The way the learned fraternity censured Hermann
Grimm appeared stupid to him, like school pedan-
try.
Grimm appeared stupid to him, like school pedan-
try.
Treitschke - 1914 - His Doctrine of German Destiny
" At the general
drinking bout improvised by the students prior
to going to the front or to barracks, Treitschke
was received as if he had been the commander-in-
chief , and he certainly was on that evening. The
speech of Pro-Rector Bluntschli, opening the ball,
had a decidedly sobering effect. He pointed out
how many a young life would come to an early end,
how many a handsome fortune would be lost, how
many a house and village would be burned to ashes,
etc. The speech was written down, and when
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? His Life and Work 57
shown to Treitschke he merely said, "S'isch halt a
Schwizer" ("He is, after all, only a Swiss")-
Capital words by Zeller followed: "We have
heard the crowing of the Gallic cock, and the
roaring of Mars ; but there is only one to tame wild
Ares, and that is Pallas Athene, the Goddess of
Clever Strategy, and upon her we rely. " When,
subsequently, Treitschke rose, applause and ac-
clamations prevented him for some time from
making himself heard. His speech expressed joy
at the events happening in our lifetime, and ex-
hortations to prove as worthy as the fighters of
1813. Ideas and colour of speech were as count-
less as the bubbles in a glass of champagne, but
they intoxicated. His magnificent peroration
terminated approximately in the following manner:
"Fichte dismissed German youth to the Holy
War with the motto, 'Win or die'; but we say,
1 Win at any price ! ' ' Already he had received a
more cordial reception than anyone, but now
hundreds rushed forward with raised glasses eager
to drink his health. The shouts of enthusiasm
threatened the safety of floor and ceiling. As one
crowd receded, so another surged round him, just
as waves beget waves. I have seen many teachers
honoured under similar circumstances, all with a
smile of flattered vanity on their lips, but never
had homage assumed such proportions. Treitsch-
ke's face showed outspoken joy at these warm-
hearted young people, who surely would not fail
to give a good account of themselves, and it was
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? 58 Treitschke
distinctly annoying to him that the following
winter he had to give lectures to those who had
not joined the ranks. He was, however, deeply
moved at the nation having risen as one man, and
he apologized for all the unkind words he had
uttered previously. Later on, he wrote: "During
those days in Germany it seemed as if humanity
had improved. " The song on the Prussian eagle,
which from Hohenzollern flew towards the north
and now returns southwards a subject inspired
by Baumgarten is a beautiful memento of his
elated feelings at that time.
During the ensuing period he led a surprisingly
retired life, and we heard only that he was writing.
When meeting him shortly before the days of
Saarbruck, he looked pale and excited. "What a
long time it takes, " he said, "for such great armies
to be brought together! The tension is almost un-
bearable. " He was visibly ill with excitement.
When the days of Worth and Spichern had happily
passed, we met at the Museum to study the tele-
grams which arrived hourly. He, however, failed
to turn up, and it was said he was writing. There
was a good deal of simulated activity about, but
for him there was nothing in particular to do. At
last his excellent essay, What We Demand of France,
saw the light of day, and at the same time it
appeared in the Prussian Annuals. Now it was
evident what he had been doing in seclusion.
Everybody was amazed at the mass of detail
collected during the short interval, in order to
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? His Life and Work 59
impress the reader with the thoroughly German
character of Alsace. Of almost every little town
he knew a story by which it became intertwined
with the German past. There was Alsatian local
tradition galore in the book, as if he at all times had
lived with these people. To his mind the fact that
the Alsatians at the time would not hear of Ger-
many did not make them French. "The mind of
a nation is not formed by contemporary genera-
tions only, but by those following. " Erwin von
Steinbach and Sebastian Brandt, also, were of
some account, and, after reviewing the German
past of the country, he asks: "Is this millennium,
rich in German history, to be wiped out by two
centuries of French supremacy? " In regard to
the future of Alsace he was from the first convinced
it would have to become a Prussian province, as
Prussian administration alone possessed the power
to rapidly assimilate it. Only when convinced of
the realization of Unitarian ideas a Prussian, as he
now always called himself, could desire to see a
frontier of Prussia extending from Aachen to Mul-
house. To make out of Alsace an independent
State, enjoying European guarantee of neutrality,
as proposed by Roggenbach in the Reichsrath,
would have meant creating a new Belgium on our
south-west coast, in which the Catholic Church
would have been the only reality, and Treitschke,
in his essay of 1870, replied thereto by referring to
the "disgusting aspect of the nation Luxemburg-
oise, " although in the Annuals he ostensibly spared
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? 60 Treitschke
the quaint statesman, who was his friend. "Let
us attach Alsace to the Rhine Province, " he said;
"we shall then have a dozen more opposition votes
in Parliament, and what does that matter? The
rest you leave to Prussian administration. "
Neither we nor he could foresee that in thirty
years it would not achieve more; but he did not
fail to point out that the only cause of the failure
was the creation of the " Reichsland, " a hybrid
which was neither fish nor flesh. He, however,
shared Freytag's aversion for the title of Emperor,
which, in his opinion, bore too much of black, red,
gold, and Bonapartist reminiscences. Both wished
for a German King; but finally Bluntschli's com-
mon-sense prevailed, he having suggested, "The
peasant knows that an Emperor is more than a
King, and for that reason the Chief of an Empire
must be called Emperor; besides, it will be better
for the three Kings; they will then know it, too,"
saying which the stout Swiss laughed heartily.
