_ BOOK XIX. FRIEDRICH LIKE TO BE OVERWHELMED IN THE SEVEN-YEARS WAR--1759-1760
(Chapter VIII cont.)
__FRIEDRICH, STRANGE TO SAY, PUBLISHES (March-June, 1760) AN EDITION OF HIS POEMS. QUESTION, "WHO WROTE Matinees du Roi de Prusse?"--FOR THE SECOND, AND POSITIVELY THE LAST TIME
In this avalanche of impending destructions, what can be more surprising than to hear of the Editing of Poems on his Majesty's part! Actual publication of that OEuvre de Poesie, for which Voltaire, poor gentleman, suffered such tribulation seven years ago. Now coming out from choice: Reprint of it, not now to the extent of twelve copies for highly special friends, but in copious thousands, for behoof of mankind at large! The thing cost Friedrich very little meditating, and had become necessary,--and to be done with speed.
Readers recollect the OEUVRE DE POESIE, and satirical hits said to be in it. At Paris, about New-year's time 1760, some helpful Hand had contrived to bring out, under the pretended date "Potsdam," a cheap edition of that interesting Work. [
"OEuvres du Philosophe de Sans-Souci:" 1 vol. 12 mo, "Potsdam [PARIS, in truth], 1760."] Merely in the way of theft, as appeared to cursory readers, to D'Argens, for example: [His Letter to the King,
OEuvres de Frederic, xix. 138.] but, in deeper fact, for the purpose of apprising certain Crowned Heads, friendly and hostile,--Czarish Majesty and George II. of England the main two,--what this poetizing King was pleased to think of them in his private moments. D'Argens declares himself glad of this theft, so exquisitely clever is the Book. But Friedrich knows better: "March 17th, when a Copy of it came to him," Friedrich sees well what is meant,--and what he himself has to do in it. He instantly sets about making a few suppressions, changes of phrase; sends the thing to D'Argens: "Publish at once, with a little prefatory word." And, at the top of his speed, D'Argens has, in three weeks' time, the suitable AVANT-PROPOS, or AVIS AU LIBRAIRE, "circulating in great quantities, especially in London and Petersburg" ("Thief Editor has omitted; and, what is far more, has malignantly interpolated: here is the poor idle Work itself, not a Counterfeit of it, if anybody care to read it"), and an Orthodox Edition ready. [Came out April 9th [see MITCHELL, ii. 153], "and a second finer Edition in June:" in
OEuvres de Frederic, x. p. x, xix. 137 n., 138; especially in PREUSS, i. 467, 468 (if you will compare him with HIMSELF on these different occasions, and patiently wind out his bit of meaning), all manner of minutest details.] The diligent Pirate Booksellers, at Amsterdam, at London, copiously reproduced this authorized Berlin Edition too,--or added excerpts from it to their reprints of the Paris one, by way of various-readings. And everybody read and compared, what nobody will now do; theme, and treatment of theme, being both now so heartily indifferent to us.
Who the Perpetrator of this Parisian maleficence was, remained dark;--and would not be worth inquiring into at all, except for two reasons intrinsically trifling, but not quite without interest to readers of our time. First, that Voltaire, whom some suspected (some, never much Friedrich, that I hear of), appears to have been perfectly innocent;--and indeed had been incapacitated for guilt, by Schmidt and Freytag, and their dreadful Frankfurt procedures! This is reason FIRST; poor Voltaire mutely asking us, Not to load him with more sins than his own. Reason SECOND is, that, by a singular opportunity, there has, in these very months, [Spring, 1863.] a glimmering of light risen on it to this Editor; illustrating two other points as well, which readers here are acquainted with, some time ago, as riddles of the insignificant sort. The DEMON NEWSWRITER, with his "IDEA" of Friedrich, and the "MATINEES DU ROI DE PRUSSE:" readers recollect both those Productions; both enigmatic as to authorship;--but both now become riddles which can more or less be read.
