Most of these remarks sound like older Fritz (imo, you might disagree). Otoh, here are a few sounding like Crown Prince Fritz to me.
Montesquieu on how once Rome was ruled by the Emperors generals who were too successful were side-eyed suspiciously:
One had to dose one's fame so carefully that it only attracted the attention but not the jealousy of the monarch, and one wasn't allowed to appear in front of him in a splendor which his eyes could not have born.
Fritz: This is a principle which one is forced to adapt even today, as if it wasn't the same to public welfare by which hand it's caused and whose hands seals it.
Montesquieu on Tiberius (the very Emperor whom Frau von Blaspiel compared FW to): Since the hypocrisy and the dark temper of the prince spread everwhere, friendship became regarded as a danger, frankness as foolishness and virtue as unnatural vanity which could have made people recall the happiness of past times.
Fritz (after underlining this very strongly): A tyrant of the soul is a very dangerous being. He is not content with oppressing people, no, he wants that one blesses the hand which forces one on the ground and torments one.
What intrigues me that he didn't underline the very next lines of Montesquieu's text, which are even more adroit:
Montesquieu: There is no more cruel tyranny than the one conducted under the cover of law and painted over by the semblance of justice, for that means to drown people who escaped a ship wreckage even through the wood they're clutching.
After Tiberius, Caligula becomes Emperor, and it gets possibly subtextual again.
Montesquieu about Caligula going from no power to all power: The same mentality which causes somebody to be impressed by absolute power exerted by a ruler means they are no less impressed when exerting that power themselves.
Fritz (underlining and commenting at length): Pure weakness which lets us admire those taking a higher position in the world with enthusiasm. Our eyes are dazzled by the allure of their office and their power. This leads one to admire oneself as well when one has assumed a position which one has feared for such a long time and has been so very eager to assume. Human beings let their happiness consist to a great deal in the way the public imagines this, and as long as one assumes them to be happy, they don't care they are, in fact, not. They are simply pleased to know they are feared, for this provides them with an idea of the superiority of their person and basically equates them with the Almighty.
(Heinrich: ....)
Montesquieu goes on about how the worst Emperors, Nero, Caracalla, Caligula, Commodus, weren't the most unpopular but on the contrary were loved by the people and missed by them (hence all the fake Neros, for example) since the bread and games tactic totally worked and these Emperors allowed the Romans to channel their worst instincts, very unlike the noble Senate where the noble families (now plundered by the evil Emperors) had ruled and given laws to the people.
Fritz comments, not really apropos what Montesquieu is aiming at: As soon as a prince has laid a foundation of principles, he very easily switches to believing himself to be always right out of self love that makes him dislike anyone who dare to doubt the symbol of his perfection.
Fritz is a bit more source crictical than Montesquieu when it comes to the Emperors and wonders in his comments whether there were truly only five good ones in all those centuries or whether maybe the historians could have been biased: It is still strange that the entirety of Roman history offers a very voluminous catalogue of great men, while the history of the Emperors just explodes with monsters. Maybe there were some exaggarations in the bad qualities ascribed to the Emperors? Or should one only know the Romans as a whole and never as individuals in order to still respect them?
Otoh, Fritz and Montesquieu are united in misogyny when it comes to Theodora the Empress, wife of Justinian.
Montesquieu: Justinian had taken his wife from the theatre where she'd been a prostitute for a long time. She ruled him with an influence unparalleled in history. And since she kept bringing the moods and passions of her sex into politics, she spoiled the most beautiful victories and successes.
Fritz: Any government in which the men show the miserable weakness of allowing women to participate will always feel the consequences of their moods and passions.
MT, Madame de Pompadour, Elisaveta: He had it coming! He had it coming! He only had himself to blame!
These are just some of the lines and quotes. It's a truly interesting document, and I'm glad to have bought it.
Fritz: This is a principle which one is forced to adapt even today, as if it wasn't the same to public welfare by which hand it's caused and whose hands seals it.