On the other hand, Treitschke never became
reconciled to Bavaria's reserved rights. He spoke
of a new treaty of Ried, similar to that which, in
1813, guaranteed sovereignty to Bavaria, and
expressed anger at the weakly Constitution which
reverted again to federalism. With malicious joy
he reported that the former Pan-Austrian fogy,
when examining students for the degree of Doctor
of Law, now always questioned on Bavarian re-
served rights. The whole arrangement with
Bavaria and Wurtemberg appeared to him "like
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? His Life and Work 61
a Life Insurance Policy of the Napoleonic crowns
with his magnanimous Prussia, which compelled
him to adjourn his Unitarian plans ad Grcecas
calendas. "
It is also peculiar to what a small extent he
shared in the triumphant tone displayed every-
where after the war. Sybel's essay, What We might
Learn of France, had his full approval. He was
disgusted with the way the journalists in the news-
papers, the teacher in the chair, and the clergyman
in the pulpit gave vent to their patriotic effusions.
In his letters he likewise spoke slightingly of
the modern customary orations regarding German
virtue and French vice. The more he disliked
the remnants of particularism in the new Consti-
tution, the less he was disposed to admire the
Germans, who, in his opinion, had forfeited the
greatest reward of great times by their own in-
dividualism. This it was which distinguished him
from the ordinary Chauvinist, and only too well he
realized in how many things the nation, in spite of
all successes, had remained behind his ideals.
Nobody, however, has given more beautiful
expression to the deep and serious thoughts with
which we celebrated peace in 1871. Like a prayer-
book we read the essay in the Annuals, in which he
opened his heart. He himself had lost his only
brother at Gravelotte, my wife hers at La Chart re.
The Prussian nobility was in mourning; he, how-
ever, consoled us: "May common grief still more
than great successes unite our people formerly at
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? 62 Treitschke
variance with each other. Rapidly die away the
shouts of victory, long remain the deep lines of
grief. Who will count the tears which have been
shed around the Christmas-tree? Who has seen
the hundred thousand grieved hearts from the
Alps to the sea, who, like a big, devout community,
have pinned their faith again to the splendour of
the Fatherland? " Actuated by the same senti-
ments, I had preached, shortly before, in the
Church of the Holy Spirit, on "Blessed are ye who
have suffered, " and therefore could doubly appre-
ciate his efforts to touch the people's innermost
feelings. His words have never been forgotten.
V.
The few years which Treitschke spent in Heidel-
berg after the war were, as he himself admitted,
the happiest of his life. His tiny house, overlook-
ing the Neckar and Rhine Valley, was for him a
constant source of joy, and proudly he would take
his visitors to the top of the vineyard, from which
the Speyer Dom and Donner Mountain, near
Worms, were visible. Immediately adjacent to
his property excavations had been made in times
gone by, and even now bricks and fragments of
pottery, bearing the stamp of the Roman Legation
were to be found. Thus he had historical ground
even under his feet. When, occasionally, on my
return from a visit about midnight, I still saw
lights in his study, I could not refrain from think-
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? His Life and Work 63
ing of Schiller, who, likewise, found the late hours
of night most propitious for his creations. It
would be a mistaken idea to think that Treitschke,
vivaciously as he lectured, wrote his works with-
out exhaustive preparations. He just served as a
proof that genius and industry go hand-in-hand.
Thanks to his iron constitution, he could work
until two o'clock in the morning, yet be gay and
full of life the following day. Surrounded by his
small crowd of children two girls and a boy and
with his elegant and slim-looking wife by his side,
he felt truly happy. It was a thoroughly aristo-
cratic and harmonious home, which in every detail
betrayed the gentle and tasteful hand of his spouse.
There was something distinctly humorous in his
peculiar ways, which made the visitor feel at home.
Above all, he was completely unaware of the noise
he made. Baumgarten, who was nervous, and
worked with him in the Archives, declared that
not only was the throwing of books and constant
moving of his chair unbearable, but also his un-
controllable temper. On one occasion, Treitschke
took up the register he had been studying, and
jumping about the room on one leg, shouted,
"Aegidi, Aegidi! " It appeared that in the Am-
bassador's Report of the Prussian Diet of 1847
he had found a memorial of his friend Aegidi stud,
juris in Heidelberg, which the Ambassador had
communicated to Berlin with a view to showing
the present spirit of German students, and which
started with the following declaration: "Like the
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? 64 Treitschke
Maid of Orleans before the King of her country, so
I, a German youth, come before the noble Diet
in order to give proof of the patriotic wishes
agitating youth. " Similar humorous outbursts
of his temperament occurred, of course, at home
as well. He at times experienced difficulties with
his toilette. The ladies, then, had to manipulate
him into a corner to adjust his tie or collar. In
Scheveningen, where he occupied a room next his
family, he once rushed out on the general balcony
when unable to manipulate a button, shouting,
''Help! help! " so that the phlegmatic Dutch
neighbours looked out of the windows, thinking a
great misfortune had happened. The importunity
with which some people asked for autographs, and
others for copies of his books, his photograph, or a
memento of some kind, provided his keen sense of
propriety with excellent material for displaying
originality. All this, however, was done in such a
humorous fashion that his company proved most
amusing. He behaved towards his students with
strictness, although he was gay enough when
addressing them from the chair. They idolized
him, but at all times he kept them at a distance.
When the University filled again for the winter
term, 1871-1872, Treitschke had gained among the
students a position second to none. His lectures
on modern history, politics, and the Reformation,
were crowded, and his descriptive powers always
thrilled his audience. Hausser's force had been
in his irony; with Treitschke, humour and pathos
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? His Life and Work 65
alternated like thunder and lightning. Even
listeners of more matured age admitted that they
had never heard anything that could be compared
with his natural elementary eloquence. Unable to
hear the clock strike, he had arranged with those
sitting in front to make a sign at a given hour;
but, as nobody wished him to discontinue, he often
unduly prolonged his lectures. Now and then
ladies turned up. At first he informed them by
letter that he could not permit their presence,
but when they persisted in coming he told the
porter to refuse them entrance, and angrily added
his intention of putting up a notice similar to
those in front of anatomical theatres: "For
gentlemen only! " When meeting his colleagues
he never even hinted at the striking success he
scored with his audience. His disposition was
anything but over-confident, and he associated
just as cordially with those whose academic
failures were notorious provided he appreciated
them otherwise as with the past-masters, whose
level was as high as his own. He never referred
at all to the demonstrations which students made
in his favour. In the choice of his friends, as well
as in the choice of his enemies, he was aristocratic,
but vain he was not. Enthusiastic patriotism was
the keynote of his life, and this explains its aesthet-
ics. A sensitive admirer of nature, appreciating as
keenly as anybody the lovely scenery of the ruins
of Heidelberg Castle, he nevertheless favoured
the re-building of the same, obsessed by the idea
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? 66 Treitschke
that it must become the palace of the German
King. His literary opinions could easily be gauged
as his compass always pointed towards Prussia.
