The Sun.
London, England, 1861-10-19 00:00:00

King William I. is the son of Frederic William
111. ; he was born in 1797, and is old enough to
have learned wisdom. Did his Ministers suggest to
him the speech which he thought fit to address to
the deputies, or was it done on his own responsibi-
lity ? The well-wishers of Prussia, and there are
many in this country, those who had believed in a
great and free nation under a popular King, an
England in the north of Europe, will deeply regret
the error into which he has fallen, an error
which, we trust, may not be perpetuated in the
future policy of his reign.
" I desired," said the King to the deputies, " to
summon the representatives of the Chambers to my
presence even before the coronation, and I thank
you for having complied with my wish. The
rulers of Prussia receive their crown from God.
To-morrow, therefore, I shall take the crown from
the Lord's table, and place it on my head. This is
the signification of the expression, ' King, by the
grace of God,' and therein lies the sanctity of the
Crown, which is inviolable. I know that you will
thus understand the meaning of the act which
have summoned you to witness. The Crown has
been surrounded by new institutions, by virtue of
which you are destined to afford it the benefit of
your counsel. You will advise me, and I shall
listen to your advice."
These are haughty and ill-sounding words. All
hereditary sovereigns and others, for all we can say,
rule "by the grace of God." What special and peculiar
right to make the claim can be urged by the occupant
of a throne founded as recently as the beginning of
the last century—the descendant of a Prince who
arrogantly took the crown and put it on his o wn head,
while in fact he took it only with the permission
of the Emperor of Germany, we are quite at a loss
to conceive, If the crowning oneself is any proof
of Divine right, Napoleon 1., could have put for-
ward the claim. What authority, indeed, have we
for the &Cement that "the rulers of Prussia receive
their crown from God ?" Such language, to say
the least of it, appears to us extremely irreverent.
The age of miracles .is past. The Almighty now a
days works by human instruments. What Samuel
annointed the beer-and-tobacco-loving Frederic ?
What Heaven-appointed coadjutors held up the
arms of his unfortunate descendant at Jena ? What
Joshua put back the sun in the wars with Maria
Theresa, and stayed the cycle of the heavens till
the Prussians were avenged upon their enemies ?
Who saved the Prussians after the repulse at Ligny,
if it was not a Deus ex Machina in the shape of
Wellington ? Even to argue on such a subject
seems almost blasphemous. In this remarkable
address we seem almost to discover the very pen
which indited the programme of the Holy Alliance.
We recognise, too, which is more to the point, the
singular shibboleth of the Prussian party of the
Cross, which stands in the way of the progress of
this young country in liberal institutions, and the
theory of self-government, which is the best foun-
dation of statecraft.

We willingly admit that the sanctity of the crown
of Prussia should be respected as inviolable. No one
has threatened it ; the Prussians are probably the
most loyal people in Europe. And is this loyal
people to be told that all that is meant by their new
representative Government in which they are
glorying is that they may favour the King with
the benefit of their counsel—that they may advise
him, And that he will graciously condescend to listen
to their advice P We think he will do well to be
guided by it in most things.

(From the Daily Aeles.)

The King of Prussia has been explaining his
theory of the Prussian monarchy to a number of
his subjects. " The rulers of Prussia," said his Ma-
jesty, addressing the members of the legislature,
" receive their crown from God." We have no

means of denying the fact, which seems to follow on
any theory of the Divine government of the world,
and to be true alike of the policeman's staff and the
monarch's sceptre. But if the King meant more
than that, then, however true it may be, he should
have been careful, above all things, to keep his
secret. For, explain it how we will, it is precisely
crowns of this kind, held by a mystical title, that
now-a-days oftenest tumble off. Henry of France,
Francis of Naples, and his namesake of Modena,
could tell each his experience on this head. Unless

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the King was thinking of the epoch of the Treaty-
of Vienna, the Holy Alliance, and Madame Krude-
ner, he would have clone better to say nothing
about the origin of his crown. If he had given
thanks to the God of Spoil, there might, indeed, be
some grim propriety in the swaggering vaunt ; at
least, the inhabitants of Silesia, Posen, and
Eastern Saxony.may be forgiven if they thus in-
terpret the claim to govern by the title of the
sword. But the descendant of the great Frede-
rick would probably like to forget the means
by which his house has come to kingship. The
royalty of yesterday apes the rank and prestige of
the old sovereignties of Europe; and in a realm, the
seams of :whose patchwork are still new and ob-
vious, he raves of indefeasible title and maunders
about right divine ! Perhaps the most repulsive
feature of the proceeding is the attempt to import
into it the solemnity of religious sanction. Such
pitiful mummery would be deplorable at a corona-
tion in Austria or Spain; but how would Luther
laugh to scorn such hypocritical words, could he
but hear them ! The thing becomes still more in-
effably ridiculous and repulsive when we recollect
that Prussia is not even nominally Lutheran, and
that the bulk of her people—variously composed of
Jews, Calvinists, Catholics, and a hundred shades
of speculative beliefs—no more believe in the
mystery-mongering of King William at Konigsberg
than the members of the Embassy at Jeddo believe
in the authority of Bhudda: What means, then,
this wretched attempt to steal a few poor drops of
holy oil for the anointing of the regal brow ? Or
what infatuation has possessed a man who, if he
were but simply true to himself and to his
country, might play a great and useful part in the
affairs of Europe ? Was it for this that sympathy
and alliance with Constitutional England has so
long been insisted on, or that intimacy with the
" enlightened despotism" of France has been
urged, as some thought, not in vain ? Represen-
tative Government in Prussia has certainly been
of the slowest growth; but the apologists for its
slowness have always argued that it was an esti-
mable movement to detach Northern Germany
from the principles of the Holy Alliance, and to ob-
literate all traces of legitimacy in the Court and
Administration of Berlin. While the late King,
reigned, prejudiced men despaired of this, because
they had to deal with one whose mind was so be-
wildered with mysticism, religious and political,
that he never could be made thoroughly to under-
stand what his best friends meant, and they never
were able to understand him. But his successor
has no such excuse. Bred a soldier, unversed in the
Jesuitic ways of bureaucratic life, got the credit
with many of being a man of common sense, who, if
he did not go fast and did not go far, would at least
avoid the absurdities and solecisms of his puzzled-
pated brother. His leanings were believed to be
reactionary in some respects, though it was hoped
he would prove himself liberal in others. On the
whole, however, men looked with satisfaction on his
accession to the throne,:because they felt satisfied
that he had no theories to mislead or phantasies to
beguile him. The extraordinary escapade of Thurs-
day last dissipates these hopes, and drives the most
wain to WWII) that the slynivoty rmaigt,