d in human
progress. Only degraded and demoralized peoples can ever rejoice in war;
and when it is not undertaken for a great necessity, it fills the world
with bitter imprecations. It is cruel and hard and unjust in its nature,
and utterly antagonistic to civilization. Its greater evils are indeed
overruled; Satan is ever rebuked and baffled by a benevolent Providence.
But war is always a curse and a calamity in its immediate results,--and
in its ultimate results also, unless waged in defence of some
immortal cause.

It must be confessed, war is terribly exciting. The eyes of the
civilized world were concentrated on Frederic II. during this memorable
period; and most people anticipated his overthrow. They read everywhere
of his marchings and counter-marchings, his sieges and battles, his
hair-breadth escapes, and his renewed exertions, from the occupation of
Saxony to the battle of Torgau. In this war he was sometimes beaten, as
at Kolin; but he gained three memorable victories,--one over the French,
at Rossbach; the second, over the Austrians, at Luthen; and the third,
over the Russians, at Zorndorf, the most bloody of all his battles. And
he gained these victories by outflanking, his attack being the form of a
wedge,--learned by the example of Epaminondas,--a device which led to
new tactics, and proclaimed Frederic a master of the art of war. But in
these battles he simply showed himself to be a great general. It was not
until his reverses came that he showed himself a great man, or earned
the sympathy which Europe felt for a humiliated monarch, putting forth
herculean energies to save his crown and kingdom. His easy and great
victories in the first year of the war simply saved him from
annihilation; they were not great enough to secure peace. Although thus
far he was a conqueror, he had no peace, no rest, and but little hope.
His enemies were so numerous and powerful that they could send large
reinforcements: he could draw but few. In time it was apparent that he
would be destroyed, whatever his skill and bravery. Had not the Empress
Elizabeth died, he would have been conquered and prostrated. After his
defeat at Hochkirch, he was obliged to dispute his ground inch by inch,
compelled to hide his grief from his soldiers, financially straitened
and utterly forlorn; but for a timely subsidy from England he would have
been desperate. The fatal battle of Kunnersdorf, in his fourth campaign,
when he lost twenty thousand m