A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon Part 24

[Sidenote: Early Days of Charles XII.]

The young monarch, at first, gave but few indications of the remarkable qualities which afterwards distinguished him. He was idle, dissipated, haughty, and luxurious. When he came to the council chamber, he was absent and indifferent, and generally sat with both legs thrown across the table.

But his lethargy and indifference did not last long. Three great monarchs had conspired to ruin him, and dismember his kingdom. These were the Czar Peter, Frederic IV. of Denmark, and Frederic Augustus, King of Poland, and also Elector of Saxony; and their hostile armies were on the point of invading his country.

The greatness of the danger brought to light his great qualities. He vigorously prepared for war. His whole character changed. Quintus Curtius became his text-book, and Alexander his model. He spent no time in sports or magnificence. He clothed himself like a common soldier, whose hards.h.i.+ps he resolved henceforth to share. He forswore the society and the influence of woman. He relinquished wine and all the pleasures of the table. Love of glory became his pa.s.sion, and continued through life; and this ever afterwards made him insensible to reproach, danger, toil, fear, hunger, and pain. Never was a more complete change effected in a man's moral character; and never was an improved moral character consecrated to a worse end. He was not devoted to the true interests of his country, but to a selfish, base, and vain pa.s.sion for military fame.

But his conduct, at first, called forth universal admiration. His glorious and successful defence against enemies apparently overwhelming gave him a great military reputation, and secured for him the sympathies of Christendom. Had he died when he had repelled the Russian, the Danish, and the Polish armies, he would have secured as honorable an immortality as that of Gustavus Adolphus. But he was not permitted to die prematurely, as was his great ancestor. He lived long enough to become intoxicated with success, to make great political blunders, and to suffer the most fatal and mortifying misfortunes.

The commencement of his military career was beautifully heroic.

"Gentlemen," said the young monarch of eighteen to his counsellors, when he meditated desperate resistance, "I am resolved never to begin an unjust war, and never to finish a just one but with the destruction of my enemies."

[Sidenote: Charles's Heroism.]

In six weeks he finished, after he had begun, the Danish war having completely humbled his enemy, and succored his brother-in-law, the Duke of Holstein.

His conflict with Peter has been presented, when with twenty thousand men he attacked and defeated sixty thousand Russians in their intrenchments, took one hundred and fifty pieces of cannon, and killed eighteen thousand men. The victory of Narva astonished all Europe, and was the most brilliant which had then been gained in the annals of modern warfare.

Charles was equally successful against Frederic Augustus. He routed his Saxon troops, and then resolved to dethrone him, as King of Poland. And he succeeded so far as to induce the Polish Diet to proclaim the throne vacant. Augustus was obliged to fly, and Stanislaus Leczinski was chosen king in his stead, at the nomination of the Swedish conqueror. The country was subjugated, and Frederic Augustus became a fugitive.

But Charles was not satisfied with expelling him from Poland. He resolved to attack him also in Saxony itself. Saxony was then, next to Austria, the most powerful of the German states. Nevertheless, Saxony could not arrest the victorious career of Charles. The Saxons fled as he approached. He penetrated to the heart of the electorate, and the unfortunate Frederic Augustus was obliged to sue for peace, which was only granted on the most humiliating terms; which were, that the elector should acknowledge Stanislaus as king of Poland; that he should break all his treaties with Russia, and should deliver to the King of Sweden all the men who had deserted from his army. The humbled elector sought a personal interview with Charles, after he had signed the conditions of peace, with the hope of securing better terms. He found Charles in his jack boots, with a piece of black taffeta round his neck for a cravat, and clothed in a coa.r.s.e blue coat with bra.s.s b.u.t.tons. His conversation turned wholly on his jack boots; and this trifling subject was the only one on which he would deign to converse with one of the most accomplished monarchs of his age.

Charles had now humbled and defeated all his enemies. He should now have returned to Sweden, and have cultivated the arts of peace. But peace and civilization were far from his thoughts. The subjugation of all the northern powers became the dream of his life. He invaded Russia, resolved on driving Peter from his throne.

[Sidenote: His Misfortunes.]

He was eminently successful in defensive war, and eminently unsuccessful in aggressive war. Providence benevolently but singularly comes to the aid of all his children in distress and despair. Men are gloriously strong in defending their rights; but weak, in all their strength, when they a.s.sail the rights of others. So signal is this fact, that it blazes upon all the pages of history, and is ill.u.s.trated in common life as well as in the affairs of nations.