For the surprising circumstance (though in certain periods, when the realm of very Chaos re-emerges, fitfully, into upper sunshine now and then, nothing ought to surprise one as happening there) is, That, only a few months ago, the incomparable MATINEES (known to my readers five years since) has found a new Editor and reviver. Editor illuminated "by the Secretary of the Great Napoleon," "by discovery of manuscripts," "by the Duc de Rovigo," and I know not what; animated also, it is said, by religious views. And, in short, the MATINEES is again abroad upon the world,--"your London Edition twice reprinted in Germany, by the Jesuit party since" (much good may it do the Jesuit party!)--a MATINEES again in comfortable circumstances, as would seem. Probably the longest-eared Platitude now walking the Earth, though there are a good many with ears long. Unconscious, seemingly, that it has been killed thrice and four times already; and that indeed, except in the realm of Nightmare, it never was alive, or needed any killing; belief in it, doubt upon it (I must grieve to inform the Duc de Rovigo and honorable persons concerned), being evidence conclusive that you have not yet the faintest preliminary shadow of correct knowledge about Friedrich or his habits or affairs, and that you ought first to try and acquire some.
To me argument on this subject would have been too unendurable. But argument there was on it, by persons capable and willing, more than one: and in result this surprising brand-new London moon-calf of a MATINEES was smitten through, and slit in pieces, for the fifth time,--as if that could have hurt it much! "MIT DER DUMMHEIT," sings Schiller; "Human Stupidity is stronger than the very Gods." However, in the course of these new inspections into matters long since obsolete, there did--what may truly be considered as a kind of profit by this Resuscitating of the moon-calf MATINEES upon afflicted mankind, and is a net outcome from it, real, though very small--some light rise as to the origin and genesis of MATINEES; some twinkles of light, and, in the utterly dark element, did disclose other monstrous extinct shapes looming to right and left of said monster: and, in a word, the Authorship of MATINEES, and not of MATINEES only, becomes now at last faintly visible or guessable. To one of those industrious Matadors, as we may call them, Slayers of this moon-calf for the fourth or fifth time, I owe the following Note; which, on verifying, I can declare to be trustworthy:--
"The Author of MATINEES, it is nearly certain", says my Correspondent, "is actually a 'M. de Bonneville,'--contrary to what you wrote five years ago. [A.D. 1858 (SUPRA, v. 165, 166).] Not indeed the Bonneville who is found in Dictionaries, who is visibly impossible; but a Bonneville of the preceding generation, who was Marechal de Saxe's Adjutant or Secretary, old enough to have been the Uncle or the Father of that revolutionary Bonneville. Marechal de Saxe died November 30th, 1750; this senior Bonneville, still a young man, had been with him to Potsdam on visit there. Bonneville, conscious of genius, and now out of employment, naturally went thither again; lived a good deal there, or went between France and there: and authentic History knows of him, by direct evidence, and by reflex, the following Three Facts (the SECOND of them itself threefold), of which I will distinguish the indubitable from the inferentially credible or as good as certain:--
"1. Indubitable, That Bonneville sold to Friedrich certain Papers, military Plans, or the like, of the late Marechal and was paid for them; but by no means met the recognition his genius saw itself to merit. These things are certain, though not dated, or datable except as of the year 1750 or 1751. After which, for above twenty years, Bonneville entered upon a series of adventures, caliginous, underground, for most part; 'soldiering in America,' 'writing anonymous Pamphlets or Books,' roaming wide over the world; and led a busy but obscure and uncertain life, hanging by Berlin as a kind of centre, or by Paris and Berlin as his two centres; and had a miscellaneous series of adventures, subterranean many of them, unluminous all of them, not courting the light; which lie now in naturally a very dark condition. Dimly discernible, however, in the general dusk of Bonneville, dim and vague of outline, but definitely steady beyond what could have been expected, it does appear farther,--what alone entitles Bonneville to the least memory here, or anywhere in Nature now or henceforth,--
"2. Inferentially credible, That, shortly after that first rebuff in Potsdam, he, not another, in 1752, was your 'DEMON NEWSWRITER,' whom we gazed at, some time since, devoutly crossing ourselves, for a little while!
