Frederick-William IV.

Frederick-William IV., king of Prussia, son of Frederick-William III., was born October 15, 1795. His reign is characterised by one long struggle of the people of Prussia against their king for a constitutional form of government. Frederick-William IV. exhibited much of his father's vacillation and instability of purpose; and, although he began his reign (June 7, 1840) by granting minor reforms and promising radical changes of a liberal character, he always evaded the fulfilment of these pledges. He was possessed by high but vague ideas of the divine right of kings, and showed a strong tendency to mystic piety. A determined enemy to the ideas of the French Revolution, he refused to accept the imperial crown offered him by the Liberal Frankfort Diet in 1849; and at first he resolutely opposed the popular movement which followed the French Revolution of 1848; but when the people emphasised their reiterated demand for constitutional government by storming the arsenal and seizing on the palace of the Prince of Prussia, afterwards the Emperor William I., who was at that time especially obnoxious to the Liberals, the king complied with their wishes. At length, on 31st January 1850, the country was granted a representative parliament, summoned in accordance with the terms of a written constitution, based upon democratic principles. In 1857 Frederick-William was seized with remittent attacks of insanity, and resigned the management of public affairs to his brother and heir, who from 1858 acted as regent of the kingdom till his own accession, as William I., on the death of Frederick-William, 2d January 1861. See his Life by Ranke (1878).