When he invited us to an evening, we knew before-
hand we should read the Prince of Hamburg, or
some similar work. This explains also his pre-
dilection for Kleist, and for Uhland, the patriot.
Of Hebbel's works he was about to prepare an
analysis of them in a new form for publication in
the essays the Nibelungs were his favourite.
Did he not himself bear resemblance to Siegfried,
who plans to chain up the perfidious Danish Kings
outside the gate, where, as they had behaved like
dogs, they were to bark on his arrival and de-
parture? This was quite his style of thinking,
just as at the Theatre Francais my travelling
companion, when listening to the patriotic ravings
of Ernani, the highwayman, whispered to me:
" Exactly like Treitschke! " Not only The Trou-
sers of Hen von Bredow, of which he knew con-
siderable parts by heart, but Brandenburg poetry
in general, gave him great pleasure. He even
shielded Hesekiel and Scherenberg against attacks ;
and the scruples of learned men respecting Prey-
tag's Ingo and Ingraban were suppressed by him.
Turbulent men were to his liking; the criticisms
of German Law History and of the Spruner Atlas
regarding these descriptions had, to his mind,
nothing to do with poetry. Whatever met with
the approval of his patriotism could be sure of his
appreciation. My first two novels met with a very
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? His Life and Work 67
friendly reception in the Press, as, thanks to my
pseudonym, "George Taylor," quite different
authors had been suspected. No sooner, how-
ever, had the wise men from the East discovered
that a theologian had been the author than, on
the appearance of the third novel, entitled Jetta,
they vented their rage at having been deceived.
Treitschke, however declared Jetta to be the best
of the three books. He liked the Alemans for the
thrashing they had given the Romans, and that
settled the matter as far as he was concerned.
The way the learned fraternity censured Hermann
Grimm appeared stupid to him, like school pedan-
try. He. realized as well as anybody else the de-
fects and mistakes, but he called it childish spite
to take to task such an ingenious author for all
sorts of blunders and amateurish trivialities when
he had original views, and had created a picture of
culture such as the life of Michelangelo. In the
same way he stood up for living and not for dead
writers, in spite of the opposition of the learned
fraternity; but he did not, however, defend their
superficiality or phrase-making.
The great literary post-bellum events were The
Old and the New Faith, by Strauss, and the revival
of Schopenhauer pessimism by Hartmann and
Nietzsche, books which albeit different in form,
yet related in their fundamental views of the
world appeared to Treitschke, in view of the
melancholy tone adopted, like an inexplicable
phenomenon. How could anybody be a pessimist
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? 68 Treitschke
in times like the present, when it was a pleasure
to be alive? Of Hartmann he said: "This is the
philosophy of the Berliner when suffering from
phthisis. " With Olympic roars of laughter he
derided, over a glass of beer, Hartmann's senti-
mentality and his many discussions whether the
feelings of pleasure or displeasure predominate
in human nature. After all, Hartmann had left
us the consolation of Nirvana; but Nietzsche, by
his revival theory, deprived us of the consoling
thought of peacefulness after death. Nietzsche's
first essay on the origin of tragedy had met with
Treitschke's approval. Was he not himself to
adopt the Nietzschean phrase of "a dithyrambic
disposition"? and, to him, Socratic natures were
likewise unsympathetic. In his criticism on
Strauss he gave proof of his aversion to Socratic
dispositions, an aversion which he shared with
Nietzsche. He was the only one of our circle who
defended Nietzsche's essay and criticized Strauss's
Old and New Faith. He would not admit the
merits of a book which represents the materialistic
theory in transparent clearness, and thereby
brings defects to light which cannot be overlooked.
He simply went by results. A book, which as far
as we, the enlightened ones, were concerned,
sought a last consolation in music, had to be some-
what disagreeable to him, deaf as he was. But he
would not even admit Strauss's beauty of style.
"Beautiful style by itself does not exist, " he said.
"A style is beautiful when the writer is represented
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? His Life and Work 69
by it. Style should faithfully express the nature
and temperament of the author. With Lessing, I
admire the clear statements, because they are
natural to this clear dialectician ; but with Strauss
they do not belong to the man, as with Lessing,
but to the essay. " Strauss's style just lacked the
personal element. If Strauss, on the other hand,
found Treitschke's style indigestible, the contrast
is thereby quite correctly characteristic. While
patriotic pathos dominated the one, the other one
was, throughout, reflective and logical; that is
to say, the one was a dithyramb and the other
one a Socratic nature. I could not always share
Treitschke's clearly formed opinions, but we were
all grateful to him for the interest with which he
invested conversation, and for his ability to main-
tain it. His own activity was that of an artist as
well as that of a scientist. Impressions of his
travels through all the valleys of Germany, poetry,
newspaper extracts, conversations and humorous
stories of friends, were always at his command, and
these, combined with accurate studies from the
Archives and information verbally received, en-
abled him to shape his work. Considering his
system of gathering information, it was inevitable
that occasionally he was provided with unauthen-
tic news, for, as soon as conversation arose on a
subject useful to him, his pocket-book appeared,
and he asked to have the story put down. When
I once wrote for him that, at the outbreak of the
Army mutiny in Karlsruhe, a picture of Grand
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? 70 Treitschke
Duke Leopold was exhibited in all the libraries,
with the verse:
Zittert ein Tyrann von Revolutionen,
Du Leopold kannst ruhig thronen.
