(Mind you, given not just clerical but legal laws in Ancien Regime France were really firm on how to deal with the body of suicides, and people who helped other people to commit suicide, so I can see why not.)
Agreed! Plausible deniability is a thing.
But Voltaire replied to him: "To claim a religion which I wanted to destroy for sixty years, really?"
Really? Do you know who I am?
when you're busy establishing yourself as a Mars-and-Apollo-hybrid
Haha. Sparta in the morning, Athens in the afternoon, as Voltaire said of Fritz's court.
I'm assuming he did take care not to wear them outside of a plausible "I'm reading now" context when in company.
Agreed. I could see him ostentatiously taking them off to look up from what he was reading to whoever he was talking to, and fix them with his "My eyes appear to be boring through your skull because I can't see a thing otherwise, but feel free to be intimidated!" stare. ;)
Also, note he doesn't get undressed alone.
Normally, I would have assumed that from the get-go, but for Fritz specifically, I've been going by MacDonogh's "...his extreme prudery. His servant Schöning, who occupied a position of great trust at the end of Frederick's life, maintained that he could not suffer anyone to see him without his clothes on, and would not even attend to a call of nature in their presence." Citation: Either Volz's 3-volume bio or Halmsten's Friedrich II in Selbstzeugnisse und Bilddokumenten or neither (he cites both in the same endnote at the end of a paragraph that contains a bunch of stuff, and he's been known to have uncited claims in the paragraph when he does that).
On the one hand, never trust MacDonogh and it *would* be weird for Fritz not to be undressing with servants around; on the other, I found it just plausible enough because Fritz is weird wrt his fellow monarchs, and isolation is one of his notable qualities. Even from the early days when he wanted to build a palace that was a private residence and not hold any kind of proper court there, and almost never allow guests at his musical performances.
So we'll see if Volz supports this claim. Currently waiting on delivery from our royal patron.
Also, cahn, notice that not wanting to attend to a call of nature while talking to other people is "extreme prudery" by the standards of the day--it really was!
Re: The Lehndorff Report: We didn't start the fire! (1778 - 1780)
Agreed! Plausible deniability is a thing.
But Voltaire replied to him: "To claim a religion which I wanted to destroy for sixty years, really?"
Really? Do you know who I am?
when you're busy establishing yourself as a Mars-and-Apollo-hybrid
Haha. Sparta in the morning, Athens in the afternoon, as Voltaire said of Fritz's court.
I'm assuming he did take care not to wear them outside of a plausible "I'm reading now" context when in company.
Agreed. I could see him ostentatiously taking them off to look up from what he was reading to whoever he was talking to, and fix them with his "My eyes appear to be boring through your skull because I can't see a thing otherwise, but feel free to be intimidated!" stare. ;)
Also, note he doesn't get undressed alone.
Normally, I would have assumed that from the get-go, but for Fritz specifically, I've been going by MacDonogh's "...his extreme prudery. His servant Schöning, who occupied a position of great trust at the end of Frederick's life, maintained that he could not suffer anyone to see him without his clothes on, and would not even attend to a call of nature in their presence." Citation: Either Volz's 3-volume bio or Halmsten's Friedrich II in Selbstzeugnisse und Bilddokumenten or neither (he cites both in the same endnote at the end of a paragraph that contains a bunch of stuff, and he's been known to have uncited claims in the paragraph when he does that).
On the one hand, never trust MacDonogh and it *would* be weird for Fritz not to be undressing with servants around; on the other, I found it just plausible enough because Fritz is weird wrt his fellow monarchs, and isolation is one of his notable qualities. Even from the early days when he wanted to build a palace that was a private residence and not hold any kind of proper court there, and almost never allow guests at his musical performances.
So we'll see if Volz supports this claim. Currently waiting on delivery from our royal patron.
Also,