Frederick William I ("the Soldier King"), Instructions on the Formation and Functioning of the General Directory (December 20, 1722)

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11. The General Directory must also use every means to prevent persons domiciled in Our Lands from transferring their money or capital abroad. And the said Directory will have to consider, in full session and maturely, how this may best be prevented, and how capitalists may be given the opportunity to place and invest their money in Our Lands.

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XII. Manufactures.

1. The General Directory is already aware of the importance to Us and Our Lands of the establishment of good and well-organized manufactures, and must therefore take all pains to ensure that all kinds of manufactures of woolens, iron, wood, and leather, and the craftsmen for them which are not yet established in Our Lands be, as far as possible, introduced into them.

2. In order to achieve this most useful objective, the General Directory must import the necessary manufactures, according to the methods adopted by Us for the musket factory in Potsdam. [ . . . ]

XIV. On arresting deserters.

1. In order that desertion from Our army be checked and deserters more easily apprehended, the General Directory shall issue and publish, as from Us and in Our name, in Our Kingdom and also in all Provinces and Lands, a severe Edict, which shall afterwards be read out on the first Sunday of each month in towns in which there are no fortresses, and similarly in all villages with churches, to the effect that burghers and peasants shall not allow any soldier, N.C.O., grenadier, musketeer, cavalryman, or dragoon, man on furlough, or orderly who cannot show a regular pass to pass through any town or village, but shall immediately arrest him and hand him over to the nearest regiment, which shall then send the deserter on to his own regiment, which will then defray the expenditure incurred.

If a soldier deserts from a regiment or company and the officer announces this in the town or country district, the burghers and peasants shall immediately sound the alert, ring the alarm bells, occupy the exits, and institute further search for the deserter.

When they apprehend him the nearest excise office shall pay the peasants, burghers, or agents who have caught and handed in the deserter the sum of twelve thalers, which Councillor Schöning is to deduct from the money paid to the regiment.