Dein Volk verlasst Dich nicht
(Though a tyrant may dread revolution,
Thou, O Leopold, mayest safely reign.
Thy people will not forsake thee),
he immediately placed the piece of paper separately
and said, "This will appear in the sixth volume";
but it never saw the light of day. I personally
could vouch for the correctness of my story, but
how easy it was to obtain wrong information under
these circumstances, and, as a matter of fact, all
sorts of protests against his anecdotes were raised
after each publication. It is notorious how cir-
cumstantially he subsequently had to explain or
contradict the story of the silver spoon of Prince
Wrede, the Red Order of the Eagle of Privy Coun-
cillor Schmalz, and many other things, and much
more frequently still he promised correction in the
subsequent edition to those who had lodged com-
plaints. We were very much annoyed at the injus-
tice with which he, in the fifth volume, character-
ized the Grand Duke Leopold, who was exceedingly
conscientious and benevolent. When attacking
him for it in our domestic circle, he declared that
every petty State had its idol, and that we ought
to break ourselves of it as others had done.
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? His Life and Work 71
Treitschke's tales from the Reichstag provided
a rich source of amusement. When entering
Parliament, in 1871, all friends were of opinion
the deaf man would not stand it long, and his
enemies mockingly remarked: "It is right he
should be there. " But the canvassing tour in
itself proved a great recreation for him, and if he
had achieved nothing beyond the strengthening,
by his fiery speeches, of the German sentiment of
people on the Hunsruck and in the Nahe Valley,
this gain alone was worth the trouble. His effi-
ciency in Berlin exceeded all expectations. He
sat next to the shorthand writers, and after having
grasped their system of abbreviations, he followed
the speeches, and thus was often better informed
than those who sneered at the deaf deputy. It
was more difficult for him to attend at Committee
sittings, but his friend Wehrenpfennig kept him
informed as far as possible. As all parties decided
in committee how to vote, Treitschke's speeches
in plenum really were of value for the public only,
but the reputation of the Reichsrath certainly was
considerably enhanced by the fact that people who
liked reading the parliamentary proceedings were
able to find the speeches reproduced in the news-
papers. The orations of "the deaf man who had
no business in Parliament" are, with the exception
of Bismarck's, after all, the only ones which, after
his death, have been edited in book form from the
protocols, and even to-day they are a source of
political information and patriotic elevation. It
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? 72 Treitschke
was a great event when the circle of friends in
Heidelberg heard that Treitschke had delivered
his maiden speech in the Reichstag, and great was
our joy when we read that in this first speech he
had vehemently attacked the Ultramontanes.
Deputy Reichensperger moved that, with a
view to safeguarding the liberty of the Press,
Unions and the Church Articles III-V of the Frank-
fort fundamental laws should be incorporated
in the Constitution of the Empire. Treitschke
started by declaring that the nation's hope of a
temporary continuance, at any rate in Parliament,
of the noble spirit of unanimity which, during the
war, had raised Germany above other nations,
had been defeated by the Ultramontanes. At the
beginning of the German Reichstag, we have
heard the Empire of the Papal King, the Republic
of Poland, and the Empire of the Guelfs discussed,
while I had hoped we should now have firmly es-
tablished progress in our territory, and would look
hopefully towards the future. It is impossible to
believe that the great question of State and Church
could be solved by a four-line sentence. In order
to bring about the Constitution every party was
obliged to make sacrifices. The disturbers of the
peace are now exactly those gentlemen who always
assert that they are the oppressed minority. Now,
gentlemen, if this were true, I must say that they
endured their oppression with a very small
measure of Christian patience. If fundamental
laws should become incorporated with the New
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? His Life and Work 73
Constitution, he continued, why have Mr. Reichen-
sperger and his associates forgotten the principal
ones? The article is lacking ; "science and its dog-
ma are free," a principle the adoption of which
would be highly beneficial to the Catholic Theo-
logic Faculties. Why is the definition lacking
respecting civil marriage law? In this way he
ruthlessly tore off the opponents' masks, as if they
had aimed at liberty. When Bishop Kettler had
uttered a warning to speak a little more modestly,
and with less confidence of the future of an Empire
which had as yet to be founded, Treitschke ironi-
cally pointed to the great progress made consider-
ing that Kettler no longer sat in Parliament as
Bishop of Mayence, but owed his seat to the
poll of an electoral district. If the movers of
the bill were to point out they demanded nothing
beyond what the Prussian Constitution had taken
over long before from the Frankfort Constitution,
they betrayed thereby their intention to give the
Bishops in this article the possibility of scoffing
at the laws of the country by appealing to the law
of the Empire. In Baden they had undergone too
many experiences in this respect to be deceived
any longer. But the German nation is sensible and
honest enough to understand that these poor
articles are not fundamental laws, but aim at
procuring, by a side-issue, an independent position
for the Catholic Church as regards the State. He
therefore thought he did no injustice to the
movers of the bill when he expressed the belief that
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? 74 Treitschke
the Press and Unions were only a momentary
addition to their proposal, but that their real in-
tention was directed to the independence of the
Catholic Church. The defeat of the Ultramon-
tanes was as complete as possible, and there ex-
isted no other more pressing matter for which
Treitschke could have acted as champion on behalf
of Baden. In parliamentary matters he was now,
likewise, recognized as the worthy successor of
Hausser. The general belief that Treitschke owed
his great success to mannerism was dispelled by
his speeches in the Reichstag. It was not rhetoric
or pathos which scored, but the force of conviction.
