ONE:I have called you together, not to ask your advice, but to inform you that to-morrow I shall attack Marshal Daun. I am aware that he occupies a strong position, but it is one from which he can not escape. If I beat him, all his army must be taken prisoners or drowned in the Elbe. If we are beaten, we must all perish. This war is become tedious. You must all find it so. We will, if we can, finish it to-morrow. General Ziethen, I confide to you the right wing of the army. Your object must be, in marching straight to Torgau, to cut off the retreat of the Austrians when I shall have beaten them, and driven them from the heights of Siptitz.Under these circumstances, Frederick made indirect but vigorous exertions to bring the war to a close. I am ready and desirous now, he said, as at all times, for peace. I will immediately sheathe the sword if I can be guaranteed the possession of Silesia.
FORE:Frederick was, with great energy, gathering all his resources for a decisive conflict in his fortresses along the banks of the Neisse. By almost superhuman exertions he had collected an army there of about seventy thousand men. The united army of Austria and Saxony marching upon him amounted to one hundred thousand regulars, together with uncounted swarms of349 Pandours sweeping around him in all directions, interrupting his communications and cutting off his supplies.
FORE:The thought alone, he wrote, of your death, my dear Suhm, affords me an argument in proof of the immortality of the soul. For is it possible that the spirit which acts in you with so much clearness, brightness, and intelligence, which is so different from matter and from bodythat fine soul endowed with so many solid virtues and agreeable qualitiesis it possible that this should not be immortal? No! I would maintain in solid argument that, if the greatest part of the world were to be annihilated,426 you, Voltaire, Boileau, Newton, Wolfius, and some other geniuses of this order must be immortal.107
FORE: Rgla diffremment la chose.
