"Originally published 1858-1865."
Edited, with introduction, by Henry Duff Traill
Frederick II (German: Friedrich;1712 – 1786) reigned over the Kingdom of Prussia from 1740 until 1786. The third Hohenzollern king, Frederick is best known for his military victories, his reorganization of Prussian armies, his patronage of the Arts and the Enlightenment in Prussia, and his final success against great odds in the Seven Years' War. He became known as Frederick the Great (Friedrich der Große) and was nicknamed Der Alte Fritz ("Old Fritz") by the Prussian people.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_the_Great
Thomas Carlyle (1795 – 1881) was a Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher during the Victorian era. He called economics "the dismal science", wrote articles for the Edinburgh Encyclopedia, and became a controversial social commentator. In later writings, Carlyle sought to examine instances of heroic leadership in history.
His last major work was the epic life of Frederick the Great (1858–1865). In this Carlyle tried to show how a heroic leader can forge a state, and help create a new moral culture for a nation. For Carlyle, Frederick epitomised the transition from the liberal Enlightenment ideals of the eighteenth century to a new modern culture of spiritual dynamism: embodied by Germany, its thought and its polity. The book is most famous for its vivid, arguably very biased, portrayal of Frederick's battles, in which Carlyle communicated his vision of almost overwhelming chaos mastered by leadership of genius. The work was studied as a textbook in the military academies of Germany.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Carlyle