He spoke better than others because he had
grasped the thought of liberty, and of nationality,
with more ardour than they had. To him more
than to any other speaker the words of Cato
senior applied: "Keep firmly in mind the subject
and the words will follow. "
In a further speech on the law on July 9, 1871,
he woefully surrendered his ideal to see Alsace
Lothing a province of Germany, but all the more
energetically he opposed the desire of a party,
supported by Roggenbach, to form Alsace into a
State. If it was not to become part of the Prussian
State it should, at least, be a province of the Ger-
man Empire, reigned over by the Emperor, and
not become a new Small State. The Alsatian
public servants should frequently be transferred,
even to Schwelm, and to Stalluponen, so that they
should get to know Germany. Neither was he in
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? His Life and Work 75
favour of having a Lord Lieutenant appointed.
"Such a prince makes the worst public servant,
because he is obliged to act as if his house '/were a
Court. The elements of Society which could be
attracted by these countless gewgaws are such
that I, at any rate, would with pleasure dispense
with their support. " Neither in Strasburg nor
in Heidelberg or Berlin did this particular speech
meet with great approbation, but who will assert
to-day that he was wrong? All the more ap-
proved was his speech of November 2, 1871, in
which he demanded the intervention of the Empire
to procure for Mecklenburg the privileges of the
Estates of the Realm. A great impression was
produced when he pointed out that, of half a
million inhabitants, no less than 60,000 people had
emigrated within the last fifteen years from this
little country richly blessed by nature. In his
indignation he ever adopted a tone which, hitherto,
one was wont to hear only at democratic meetings.
He pointed out that conditions in Mecklenburg
had become the butt of humour. " It is dangerous
when the patient German people begin to sneer.
That scornful laughter over the old German Diet
and the King of the Guelfs carried on for many
years has led to very serious consequences; it has
brought about the well-known end of all things.
The star of unity is in the ascendant. Woe betide
the State which wilfully secludes itself from this
mighty and irresistible impulse ; sooner or later the
catastrophe will overtake it. " In the same way as
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? 76 Treitschke
these threatening words had created a great im-
pression in Parliament, so they found an enthusi-
astic echo in our circle; and equally great was his
success when he supported the supplementing of
the Penal Code by the so-called Pulpit Paragraph,
by which he again told the bitter truth to the
Ultramontanes. For the last time before proroga-
tion of Parliament he spoke on November 29, 1871,
when the progressive party renewed the old
controversy on parliamentary co-operation regard-
ing Army Estimates. Treitschke was strongly in
favour of the War Minister's views; he availed
himself, however, of this occasion to attack
strongly von Muhler, the Minister of Public In-
struction, and when called to order by the Con-
servatives he replied: "See that a capable man is
appointed at the head of the Ministry of Public
Instruction who bestows only the tenth part of
that energy which the Minister for War is in the
habit of bestowing upon his department; you will
then have practical experience that one thing can
be done, and that another cannot be left undone. "
On the whole, the Baden Deputies returned from
Berlin in a very dejected mood. Of Bluntschli,
the Berlin newspapers had written that his delivery
gave the impression he was dictating his speeches.
He had remained obscure that he knew; but
consoled himself with the thought that it took
time to find the tone for such a big assembly. Of
Roggenbach, who, with all his brilliant conver-
sational gifts, completely lacked oratorical powers,
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? His Life and Work 77
a gay Palatine country judge, who was also a
member of the Reichstag, said: "If this is your
most brilliant statesman I should like to come
across your most stupid one. " In the same way
the others returned like a beaten army, for not the
remotest comparison existed between the part
played by them in Berlin and the one played by
them in Karlsruhe at the Municipal Hall. Only
one appeared with laurels, and this one was
Treitschke, who had saved our reputation. He
was also welcomed home as heartily as possible;
although Baumgarten said at the time, in a morose
tone, that Treitschke never considered a law pro-
posal favourably unless he had delivered a speech
on it. The Ul tramontanes, however, considered
the game unevenly matched. While he over-
whelmed them with the strongest expressions, they
could not hit back because he did not hear them.
In an identical fashion the second session, 1873-
1874, passed, which Treitschke still attended from
Heidelberg, and the "round table" applauded his
brilliant passages of arms. Many of his winged
words have survived to the present day, as, for
instance, his explanation of the request of German
issuing banks for paper (money) "based on a
deeply founded desire in human nature"; or
"making debts without getting interest on them";
or his sneering remarks about the predilection of
South Germans for Bavarian military helmets and
dirty florin notes. His patriotism again rose to its
full height when discussions on the septennate took
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? 78 Treitschke
place, when the same party, whose chaplains in
the Black Forest had falsely told the constituents
that "septennate" meant serving for seven
successive years, complained in Parliament that
they were called the enemies of the Empire, he
referred to their behaviour, and for simplicity's
sake began with the Pope.
"Who was it who expressed the devout Chris-
tian wish that a little stone might fall from heaven
to shatter the feet of the German Colossus? Those
who consider the author of this ingenious pro-
nouncement infallible would only have confessed
publicly to this wish after Germany had lost a
battle, and which God forbid. Meanwhile, Prussia
was the little stone which had opened the doors
of the Eternal City to united and free Italy, and at
the same time had annihilated the most sinful
Small State of that part of the globe. In similar
strain he spoke on December 17, 1874, to Deputy
Winterer, who demanded the abolition of the
School Law granted the preceding year to Alsace
Lothing. In opposition to Winterer's hymns on
the achievements of the school brethren he read
extracts from their rules which prescribed in which
case the brother has to rise before the superior,
in which case to kneel down, and in which case he
only had to kiss the floor. " Gentlemen, " he asked
the Ultramontanes, "I am indeed curious to know
whether there is anything worse than the naked
floor the devout school brother is to kiss. " When
the gentlemen of the clerical party expressed the
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? His Life and Work 79
wish to save the ecclesiastical and French spirit
of their public schools he replied in unmistakable
fashion: "We have the intention to Germanize
this newly acquired German province ; we have the
intention and will carry it out.
