[Footnote 37: Gentz: Ausgewählte Schriften; Garden: Traités; Bailleu: Frankreich und Preussen; Hardenberg's Denkwürdigkeiten; Czartoryski: Mémoires; Foucart: Campagne de Prusse; Fitzmaurice: Duke of Brunswick; Hohenlohe: Letters on Strategy (Eng. ed.); Lettow-Vorbeck: Der Krieg von 1806-07; Desvernois: Mémoires; Hansing: Hardenberg und die Dritte Coalition; Bonnal: La Manoeuvre de Jena; Gourgaud: Sainte Hélène; Lecestre: Lettres inédites; Davout: Correspondance, etc., Opérations du 3e Corps, 1806-07; the works of Oncken and Rocquain.] The Prussian Despotism -- State of Society -- The Patriots -- The Liberals -- The Execution of Palm -- The Prussian Court and the Nation -- Demoralization of the Army -- The Conduct of Napoleon -- War Inevitable -- The French Army -- Napoleon's Strategic Plan -- Prussian Feebleness -- Napoleon's System of Travel -- His Life in the Field -- Another Campaign of Marching -- The Affair at Schleiz -- The Prussians Outflanked -- French Soldiers in the Leash -- The Battle of Jena -- Davout and Bernadotte -- The Battle of Auerstädt -- Rout of the Prussian Army. [Sidenote: 1806] Frederick William I of Prussia built up a system of admirable simplicity and economy in civil administration, which enabled him to lavish proportionately large sums on the finest army of the day. This instrument his brilliant son, Frederick the Great, used to increase the Prussian territories by an area of seventy-five thousand square miles; and when he died, having pursued his father's policy, he left his country without a debt, with a reserve of nearly forty-five million dollars in her treasury, and with a greatly increased income. His nephew and successor, Frederick William II, was also a despot, but a feeble one. Under him throve the disgraceful system of irresponsible cabinet government whereby both religious and intellectual liberty were necessarily diminished, if not destroyed. By a shameful subserviency to Austria he increased his territories, securing a small share in the disreputable partitions of Poland; but on his death in 1797 the people were sluggish, the nation was in debt, and the army was disorganized. Frederick William III was a good citizen, but a poor king. Inheriting the policy of neutrality, he had obstinately clung to it, surrounding himself with irregular privy councilors who hampered the ministers in their functions, and prevented the king from putting confidence in his legal advisers; his court was rent by factions, and but for one circumstance, shortly to be noted, would have been utterly out of touch with the nation.