V.

The prince on whose mind he operated most powerfully was the Duke of Brunswick, whom the emperor and the king of Prussia alike destined for the command of the combined armies against the French.  This prince was in their hopes the Agamemnon of Germany.

Charles-Frederic-Ferdinand of Brunswick-Wolfenbuttel, bred in combats and in pleasures, had inspired in the camps of the great Frederic the genius of war, the spirit of French philosophy, and the Machiavellianism of his master.  He had accompanied this philosopher and soldier-king in all the campaigns of the seven years’ war.  At the peace he travelled in France and Italy.  Received everywhere as the hero of Germany, and as the heir to the genius of Frederic, he had married a sister of George III., king of England.  His capital, where his mistresses shone or philosophers harangued, united the epicureism of the court to the austerity of the camp.  He reigned according to the precepts of sages; he lived after the example of the Sybarites.  But his soldier’s mind, which was but too easily given up to beauty, was not quenched in love; he only gave his heart to women, he reserved his head for glory, war, and the government of his states.  Mirabeau, then a young man, had stayed at his court, on his way to Berlin, to catch the last glimpses of the shining genius of the great Frederic.  The Duke of Brunswick had favourably received and appreciated Mirabeau.  These two men, placed in such different ranks, resembled each other by their qualities and defects.  They were two revolutionary spirits; but from their difference of situations and countries, the one was destined to create, and the other to oppose, a revolution.

Be this as it may, Mirabeau was seduced by the sovereign, whom he was sent to seduce.

“This prince’s countenance,” he writes in his secret correspondence, “betokens depth and finesse.  He speaks with eloquence and precision:  he is prodigiously well-informed, industrious, and clear-sighted:  he has a vast correspondence, which he owes to his merit alone:  he is even economical of his amours.  His mistress, Madame de Hartfeld, is the most sensible woman of his court.  A real Alcibiades, he loves pleasure, but never allows it to intrude on business.  When acting as the Prussian general, no one so early, so active, so precisely exact as he.  Under a calm aspect, which arises from the absolute control he has over his mind, his brilliant imagination and ambitious aspirations often carry him away; but the circumspection which he imposes on himself, and the satisfactory reflection of his fame, restrain him and lead him to doubts, which, perhaps, constitute his sole defect.”

Mirabeau predicted to the Duke of Brunswick, from this moment, leading influence in the affairs of Germany after the death of the king of Prussia, whom Germany called the Great King.