Frederick The Great 1740-1786

by Richard E. Noble

Frederick the Great, otherwise known as the philosopher king was neither “Great” nor a philosopher. To give you some idea of what kind of a guy Freddy was, about two hundred years later, Adolf Hitler idealized the man.
Freddy’s father, Frederick William I, was kind of like Teddy Roosevelt; he believed in carrying a big stick, but instead of walking softly, he thought it better to hit people with it. He was prone to walking around the streets of his Austrian princedom and beating the poor and unemployed, or little old ladies who were selling apples but not doing their knitting. He also used his stick to beat up little Freddy.
Frederick the not so Great was an obstinate little child. Whatever daddy liked, he liked the opposite. Freddy consequently liked the arts, wrote poetry, spoke French, and played the flute. He also liked other little boys, and as a young man, tried to run off to England with two of them. His daddy caught the naughty little boys and put one in prison for treason, and had the other one beheaded in plain view of Freddy’s bedroom window. This did not succeed in changing Freddy’s sexual direction in life, but it did stop him from bringing any of his boy friends home to meet ‘Pops’.
Freddy wrote a book about how a good philosopher king should act, and very shortly thereafter began invading countries and killing people who didn’t like it.
Freddy liked to invite famous people to come and live at his palace. Voltaire was a house guest for three years, which kind of makes one wonder a little about Voltaire. Freddy finally accused Voltaire of stealing some silverware or candlesticks or something, and Voltaire had to scat for his life. In retrospect, Voltaire said that Freddy was a ‘likable whore’.
Freddy liked to write and wrote thirty-eight volumes of something that nobody but probably Adolf Hitler has ever read.
Freddy was also a part of Adolf ‘s Jewish inspiration. He liked to kill or exile the poor ones, but the wealthier ones were allowed to live ... for a price. They could also go from town to town - as long as they didn’t mind paying a toll at every street corner and getting beat up and robbed by the local German population. Also one son of a “prized” Jewish family could take a bride ... for a price of course.
Tom Paine wrote in his “Rights of Man” that if the world could get rid of its Kings and Royal families, the world would at last be free from war. I always wondered where Tom got such a naive idea, but reading about Freddy and the rest of the Royal families is beginning to make it all clear. And even if it didn’t stop war, it might have been a fun thing to do, just for the hell of it.