History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 16 [70]
slightly memorable to us. How, for example, his vigilantes and endeavors on this score brought him into rubbings, not collisions, but jealousies and gratings, with the English and Dutch, the reader will see anon.
Law-reform is gloriously prosperous; Husbandry the like, and Shipping Interest itself as yet. But in the Third grand Head, that of realizing the Reinsberg Program, beautifying his Domesticities, and bringing his own Hearth and Household nearer the Ideal, Friedrich was nothing like so successful; in fact had no success at all. That flattering Reinsberg Program, it is singular how Friedrich cannot help trying it by every new chance, nor cast the notion out of him that there must be a kind of Muses'-Heaven realizable on Earth! That is the Biographic Phenomenon which has survived of those Years; and to that we will almost exclusively address ourselves, on behalf of ingenuous readers.
Chapter IX.
SECOND ACT 0F TEE VOLTAIRE VISIT.
Voltaire's Visit lasted, in all, about Thirty-two Months; and is divisible into Three Acts or Stages. The first we have seen: how it commenced in brightness as of the sun, and ended, by that Hirsch business, in whirlwinds of smoke and soot,--Voltaire retiring, on his passionate prayer, to that silent Country-house which he calls the Marquisat; there to lie in hospital, and wash himself a little, and let the skies wash themselves.
The Hirsch business having blown over, as all things do, Voltaire resumed his place among the Court-Planets, and did his revolutions; striving to forget that there ever was a Hirsch, or a soot- explosion of that nature. In words nobody reminded him of it, the King least of all: and by degrees matters were again tolerably glorious, and all might have gone well enough; though the primal perfect splendor, such fuliginous reminiscence being ineffaceable, never could be quite re-attained. The diamond Cross of Merit, the Chamberlain gold Key, hung bright upon the man; a man the admired of men. He had work to do: work of his own which he reckoned priceless (that immortal SIECLE DE LOUIS QUATORZE; which he stood by, and honestly did, while here; the one fixed axis in those fooleries and whirlings of his);--work for the King, "two hours, one hour, a day," which the King reckoned priceless in its sort. For Friedrich himself Voltaire has, with touches of real love coming out now and then, a very sincere admiration mixed with fear; and delights in shining to him, and being well with him, as the greatest pleasure now left in life. Besides the King, he had society enough, French in type, and brilliant enough: plenty of society; or, at his wish, what was still better, none at all. He was bedded, boarded, lodged, as if beneficent fairies had done it for him; and for all these things no price asked, you might say, but that he would not throw himself out of window! Had the man been wise-- But he was not wise. He had, if no big gloomy devil in him among the bright angels that were there, a multitude of ravening tumultuary imps, or little devils very ILL-CHAINED; and was lodged, he and his restless little devils, in a skin far too thin for him and them!--
Reckoning up the matter, one cannot find that Voltaire ever could have been a blessing at Berlin, either for Friedrich or himself; and it is to be owned that Friedrich was not wise in so longing for him, or clasping him so frankly in his arms. As Friedrich, by this time, probably begins to discover;--though indeed to Friedrich the thing is of finite moment; by no means of infinite, as it was to Voltaire. "At worst, nothing but a little money thrown away!" thinks Friedrich: "Sure enough, this is a strange Trismegistus, this of mine: star fire-work shall we call him, or terrestrial smoke-and-soot work? But one can fence oneself against the blind vagaries of the man; and get a great deal of good by him, in the lucid intervals." To Voltaire himself the position is most agitating; but then its glories, were there nothing more! Besides hy is always thinking to quit it shortly; which
Law-reform is gloriously prosperous; Husbandry the like, and Shipping Interest itself as yet. But in the Third grand Head, that of realizing the Reinsberg Program, beautifying his Domesticities, and bringing his own Hearth and Household nearer the Ideal, Friedrich was nothing like so successful; in fact had no success at all. That flattering Reinsberg Program, it is singular how Friedrich cannot help trying it by every new chance, nor cast the notion out of him that there must be a kind of Muses'-Heaven realizable on Earth! That is the Biographic Phenomenon which has survived of those Years; and to that we will almost exclusively address ourselves, on behalf of ingenuous readers.
Chapter IX.
SECOND ACT 0F TEE VOLTAIRE VISIT.
Voltaire's Visit lasted, in all, about Thirty-two Months; and is divisible into Three Acts or Stages. The first we have seen: how it commenced in brightness as of the sun, and ended, by that Hirsch business, in whirlwinds of smoke and soot,--Voltaire retiring, on his passionate prayer, to that silent Country-house which he calls the Marquisat; there to lie in hospital, and wash himself a little, and let the skies wash themselves.
The Hirsch business having blown over, as all things do, Voltaire resumed his place among the Court-Planets, and did his revolutions; striving to forget that there ever was a Hirsch, or a soot- explosion of that nature. In words nobody reminded him of it, the King least of all: and by degrees matters were again tolerably glorious, and all might have gone well enough; though the primal perfect splendor, such fuliginous reminiscence being ineffaceable, never could be quite re-attained. The diamond Cross of Merit, the Chamberlain gold Key, hung bright upon the man; a man the admired of men. He had work to do: work of his own which he reckoned priceless (that immortal SIECLE DE LOUIS QUATORZE; which he stood by, and honestly did, while here; the one fixed axis in those fooleries and whirlings of his);--work for the King, "two hours, one hour, a day," which the King reckoned priceless in its sort. For Friedrich himself Voltaire has, with touches of real love coming out now and then, a very sincere admiration mixed with fear; and delights in shining to him, and being well with him, as the greatest pleasure now left in life. Besides the King, he had society enough, French in type, and brilliant enough: plenty of society; or, at his wish, what was still better, none at all. He was bedded, boarded, lodged, as if beneficent fairies had done it for him; and for all these things no price asked, you might say, but that he would not throw himself out of window! Had the man been wise-- But he was not wise. He had, if no big gloomy devil in him among the bright angels that were there, a multitude of ravening tumultuary imps, or little devils very ILL-CHAINED; and was lodged, he and his restless little devils, in a skin far too thin for him and them!--
Reckoning up the matter, one cannot find that Voltaire ever could have been a blessing at Berlin, either for Friedrich or himself; and it is to be owned that Friedrich was not wise in so longing for him, or clasping him so frankly in his arms. As Friedrich, by this time, probably begins to discover;--though indeed to Friedrich the thing is of finite moment; by no means of infinite, as it was to Voltaire. "At worst, nothing but a little money thrown away!" thinks Friedrich: "Sure enough, this is a strange Trismegistus, this of mine: star fire-work shall we call him, or terrestrial smoke-and-soot work? But one can fence oneself against the blind vagaries of the man; and get a great deal of good by him, in the lucid intervals." To Voltaire himself the position is most agitating; but then its glories, were there nothing more! Besides hy is always thinking to quit it shortly; which