History of Friedrich II of Prussia, vol 21 | Page 3

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Carlyle's "History of Friedrich II of Prussia" Book XXI Processed by
D.R. Thompson [email protected]

BOOK XXI.
AFTERNOON AND EVENING OF FRIEDRICH'S LIFE.
1763-1786.

Chapter I.
PREFATORY.
The Twelve Hercules-labors of this King have ended here; what was
required of him in World-History is accomplished. There remain to
Friedrich Twenty-three Years more of Life, which to Prussian History
are as full of importance as ever; but do not essentially concern
European History, Europe having gone the road we now see it in. On
the grand World-Theatre the curtain has fallen for a New Act;
Friedrich's part, like everybody's for the present, is played out. In fact,
there is, during the rest of his Reign, nothing of World-History to be
dwelt on anywhere. America, it has been decided, shall be English;
Prussia be a Nation. The French, as finis of their attempt to cut
Germany in Four, find themselves sunk into torpor, abeyance and
dry-rot; fermenting towards they know not what. Towards Spontaneous
Combustion in the year 1789, and for long years onwards!
There, readers, there is the next milestone for you, in the History of
Mankind! That universal Burning-up, as in hell-fire, of Human Shams.
The oath of Twenty-five Million men, which has since become that of
all men whatsoever, "Rather than live longer under lies, we will
die!"--that is the New Act in World-History. New Act,--or, we may call
it New PART; Drama of World-History, Part Third. If Part SECOND
was 1,800 years ago, this I reckon will be Part THIRD. This is the truly
celestial-infernal Event: the strangest we have seen for a thousand years.
Celestial in one part; in the other, infernal. For it is withal the breaking

out of universal mankind into Anarchy, into the faith and practice of
NO-Government,--that is to say (if you will be candid), into
unappeasable Revolt against Sham-Governors and
Sham-Teachers,--which I do charitably define to be a Search, most
unconscious, yet in deadly earnest, for true Governors and Teachers.
That is the one fact of World-History worth dwelling on at this day;
and Friedrich cannot be said to have had much hand farther in that.
Nor is the progress of a French or European world, all silently ripening
and rotting towards such issue, a thing one wishes to dwell on. Only
when the Spontaneous Combustion breaks out; and, many-colored,
with loud noises, envelops the whole world in anarchic flame for long
hundreds of years: then has the Event come; there is the thing for all
men to mark, and to study and scrutinize as the strangest thing they
ever saw. Centuries of it yet lying ahead of us; several sad Centuries,
sordidly tumultuous, and good for little! Say Two Centuries yet,--say
even Ten of such a process: before the Old is completely burnt out, and
the New in any state of sightliness? Millennium