thy swiftness, skill, and order amazed all
nations. Thou wast regarded as the model of warrior-kings. There exists
a still more glorious name: the name of citizen-king.... Once more open
thy heart to the noble and virtuous sentiments that were the delight of
thy young days." He then rebukes Frederick for keeping money locked up
in his military chest, instead of throwing it into circulation, for his
violent and arbitrary administration, and for the excessive imposts
under which his people groaned. "Dare still more; give rest to the
earth. Let the authority of thy mediation, and the power of thy arms,
force peace on the restless nations. The universe is the only country of
a great man, and the only theatre for thy genius; become then the
benefactor of nations."[163]

[163] Book v. Sec. 31.

In after days, when Raynal visited Berlin, overflowing with vanity and
self-importance, he succeeded with some difficulty in procuring an
interview with the King, and then Frederick took his revenge. He told
Raynal that years ago he had read the history of the Stadtholderate, and
of the English Parliament. Raynal modestly interposed that since those
days he had written more important works. "_I don't know them_," said
the king, in a tone that closed the subject.[164]

[164] _Thiebault_, iii. 172; where there is a long and most
disparaging account of Raynal, by no means incredible, though we
must remember that a competent judge has pronounced Thiebault to be
"stupid, incorrect, and the prey of stupidities."

More disinterested persons than Frederick set as low a value on Raynal's
performance. One writer even compares the book to a quack mounted on a
waggon, retailing to the gaping crowd a number of commonplaces against
despotism and religion, without a single curious thing about them except
their hardihood.[165] But the instinct of the gaping crowd was sound.
Measured by the standard and requirements of modern science, Raynal's
history is no high achievement. It may perhaps be successfully contended
that the true conception of history has on the whole gone back, rather
than advanced, within the last hundred years. There have been many signs
in our own day of its becoming narrow, pedantic, and trivial. It
threatens to degenerate from a broad survey of great periods and
movements of human societies into vast and countless accumulations of
insignificant facts, sterile knowledge, and frivolous antiquarianism, in
whic