History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 12Carlyle, Thomas
History
History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 12
Carlyle, Thomas
Frederick II, King of Prussia, 1712-1786; Prussia (Germany) -- History -- Frederick II, 1740-1786; Social problems
"But Votes, under pain of Death Official, are necessary to your poor
Walpole: and votes, I hear, are still bidden for, and bought. You may
buy them by money down (which is felony, and theft simple, against the
poor Nation); or by preferments and appointments of the unmeritorious
man,--which is felony double-distilled (far deadlier, though more
refined), and theft most compound; theft, not of the poor Nation's
money, but of its soul and body so far, and of ALL its moneys and
temporal and spiritual interests whatsoever; theft, you may say, of
collops cut from its side, and poison put into its heart, poor Nation!
Or again, you may buy, not of the Third Estate in such ways, but of
the Fourth, or of the Fourth and Third together, in other still more
felonious and deadly, though refined ways. By doing clap-traps, namely;
letting off Parliamentary blue-lights, to awaken the Sleeping Swineries,
and charm them into diapason for you,--what a music! Or, without
clap-trap or previous felony of your own, you may feloniously, in the
pinch of things, make truce with the evident Demagogos, and Son of Nox
and of Perdition, who has got 'within those walls' of yours, and is
grown important to you by the Awakened Swineries, risen into alt, that
follow him. Him you may, in your dire hunger of votes, consent to
comply with; his Anarchies you will pass for him into 'Laws,' as you are
pleased to term them;--instead of pointing to the whipping-post, and
to his wicked long ears, which are so fit to be nailed there, and of
sternly recommending silence, which were the salutary thing.--Buying may
be done in a great variety of ways. The question, How you buy? is not,
on the moral side, an important one. Nay, as there is a beauty in going
straight to the point, and by that course there is likely to be the
minimum of mendacity for you, perhaps the direct money-method is a shade
less damnable than any of the others since discovered;--while, in
regard to practical damage resulting, it is of childlike harmlessness in
comparison!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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