Frederick the Great devoted the last years of his life to the consolidation of his monarchy [Footnote: For the internal reforms of Frederick, see below, pp. 440 ff.] and to enlarging its sphere of influence rather by diplomacy than by war. Frederick felt that the best safeguard against further attempts of Austria to recover Silesia was a firm alliance between Prussia and Russia. And it was an outcome of that alliance that in 1772 he joined with the Tsarina Catherine in making the first partition of Poland. Catherine appropriated the country east of the Düna and the Dnieper rivers. Frederick annexed West Prussia, except the towns of Danzig and Thorn, thereby linking up Prussia and Brandenburg by a continuous line of territory. Maria Theresa, moved by the loss of Silesia and by fear of the undue preponderance which the partition of Poland would give to her northern rivals, thought to adjust the balance of power by sharing in the shameful transaction: she occupied Galicia, including the important city of Cracow. Maria Theresa repeatedly expressed her abhorrence of the whole business, but, as the scoffing Frederick said, "She wept, but she kept on taking."
The partition of Poland was more favorable to Prussia than to Austria. In the former case, the land annexed lay along the Baltic and served to render East Prussia, Brandenburg, and Silesia a geographical and political unit. On the other hand, Austria to some extent was positively weakened by the acquisition of territory outside her natural frontiers, and the addition of a turbulent Polish people further increased the diversity of races and the clash of interests within the Habsburg dominions.
When, a few years later, the succession to the electorate of Bavaria was in some doubt and Austria laid claims to the greater part of that state (1777-1779), Frederick again stepped in, and now by intrigue and now by threats of armed force again prevented any considerable extension of Habsburg control. His last important act was the formation of a league of princes to champion the lesser German states against Austrian aggression.
By hard work, by military might, by force of will, unhampered by any moral code, Frederick the Great perfected the policies of the Great Elector and of Frederick William I and raised Prussia to the rank of partner with Austria in German leadership and to an eminent position in the international affairs of Europe. Had Frederick lived, however, but a score of years longer, he would have witnessed the total extinction of the Holy Roman Empire, the apparent ruin of the Germanies, and the degradation of his own country as well as that of Austria. [Footnote: See below, Chapter XVI.] He might even have perceived that a personal despotism, built by bloodshed and unblushing deceit, was hardly proof against a nation stirred by idealism and by a consciousness of its own rights and power.
[Illustration: THE HOHENZOLLERN FAMILY (1415-1915): ELECTORS OF
BRANDENBURG, KINGS OF PRUSSIA, AND GERMAN EMPERORS]
ADDITIONAL READING
GENERAL. Brief narratives: J. H. Robinson and C. A. Beard, The Development of Modern Europe, Vol. I (1907), ch. iv, v; E. F. Henderson, A Short History of Germany, Vol. II (1902), ch. i-iv; A. H. Johnson, The Age of the Enlightened Despot, 1660-1789 (1910), ch. vii, viii; Ferdinand Schevill, The Making of Modern Germany (1916), ch. i, ii; Arthur Hassall, The Balance of Power, 1715-1789 (1896), ch. vi-ix; C. T. Atkinson, A History of Germany, 1715-1813 (1908), almost exclusively a military history; H. T. Dyer, A History of Modern Europe from the Fall of Constantinople, 3d ed. rev. by Arthur Hassall, 6 vols. (1901), ch. xlv-xlviii. Longer accounts: Cambridge Modern History, Vol. V (1908), ch. xii, xx, xxi, and Vol. VI (1909), ch. vii- ix, xx; Histoire générale, Vol. V, ch. xix, Vol. VI, ch. xvi, and Vol. VII, ch. iv, v; Émile Bourgeois, Manuel historique de politique étrangère, 4th ed., Vol. I (1906), ch. vi, xii, valuable for international relations of the Germanies; Bernhard Erdmannsdörffer, Deutsche Geschichte, 1648-1740, 2 vols. (1892-1893).