Yeah, that sounds one of those "sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander" things that he'll do an about-face on between the 1730s and 1740s. Gotta keep those princes of the blood from scheming, after all!
There is no more cruel tyranny than the one conducted under the cover of law and painted over by the semblance of justice
Oof. Too close to home, maybe. :(
They are simply pleased to know they are feared, for this provides them with an idea of the superiority of their person and basically equates them with the Almighty.
(Heinrich: ....)
Lol!
Fritz is a bit more source crictical than Montesquieu when it comes to the Emperors and wonders in his comments whether there were truly only five good ones in all those centuries or whether maybe the historians could have been biased:
Oooh, that is another really interesting one to me. Especially since I was struck by how *non* source critical Fritz was with Roman myth (when Voltaire was being very source critical) and specifically with Remusberg.
MT, Madame de Pompadour, Elisaveta: He had it coming! He had it coming! He only had himself to blame!
Ha! Very true. FRITZ!
These are just some of the lines and quotes. It's a truly interesting document, and I'm glad to have bought it.
Oh good, I'm glad it was available in German at an affordable price. Thanks as always for sharing!
Especially since I was struck by how *non* source critical Fritz was with Roman myth (when Voltaire was being very source critical) and specifically with Remusberg.
Which would argue that it's not Crown Prince but King Fritz being source sceptical. He knows that a monarch's gotta do what a monarch's gotta do sometimes, after all, and yet people are always complaining! *veg*
But -- wasn't he always aware that Remusberg was a story he liked to tell but that it wasn't anywhere near actual history? That's how it came across to me in his letters at least. And then there was the exchange with Voltaire regarding their Peter the Great disillusionment, where Fritz talks about historiography and how stories and rulers are shaped by the people writing them. So he was clearly aware of the issue as a Crown Prince, at least in theory.
But -- wasn't he always aware that Remusberg was a story he liked to tell but that it wasn't anywhere near actual history? That's how it came across to me in his letters at least.
Huh. Maybe I'm just an unironic reader, as cahn is always saying of herself and which definitely applies to me, but I took Fritz's comments at face value. So did Hamilton in his Rheinsberg volume:
Voltaire having once let fall the word 'chimerical' with reference to the accounts of early Roman history, Frederick, greatly surprised—it seems he had held these as gospel, whilst scorning the modern impostures of the Christian annals—took him to task.
Though he's far from reliable, I have to say, in this case, my reading is the same as his. Here are my sources (Google translated):
je veux croire Des vieux Romains la chimérique histoire.
I want to believe the chimerical story of the old Romans
Fritz reads it and comments:
Can we give the epithet of chimera to Roman history, history proven by the testimony of so many authors, so many respectable monuments of antiquity, and an infinity of medals, of which it would only be necessary a part to establish the truths of religion? The standards of hay of the Romans are unknown to me; my ignorance cannot be used as an excuse, but, as far as I can remember, their first standards were hands adjusted at the top of a pole.
Voltaire's defense:
With regard to the earliest times in their [the Romans'] history, I report to your Royal Highness as in all the earliest times. What do you think of Remus and Romulus, son of the god Mars? of the wolf? the woodpecker? the cool head of a man who built the Capitol? gods of Lavinium who returned on foot from Alba to Lavinium? of Castor and Pollux fighting at Lake Régille? of Attius Naevius who cut stones with a razor? of the vestal that pulled a vessel with her belt? the palladium? shields fallen from the sky? finally Mucius Scaevola, Lucretia, Horaces, Curtius, stories no less chimerical than the miracles of which I have just spoken? Monseigneur, we must put all of this in Odin's room, with our holy bulb, the Virgin's shirt, the sacred foreskin, and the books of our monks.
Fritz on Remus:
As for the early days of Roman history, I saw myself committed to supporting its truth, and that, for a reason that will surprise you. To explain it to you, I am obliged to enter into a detail which I will try to shorten as much as possible.
