Germany? Hence, the great armies which the government of
France sent to the aid of Maria Theresa were without spirit, and were
not even marshalled by able generals. In fact, the French seemed more
intent on crippling England than in crushing Frederic. The war had
immense complications. Though France and England were drawn into it, yet
both France and England fought more against each other than for the
parties who had summoned them to their rescue.

England was Frederic's ally, but her aid was not great directly. She did
not furnish him with many troops; she sent subsidies instead, which
enabled him to continue the contest. But these were not as great as he
expected, or had reason to expect. With all the money he received from
Walpole or Pitt he was reduced to the most desperate straits.

One thing was remarkable in that long war of seven years, which strained
every nerve and taxed every energy of Prussia: it was carried on by
Frederic in hard cash. He did not run in debt; he' always had enough on
hand in coin to pay for all expenses. But then his subjects were most
severely taxed, and the soldiers were poorly paid. If the same economy
he used in that war of seven years had been exercised by our Government
in its late war, we should not have had any national debt at all at the
close of the war, although we probably should have suspended
specie payments.

It would not be easy or interesting to attempt to compress the details
of a long war of seven years in a single lecture. The records of war
have great uniformity,--devastation, taxes, suffering, loss of life and
of property (except by the speculators and government agents), the
flight of literature, general demoralization, the lowering of the tone
of moral feeling, the ascendency of unscrupulous men, the exaltation of
military talents, general grief at the loss of friends, fiendish
exultation over victories alternated with depressing despondency in view
of defeats, the impoverishment of a nation on the whole, and the
sickening conviction, which fastens on the mind after the first
excitement is over, of a great waste of life and property for which
there is no return, and which sometimes a whole generation cannot
restore. Nothing is so dearly purchased as the laurels of the
battlefield; nothing is so great a delusion and folly as military glory
to the eye of a Christian or philosopher. It is purchased by the tears
and blood of millions, and is rebuked by all that is gran