Immediately after the funeral of the deceased monarch, he applied himself to public business with the utmost as siduity; and, among other regulations, instituted a new or der of knighthood, called the order of merit," with the professed design of rewarding meritorious individuals, without distinction of birth, religion, or country. Soon after his accession, lie invited many learned and scientific characters to his capital ; and adopted measures for estab lishing an academy of sciences in that city. He-next pro ceeded to visit different parts of his dominions, in order to receive the homage of his subjects ; and set out incognito to Strasburgh, that he might take a view of the French frontiers. He intended to have proceeded to Paris, under his feigned name of the Count du Fom, but, having been re cognised on his way, he turned aside to Cleves, where he had his first interview with Voltaire, whom he employed to publish his refutation of Machiavel, at the very moment when he was exemplifying the principles which he con demned, by levying a contribution on the city of Liege, and inforcing a questionable claim to the surrounding dis trict. From the •very commencement of his reign, he seems to have formed a plan for the increase of his terri tories; and, 14 -the death of the Emperor of Germany, an extensive field was opened for the operations of his ambi tion. Disregarding the Pragmatic Sanction, by which all the powers of Europe had guaranteed the Emperor's he reditary dominions to his eldest daughter the Archduchess Maria Theresa, he revived some obsolete claims to the duchy of Silcja, and took immediate possession, whh an army of 30,000. 1 le made himself master of Glogau by surprise, defeated the Austrian army at Alolwitz, reduced the cities of Brieg and Nciss, entered Breslaw, the capital, without opposition, and having publicly received the ho mage of the Silesians, returned in triumph to Berlin. about the end of the year 1741. Early in the following year, he again joined his army ; gained the hard contested battle of Czaslau over the Austrian General PI ince Charles of Lor raine ; seized the favourable moment for securing the ter ritory which he had conquered, by negotiating a separate peace with the Queen of Hungary ; and resumed, amidst the acclamations of his citizens at Berlin, the internal ad ministration of his kingdom. With a small retinue, and with his usual rapidity, he went through a great part of his dominions, inquiring into grievances. inspecting his re venues, and ascertaining the condition of his troops. But in the midst of apparent peace, and while externally occu pied in the institution of a new academy in his capital, and the celebration of his sister's marriage with the Prince Royal of Sweden, he was making the most active military preparations ; and, under pretence of preserving the Ger manic constitution from the encroachments of the House of Austria, he issued the most artful manifestoes, and at the head of 80,000 men suddenly entered the kingdom of Bohemia. Ile• took the city of Prague, and was pushing his conquests with more than ordinary vigour; hut, by the able and rapid exertions of Prince Charles of Lorraine, a stop was put to his progress, and he was compelled, with immense loss, to make a precipitate retreat into Silesia. He was so extremely mortified by the disastrous result of this campaign, that he is said to have forbidden all conver sation on the subject at his court; and hastening to retrieve his lost honours with an army of 70,000, he came upon the Austrians unexpectedly at Hohen Freidberg, where he gained a complete victory, as much by his own crafty ge neralship, as by the valour of his soldiers. Marching- for wards into Bohemia, he was suddenly met and attacked in his camp at Sohr, by his enterprising adversary the Prince of Lorraine ; but though thus taken at great disadvantage, and assailed by superior numbers, he took his measures with so much promptitude and skill, and received such able support from his officers and men, that, besides repulsing the attack with spirit, he routed the enemy with great slaughter. Sending his army into winter quarters, he en tered Berlin in a triumphant style, with the cannon and co lours which he had taken from the Austrians ; but, hearing that the Prince of Lorraine still continued his movements, he returned rapidly to the field ; and, after a series of successes, entered the city of Dresden, where he concluded a treaty of peace in 1745, securing the possession of Silesia, and receiving a million of German crowns from the Elec tor of Saxony. Returning to his capital with all the pomp
of victory, he displayed the utmost affability towards his applauding people ; and, while making the circuit of the city in the midst of the illuminations, he halted in his pro gress to take a last farewell of one of his early preceptors, who was lying at the point of death.
In the year 1746, a season of general peace among the powers of Germany, Frederick was wholly occupied with matters of domestic policy; and adopted various regula tions for the prosperity of commerce, literature, and the arts. He directed his attention particularly to effect a thorough reform in the courts of justice, especially to les semi the delays and expellees of legal proceedings ; and at length produced the famous CODE, which was adopted in all the Prussian dominions.* In concur rence with the President Maupertuis, he framed, about the same time, several additional rules for the Royal Academy; but he treated his philosophers rather like a regiment of soldiers, and attempted too much to regulate matters of taste and opinion by kingly authority. During the same period of peace, he published his 44 Memoirs of the House of Brandenburg," and his 44 Poem on the Art of War;" the former, a work written with spirit, and full of valuable information, though not always free from mistakes and mis representations ; and the latter, a performance neither des titute of poetical merit, nor deficient in sound principles of military science, but remarkable for the eKtraordinary omission of the name of Marlborough, while the generals whom the British commander frequently defeated are fur nished with their respective portions of fame. lie em ployed himself much in embellishing some of his principal cities; and among other measures, which he adopted for the benefit of his subjects, he asserted their right to navi gate the seas without interruption from belligerent powers, so that lie has been considered as the author of the system of armed maritime neutrality. He exerted himself by eve ry method to increase the population of his dominions; and, in this view, expended large sums of money in clear ing waste lands and forming navigable canals ; gave great encouragemept to French Protestants and other industri ous emigrants to settle in his territories; and particularly succeeded by these means in peopling and fertilizing the deserts of Pomerania.
In 1749, he was visited by the celebrated Marechal Saxe, whom he treated with every mark of distinction ; and in the year following, after various applications, he prevailed upon Voltaire to reside at his court, whom he created one of his chamberlains, and provided with an an nual pension of 20,000 livres. But their friendship was not of long duration ; and they were both too ambitious of despotic power in the republic of letters to exist harmoni ously in the same circle. The king was disgusted by the familiarity with which the French wit behaved to him in public, and with the sarcastic remarks in which he some times indulged even upon kis royal person. His majesty also was much offended by a money transaction, of rather a dishonourable description, in which Voltaire had engaged with the aid of a Jew ; and the other wits at the Prussian_ court, envious of his high favour, took care to report to the monarch's ear the most offensive of his sayings. But the principal cause of their greatest misunderstanding, and fi nal separation, was the decided part which Voltaire took against Frederick in a dispute between i'.laupertuis and Koenig. Even this open dissension was in some measure composed, when his majesty having sent a message to Vol tithe, requesting him to write an apology to I\laupertuis, the Frenchman burst into a violent rage, and desired the messenger to tell the king that " he might go to hell." Still, it is said, they had another interview, in which they were seemingly reconciled, and Voltaire received permis sion to go to Plombieres for the benefit of his health ; but the king having afterwards discovered that Voltaire had written a satirical piece against him, he sent a letter, dis missing him from his service, and requiring him to return the contract of their engagement, with a volume of poetry, with which he had been entrusted. Voltaire immediately left Berlin, but retained possession of the contract, which hound Frederick to pay him 20,000 livres a year, and of the poetry, which he considered as a present ; but he was arrested at Frankfort on the Maine at the king's instance, and treated in a most unworthy manner, till he made the required restitution.