History of Friedrich II of Prussia, vol 17 | Page 6

the benefit of the curious!),--and it is, at last, a thing not doubtful to anybody that Friedrich, in that matter did read aright. So that now the loud uproar is reduced to one small question with us, What did he read in those Menzel Documents? What Fact lying in them was it that Friedrich had to read? Here, smelted down by repeated roastings, is succinct answer;--for the ultimate fragment of incombustible here as elsewhere, will go into a nutshell, once the continents of Diplomatist-Gazetteer logic and disorderly stable-litter, threatening to heap themselves over the very stars, have been faithfully burnt away.
Readers heard of a "Union of Warsaw," early in 1745, concluded by the Sea-Powers and the Saxon-Polish and Hungarian Majesties: very harmless UNION of Warsaw, public to all the world,--but with a certain thrice-secret "TREATY of Warsaw" (between Polish and Hungarian Majesty themselves two, the Sea-Powers being horror- struck by mention of it) which had followed thereupon, in an eager and wonderful manner. Thrice-secret Treaty, for Partitioning Friedrich, and settling the respective shares of his skin. Treaty which, to denote its origin, we called of Warsaw; though it was not finished there (shares of skin so difficult to settle), and "Treaty of LEIPZIG, 18th May, 1745," is its ALIAS in Books:--of which Treaty, as the Sea-Powers had recoiled horror-struck, there was no whisper farther, to them or to the rest of exoteric mankind;--though it has been one of the busiest Entities ever since. From the Menzel Documents, I know not after what circuitous gropings and searchings, Friedrich first got notice of that Treaty: [Now printed in OEuvres de Frederic, iv. 40-42.] figure his look on discovering it!
We said it was the remarkablest bit of sheepskin in its Century. Readers have heard too, That it was proposed to Bruhl, by a grateful Austria, directly on signing the Peace of Dresden: "Our Partition-Treaty stands all the same, does it not?"--and in what humor Bruhl answered: "Hah? Get Russia to join!" Both these facts, That there is a Treaty of Warsaw and that this is the Austrian-Saxon temper and intention towards him and it, Friedrich learned from the Menzel Documents. And if the reader will possess himself of these two facts, and understand that they are of a germinative, most vital quality, indestructible by the times and the chances; and have been growing and developing themselves, day and night ever since, in a truly wonderful manner,--the reader knows in substance what Menzel had to reveal.
Russia was got to join;--there are methods of operating on Russia, and kindling a poor fat Czarina into strange suspicions and indignations. In May, 1746, within six months of the Peace of Dresden, a Treaty of Petersburg, new version of the Warsaw one, was brought to parchment; Czarina and Empress-Queen signing,--Bruhl dying to sign, but not daring. How Russia has been got to join, and more and more vigorously bear a hand; how Bruhl's rabidities of appetite, and terrors of heart, have continued ever since; how Austria and Russia,--Bruhl aiding with hysterical alacrity, haunted by terror (and at last mercifully EXCUSED from signing),-- have, year after year, especially in this last year, 1755, brought the matter nearer and nearer perfection; and the Two Imperial Majesties, with Bruhl to rear, wait only till they are fully ready, and the world gives opportunity, to pick a quarrel with Friedrich, and overwhelm and partition him, according to covenant: This, wandering through endless mazes of detail, is in sum what the Menzel Documents disclose to Friedrich and us. How, in a space of ten years, the small seed-grain of a Treaty of Warsaw, or Treaty of Petersburg, planted and nourished in that manner, in the Satan's Invisible World, has grown into a mighty Tree there,--prophetic of Facts near at hand; which were extremely sanguinary to the Human Race for the next Seven Years.
This is the sum-total: but for Friedrich's sake, and to illustrate the situation, let us take a few glances more, into the then Satan's Invisible World, which had become so ominously busy round Friedrich and others. The Czarina, we say, was got to engage; 22d May, 1746, there came a Treaty of Petersburg duly valid, which is that of Warsaw under a new name: and still Bruhl durst not, for above a year coming,--not till August 15th, 1747; [MEMOIRE RAISONNE (in Gesammelte Nachrichten ), i. 459.] and then, only in a hypothetic half-and-half way, with fear and trembling, though with hunger unspeakable, in sight of the viands. A very wretched Bruhl, as seen in these Menzel Documents. On poor Polish Majesty Bruhl has played the sorcerer, this long while, and ridden him as he would an enchanted quadruped, in a shameful manner: but how, in turn (as we study Menzel), is Bruhl himself hagridden, hunted by