A few years ago we found in a Vatican manuscript the story of Romulus and Remus, reported in a completely different way from that of which it is known to us. This manuscript is proof that Rémus escaped from the pursuit of his brother, and that, to hide from his jealous fury, he took refuge in the northern provinces of Germania, towards the banks of the Elbe; that he built there a town situated near a large lake, to which he gave his name; and that, after his death, he was buried on an island which, rising from the bosom of the waters, forms a kind of mountain in the middle of the lake.
Two monks came here, four years ago, from the pope, to discover the place that Rémus founded, according to the description I have just given. They judged that it must be Remusberg, or as that which would say Mont Rémus. These good fathers made dig in the island, from all sides, to discover the ashes of Rémus. Either they have not been preserved carefully enough, or the time, which destroys everything, has confused them with the earth, what is certain is that they have found nothing.
One thing that is no more proven than that is that, about a hundred years ago, laying the foundations of this castle, we found two stones on which was engraved the story of the flight of vultures. Although the figures were very erased, we could recognize something. Our ancestor Goths, unfortunately very ignorant, and little curious about antiquities, neglected to preserve these precious monuments of history for us, and consequently left us in obscure uncertainty as to the truth of such an important fact.
We found, not three months ago, by stirring the soil in the garden, an urn and Roman coins, but which were so old, that the corner was almost erased. I sent them to M. de La Croze. He judged that their antiquity could be from seventeen to eighteen centuries.
I hope, sir, that you will be grateful to me for the anecdote that I have just taught you, and that, in its favor, you will excuse the interest that I take in everything that can look at the history of one of the founders of Rome, of which I believe to keep the ashes. Besides, I am not accused of too much gullibility. If I sin, it is not by superstition.
He does sound quite sincere in this, yes, and I had a look at both Pleschinski and the original French and see that my perception might have been influenced a tiny bit by free translation - for example, he translated "je me suis vu engagé à soutenir sa vérité" as "an einer Klärung interessiert", which is a bit more open and ambiguous. If I remember my first reading correctly, I wasn't quite sure what to make of Fritz' thoughts at that point myself, but! - this isn't the end of the topic in their correspondence. Voltaire responds with a whole ode to Remusberg, says that as always he has a different opinion than the monks, but also that "Remus probably would have been as astonished to find himself in paradise as in Prussia". And then, Fritz' final words on the topic, which led me to my interpretation that he's fully aware of the questionableness of the anecdote but loved it nonetheless:
I only gave you Remus' story for what it is worth. The origins of nations are for the most part fabled; they only prove the antiquity of the foundations. Put Remus' anecdote next to the story of the holy ampulla and Merlin's magical deeds.
[Je ne vous ai donné l'histoire de Rémus que pour ce qu'elle vaut. Les origines des nations sont pour la plupart fabuleuses; elles ne prouvent que l'antiquité des établissements. Mettez l'anecdote de Rémus à côté de l'histoire de la sainte ampoule et des opérations magiques de Merlin.]
Oh, nice! I wasn't aware of that. I mean to read through Pleschinski someday, but, um, *mutters something about slow German skills*.
But you know what my interpretation is, having seen both quotes now? Fritz totally changed his mind and didn't want to admit it. He seems pretty solidly on the side of "But Roman history is completely valid!" in the first letter and "Look, I can prove it! I'm not the gullible type!" in the second, and then in the third is all, "Oh, but I didn't actually mean it, you knew that all along, right?"
Which is totally what I did all the time when I was at his stage of emotional development, when I had to know everything and admitting I was wrong was to be avoided at, if not all costs, then most costs. :P (You guys are lucky you're getting 30-something year-old me in salon and not Younger Know-It-All Super-Defensive Self.)
I think the exchange with Voltaire prompted Fritz to take a step back and evaluate Roman history and local legends the same way he evaluated, say, Christianity, instead of taking their truth for granted.
