He was therefore obliged to do like his predecessors, to seek to control his officials by themselves. Thus began in Prussia the reign of the bureaucracy. The number of offices became greater, useless intermediate authorities were introduced, and the transaction of all business became circuitous. It was the first consequence of the endeavour to proceed justly, thoroughly, and securely, and to remodel the strict despotism of the olden time. But to the people this appeared a loss. As long as there was no press, and no tribunal to help the oppressed to their rights, petitions had quite a different signification to what they have now; for now the most insignificant can gain the sympathy of a whole country by inserting a few lines in a newspaper, and set ministers and representatives of the people in commotion for days. Frederic II. had received every petition, and generally disposed of them himself, and thus, undoubtedly, his kingly despotism came to light Frederic William could not bear to have petitions presented to himself; he sent them immediately to the courts. This was according to rule. But, as the magistrates were not yet obliged to take care that these complaints of individuals should be made public, they were only too frequently thrown on one side, and the poor people exclaimed that there was no longer any help against the encroachments of the Landräthe,[[36]] or against the corruption of excisemen. Even the King suffered from it; not his good will, but his power was doubted to give help against the officials.
To this evil was added another. The officials of the administration had become more numerous, but not more powerful. Life was more luxurious, prices had increased enormously, and their salaries, always scanty even in the olden time, had not risen in proportion. In the cities, justice and administration were not yet separated; a kind of tutelage was exercised even in the merest trifles; the spontaneous activity of the citizen was failing; the "Directors" of the city were royal officials, frequently discharged auditors and quartermasters of regiments. In 1740 this had been a great advance; in 1806 the education and professional knowledge of such men was insufficient. Into the war and territorial departments, however, which are now called government departments, the young nobility already sought for admittance; among them not a few were men of note, who later were reckoned the greatest names in Prussia; and most of them, without much exertion, quickly made their fortunes. It was complained that in some of the offices almost all the work was done by the secretaries. But that, in truth, was only the case in Silesia, which had its own minister. After the great Polish acquisition, Count Hoym, in Silesia, had for some years the chief administration of the Polish province. It was a bad measure to give a subject unlimited power over that vast territory; it was a misfortune for him and the State. He lived at Breslau as king, and he kept spies at the court of his Sovereign, who were to keep him au fait of the state of things. The poor nobles of Silesia thronged around him, and he gave his favourites office, landed properties, and wealth. The uprightness of the officials in the new province was injured by this unfit condition of things. Government domains were sold at low prices, and Generals and privy councillors were thus enabled to acquire large landed properties for little money.
It is curious that the first open resistance to this arose among the officials themselves, and that the opposition was carried on, for the first time, in Prussia, through the modern weapon of the press. The most violent complainant was the chief custom-house officer, Von Held; he accused Count Hoym, Chancellor Goldbeck, General Rüchel, and many others, of fraud, and compared the present state of Prussia with the just time of Frederic II. The case made an immense sensation. Investigations were commenced against him and his friends; they were prosecuted as members of a secret society, and as demagogues. Held's writings were confiscated; and he himself imprisoned and condemned, but at last set at liberty. In his imprisonment the irritated and embittered man attacked the King himself:[[37]] he accused him of too great economy—which we consider the first virtue of a King of Prussia; of hardness—which was unfounded; and of playing at soldiering—this, unfortunately, with good grounds. He complained: "When the Prince will no longer hear truth, when he throws upright men and true patriots into prison, and appoints those who have been accused of fraud to be directors of the commission appointed to try them, then must the honest, calm, but not the less warm, friends of their Fatherland sigh." Meanwhile he did not satisfy himself with sighing, but became satirical.
From this dispute, which only turns on an individuals circumstances, we learn how bold and reckless was the language of political critics in old Prussia; and how low and helpless the position of its princes against such attacks. As the King took the whole government upon his own shoulders, he bore also the whole responsibility, as he alone guided the machine of the State; so every attack on the particular acts of the administration, and upon the officials of the State, was a personal attack upon him. Wherever there was an error the King bore the blame, either because he had neglected something or because he had not punished the guilty. Every peasant woman who had her eggs crushed by the excise officers at the city gates felt the harshness of the King; and if a new tax irritated the city people, the boys in the streets cried out and jeered behind the King's horse, and it was even possible that a handful of mud might be thrown at his noble head. Again broke forth a quiet war betwixt the King of Prussia and the foreign press. Even Frederic William I. had, in his "Tabakacollegium," exercised his powers of imagination in composing a short article against the Dutch newspaper writers who had annoyed him; his great son, also, was irritated by their pens, but he knew how to pay them in like coin. Quite a volley of scorn and spite was fired in innumerable novels, satires, and pasquinades against his successor. Of what avail against this was violence, the opening of letters and secret investigations? What use was confiscation? The forbidden writings were still read, and the coarse lies were believed. Of what use was it if the King caused himself to be defended by loyal pens, if in a well considered reply the public were informed that Frederic William III. had shown no harshness to the Countess of Lichtenau; that he was a very good husband[[38]] and father, an upright man who had the best intentions? The people might, or might not, believe it; at all events they had made themselves judges of the life of their Prince in a manner which, as we view it, was highly derogatory to the majesty of the Crown.