drinking bout improvised by the students prior
to going to the front or to barracks, Treitschke
was received as if he had been the commander-in-
chief , and he certainly was on that evening. The
speech of Pro-Rector Bluntschli, opening the ball,
had a decidedly sobering effect. He pointed out
how many a young life would come to an early end,
how many a handsome fortune would be lost, how
many a house and village would be burned to ashes,
etc. The speech was written down, and when
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? His Life and Work 57
shown to Treitschke he merely said, "S'isch halt a
Schwizer" ("He is, after all, only a Swiss")-
Capital words by Zeller followed: "We have
heard the crowing of the Gallic cock, and the
roaring of Mars ; but there is only one to tame wild
Ares, and that is Pallas Athene, the Goddess of
Clever Strategy, and upon her we rely. " When,
subsequently, Treitschke rose, applause and ac-
clamations prevented him for some time from
making himself heard. His speech expressed joy
at the events happening in our lifetime, and ex-
hortations to prove as worthy as the fighters of
1813. Ideas and colour of speech were as count-
less as the bubbles in a glass of champagne, but
they intoxicated. His magnificent peroration
terminated approximately in the following manner:
"Fichte dismissed German youth to the Holy
War with the motto, 'Win or die'; but we say,
1 Win at any price ! ' ' Already he had received a
more cordial reception than anyone, but now
hundreds rushed forward with raised glasses eager
to drink his health. The shouts of enthusiasm
threatened the safety of floor and ceiling. As one
crowd receded, so another surged round him, just
as waves beget waves. I have seen many teachers
honoured under similar circumstances, all with a
smile of flattered vanity on their lips, but never
had homage assumed such proportions. Treitsch-
ke's face showed outspoken joy at these warm-
hearted young people, who surely would not fail
to give a good account of themselves, and it was
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? 58 Treitschke
distinctly annoying to him that the following
winter he had to give lectures to those who had
not joined the ranks. He was, however, deeply
moved at the nation having risen as one man, and
he apologized for all the unkind words he had
uttered previously. Later on, he wrote: "During
those days in Germany it seemed as if humanity
had improved. " The song on the Prussian eagle,
which from Hohenzollern flew towards the north
and now returns southwards a subject inspired
by Baumgarten is a beautiful memento of his
elated feelings at that time.
During the ensuing period he led a surprisingly
retired life, and we heard only that he was writing.
When meeting him shortly before the days of
Saarbruck, he looked pale and excited. "What a
long time it takes, " he said, "for such great armies
to be brought together! The tension is almost un-
bearable. " He was visibly ill with excitement.
When the days of Worth and Spichern had happily
passed, we met at the Museum to study the tele-
grams which arrived hourly. He, however, failed
to turn up, and it was said he was writing. There
was a good deal of simulated activity about, but
for him there was nothing in particular to do. At
last his excellent essay, What We Demand of France,
saw the light of day, and at the same time it
appeared in the Prussian Annuals. Now it was
evident what he had been doing in seclusion.
Everybody was amazed at the mass of detail
collected during the short interval, in order to
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? His Life and Work 59
impress the reader with the thoroughly German
character of Alsace. Of almost every little town
he knew a story by which it became intertwined
with the German past. There was Alsatian local
tradition galore in the book, as if he at all times had
lived with these people. To his mind the fact that
the Alsatians at the time would not hear of Ger-
many did not make them French. "The mind of
a nation is not formed by contemporary genera-
tions only, but by those following. " Erwin von
Steinbach and Sebastian Brandt, also, were of
some account, and, after reviewing the German
past of the country, he asks: "Is this millennium,
rich in German history, to be wiped out by two
centuries of French supremacy? " In regard to
the future of Alsace he was from the first convinced
it would have to become a Prussian province, as
Prussian administration alone possessed the power
to rapidly assimilate it. Only when convinced of
the realization of Unitarian ideas a Prussian, as he
now always called himself, could desire to see a
frontier of Prussia extending from Aachen to Mul-
house. To make out of Alsace an independent
State, enjoying European guarantee of neutrality,
as proposed by Roggenbach in the Reichsrath,
would have meant creating a new Belgium on our
south-west coast, in which the Catholic Church
would have been the only reality, and Treitschke,
in his essay of 1870, replied thereto by referring to
the "disgusting aspect of the nation Luxemburg-
oise, " although in the Annuals he ostensibly spared
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? 60 Treitschke
the quaint statesman, who was his friend. "Let
us attach Alsace to the Rhine Province, " he said;
"we shall then have a dozen more opposition votes
in Parliament, and what does that matter? The
rest you leave to Prussian administration. "
Neither we nor he could foresee that in thirty
years it would not achieve more; but he did not
fail to point out that the only cause of the failure
was the creation of the " Reichsland, " a hybrid
which was neither fish nor flesh. He, however,
shared Freytag's aversion for the title of Emperor,
which, in his opinion, bore too much of black, red,
gold, and Bonapartist reminiscences. Both wished
for a German King; but finally Bluntschli's com-
mon-sense prevailed, he having suggested, "The
peasant knows that an Emperor is more than a
King, and for that reason the Chief of an Empire
must be called Emperor; besides, it will be better
for the three Kings; they will then know it, too,"
saying which the stout Swiss laughed heartily.
On the other hand, Treitschke never became
reconciled to Bavaria's reserved rights. He spoke
of a new treaty of Ried, similar to that which, in
1813, guaranteed sovereignty to Bavaria, and
expressed anger at the weakly Constitution which
reverted again to federalism. With malicious joy
he reported that the former Pan-Austrian fogy,
when examining students for the degree of Doctor
of Law, now always questioned on Bavarian re-
served rights. The whole arrangement with
Bavaria and Wurtemberg appeared to him "like
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? His Life and Work 61
a Life Insurance Policy of the Napoleonic crowns
with his magnanimous Prussia, which compelled
him to adjourn his Unitarian plans ad Grcecas
calendas. "
It is also peculiar to what a small extent he
shared in the triumphant tone displayed every-
where after the war. Sybel's essay, What We might
Learn of France, had his full approval. He was
disgusted with the way the journalists in the news-
papers, the teacher in the chair, and the clergyman
in the pulpit gave vent to their patriotic effusions.
