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 found friends and secret sympathizers not only in Silesia, but also in Bohemia itself, when he afterwards invaded that country. Though himself an agnostic, Frederick the Great was far too keen an observer not to have perceived how greatly the religious difficulties in the Habsburg dominions favoured his venturesome enterprise. The treaty of Westphalia had granted the Protestants of Silesia certain privileges, but the Jesuits constantly encroached on these privileges. After the treaty of Alt-Ranstadt and during the reign of Joseph I, the Protestants had remained unmolested, but during the last years of the rule of Charles VI—and with his tacit approval—the Protestants of Silesia had been forbidden to build schools, and their churches had been coverted into barracks. Prussia had also hereditary rights on parts of Silesia. The Margrave of Jägerndorf, a prince of the house of Hohenzollern, had been deprived of dominions at the beginning of the Thirty Years' War, and Leopold I had in 1675 taken possession of the duchies of Liegnitz, Brieg, and Wohlan after the death of the last Duke. Leopold declared the duchies to be vacant fiefs of the Bohemian crown, though a treaty concluded by a former Duke of Liegnitz assured the succession to the house of Hohenzollern. Though Frederick the Great did not omit to allude to his hereditary rights, his principal motive for immediate action was probably the opportunity of the moment.

Charles VI died on October 20, 1740, and on the 13th of December of the same year Frederick and his army crossed the borders of Silesia while negotiations were still proceeding and without a formal declaration of war. It was customary among historians of the older school to denounce this act with a flood of virtuous indignation. It is certain that Prussia had adhered to the pragmatic sanction,