r was no great burden on the government, since
it was bound to his support only for a limited period,--long or short as
the exigency of the country demanded. Hence, large armies were
maintained at comparatively trifling expense.

I need not go into the details of a system which made Prussia a nation
of patriots as well as of soldiers, and which made Scharnhorst a great
national benefactor, sharing with Stein the glory of a great
deliverance. He did not live to see the complete triumph of his system,
matured by genius and patient study; but his work remained to future
generations, and made Prussia invincible except to a coalition of
powerful enemies. All this was done under the eye of Napoleon, and a
dreamy middle class became an effective soldiery. So, too, did the
peasants, no longer subjected to corporal punishment and other
humiliations. What a great thing it was to restore dignity to a whole
nation, and kindle the fires of patriotic ardor among poor and rich
alike! To the credit of the king, he saw the excellence of the new
system, at once adopted it, and generously rewarded its authors.
Scharnhorst, the peasant's son, was made a noble, and was retained in
office until he died. Stein, however, whose overshadowing greatness
created jealousy, remained simply a baron, and spent his last days in
retirement,--though not unhonored, or without influence, even when not
occupying the great offices of state, to which no man ever had a higher
claim. The king did not like him, and the king was still an
absolute monarch.

Frederick William III. was by no means a great man, being jealous,
timid, and vacillating; but it was in his reign that Prussia laid the
foundation of her greatness as a military monarchy. It was not the king
who laid this foundation, but the great men whom Providence raised up in
the darkest hours of Prussia's humiliation. He did one prudent thing,
however, out of timidity, when his ministers waged vigorous and
offensive measures. He refused to arm against Napoleon when Prussia lay
at his mercy. This turned out to be the salvation of Prussia, A weak
man's instincts proved to be wiser than the wisdom of the wise. When
Napoleon's doom was sealed by his disasters in Russia, then, and not
till then, did the Prussian king unite with Russia and Austria to crush
the unscrupulous despot.

The condition of Prussia, then, briefly stated, when Napoleon was sent
to St. Helena to meditate and die, was this: a conquering