"Likewise that, in 1759-1760, after or before his American wanderings, he, the same Bonneville, as was suspected at the time, ["Nicolai,
Ueber Zimmermanns Fragmente, i. 181, 182, ii. 253, 254. Sketch of what is authentically known about Bonneville: 'suspected both of MATINEES and of the Stolen EDITION.'"] stole and edited this surreptitious mischief-making
OEuvres du Philosophe de Sans-Souci (Paris or Lyon, pretending to be 'Potsdam,' January, 1760)," which we are now considering!" Encouraged, probably enough, by Choiseul himself, who, in any case, is now known to have been the promoter of this fine bit of mischief, [Choiseul's own Note, "To M. de Malesherbes, DIRECTEUR DE LA LIBRAIRE, 10th December, 1759: 'By every method screen the King's Government from being suspected;--and get the Edition out at once.'" (Published in the
Constitutionnel, 2d December, 1850, by M. Sainte-Beuve; copied in Preuss,
OEuvres de Frederic, xix. 168 n.)]--and who may thereupon [or may as probably, NOT "thereupon," if it were of the least consequence to gods or men] have opened to Bonneville a new military career in America? Career which led to as good as nothing; French soldiering in America being done for, in the course of 1760. Upon which Bonneville would return to his old haunts, to his old subterranean industries in Paris and Berlin.
"And that, finally, in 1765, he, as was again suspected at the time, ["Nicolai, Ueber Zimmermanns Fragmente, i. 181, 182, ii. 253, 254. Sketch of what is authentically known about Bonneville: 'suspected both of MATINEES and of the Stolen EDITION.'"] he and no other, did write those MATINEES, which appeared next year in print (1766), and many times since; and have just been reprinted, as a surprising new discovery, at London, in Spring, 1863.
"3. Again indubitable, That either after or before those Editorial exploits, Bonneville had sold the Marechal de Saxe's Plans and Papers, which were already the King's, to some second person, and been a second time paid for them. And was, in regard to this Swindling exploit, found out; and by reason of that sale, or for what reason is not known, was put into Spandau, and, one hopes, ended his life there." ["Nicolai, UBI SUPRA;--and besides him, only the two following references, out of half a cart-load: 1. Bachaumont, MEMOIRES SECRETES, '7th February, 1765' (see Barbier,
Dictionnaire des Anonymes, Matinees), who calls MATINEES 'a development of the IDEE DE LA PERSONNE,' &c. (that is, of your 'DEMON NEWSWRITER;' already known to Bachaumont, this 'IDEE,' it seems, as well as the MATINEES in Manuscript). 2. LETTER of Grimm to Duchess of Sachsen-Gotha [OUR Duchess], dated 'Paris, 15th April, 1765:' not in printed
Correspondance de Grimm, but still in the Archives of Gotha, in company with a MS. of MATINEES, probably the oldest extant (see,--in the GRENZBOTEN Periodical, Leipzig, 1863, pp. 473-484, 500-519,--K. SAMWER, who is Chief MALLEUS of this new London moon-calf, and will inform the curious of every particular)]."
MATINEES was first printed 1766 (no place), and seven or eight times since, in different Countries; twice or thrice over, as "an interesting new discovery:"--very wearisome to this Editor; who read MATINEES (in poor LONDON print, that too) many years ago,--with complete satisfaction as to Matinees, and sincere wish not to touch it again even with a pair of tongs;--and has since had three "priceless MSS. of it" offered him, at low rates, as a guerdon to merit.
Fact No. 2, which alone concerns us here,--and which, in its three successive stages, does curiously cohere with itself and with other things,--comes, therefore, not by direct light, which indeed, by the nature of the case, would be impossible. Not by direct light, but by various reflex lights, and convergence of probabilities old and new, which become the stronger the better they are examined; and may be considered as amounting to what is called a moral certainty,--"certain" enough for an inquiry of that significance. To a kind of moral certainty: kind of moral consolation too; only One individual of Adam's Posterity, not Three or more, having been needed in these multifarious acts of scoundrelism; and that One receiving payment, or part payment, so prompt and appropriate, in the shape of a permanent cannon-ball at his ankle.
This is the one profit my readers or I have yet derived from the late miraculous Resuscitation of MATINEES ROYALES; the other items of profit in that Enterprise shall belong, not to us in the least measure, but to Bonneville, and to his well or ill disposed Coadjutors and Copartners in the Adventure. Adieu to it, and to him and to them, forever and a day! _