"--to be dictated to the Reich's
Clerks; to have a first reading, as we should call it; or even to lie on
the table, with a theoretic chance that way. But Austria, thanks to our
little George and his Pragmatic Armament, had got a new Kur-Mainz;--by
whom, in open contempt of impartiality, and in open leaning for Austria
with all his weight, it was duly forwarded to Dictature; brought before
an astonished Diet (REICHSTAG), and endlessly argued of in Reichstag
and Reich,--with small benefit to Austria, or the new Kur-Mainz. Wise
kindness to Austria had been suppression of this Piece, not bringing
of it to Dictature at all: but the new Kur-Mainz, called upon, and
conscious of face sufficient, had not scrupled. "Shame on you, partial
Arch-Chancellor!" exclaims all the world.--"Revoke such shamefully
partial Dictature?" this was the next question brought before the
Reich. In which, Kur-Hanover (Britannic George) was the one Elector
that opined, No. Majority conclusive; though, as usual, no settlement
attainable. This is the famous "DICTATUR-SACHE (Dictature Question),"
which rages on us, for about eleven months to come, in those distracted
old Books; and seems as if it would never end. Nor is there any saying
when it would have ended;--had not, in August, 1744, something else
ended, the King of Prussia's patience, namely; which enabled it to end,
on the Kaiser's then order! [Adelung, iii. B, 201, iv. 198, &c.]

It must be owned, in general, the conduct of Maria Theresa to the Reich,
ever since the Reich had ventured to reject her Husband as Kaiser, and
prefer another, was all along of a high nature; till now it has grown
into absolute contumacy, and a treating of the Reich's elected Kaiser
as a merely chimerical personage. No law of the Reich had been violated
against her Hungarian Majesty or Husband: "What law?" asked all judges.
Vicarius Kur-Sachsen sat, in committee, hatching for many months that
Question of the Kur-Bohmen Vote; and by the prescribed methods, brought
it out in the negative,--every formality and regularity observed, and
nobody but your Austrian Deputy protesting upon it, when requested to
go home. But, the high Maria had a notion that the Reich belonged to her
august Family and her; and that all Elections to the contrary were an
inconclusive thing, fundamentally void every one of them.

Thus too, long before this, in regard to the REICHS-ARCHIV Question.
The Archives and indispensablest Official Records and