ants the heirs of his crown, in preference to those of his eldest daughter, Maria Theresa; so that the son of the elector, in default of issue by Charles II., was entitled to the whole Spanish succession, unless the testament of Philip, and the renunciation of Maria Theresa, on her marriage with the French monarch, were set aside.

Beside these legal titles to inheritance, the general interests of Europe required that the electoral prince of Bavaria should succeed to the Spanish monarchy. But his two competitors were obstinate in their claims; the elector was unable to contend with either of them; and the king of England, though sufficiently disposed to preserve the balance of power, was in no condition to begin a new war. From a laudable, but perhaps too violent jealousy of liberty, the English parliament had passed a vote, soon after the peace of Ryswick, for reducing the army to seven thousand men, and had ordered that these should be native subjects'; in consequence of which, when supported by a bill, the king, to his great mortification, was obliged to dismiss even his Dutch guards.

Thus circumstanced, William was ready to listen to any terms calculated to continue the repose of Europe. Louis, though better provided for war, was no less peaceably disposed; and, sensible that any attempt to treat with the emperor would be ineffectual, he proposed to the king of England a partition of the Spanish dominions, at the same that he sent the marquis d'Harcourt, as his ambassador to the court of Madrid, with a view of procuring the whole. Leopold also sent an ambassador into Spain, where intrigues were carried high on both sides. The body of the Spanish nation favoured the lineal succession of the house of Bourbon; but the queen, who was a German princess, and who, by means of her creatures, governed both the king and the kingdom, supported the pretensions of the emperor; and all the grandees, connected with the court, were in the same interest.

Meanwhile a treaty of partition was signed through the temporising policy of William and Louis, by England, Hol- A.D. land, and France. In this treaty it was stipulated, that 1698. on the eventual demise of the king of Spain, his dominions should be divided in the following manner. Spain, her American empire, and the sovereignty of the Netherlands were assigned to the prince of Bavaria to the dauphin, the kingdom

1 Journals, Dec. 16, 1698.

of Naples and Sicily, the ports on the Tuscan shore, and the marquisate of Final, in Italy; and, in Spain, the province of Guipuscoa, with all the Spanish territories on this side of the Pyrenées, or of the mountains of Navarre, Alava, and Biscay. To Charles, the emperor's second son, was allotted the dukedom of Milan'.

The contracting powers mutually engaged to keep the treaty of partition a profound secret during the life of the king of Spain. But that condition, though necessary, could not easily be observed. As the avowed design of the alliance was the preservation of the repose of Europe, it became expedient to communicate the treaty to the emperor, and to gain his consent to a negotiation, which deprived him of the great object of his ambition. This difficult task was undertaken by William, from a persuasion of his own influence with Leopold. In the mean time, intelligence of the treaty was privately conveyed from Holland to Madrid. The Spanish ministry were filled with indignation, at finding a division of their monarchy made by foreigners, even during the life of their sovereign. The king immediately called an extraordinary council, to deliberate on so unprecedented a transaction; and the result, contrary to all expectation, but conformable to the laws of sound policy, was a will of Charles II., constituting the electoral prince of Bavaria, his sole heir, according to the testamentary intentions of Philip IV. '

The king of Spain recovered in some degree from his illness, and the hopes and fears of Europe were suspended for a time. Meanwhile England and Holland had reason to be pleased with the will, as it was more favourable to a general balance of power A.D. than the partition treaty; but the sudden death of the 1699. prince of Bavaria, not without strong suspicions of poison, revived their apprehensions. Louis and William again negotiated, and a second treaty of partition was privately signed, by

A.D. England, Holland, and France, notwithstanding the vio1700. lent remonstrances of the court of Madrid against such a

measure.

By this treaty it was agreed, that, on the eventual decease of Charles II., without issue, Spain and her American dominions should descend to Leopold's son Charles; that the dauphin's share should be nearly the same with the former assignment; and that the duke of Lorrain, ceding his territories to the dauphin, should enjoy the sovereignty of the Milanese. To prevent

1 De Torcy, vol. i.-Voltaire, Siècle, chap. xvi.

2 Voltaire, ibid.

the conjunction of Spain and the imperial crown in the person of ONE prince, provision was made, that, in case of the death of the king of the Romans, the archduke Charles, if raised to that dignity, should not succeed to the Spanish throne. It was also stipulated, that no dauphin or king of France should ever wear the crown of Spain; and a secret article provided against the contingency of the emperor's refusing to accede to the treaty, as well as against any difficulties that might arise, in regard to the exchange proposed to the duke of Lorrain'.

From thus providing for the repose of the South of Europe, the attention of William was suddenly turned toward the North, where two of the most extraordinary men that ever appeared upon the stage of human life, were rising into notice; Peter I. of Russia, and Charles XII. of Sweden. [But, before I take a survey of the conduct of these celebrated princes, a short retrospect will be necessary for the purpose of connecting the history of their reigns with my former communications relative to the affairs of the North.

