manifold! These are a world of floating vapor, of greed, of anger,
idle pretension: but within all these there are the real
necessities; what the case does require, if it is ever to be
settled! Friedrich discerns this Austrian-Bavarian necessity of
compensation; of new land to cut upon. And where is that to
come from!

In January last, Friedrich, intensely meditating this business, had
in private a bright-enough idea: That of secularizing those
so-called Sovereign Bishoprics, Austrian-Bavarian by locality and
nature, Passau, Salzburg, Regensburg, idle opulent territories,
with functions absurd not useful;--and of therefrom cutting
compensation to right and to left. This notion he, by obscure
channels, put into the head of Baron von Haslang, Bavarian
Ambassador at London; where it germinated rapidly, and came to
fruit;--was officially submitted to Lord Carteret in his own house,
in two highly artistic forms, one evening;--and sets the Diplomatic
Heads all wagging upon it. [Adelung, iii. B, 84, 90, "January-
March, 1743."] With great hope, at one time; till rumor of it got
abroad into the Orthodox imagination, into the Gazetteer world;
and raised such a clamor, in those months, as seldom was.
"Secularize, Hah! One sees the devilish heathen spirit of you;
and what kind of Kaiser, on the religious side, we now have the
happiness of having!" So that Kaiser Karl had to deny utterly,
"Never heard of such a thing!" Carteret himself had, in politeness,
to deny; much more, and for dire cause, had Haslang himself, over
the belly of facts, "Never in my dreams, I tell you!"--and to get
ambiguous certificate from Carteret, which the simple could
interpret to that effect. [Carteret's Letter (ibid. iii, B, 190).]