r man has ever done such
wonders as these? Read all the records of ancient and modern times, and
find, if you can, one fit to be put in comparison with me!

_Louis_.--Your glory would indeed have been supreme and unequalled if, in
civilising your subjects, you had reformed the brutality of your own
manners and the barbarous vices of your nature. But, alas! the
legislator and reformer of the Muscovites was drunken and cruel.

_Peter_.--My drunkenness I confess; nor will I plead, to excuse it, the
example of Alexander. It inflamed the tempers of both, which were by
nature too fiery, into furious passions of anger, and produced actions of
which our reason, when sober, was ashamed. But the cruelty you upbraid
me with may in some degree be excused, as necessary to the work I had to
perform. Fear of punishment was in the hearts of my barbarous subjects
the only principle of obedience. To make them respect the royal
authority I was obliged to arm it with all the terrors of rage. You had
a more pliant people to govern--a people whose minds could be ruled, like
a fine-managed horse, with an easy and gentle rein. The fear of shame
did more with them than the fear of the knout could do with the Russians.
The humanity of your character and the ferocity of mine were equally
suitable to the nations over which we reigned. But what excuse can you
find for the cruel violence you employed against your Protestant
subjects? They desired nothing but to live under the protection of laws
you yourself had confirmed; and they repaid that protection by the most
hearty zeal for your service. Yet these did you force, by the most
inhuman severities, either to quit the religion in which they were bred,
and which their consciences still retained, or to leave their native
land, and endure all the woes of a perpetual exile. If the rules of
policy could not hinder you from thus depopulating your kingdom, and
transferring to foreign countries its manufactures and commerce, I am
surprised that your heart itself did not stop you. It makes one shudder
to think that such orders should be sent from the most polished court in
Europe, as the most savage Tartars could hardly have executed without
remorse and compassion.

_Louis_.--It was not my heart, but my religion, that dictated these
severities. My confessor told me they alone would atone for all my sins.

_Peter_.--Had I believed in my patriarch as you believed in your priest,
I should not