When Charles turned as an a.s.sailant of the rights of his enemies, his unfortunate reverses commenced. At the head of forty-three thousand veterans, loaded with the spoils of Poland and Saxony, he commenced his march towards Russia. He had another army in Poland of twenty thousand, and another in Finland of fifteen thousand. With these he expected to dethrone the czar.

His mistakes and infatuation have been noticed, and his final defeat at Pultowa, a village at the eastern extremity of the Ukraine. This battle was more decisive than that of Narva; for in the latter the career of Peter was only arrested, but in the former the strength of Charles was annihilated. And so would have been his hopes, had he been an ordinary man. But he was a madman, and still dreamed of victory, with only eighteen hundred men to follow his fortunes into Turkey, which country he succeeded in reaching.

His conduct in Turkey was infamous and extraordinary. No reasonings can explain it. It was both ridiculous and provoking. At first, he employed himself in fomenting quarrels, and devising schemes to embark the sultan in his cause. Vizier after vizier was flattered and a.s.sailed. He rejected every overture for his peaceable return. He lingered five years in endless intrigues and negotiations, in order to realize the great dream of his life--the dethronement of the czar. He lived recklessly on the bounty of the sultan, taking no hints that even imperial hospitality might be abused and exhausted. At last, his inflexible obstinacy and dangerous intrigues so disgusted his generous host, that he was urged to return, with the offer of a suitable escort, and a large sum of money. He accepted and spent the twelve hundred purses, and still refused to return. The displeasure of the Sultan Achmet was now fairly excited. It was resolved upon by the Porte that he should be removed by force, since he would not be persuaded. But Charles resisted the troops of the sultan who were ordered to remove him. With sixty servants he desperately defended himself against an army of janizaries, and killed twenty of them with his own hand; and it was not until completely overwhelmed and prostrated that he hurled his sword into the air. He was now a prisoner of war, and not a guest; but still he was treated with the courtesy and dignity due to a king, and conducted in a chariot covered with gold and scarlet to Adrianople. From thence he was removed to Demotica, where he renewed his intrigues, and zealously kept his bed, under pretence of sickness, for ten months.

While he remained in captivity, Frederic Augustus recovered the crown of Poland, King Stanislaus was taken by the Turks, and Peter continued his conquest of Ingria, Livonia, and Finland, provinces belonging to Sweden. The King of Prussia also invaded Pomerania, and Frederic IV.

of Denmark claimed Bremen, Holstein, and Scania. The Swedes were divested of all their conquests, and one hundred and fifty thousand of them became prisoners in foreign lands.

Such were the reverses of a man who had resolved to play the part of Alexander, but who, so long as he contented himself with defending his country against superior forces, was successful, and won a fame so great, that his misfortunes could never reduce him to contempt.

[Sidenote: Charles's Return to Sweden.]

When all was lost, he signified to the Turkish vizier his desire to return to Sweden. The vizier neglected no means to rid his master of so troublesome a person. Charles returned to his country impoverished, but not discouraged. The charm of his name was broken. His soldiers were as brave and devoted as ever, but his resources were exhausted.

He succeeded, however, in raising thirty-five thousand men, in order to continue his desperate game of conquest, not of defence. Europe beheld the extraordinary spectacle of this infatuated hero pa.s.sing, in the depth of a northern winter, over the frozen hills and ice-bound rocks of Norway, with his devoted army, in order to conquer that hyperborean region. So inured was he to cold and fatigue, that he slept in the open air on a bed of straw, covered only with his cloak, while his soldiers dropped down dead at their posts from cold. In the month of December, 1718, he commenced the siege of Fredericshall, a place of great strength and importance, but, having exposed himself unnecessarily, was killed by a ball from the fortress. Many, however, suppose that he was a.s.sa.s.sinated by his own officers who were wearied with endless war, from which they saw nothing but disaster to their exhausted country.

[Sidenote: His Death.]

His death was considered as a signal for the general cessation of arms; but Sweden never recovered from the mad enterprises of Charles XII. It has never since been a first cla.s.s power. The national finances were disordered, the population decimated, and the provinces dismembered. Peter the Great gained what his rival lost. We cannot but compa.s.sionate a nation that has the misfortune to be ruled by such an absolute and infatuated monarch as was Charles XII. He did nothing for the civilization of his subjects, or to ameliorate the evils he caused. He was, like Alaric or Attila, a scourge of the Almighty, sent on earth for some mysterious purpose, to desolate and to destroy. But he died unlamented and unhonored. No great warrior in modern times has received so little sympathy from historians, since he was not exalted by any great moral qualities of affection or generosity, and unscrupulously sacrificed both friends and enemies to gratify a selfish and a depraved pa.s.sion.