The general government of the czar Alexis was honourable to himself and beneficial to his country, though he was not free from a tincture of cruelty and barbarism. He reformed the laws of Russia, encouraged commerce, improved the condition of his subjects, patronised the arts, and rendered the nation more respectable and dignified in the eye of the world. He recovered Smolensko, and other important places which had been taken by the Polanders, of whose claims of dominion over the Cossacks he also obtained a transfer. The grand signor, Mohammed IV., jealous of the power which the czar had thus acquired, endeavoured to subdue the Cossack tribes; and he met with some success in his efforts; but his career was at length checked by the united arms of Poland and Russia.

Theodore, the eldest son and successor of Alexis, was not so imbecile in mind as he was weak in body: and, during his short reign, he consulted the interests of the community, showed himself superior to idle prejudice, and paved the way for future improvements. "He lived," says Sumarokoff, "the joy and delight of his people, and died amidst their sighs and tears. On the day of his decease, Moscow was in the same state of distress which Rome felt at the death of Titus."

The obvious incapacity of John, the brother of Theodore, suggested to the aspiring mind of his sister Sophia the idea of procuring for herself the effective sovereignty. No sooner had the

1 De Torcy, vol. i.

popular czar resigned his breath, in 1682, than this princess took a very active part in the contest for power. Theodore had named his half-brother Peter for his successor; and the friends of this young prince (who was then only ten years of age) zealously laboured to enforce that appointment. Sophia, in the mean time, secured the barbarous aid of the Strelitzes, who put to death many of the chief partisans of her step-brother; and the weak John was proclaimed czar. But, as he expressed a wish that Peter should be joined with him in the sovereignty, Sophia and her military supporters agreed to this compromise, on condition of her being declared co-regent. She and her favourite Galitzin now ruled without controul; but their administration was not so just or so patriotic as to secure the strong attachment of the boyars or the people, the greater part of whom, observing the promising genius of young Peter, wished to have him for their sole sovereign. The mismanagement and ill success of a war with the Turks tended to increase the public discontent; and when Peter had reached the age of seventeen, he was enabled to subvert the power of the obnoxious Sophia, by whose machinations his life was endangered. He confined her in a nunnery, and banished Galitzin to a distant part of the empire. John continued to bear the title of czar; but he was a mere pageant, and a cipher in the state'.

Frederick III. of Denmark, the contemporary of Alexis, had distinguished his reign by the introduction of absolute monarchy, to which his people were willing to submit, rather than groan under aristocratic oppression. In a regular national assembly (in 1661), the clergy and the commons voted for the surrender of their liberties to the king; and the intimidated nobles reluctantly concurred in that extraordinary resolution. This was a bad precedent; but Frederic did not, in general, make an improper use of the indulgence. This prince was succeeded, in 1670, by Christian V., whose desire of humbling the Swedes led him into a war with that nation. Great valour was displayed on both sides, by sea as well as by land. Charles XI. then filled the Swedish throne; and, though he was at the same time embroiled with the emperor, the elector of Brandenburg, and the Dutch, he defended his dominions with ability and success. After the restoration of peace, he employed himself in the acquisition of arbitrary power, and became a tyrannical and rapacious

Tooke's Hist. of Russia, vol. ii.

2 Molesworth's Account of Denmark, chap. vii.

monarch. He died in 1697, two years before Christian, leaving (by the sister of the Danish king) the prince who was afterward styled the Alexander of the North.]

The young czar Peter had already rendered himself formidable by the defeat of the Turks in 1696, and the taking of Asoph, which opened to him the dominion of the Black Sea. This acquisition led to more extensive views. He resolved to make Russia the centre of trade between Europe and Asia; to connect the Dwina, the Wolga, and the Don, by means of canals; and thus to open a passage from the Baltic to the Euxine and Caspian seas, and from those seas to the Northern Ocean'. The port of Archangel, frozen up for the greater part of the year, and which cannot be entered without a long, circuitous, and dangerous passage, he did not think sufficiently commodious; he therefore resolved to build a city upon the Baltic Sea, which should become the magazine of the North, and the capital of his extensive empire.

Several princes, before this illustrious barbarian, disgusted with the pursuits of ambition, or weary of the burthen of public affairs, had renounced their crowns, and taken refuge in the shades of indolence, or of philosophical retirement; but history affords no example of a sovereign who had divested himself of the royal character, in order to learn the art of governing better: this was a stretch of magnanimity reserved for Peter the Great. Though almost destitute himself of education, he discovered, by the natural force of his genius, and a few conversations with strangers, his own rude state and the savage condition of his subjects. He resolved to become worthy of the character of a MAN, to see men, and to have men to govern. Animated by the noble ambition of acquiring instruction, and of carrying back to his people the improvements of other nations, he quitted his dominions in 1698, as a private gentleman in the retinue of three ambassadors, whom he sent to different courts of Europe.

As soon as Peter arrived at Amsterdam, which was the first place that particularly attracted his notice, he applied himself to the study of commerce and the mechanical arts; and, to acquire the art of ship-building, he entered himself as a carpenter in one of the principal dock-yards, and laboured and lived, in all respects, as the common journeymen. At his leisure hours he studied natural philosophy, navigation, fortification, surgery, and such

1 Histoire de Russie, par Voltaire, vol. i. composed from the most authentic materials, chiefly furnished by the court of Petersburg.