But I could be wrong! (Says 30-something-year-old self.)
They are simply pleased to know they are feared, for this provides them with an idea of the superiority of their person and basically equates them with the Almighty.
(Heinrich: ....)
OMG. LOL!
MT, Madame de Pompadour, Elisaveta: He had it coming! He had it coming! He only had himself to blame!
....if you'd have been there, if you'd have seen it, I betcha you would have done the same!
One day, I really must write the 7 Years Wars filk, starring Fritz and the Ladies of European Power. (Plus (P)Russian Pete. He, naturally, is the Hungarian.)
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timeasmymeasure
Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-06 07:47 am (UTC)Montesquieu on how once Rome was ruled by the Emperors generals who were too successful were side-eyed suspiciously:
One had to dose one's fame so carefully that it only attracted the attention but not the jealousy of the monarch, and one wasn't allowed to appear in front of him in a splendor which his eyes could not have born.
Fritz: This is a principle which one is forced to adapt even today, as if it wasn't the same to public welfare by which hand it's caused and whose hands seals it.
Montesquieu on Tiberius (the very Emperor whom Frau von Blaspiel compared FW to): Since the hypocrisy and the dark temper of the prince spread everwhere, friendship became regarded as a danger, frankness as foolishness and virtue as unnatural vanity which could have made people recall the happiness of past times.
Fritz (after underlining this very strongly): A tyrant of the soul is a very dangerous being. He is not content with oppressing people, no, he wants that one blesses the hand which forces one on the ground and torments one.
What intrigues me that he didn't underline the very next lines of Montesquieu's text, which are even more adroit:
Montesquieu: There is no more cruel tyranny than the one conducted under the cover of law and painted over by the semblance of justice, for that means to drown people who escaped a ship wreckage even through the wood they're clutching.
After Tiberius, Caligula becomes Emperor, and it gets possibly subtextual again.
Montesquieu about Caligula going from no power to all power: The same mentality which causes somebody to be impressed by absolute power exerted by a ruler means they are no less impressed when exerting that power themselves.
Fritz (underlining and commenting at length): Pure weakness which lets us admire those taking a higher position in the world with enthusiasm. Our eyes are dazzled by the allure of their office and their power. This leads one to admire oneself as well when one has assumed a position which one has feared for such a long time and has been so very eager to assume.
Human beings let their happiness consist to a great deal in the way the public imagines this, and as long as one assumes them to be happy, they don't care they are, in fact, not. They are simply pleased to know they are feared, for this provides them with an idea of the superiority of their person and basically equates them with the Almighty.
(Heinrich: ....)
Montesquieu goes on about how the worst Emperors, Nero, Caracalla, Caligula, Commodus, weren't the most unpopular but on the contrary were loved by the people and missed by them (hence all the fake Neros, for example) since the bread and games tactic totally worked and these Emperors allowed the Romans to channel their worst instincts, very unlike the noble Senate where the noble families (now plundered by the evil Emperors) had ruled and given laws to the people.
Fritz comments, not really apropos what Montesquieu is aiming at: As soon as a prince has laid a foundation of principles, he very easily switches to believing himself to be always right out of self love that makes him dislike anyone who dare to doubt the symbol of his perfection.
Fritz is a bit more source crictical than Montesquieu when it comes to the Emperors and wonders in his comments whether there were truly only five good ones in all those centuries or whether maybe the historians could have been biased: It is still strange that the entirety of Roman history offers a very voluminous catalogue of great men, while the history of the Emperors just explodes with monsters. Maybe there were some exaggarations in the bad qualities ascribed to the Emperors? Or should one only know the Romans as a whole and never as individuals in order to still respect them?
Otoh, Fritz and Montesquieu are united in misogyny when it comes to Theodora the Empress, wife of Justinian.