In his letters he likewise spoke slightingly of
the modern customary orations regarding German
virtue and French vice. The more he disliked
the remnants of particularism in the new Consti-
tution, the less he was disposed to admire the
Germans, who, in his opinion, had forfeited the
greatest reward of great times by their own in-
dividualism. This it was which distinguished him
from the ordinary Chauvinist, and only too well he
realized in how many things the nation, in spite of
all successes, had remained behind his ideals.
Nobody, however, has given more beautiful
expression to the deep and serious thoughts with
which we celebrated peace in 1871. Like a prayer-
book we read the essay in the Annuals, in which he
opened his heart. He himself had lost his only
brother at Gravelotte, my wife hers at La Chart re.
The Prussian nobility was in mourning; he, how-
ever, consoled us: "May common grief still more
than great successes unite our people formerly at
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? 62 Treitschke
variance with each other. Rapidly die away the
shouts of victory, long remain the deep lines of
grief. Who will count the tears which have been
shed around the Christmas-tree? Who has seen
the hundred thousand grieved hearts from the
Alps to the sea, who, like a big, devout community,
have pinned their faith again to the splendour of
the Fatherland? " Actuated by the same senti-
ments, I had preached, shortly before, in the
Church of the Holy Spirit, on "Blessed are ye who
have suffered, " and therefore could doubly appre-
ciate his efforts to touch the people's innermost
feelings. His words have never been forgotten.
V.
The few years which Treitschke spent in Heidel-
berg after the war were, as he himself admitted,
the happiest of his life. His tiny house, overlook-
ing the Neckar and Rhine Valley, was for him a
constant source of joy, and proudly he would take
his visitors to the top of the vineyard, from which
the Speyer Dom and Donner Mountain, near
Worms, were visible. Immediately adjacent to
his property excavations had been made in times
gone by, and even now bricks and fragments of
pottery, bearing the stamp of the Roman Legation
were to be found. Thus he had historical ground
even under his feet. When, occasionally, on my
return from a visit about midnight, I still saw
lights in his study, I could not refrain from think-
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? His Life and Work 63
ing of Schiller, who, likewise, found the late hours
of night most propitious for his creations. It
would be a mistaken idea to think that Treitschke,
vivaciously as he lectured, wrote his works with-
out exhaustive preparations. He just served as a
proof that genius and industry go hand-in-hand.
Thanks to his iron constitution, he could work
until two o'clock in the morning, yet be gay and
full of life the following day. Surrounded by his
small crowd of children two girls and a boy and
with his elegant and slim-looking wife by his side,
he felt truly happy. It was a thoroughly aristo-
cratic and harmonious home, which in every detail
betrayed the gentle and tasteful hand of his spouse.
There was something distinctly humorous in his
peculiar ways, which made the visitor feel at home.
Above all, he was completely unaware of the noise
he made. Baumgarten, who was nervous, and
worked with him in the Archives, declared that
not only was the throwing of books and constant
moving of his chair unbearable, but also his un-
controllable temper. On one occasion, Treitschke
took up the register he had been studying, and
jumping about the room on one leg, shouted,
"Aegidi, Aegidi! " It appeared that in the Am-
bassador's Report of the Prussian Diet of 1847
he had found a memorial of his friend Aegidi stud,
juris in Heidelberg, which the Ambassador had
communicated to Berlin with a view to showing
the present spirit of German students, and which
started with the following declaration: "Like the
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? 64 Treitschke
Maid of Orleans before the King of her country, so
I, a German youth, come before the noble Diet
in order to give proof of the patriotic wishes
agitating youth. " Similar humorous outbursts
of his temperament occurred, of course, at home
as well. He at times experienced difficulties with
his toilette. The ladies, then, had to manipulate
him into a corner to adjust his tie or collar. In
Scheveningen, where he occupied a room next his
family, he once rushed out on the general balcony
when unable to manipulate a button, shouting,
''Help! help! " so that the phlegmatic Dutch
neighbours looked out of the windows, thinking a
great misfortune had happened. The importunity
with which some people asked for autographs, and
others for copies of his books, his photograph, or a
memento of some kind, provided his keen sense of
propriety with excellent material for displaying
originality. All this, however, was done in such a
humorous fashion that his company proved most
amusing. He behaved towards his students with
strictness, although he was gay enough when
addressing them from the chair. They idolized
him, but at all times he kept them at a distance.
When the University filled again for the winter
term, 1871-1872, Treitschke had gained among the
students a position second to none. His lectures
on modern history, politics, and the Reformation,
were crowded, and his descriptive powers always
thrilled his audience. Hausser's force had been
in his irony; with Treitschke, humour and pathos
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? His Life and Work 65
alternated like thunder and lightning. Even
listeners of more matured age admitted that they
had never heard anything that could be compared
with his natural elementary eloquence. Unable to
hear the clock strike, he had arranged with those
sitting in front to make a sign at a given hour;
but, as nobody wished him to discontinue, he often
unduly prolonged his lectures. Now and then
ladies turned up. At first he informed them by
letter that he could not permit their presence,
but when they persisted in coming he told the
porter to refuse them entrance, and angrily added
his intention of putting up a notice similar to
those in front of anatomical theatres: "For
gentlemen only! " When meeting his colleagues
he never even hinted at the striking success he
scored with his audience. His disposition was
anything but over-confident, and he associated
just as cordially with those whose academic
failures were notorious provided he appreciated
them otherwise as with the past-masters, whose
level was as high as his own. He never referred
at all to the demonstrations which students made
in his favour. In the choice of his friends, as well
as in the choice of his enemies, he was aristocratic,
but vain he was not. Enthusiastic patriotism was
the keynote of his life, and this explains its aesthet-
ics. A sensitive admirer of nature, appreciating as
keenly as anybody the lovely scenery of the ruins
of Heidelberg Castle, he nevertheless favoured
the re-building of the same, obsessed by the idea
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? 66 Treitschke
that it must become the palace of the German
King. His literary opinions could easily be gauged
as his compass always pointed towards Prussia.
