Note 31 — Chapter IX · THE DEATH OF FREDERICK WILLIAM.
Reading edition
Bielfeld informs us that “about one in the afternoon he sent for Ellert, his first physician, and asked him if he thought that his life and his sufferings could continue long, and if the agonies of his last moments would be great. The physician answered, ‘Your majesty has already arrived at that period. I feel the pulse retire. It now beats below your elbow.’
“The king inquired, ‘Where will it retire at last?’
“‘To the heart,’ the doctor replied. ‘And in about an hour it will cease to beat at all.’
“On which the king said, with perfect resignation, ‘God’s will be done!’”—Letters, vol. iii., p. 127.