Opportunity that was shooting past--is a Life of War. The chief
memory that will remain of him is that of a King and man who fought
consummately well. Not Peace and the Muses; no, that is denied him,
--though he was so unwilling, always, to think it denied! But his
Life-Task turned out to be a Battle for Silesia. It consists of
Three grand Struggles of War. And not for Silesia only;--
unconsciously, for what far greater things to his Nation and
to him!

"Deeply unconscious of it, they were passing their 'Trials,' his
Nation and he, in the great Civil-Service-Examination Hall of this
Universe: 'Are you able to defend yourselves, then; and to hang
together coherent, against the whole world and its incoherencies
and rages?' A question which has to be asked of Nations, before
they can be recognized as such, and be baptized into the general
commonwealth; they are mere Hordes or accidental Aggregates, till
that Question come. Question which this Nation had long been
getting ready for; which now, under this King, it answered to the
satisfaction of gods and men: 'Yes, Heaven assisting, we can stand
on our defence; and in the long-run (as with air when you try to
annihilate it, or crush it to NOTHING) there is even an infinite
force in us; and the whole world does not succeed in annihilating
us!' Upon which has followed what we term National Baptism;--or
rather this was the National Baptism, this furious one in torrent
whirlwinds of fire; done three times over, till in gods or men
there was no doubt left. That was Friedrich's function in the
world; and a great and memorable one;--not to his own Prussian
Nation only, but to Teutschland at large, forever memorable.

"'Is Teutschland a Nation; is there in Teutschland still a Nation?'