REFERENCES.--Voltaire's History of Russia, a very attractive book, on account of its lively style. Voltaire's Life of Charles XII., also, is equally fascinating. There are tolerable histories of both Russia and Sweden in Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopedia; also in the Family Library. See, also, a History of Russia and Sweden in the Universal History.

Russell's Modern Europe.

CHAPTER XIX.

GEORGE I., AND THE ADMINISTRATION OF SIR ROBERT WALPOLE.

[Sidenote: Accession of George I.]

Queen Anne died in 1714, soon after the famous treaty of Utrecht was made, and by which the war of the Spanish Succession was closed. She was succeeded by George I., Elector of Hanover. He was grandson of Elizabeth, only daughter of James I., who had married Frederic, the King of Bohemia. He was fifty-four years of age when he ascended the English throne, and imperfectly understood the language of the nation whom he was called upon to govern.

George I. was not a sovereign who materially affected the interests or destiny of England; nor was he one of those interesting characters that historians love to delineate. It is generally admitted that he was respectable, prudent, judicious, and moral; amiable in his temper, sincere in his intercourse, and simple in his habits,--qualities which command respect, but not those which dazzle the people. It is supposed that he tolerably understood the English Const.i.tution, and was willing to be fettered by the restraints which the parliaments imposed. He supported the Whigs,--the dominant party of the time,--and sympathized with liberal principles, so far as a monarch can be supposed to advance the interests of the people, and the power of a cla.s.s ever hostile to the prerogatives of royalty. He acquiesced in the rule of his ministers--just what was expected of him, and just what was wanted of him; and became--what every King of England, when popular, has since been--the gilded puppet of a powerful aristocracy. His social and const.i.tutional influence was not, indeed, annihilated; he had the choice of ministers, and collected around his throne the great and proud, who looked to him as the fountain of all honor and dignity.

But, still, from the accession of the house of Hanover the political history of England is a history of the acts of parliaments, and of those ministers who represented the dominant parties of the nation.

Few n.o.bles were as great as some under the Tudor and Stuart princes; but the power of the aristocracy, as a cla.s.s, was increased. From the time of George I. to Queen Victoria, the ascendency of the parliaments has been most marked composed chiefly of n.o.bles, great landed proprietors, and gigantic commercial monopolists. The people have not been, indeed, unheard or unrepresented; but, literally speaking, have had but a feeble influence, compared with the aristocracy. Parliaments and ministers, therefore, may be not unjustly said to be the representatives of the aristocracy--of the wise, the mighty, and the n.o.ble.

When power pa.s.ses from kings to n.o.bles, then the acts of n.o.bles const.i.tute the genius of political history, as fully as the acts of kings const.i.tute history when kings are absolute, and the acts of the people const.i.tute history where the people are all-powerful.

[Sidenote: Sir Robert Walpole.]

A notice, therefore, of that great minister who headed the Whig party of aristocrats, and who, as their organ, swayed the councils of England for nearly forty years, demands our attention. His political career commenced during the reign of Anne, and continued during the reign of George I., and part of the reign of George II. George I., as a man or as a king, dwindled into insignificance, when compared with his prime minister, Sir Robert Walpole. And he is great, chiefly, as the representative of the Whigs; that is, of the dominant party of rich and great men who sat in parliament; a party of politicians who professed more liberal principles than the Tories, but who were equally aristocratic in the social sympathies, and powerful from aristocratic connections. What did the great Dukes of Devons.h.i.+re or Bedford care for the poor people, who, politically, composed no part of the nation? But they were Whigs, and King George himself was a Whig.

Sir Robert belonged to an ancient, wealthy, and honorable family; was born 1676, and received his first degree at King's College, Cambridge, in 1700. He entered parliament almost immediately after, became an active member, sat on several committees, and soon distinguished himself for his industry and ability. He was not eloquent, but acquired considerable skill as a debater. In 1705, Lord G.o.dolphin, the prime minister of Anne, made him one of the council to Prince George of Denmark; in 1706, Marlborough selected him as secretary of war; in 1709, he was made treasurer of the navy; and in 1710, he was the acknowledged leader of the House of Commons. He lost office, however, when the Whigs lost power, in 1710; was subjected to cruel political persecution, and even impeached, and imprisoned in the Tower. This period is memorable for the intense bitterness and severe conflicts between the Whigs and Tories; not so much on account of difference of opinion on great political principles, as the struggle for the possession of place and power.

On the accession of George I., Walpole became paymaster of the forces, one of the most lucrative offices in the kingdom. Townshend was made secretary of state. The other great official dignitaries were the Lords Cowper, Marlborough, Wharton, Sunderland, Devons.h.i.+re, Oxford, and Somerset; but Townshend and Walpole were the most influential. They impeached their great political enemies, Ormond and Bolingbroke, the most distinguished leaders of the Tory party. Bolingbroke, in genius and learning, had no equal in parliament, and was a rival of Walpole at Eton.

