is growing less as his next neighbour is growing greater, he could not heartily wish success to a confederacy which was to aggrandize the other powers of Germany. The Prussians gave him likewise a particular and immediate provocation to oppose them: for, when they departed to the conquest of Bohemia, with all the elation of imaginary success, they passed through his dominions with unlicensed and contemptuous disdain of his authority. As the approach of prince Charles gave a new prospect of events, he was easily persuaded to enter into an alliance. with the queen, whom he furnished with a very large body of troops.

The king of Prussia having left a garrison in Prague, which he commanded to put the burghers to death if they left their houses in the night, went forward to take the other towns and fortresses, expecting, perhaps, that prince Charles would be interrupted in his march; but the French, though they appeared to follow him, either could not or would not overtake him.

In a short time, by marches pressed on with the utmost eagerness, Charles reached Bohemia, leaving the Bavarians to regain the possession of the wasted plains of their country, which their enemies, who still kept the strong places, might again seize at will. At the approach of the Austrian army, the courage of the king of Prussia seemed to have failed him. He retired from post to post, and evacuated town after town, and fortress after fortress, without resistance, or appearance of resistance, as if he was resigning them to the rightful owners.

It might have been expected that he should have made some effort to rescue Prague; but, after a faint attempt to dispute the passage of the Elbe, he ordered his garrison of eleven thousand men to quit the place. They left behind them their magazines, and heavy artillery, among which were seven pieces of remarkable excellence, called "The Seven Electors." But they took with them their field cannon and a great number of carriages laden with stores and plunder, which they were forced to leave

in their way to the Saxons and Austrians that harassed their march. They at last entered Silesia with the loss of about a third part.

The king of Prussia suffered much in his retreat; for besides the military stores, which he left every where behind him, even to the clothes of his troops, there was a want of provisions in his army, and consequently frequent desertions and many diseases; and a soldier sick or killed was equally lost to a flying army.

At last he re-entered his own territories, and, having stationed his troops in places of security, returned for a time to Berlin, where he forbad all to speak either ill or well of the campaign.

To what end such a prohibition could conduce, it is difficult to discover: there is no country in which men can be forbidden to know what they know, and what is universally known may as well be spoken. It is true, that in popular governments seditious discourses may inflame the vulgar; but in such governments they cannot be restrained, and in absolute monarchies they are of little effect.

When the Prussians invaded Bohemia, and this whole nation was fired with resentment, the king of England gave orders in his palace that none should mention his nephew with disrespect; by this command he maintained the decency necessary between princes, without enforcing, and probably without expecting, obedience but in his own presence.

The king of Prussia's edict regarded only himself, and therefore it is difficult to tell what was his motive, unless he intended to spare himself the mortification of absurd and illiberal flattery, which, to a mind stung with dis grace, must have been in the highest degree painful and disgusting.

Moderation in prosperity is a virtue very difficult to all mortals; forbearance of revenge, when revenge is within reach, is scarcely ever to be found among princes. Now was the time when the queen of Hungary might perhaps

have made peace on her own terms; but keenness of resentment, and arrogance of success, withheld her from the due use of the present opportunity. It is said, that the king of Prussia in his retreat sent letters to prince Charles, which were supposed to contain ample concessions, but were sent back unopened. The king of England offered likewise to mediate between them; but his propositions were rejected at Vienna, where a resolution was taken not only to revenge the interruption of their success on the Rhine by the recovery of Silesia, but to reward the Saxons for their seasonable help by giving them part of the Prussian dominions.

In the beginning of the year 1745 died the emperor Charles of Bavaria; the treaty of Francfort was consequently at an end; and the king of Prussia, being no longer able to maintain the character of auxiliary to the emperor, and having avowed no other reason for the war, might have honourably withdrawn his forces, and on his own principles have complied with the terms of peace; but no terms were offered him; the queen pursued him with the utmost ardour of hostility, and the French left him to his own conduct and his own destiny.

His Bohemian conquests were already lost; and he was now chased back into Silesia, where, at the beginning of the year, the war continued in an equilibration by alternate losses and advantages. In April, the elector of Bavaria seeing his dominions over-run by the Austrians, and receiving very little succour from the French, made a peace with the queen of Hungary upon easy conditions, and the Austrians had more troops to employ against Prussia.

But the revolutions of war will not suffer human presumption to remain long unchecked. The peace with Bavaria was scarcely concluded when the battle of Fontenoy was lost, and all the allies of Austria called upon her to exert her utmost power for the preservation of the Low Countries; and, a few days after the loss at Fontenoy, the first battle between the Prussians and the com

bined army of Austrians and Saxons was fought at Niedburg in Silesia.

The particulars of this battle were variously reported by the different parties, and published in the journals of that time; to transcribe them would be tedious and useless, because accounts of battles are not easily understood, and because there are no means of determining to which of the relations credit should be given. It is sufficient that they all end in claiming or allowing a complete victory to the king of Prussia, who gained all the Austrian artillery, killed four thousand, took seven thousand prisoners, with the loss, according to the Prussian narrative, of only sixteen hundred men.

He now advanced again into Bohemia, where, however, he made no great progress. The queen of Hungary, though defeated, was not subdued. She poured in her troops from all parts to the reinforcement of prince Charles, and determined to continue the struggle with all her power. The king saw that Bohemia was an unpleasing and inconvenient theatre of war, in which he should be ruined by a miscarriage, and should get little by a victory. Saxony was left defenceless, and, if it was conquered, might be plundered.

He therefore published a declaration against the elector of Saxony, and, without waiting for reply, invaded his dominions. This invasion produced another battle at Standentz, which ended, as the former, to the advantage of the Prussians. The Austrians had some advantage in the beginning; and their irregular troops, who are always daring, and are always ravenous, broke into the Prussian camp, and carried away the military chest. But this was easily repaired by the spoils of Saxony.

The queen of Hungary was still inflexible, and hoped that fortune would at last change. She recruited once more her army, and prepared to invade the territories of Brandenburg; but the king of Prussia's activity prevented all her designs. One part of his forces seized Leipsic, and the other once more defeated the Saxons ;

the king of Poland fled from his dominions, prince Charles retired into Bohemia. The king of Prussia entered Dresden as a conqueror, exacted very severe contributions from the whole country, and the Austrians and Saxons were at last compelled to receive from him such a peace as he would grant. He imposed no severe conditions except the payment of the contributions, made no new claim of dominions, and, with the Elector Palatine, acknowledged the duke of Tuscany for emperor.

The lives of princes, like the histories of nations, have their periods. We shall here suspend our narrative of the king of Prussia, who was now at the height of human greatness, giving laws to his enemies, and courted by all the powers of Europe.

BROWNE.

THOUGH the writer of the following *ESSAYS seems to have had the fortune, common among men of letters, of raising little curiosity after his private life, and has, therefore, few memorials preserved of his felicities and misfortunes; yet because an edition of a posthumous work appears imperfect and neglected, without some account of the authour, it was thought necessary to attempt the gratification of that curiosity which naturally inquires by what peculiarities of nature or fortune eminent men have been distinguished, how uncommon attainments have been gained, and what influence learning had on its possessors, or virtue on its teachers.

SIR THOMAS BROWNE was born at London, in the parish of St. Michael in Cheapside, on the 19th of October, 1605. His father was a merchant, of an ancient family at Upton in Cheshire. Of the name or family of his mother I find no account.

• "Christian Morals," first printed in 1756. H.

+ Life of Sir Thomas Browne, prefixed to the Antiquities of Norwich.