Yet the times were quiet, and the culture and mind of the nation was not occupied by politics. What would happen if the people were roused to political excitement? The monarchy, in this inferior position, would be entirely ruined, however good might be the intentions of the Hohenzollerns. For they were no longer, as they had been in the eighteenth century, and were still in the time of Frederic II., great landed proprietors on unpopulated territory; they were, in fact, kings of an important nation; they were no longer in the position of obtaining the knowledge of every perversity of the great host of officials and of ruling over the great administration personally. Now, the administration was carried on by officials; if it went right it was a matter of course, but every mistake fell upon the King's head. How this was to be remedied before 1806 no one, not even the best, knew. But discontent and a feeling of insecurity increased among the people.
Such a condition of things, in a transition time, from the old despotic state to a new one, gave a helpless aspect to the Prussian commonwealth. It was however, in truth, no symptom of fatal weakness, as was shortly after shown by zealous Prussians.
For, besides the strength and capacity of self-sacrifice, which was still slumbering in the people, a fresh hopeful vigour was already visible in a distinguished circle. Again it was to be found among the Prussian officials. The supreme court of judicature had maintained itself in the high consideration it had gained since the organisation of the last King. It was a numerous body; it included the flower of Prussian intelligence, the greatest strength of the citizens, and the highest culture of the nobles. The elder were trained under Cocceji, and the younger under Carmer—judicious, upright, firm men, of great capacity for work, of proud patriotism and independence of character, who were not led astray by any ministerial rescript. The court coteries did not yet venture to assail these unpliable men; and it is a merit in the King that he held a protecting hand over their integrity. They belonged partly to citizens' families, which for many generations had sent their sons to the lecture-rooms of the professors of law; in the East to Frankfort and Königsberg, in the West to Halle and Göttingen. Their families formed an almost hereditary aristocracy of officials. United with them as fellow-students and friends, and like-minded, were the best talents of the administration; also foreigners who had entered the Prussian civil service. From this circle had been produced all the officials, who, after the prostration of Prussia, were active in the renovation of the State, Stein, Schön, Vinke, Grolmann, Sack, Merkel, and many others, presidents of the administration, and heads of the courts of justice after 1815.
It is a pleasure in this time of insecurity to direct our attention to the quiet labours of these trustworthy men. Many of them were strictly trained bureaucrats, with limited ideas and feelings; on the green table of the Board lay the ambition and labour of their whole lives. But they, the chief judges, the administrators of the Province, maintained faithfully and lastingly through difficult times their consciousness of being Prussians; each of them imparted to those about him something of the tenacious perseverance and the confident judgment which distinguished them. Even when they were severed from the body of their State, and were obliged to declare the law under foreign rule, they worked on in their sphere unchanged, in the old way; accustomed to calm self-control, they concealed in the depths of their souls the fiery longing after their hereditary ruler, and perhaps quiet plans for a better time.
Whoever will compare these men with some of the powerful talents of the official class which were developed at this time in the territories of South Germany, will perceive an essential difference. There, even in the best, there are frequently traits that are displeasing to us; arbitrariness in their political points of view; indifference as to whom or for what they served; a secret irony with which they consider the petty relations of their country. They all suffer from the want of a State which merits the love of a man. This want gives their judgment, acute as it may be, something uncertain, unfinished, and peevish; one does not doubt their integrity, but one feels strongly that there is a moral instability in them which makes them like adventurers, though learned and highly cultivated men. Undoubtedly, however, if a Prussian once lost his love of Fatherland, he became weaker than them. Karl Heinrich Lang is deficient in what Freidrich Gentz once had, and lost by moral weakness.
Conscientious officials have admitted at this time the confusion of every country, especially the North; but the Prussians may justly claim this pre-eminence, that in the circle of their middle order, not the most refined, but the soundest culture of that time was to be found, not occasionally, but as a rule.