The world's story; a history of the world in story, song and art, edby Eva March Tappan . miration cooled. Theking lessened the guests allowance of sugar and chocolate;and the guest stole the kings wax candles. Voltaire laughedat the sovereigns verses, and the would-be poet accused himof stealing the precious collection. Thus came to an end thefriendship of Frederick the Great with Voltaire; and in some-what similar fashion ended most of his friendships. In this picture Frederick is shown sitting with his back tothe door at the farther end of the table and talking with Vol-taire, who is the se
The world's story; a history of the world in story, song and art, edby Eva March Tappan . miration cooled. Theking lessened the guests allowance of sugar and chocolate;and the guest stole the kings wax candles. Voltaire laughedat the sovereigns verses, and the would-be poet accused himof stealing the precious collection. Thus came to an end thefriendship of Frederick the Great with Voltaire; and in some-what similar fashion ended most of his friendships. In this picture Frederick is shown sitting with his back tothe door at the farther end of the table and talking with Vol-taire, who is the second figure on the kings right. At the leftof the king sits Field Marshal Keith, a brave Scotchman whowas one of Fredericks most intimate friends. In the fore-ground are La Mettrie and Marquis dArgens, two Frenchphilosophers and critics. Count Rothenburg, and otherpersons celebrated in their day. Voltaire is replying to aremark of the young king, and the party is waiting withevident interest for a bon mot or for one of those delicateflatteries in which the great Frenchman so VI GERMAN AUTHORS AND COMPOSERS HISTORICAL NOTE When the Seven Years War had come to an end, m 1763,there was on the surface little to encourage literature. War-fare is always expensive, and the country had been muchimpoverished. On the other hand, so energetic a ruler asFrederick the Great could not fail to arouse in his subjectsan ardent desire for progress, advancement, and knowl-edge. The heroic struggle of Prussia had led to a revivalof national feeling such as had not existed for centuries, andthis in turn resulted in such an outburst of writing as hasseldom been seen. Authors arose almost by the hundred,eager to free themselves from superstition, from the tyrannyof the thoughts of others, and in short from anything ap-proaching to law in literary composition. What resultedwas, of German literature, the Sturm und Drang (stormand stress) period, as it was called. This covered some tenor twel
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