[Sidenote: The Pretender.]

The first event of importance, under the new ministry, was the invasion of Great Britain by the Pretender--the Prince James Frederic Edward Stuart, only son of James II. His early days were spent at St.

Germain's, the palace which the dethroned monarch enjoyed by the hospitality of Louis XIV. He was educated under influences entirely unfavorable to the recovery of his natural inheritance, and was a devotee to the pope and the interests of absolutism. But he had his adherents, who were called _Jacobites_, and who were chiefly to be found in the Highlands of Scotland. In 1705, an unsuccessful effort had been made to regain the throne of his father, but the disasters attending it prevented him from milking any renewed effort until the death of Anne.

When she died, many discontented Tories fanned the spirit of rebellion; and Bishop Atterbury, a distinguished divine, advocated the claims of the Pretender. Scotland was ripe for revolt. Alarming riots took place in England. William III. was burned in effigy at Smithfield. The Oxford students pulled down a Presbyterian meeting-house, and the sprig of oak was publicly displayed on the 29th of May. The Earl of Mar hurried into Scotland to fan the spirit of insurrection; while the gifted, brilliant, and banished Bolingbroke joined the standard of the chevalier. The venerable and popular Duke of Ormond also a.s.sisted him with his counsels.

[Sidenote: Invasion of Scotland.]

Advised by these great n.o.bles, a.s.sisted by the King of France, and flattered by the Jacobite faction, the Pretender made preparations to recover his rights. His prospects were apparently better than were those of William, when he landed in England. The Earl of Mar was at the head of ten thousand men; but the chevalier was no general, and was unequal to his circ.u.mstances. When he landed in Scotland, he surrendered himself to melancholy and inaction. His sadness and pusillanimity dispirited his devoted band of followers. He retreated before inferior forces, and finally fled from the country which he had invaded. The French king was obliged to desert his cause, and the Pretender retreated to Italy, and died at the advanced age of seventy-nine, after witnessing the defeat of his son, Charles Edward, whose romantic career and misfortunes cannot now be mentioned. By the flight of the Pretender from Scotland, in 1715, the insurrection was easily suppressed, and the country was not molested by the intrigues of the Stuart princes for thirty years.

The year which followed the invasion of Scotland was signalized by the pa.s.sage of a great bill in parliament, which is one of the most important events in parliamentary history. In 1716, the famous Septennial Act, which prolonged parliament from three to seven years, was pa.s.sed. So many evils, practically, resulted from frequent elections, that the Whigs resolved to make a change; and the change contributed greatly to the tranquillity of the country, and the establishment of the House of Brunswick. The duration of the English parliament has ever since, const.i.tutionally, been extended to seven years, but the average duration of parliaments has been six years--the term of office of the senators of the United States.

After the pa.s.sage of the Septennial Act, the efforts of Walpole were directed to a reduction of the national debt. He was then secretary of the treasury. But before he could complete his financial reforms, he was driven from office by the cabals of his colleagues, and the influence of the king's German favorites and mistresses. The Earl of Sunderland, who had married a daughter of the Duke of Marlborough, was at the head of the cabal party, and was much endeared to the Whigs by his steady attachment to their principles. He had expected, and probably deserved, to be placed at the head of the administration.

When disappointed, he bent all his energies to undermine Townsend and Walpole, and succeeded for a while. But Walpole's opposition to the new administration was so powerful, that it did not last long.

Sunderland had persuaded the king to renounce his const.i.tutional prerogative of creating peers; and a bill, called the _Peerage Bill_, was proposed, which limited the House of Lords to its actual existing number, the tendency of which was to increase the power and rank of the existing peers, and to raise an eternal bar to the aspirations of all commoners to the peerage, and thus widen the gulf between the aristocracy and the people. Walpole presented these consequences so forcibly, and showed so clearly that the proposed bill would diminish the consequence of the landed gentry, and prove a grave to honorable merit, that the Commons were alarmed, and rejected the bill by a large and triumphant majority of two hundred and sixty-nine to one hundred and seventy-seven.

The defeat of this bill, and the great financial embarra.s.sments of the country, led to the restoration of Walpole to office. His genius was eminently financial, and his talents were precisely those which have ever since been required of a minister--those which characterized Sir Robert Peel and William Pitt. The great problem of any government is, how to raise money for its great necessities; and the more complicated the relations of society are, the more difficult becomes the problem.