When the faithful Jordan actually came to him and the King saw the man of peaceful enjoyment timid and uncomfortable in the field, he suddenly realized that he himself had become another and a stronger man.  The guest who had been honored by him so long as the more scholarly, and who had corrected his verses, criticized his letters, and been far ahead of him in the knowledge of Greek philosophy, now, in spite of all his philosophical training, gave the King the impression of a man without courage.  With bitter derision Frederick attacked him in one of his best improvisations, contrasting the warrior in himself with the weak philosopher.  In however bad taste the ridiculing verses were with which he overwhelmed Jordan again and again, the return of the old cordial feeling was just as quick; but it was the first gentle hint of fate for the King himself.  The same thing was to befall him often.  He was to lose valuable men, loyal friends, one after another; not only by death, but still more by the coldness and estrangement which arose between his nature and theirs.  For the way upon which he had now entered was destined to develop more and more all the greatness, but also all the narrow features, of his nature, up to the limit of human possibility.  The higher he rose above others, the smaller their natures inevitably appeared to him.  Almost all whom in later years he measured by his own standard were far from able to endure the test, and the dissatisfaction and disappointment which he then experienced became again keener and more relentless until he himself, from a solitary height, looked down with stony eyes upon the doings of the men at his feet; but always, even to his last hours, the piercing chill of his searching glance was broken by the bright splendor of soft human feelings, and the fact that these were left to him is what makes his great tragic figure so affecting.

During the first war, to be sure, he still looked back with longing to the calm peace of his “Remusberg,” and felt deeply the exaction of the tremendous fate which had already involved him.  “It is hard to bear with equanimity this good and bad fortune,” he writes; “one may appear indifferent in success and unmoved in adversity, the features of the face can be controlled; but the man, the inward man, the depths of the heart, are affected none the less.”  And he concludes hopefully, “All that I wish for myself is that success may not destroy in me the human feelings and virtues, to which I have always clung.  May my friends find me as I have always been.”  And at the end of the war he writes:  “See, your friend is victorious for the second time!  Who would have said a few years ago that your pupil in philosophy would play a soldier’s part in the world; that Providence would use a poet to overthrow the political system of Europe?” This shows how fresh and young Frederick felt when he returned to Berlin in triumph after his first war.