CHAPTER NINE
Frederick and War
Frederick's theory and practice of war are of unique interest in the
annals of military history. He was, likeNapoleon, supreme director of
army and state, but he was also a genuine intellectual who brought to
his trade the detachment of an outsider.
It was natural in Frederick to consider his profession in the
widest possible context. In religious matters he moved from a Calvin-
istic determinism (which he probably adopted just to annoy his
father) to a deism which he was prepared to uphold in the face of the
outright atheism which became fashionable in some intellectual
circles in the 1770s. He believed that Christianity in its various forms,
of which Protestantism represented the least objectionable, served a
useful social purpose, but Frederick's God remained a distant one,
who could have no conceivable interest in the outcome of wars, let
alone the welfare of the individual (PC 14288; Catt, 1884, 110).
Frederick had an acute awareness of the place of his own time in
the unfolding of history, and on the whole he was encouraged by
what he read and observed. Material and intellectual conditions had
certainly improved in recent centuries, and he traced this betterment
to the gradual diffusion of the wealth of the New World, to the
invention of printing, and to the establishment of an efficient system
of posts. He conceded that the eighteenth century was perhaps
mediocre in comparison with more heroic periods, 'but I must say to
its credit that we see none of those barbaric or cruel acts which
disfigure earlier ages. Nowadays we have less trickery or fanaticism,
but more humanity and good manners' (to Voltaire, 13 October 1742,
Oeuvres, XXII, 115).
When war did break out, Frederick explained that a certain
regulative process came into effect. 'Europe divides into two great
factions... The consequence is a certain balance of forces which
ensures that any one party, even after great initial successes, is hardly
any further forward by the time we conclude a general peace' ('Pen-
sees et Regies', 1755, Oeuvres, XXVIII, 124).
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