So long a prescription supposes an
acquiescence in the other claimants; and that acquiescence supposes
also some reason, perhaps now unknown, for which the claim was
forborne. Whether this rule could be considered as valid in the
controversy between these sovereigns, may, however, be doubted, for
the bishop's answer seems to imply, that the title of the house of
Brandenburg had been kept alive by repeated claims, though the seizure
of the territory had been hitherto forborne.
The king did not suffer his claim to be subjected to any altercations,
but, having published a declaration, in which he charged the bishop
with violence and injustice, and remarked that the feudal laws allowed
every man, whose possession was withheld from him, to enter it with an
armed force, he immediately despatched two thousand soldiers into the
controverted countries, where they lived without control, exercising
every kind of military tyranny, till the cries of the inhabitants
forced the bishop to relinquish them to the quiet government of
Prussia.
This was but a petty acquisition; the time was now come when the king
of Prussia was to form and execute greater designs. On the 9th of
October, 1740, half Europe was thrown into confusion by the death of
Charles the sixth, emperour of Germany, by whose death all the
hereditary dominions of the house of Austria descended, according to
the pragmatick sanction, to his eldest daughter, who was married to
the duke of Lorrain, at the time of the emperour's death, duke of
Tuscany.
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