Montesquieu: Justinian had taken his wife from the theatre where she'd been a prostitute for a long time. She ruled him with an influence unparalleled in history. And since she kept bringing the moods and passions of her sex into politics, she spoiled the most beautiful victories and successes.
Fritz: Any government in which the men show the miserable weakness of allowing women to participate will always feel the consequences of their moods and passions.
MT, Madame de Pompadour, Elisaveta: He had it coming! He had it coming! He only had himself to blame!
These are just some of the lines and quotes. It's a truly interesting document, and I'm glad to have bought it.
Re: Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-07 11:22 pm (UTC)Yeah, that sounds one of those "sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander" things that he'll do an about-face on between the 1730s and 1740s. Gotta keep those princes of the blood from scheming, after all!
There is no more cruel tyranny than the one conducted under the cover of law and painted over by the semblance of justice
Oof. Too close to home, maybe. :(
They are simply pleased to know they are feared, for this provides them with an idea of the superiority of their person and basically equates them with the Almighty.
(Heinrich: ....)
Lol!
Fritz is a bit more source crictical than Montesquieu when it comes to the Emperors and wonders in his comments whether there were truly only five good ones in all those centuries or whether maybe the historians could have been biased:
Oooh, that is another really interesting one to me. Especially since I was struck by how *non* source critical Fritz was with Roman myth (when Voltaire was being very source critical) and specifically with Remusberg.
MT, Madame de Pompadour, Elisaveta: He had it coming! He had it coming! He only had himself to blame!
Ha! Very true. FRITZ!
These are just some of the lines and quotes. It's a truly interesting document, and I'm glad to have bought it.
Oh good, I'm glad it was available in German at an affordable price. Thanks as always for sharing!
Re: Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-08 02:47 pm (UTC)Which would argue that it's not Crown Prince but King Fritz being source sceptical. He knows that a monarch's gotta do what a monarch's gotta do sometimes, after all, and yet people are always complaining! *veg*
Re: Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-08 02:58 pm (UTC)Re: Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-08 10:12 pm (UTC)Huh. Maybe I'm just an unironic reader, as
Voltaire having once let fall the word 'chimerical' with reference to the accounts of early Roman history, Frederick, greatly surprised—it seems he had held these as gospel, whilst scorning the modern impostures of the Christian annals—took him to task.
Though he's far from reliable, I have to say, in this case, my reading is the same as his. Here are my sources (Google translated):
Voltaire, in Le Mondain, writes:
je veux croire
Des vieux Romains la chimérique histoire.
I want to believe
the chimerical story of the old Romans
Fritz reads it and comments:
Can we give the epithet of chimera to Roman history, history proven by the testimony of so many authors, so many respectable monuments of antiquity, and an infinity of medals, of which it would only be necessary a part to establish the truths of religion? The standards of hay of the Romans are unknown to me; my ignorance cannot be used as an excuse, but, as far as I can remember, their first standards were hands adjusted at the top of a pole.
Voltaire's defense:
With regard to the earliest times in their [the Romans'] history, I report to your Royal Highness as in all the earliest times. What do you think of Remus and Romulus, son of the god Mars? of the wolf? the woodpecker? the cool head of a man who built the Capitol? gods of Lavinium who returned on foot from Alba to Lavinium? of Castor and Pollux fighting at Lake Régille? of Attius Naevius who cut stones with a razor? of the vestal that pulled a vessel with her belt? the palladium? shields fallen from the sky? finally Mucius Scaevola, Lucretia, Horaces, Curtius, stories no less chimerical than the miracles of which I have just spoken? Monseigneur, we must put all of this in Odin's room, with our holy bulb, the Virgin's shirt, the sacred foreskin, and the books of our monks.
Fritz on Remus:
As for the early days of Roman history, I saw myself committed to supporting its truth, and that, for a reason that will surprise you. To explain it to you, I am obliged to enter into a detail which I will try to shorten as much as possible.
