red
virtually a constitution, which they called a capitulation. When Charles
was crowned as Charles VI., he was obliged to promise that he would
never assemble a diet or council without convening all the princes and
States of the empire; that he would never wage war, or conclude peace,
or enter into alliance with any nation without the consent of the
States; that he would not, of his own authority, put any prince under
the ban of the empire; that confiscated territory should never be
conferred upon any members of his own family, and that no successor to
the imperial crown should be chosen during his lifetime, unless absence
from Germany or the infirmities of age rendered him incapable of
administering the affairs of the empire.

The emperor, invested with the imperial crown, hastened to Vienna, and,
with unexpected energy, entered upon the administration of the
complicated interests of his widespread realms. After passing a few
weeks in Vienna, he repaired to Prague, where, in May, he was, with much
pomp, crowned King of Hungary. He then returned to Vienna, and prepared
to press with new vigor the war of the Spanish succession.

Louis XIV. was now suffering the earthly retribution for his ill-spent
life. The finances of the realm were in a state of hopeless
embarrassment; famine was filling the kingdom with misery; his armies
were everywhere defeated; the imprecations of a beggared people were
rising around his throne; his palace was the scene of incessant feuds
and intrigues. His children were dead; he was old, infirm, sick, the
victim of insupportable melancholy--utterly weary of life, and yet
awfully afraid to die. France, in the person of Louis XIV., who could
justly say, "I am the State," was humbled.

The accession of Charles to the throne of the empire, and to that of
Austria, Hungary and Bohemia, while at the same time he claimed
sovereignty over the vast realms of the Spanish kingdom, invested him
with such enormous power, that England, which had combined Europe
against the colossal growth of France, having humbled that power, was
disposed to form a combination against Austria. There was in consequence
an immediate relaxation of hostilities just at the time when the French
batteries on the frontiers were battered down, and when the allied army
had apparently an unobstructed way opened to the gates of Paris. In this
state of affairs the British ministry pressed negotiations for peace.
The preliminaries were s