of Voltaire, however, is another matter for discussion.

Prince Frederick had corresponded with Voltaire for several years. When Frederick became king, he invited Voltaire to visit him. The philosopher accepted the invitation because he hoped to convince the new king that peace was the best system for all, and he traveled to Germany as an emissary for Cardinal Fleury. When Frederick realized that Voltaire was acting as a diplomat for the cardinal, his relationship with the philosopher cooled rapidly and soon Frederick was attacking Voltaire’s theories. Carlyle, the doughty but dour Scotsman did not like the “crafty” Voltaire or his Madame du Chatelet, even to the point of ridiculing the poor mistress in death. He asks his readers to disregard Voltaire’s writings on the subject of Frederick as lies, a request we must in turn suggest in connection with Carlyle on Voltaire.

Embedded in the fourth and fifth volumes are sly though satiric barbs which enliven battles and treaties. On the other hand, there is seldom a question among scholars and none among military men of the worth of these latter volumes, which are carefully composed and documented.

The Seven Years’ War and the failure to resolve the Russian problem marks the conclusion of this ambitious work, beginning with the “Afternoon and Evening of Friederich’s Life.” The repairing of a ruined Prussia, the partition of Poland, and the Bavarian war telescoped into the greater acts of reform, agricultural advances, and stable government. Although the last chapter is an appendix of a day in the life of the great general and ruler, “a Daguerreotype” which repeats something of an opening chapter written years before, the book effectively ends with the death of the monarch, an account of his burial, and a valediction restating the Carlylean thesis.