A few years ago we found in a Vatican manuscript the story of Romulus and Remus, reported in a completely different way from that of which it is known to us. This manuscript is proof that Rémus escaped from the pursuit of his brother, and that, to hide from his jealous fury, he took refuge in the northern provinces of Germania, towards the banks of the Elbe; that he built there a town situated near a large lake, to which he gave his name; and that, after his death, he was buried on an island which, rising from the bosom of the waters, forms a kind of mountain in the middle of the lake.
Two monks came here, four years ago, from the pope, to discover the place that Rémus founded, according to the description I have just given. They judged that it must be Remusberg, or as that which would say Mont Rémus. These good fathers made dig in the island, from all sides, to discover the ashes of Rémus. Either they have not been preserved carefully enough, or the time, which destroys everything, has confused them with the earth, what is certain is that they have found nothing.
One thing that is no more proven than that is that, about a hundred years ago, laying the foundations of this castle, we found two stones on which was engraved the story of the flight of vultures. Although the figures were very erased, we could recognize something. Our ancestor Goths, unfortunately very ignorant, and little curious about antiquities, neglected to preserve these precious monuments of history for us, and consequently left us in obscure uncertainty as to the truth of such an important fact.
We found, not three months ago, by stirring the soil in the garden, an urn and Roman coins, but which were so old, that the corner was almost erased. I sent them to M. de La Croze. He judged that their antiquity could be from seventeen to eighteen centuries.
I hope, sir, that you will be grateful to me for the anecdote that I have just taught you, and that, in its favor, you will excuse the interest that I take in everything that can look at the history of one of the founders of Rome, of which I believe to keep the ashes. Besides, I am not accused of too much gullibility. If I sin, it is not by superstition.
He seems pretty sincere to me; what do you think?
Re: Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-09 02:39 pm (UTC)I only gave you Remus' story for what it is worth. The origins of nations are for the most part fabled; they only prove the antiquity of the foundations. Put Remus' anecdote next to the story of the holy ampulla and Merlin's magical deeds.
[Je ne vous ai donné l'histoire de Rémus que pour ce qu'elle vaut. Les origines des nations sont pour la plupart fabuleuses; elles ne prouvent que l'antiquité des établissements. Mettez l'anecdote de Rémus à côté de l'histoire de la sainte ampoule et des opérations magiques de Merlin.]
Remus and source criticism
Date: 2021-08-09 10:07 pm (UTC)But you know what my interpretation is, having seen both quotes now? Fritz totally changed his mind and didn't want to admit it. He seems pretty solidly on the side of "But Roman history is completely valid!" in the first letter and "Look, I can prove it! I'm not the gullible type!" in the second, and then in the third is all, "Oh, but I didn't actually mean it, you knew that all along, right?"
Which is totally what I did all the time when I was at his stage of emotional development, when I had to know everything and admitting I was wrong was to be avoided at, if not all costs, then most costs. :P (You guys are lucky you're getting 30-something year-old me in salon and not Younger Know-It-All Super-Defensive Self.)
I think the exchange with Voltaire prompted Fritz to take a step back and evaluate Roman history and local legends the same way he evaluated, say, Christianity, instead of taking their truth for granted.
But I could be wrong! (Says 30-something-year-old self.)
Re: Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-09 12:03 am (UTC)Re: Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-16 05:23 am (UTC)(Heinrich: ....)
OMG. LOL!
MT, Madame de Pompadour, Elisaveta: He had it coming! He had it coming! He only had himself to blame!
HAHAHAHA! (Also: FRIIIIITZ!)
Re: Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-16 01:26 pm (UTC)One day, I really must write the 7 Years Wars filk, starring Fritz and the Ladies of European Power. (Plus (P)Russian Pete. He, naturally, is the Hungarian.)
Re: Montesquieu III: In which Fritz comments on tyrants, their successors and women in Politics
Date: 2021-08-17 04:52 am (UTC)