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History of Prussia to the accession of Frederic the Great 1134-1740
History of Prussia to the accession of Frederic the Great 11341740 Author:Herbert Tuttle Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: were first defrayed, after which the balance passed to the army service. Thus, in effect, the revenues of Saxony were, for the time being, added to those of Prus... more »sia. The lawfulness of these measures will, of course, be affirmed or denied according to the standpoint of the critic; but it is only just to Frederic to say that he acted in strict obedience to his theory of the situation. The theory was that a designing and unscrupulous minister had so far involved the government of Saxony in the schemes of the two imperial courts that it became for the king of Prussia a measure of right as well as of prudence to meet secret intrigue by open force, and make the country serve him rather than his enemies; but he held the subjects of August guiltless, and intended to treat them as gently as the law of necessity would permit. The various proclamations issued by the Prussian generals declared that the king entered Saxony as a friend, not as an enemy. Full protection was promised to private property and peaceful industry, so long as the people kept to their usual vocations, and abstained from acts of hostility.1 The electorate was to be treated as a temporary province of Prussia. This change of authority was not an unmixed evil for the Saxon people. Great as were the hardships of military occupation, and irksome as was the rule of a foreign invader, the expulsion of Briihl and the overthrow of his system were compensating benefits, to which the natives could not have been insensible. Briihl had plundered the country under the forms of law. It was endowed by nature with rare sources of wealth, and the people were industrious and thrifty; but his rapacious administration had left no channel of income un- drained, and no root of prosperity unsapped. The sums which he wrung from helpless in...« less