THE HABSBURG DOMINIONS IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. In English: Sidney Whitman, Austria (1899), and, by the same author, The Realm of the Habsburgs (1893), brief outlines; Louis Leger, A History of Austro- Hungary from the Earliest Time to the Year 1889, trans. by Mrs. B. Hill from a popular French work (1889); William Coxe, House of Austria, 4 vols. (1893-1895) in the Bohn Library, originally published nearly a century ago but still useful, especially Vol. Ill; C. M. Knatchbull-Hugessen, The Political Evolution of the Hungarian Nation, Vol. I (1908), ch. iv-vii; Ármin Vámbéry, The Story of Hungary (1894), in the "Story of the Nations" Series. In German: Franz Krones, Handbuch der Geschichte Oesterreichs, 5 vols. (1876-1879), Vol. IV, Book XVIII. There is a good brief English biography of Maria Theresa by J. F. Bright (1897) in the "Foreign Statesmen" Series, and a great standard German biography by Alfred von Arneth, Geschichte Maria Theresias, 10 vols. (1863-1879). See also A. Wolf and Hans von Zwiedineck-Südenhorst, Österreich unter Maria Theresia (1884).
THE RISE OF PRUSSIA. History of All Nations, Vol. XV, The Age of Frederick the Great, Eng. trans. of a well-known German history by Martin Philippson; Herbert Tuttle, History of Prussia to the Accession of Frederick the Great (1884), and, by the same author, History of Prussia under Frederick the Great, 3 vols., coming down to 1757 (1888-1896), primarily constitutional and political; Reinhold Koser, Geschichte der brandenburgisch-preussischen Politik, Vol. I (1914), from earliest times through the Thirty Years' War, by the late general director of the Prussian State Archives, an eminent authority on the history of his country; J. G. Droysen, Geschichte der preussischen Politik, 14 vols. (1868- 1876), the most elaborate history of Prussia down to 1756 by a famous national historian; Ernst Berner, Geschichte des preussischen Staates (1891), a briefer, popular account, richly illustrated; Hans von Zwiedineck-Südenhorst, Deutsche Geschichte im Zeitraum der Gründung des preussischen Königtums, 2 vols. (1890-1894), an enthusiastic German appreciation; Albert Waddington, Histoire de Prusse, Vol. I (1911), from the origins of the state to the death of the Great Elector, an able French presentation. There is an admirable old German biography of Frederick the Great's father, with copious extracts from the sources, by F. C. Forster, Friedrich Wilhelm I König von Preussen, 3 vols. (1834-1835). On Frederick the Great: F. W. Longman, Frederick the Great and the Seven Years' War, 2d ed. (1886), a good summary in English; W. F. Reddaway, Frederick the Great and the Rise of Prussia (1904) in the "Heroes of the Nations" Series; Thomas Carlyle, Frederick the Great, an English classic in many editions, sympathetic and in spots inaccurate; Reinhold Koser, Geschichte Friedrichs des Grossen, 5th ed., 4 vols. (1912-1914), a most thorough and authoritative biography; Politische Korrespondenz Friedrichs des Grossen, ed. by Reinhold Koser and others, in many volumes, constitutes the most valuable original source for the reign of Frederick the Great.
THE WARS OF FREDERICK THE GREAT. G. M. Priest, Germany since 1740 (1915), ch. i-iii, a useful outline; D. J. Hill, History of Diplomacy in the International Development of Europe, Vol. III (1914), ch. vi- viii, valuable for diplomatic relations; Richard Waddington, La guerre de sept ans: histoire diplomatique et militaire, 5 vols. (1899-1914), the best history of the Seven Years' War; A. D. Schaefer, Geschichte des siebenjährigen Kriegs, 2 vols. in 3 (1867-1874), a careful German account; Wilhelm Oncken, Das Zeitalter Friedrichs des Grossen, 2 vols. (1881-1882), an important work on Frederick's reign, in the imposing Oncken Series. See also A. W. Ward, Great Britain and Hanover, Some Aspects of their Personal Union (1899).