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King Of Prussia
by
“There is a special advocate appointed for the poor.
“The attorneys, who had formerly the care of collecting evidence, and of adjusting all the preliminaries of a suit, are now totally dismissed; the whole affair is put into the hands of the advocates, and the office of an attorney is annulled for ever.
“If any man is hindered by some lawful impediment from attending his suit, time will be granted him upon the representation of his case.”
Such is the order according to which civil justice is administered through the extensive dominions of the king of Prussia; which, if it exhibits nothing very subtle or profound, affords one proof more that the right is easily discovered, and that men do not so often want ability to find, as willingness to practise it.
We now return to the war.
The time at which the queen of Hungary was willing to purchase peace by the resignation of Silesia, though it came at last, was not come yet. She had all the spirit, though not all the power of her ancestors, and could not bear the thought of losing any part of her patrimonial dominions to the enemies which the opinion of her weakness raised every where against her.
In the beginning of the year 1742, the elector of Bavaria was invested with the imperial dignity, supported by the arms of France, master of the kingdom of Bohemia; and confederated with the elector Palatine, and the elector of Saxony, who claimed Moravia; and with the king of Prussia, who was in possession of Silesia.
Such was the state of the queen of Hungary, pressed on every side, and on every side preparing for resistance: she yet refused all offers of accommodation, for every prince set peace at a price which she was not yet so far humbled as to pay.
The king of Prussia was among the most zealous and forward in the confederacy against her. He promised to secure Bohemia to the emperour, and Moravia to the elector of Saxony; and, finding no enemy in the field able to resist him, he returned to Berlin, and left Schwerin, his general, to prosecute the conquest.
The Prussians, in the midst of winter, took Olmutz, the capital of Moravia, and laid the whole country under contribution. The cold then hindered them from action, and they only blocked up the fortresses of Brinn, and Spielberg.
In the spring, the king of Prussia came again into the field, and undertook the siege of Brinn; but, upon the approach of prince Charles of Lorrain, retired from before it, and quitted Moravia, leaving only a garrison in the capital.
The condition of the queen of Hungary was now changed. She was, a few months before, without money, without troops, encircled with enemies. The Bavarians had entered Austria, Vienna was threatened with a siege, and the queen left it to the fate of war, and retired into Hungary, where she was received with zeal and affection, not unmingled, however, with that neglect which must always be borne by greatness in distress. She bore the disrespect of her subjects with the same firmness as the outrages of her enemies; and, at last, persuaded the English not to despair of her preservation, by not despairing herself.
Voltaire, in his late history, has asserted, that a large sum was raised for her succour, by voluntary subscriptions of the English ladies. It is the great failing of a strong imagination to catch greedily at wonders. He was misinformed, and was, perhaps, unwilling to learn, by a second inquiry, a truth less splendid and amusing. A contribution was, by news-writers, upon their own authority, fruitlessly, and, I think, illegally proposed. It ended in nothing. The parliament voted a supply, and five hundred thousand pounds were remitted to her.
It has been always the weakness of the Austrian family to spend in the magnificence of empire, those revenues which should be kept for its defence. The court is splendid, but the treasury is empty; and, at the beginning of every war, advantages are gained against them, before their armies can be assembled and equipped.