When he invited us to an evening, we knew before-
hand we should read the Prince of Hamburg, or
some similar work. This explains also his pre-
dilection for Kleist, and for Uhland, the patriot.
Of Hebbel's works he was about to prepare an
analysis of them in a new form for publication in
the essays the Nibelungs were his favourite.
Did he not himself bear resemblance to Siegfried,
who plans to chain up the perfidious Danish Kings
outside the gate, where, as they had behaved like
dogs, they were to bark on his arrival and de-
parture? This was quite his style of thinking,
just as at the Theatre Francais my travelling
companion, when listening to the patriotic ravings
of Ernani, the highwayman, whispered to me:
" Exactly like Treitschke! " Not only The Trou-
sers of Hen von Bredow, of which he knew con-
siderable parts by heart, but Brandenburg poetry
in general, gave him great pleasure. He even
shielded Hesekiel and Scherenberg against attacks ;
and the scruples of learned men respecting Prey-
tag's Ingo and Ingraban were suppressed by him.
Turbulent men were to his liking; the criticisms
of German Law History and of the Spruner Atlas
regarding these descriptions had, to his mind,
nothing to do with poetry. Whatever met with
the approval of his patriotism could be sure of his
appreciation. My first two novels met with a very
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? His Life and Work 67
friendly reception in the Press, as, thanks to my
pseudonym, "George Taylor," quite different
authors had been suspected. No sooner, how-
ever, had the wise men from the East discovered
that a theologian had been the author than, on
the appearance of the third novel, entitled Jetta,
they vented their rage at having been deceived.
Treitschke, however declared Jetta to be the best
of the three books. He liked the Alemans for the
thrashing they had given the Romans, and that
settled the matter as far as he was concerned.
The way the learned fraternity censured Hermann
Grimm appeared stupid to him, like school pedan-
try. He. realized as well as anybody else the de-
fects and mistakes, but he called it childish spite
to take to task such an ingenious author for all
sorts of blunders and amateurish trivialities when
he had original views, and had created a picture of
culture such as the life of Michelangelo. In the
same way he stood up for living and not for dead
writers, in spite of the opposition of the learned
fraternity; but he did not, however, defend their
superficiality or phrase-making.
The great literary post-bellum events were The
Old and the New Faith, by Strauss, and the revival
of Schopenhauer pessimism by Hartmann and
Nietzsche, books which albeit different in form,
yet related in their fundamental views of the
world appeared to Treitschke, in view of the
melancholy tone adopted, like an inexplicable
phenomenon. How could anybody be a pessimist
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? 68 Treitschke
in times like the present, when it was a pleasure
to be alive? Of Hartmann he said: "This is the
philosophy of the Berliner when suffering from
phthisis. " With Olympic roars of laughter he
derided, over a glass of beer, Hartmann's senti-
mentality and his many discussions whether the
feelings of pleasure or displeasure predominate
in human nature. After all, Hartmann had left
us the consolation of Nirvana; but Nietzsche, by
his revival theory, deprived us of the consoling
thought of peacefulness after death. Nietzsche's
first essay on the origin of tragedy had met with
Treitschke's approval. Was he not himself to
adopt the Nietzschean phrase of "a dithyrambic
disposition"? and, to him, Socratic natures were
likewise unsympathetic. In his criticism on
Strauss he gave proof of his aversion to Socratic
dispositions, an aversion which he shared with
Nietzsche. He was the only one of our circle who
defended Nietzsche's essay and criticized Strauss's
Old and New Faith. He would not admit the
merits of a book which represents the materialistic
theory in transparent clearness, and thereby
brings defects to light which cannot be overlooked.
He simply went by results. A book, which as far
as we, the enlightened ones, were concerned,
sought a last consolation in music, had to be some-
what disagreeable to him, deaf as he was. But he
would not even admit Strauss's beauty of style.
"Beautiful style by itself does not exist, " he said.
"A style is beautiful when the writer is represented
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? His Life and Work 69
by it. Style should faithfully express the nature
and temperament of the author. With Lessing, I
admire the clear statements, because they are
natural to this clear dialectician ; but with Strauss
they do not belong to the man, as with Lessing,
but to the essay. " Strauss's style just lacked the
personal element. If Strauss, on the other hand,
found Treitschke's style indigestible, the contrast
is thereby quite correctly characteristic. While
patriotic pathos dominated the one, the other one
was, throughout, reflective and logical; that is
to say, the one was a dithyramb and the other
one a Socratic nature. I could not always share
Treitschke's clearly formed opinions, but we were
all grateful to him for the interest with which he
invested conversation, and for his ability to main-
tain it. His own activity was that of an artist as
well as that of a scientist. Impressions of his
travels through all the valleys of Germany, poetry,
newspaper extracts, conversations and humorous
stories of friends, were always at his command, and
these, combined with accurate studies from the
Archives and information verbally received, en-
abled him to shape his work. Considering his
system of gathering information, it was inevitable
that occasionally he was provided with unauthen-
tic news, for, as soon as conversation arose on a
subject useful to him, his pocket-book appeared,
and he asked to have the story put down. When
I once wrote for him that, at the outbreak of the
Army mutiny in Karlsruhe, a picture of Grand
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? 70 Treitschke
Duke Leopold was exhibited in all the libraries,
with the verse:
Zittert ein Tyrann von Revolutionen,
Du Leopold kannst ruhig thronen.
Dein Volk verlasst Dich nicht
(Though a tyrant may dread revolution,
Thou, O Leopold, mayest safely reign.
Thy people will not forsake thee),
he immediately placed the piece of paper separately
and said, "This will appear in the sixth volume";
but it never saw the light of day. I personally
could vouch for the correctness of my story, but
how easy it was to obtain wrong information under
these circumstances, and, as a matter of fact, all
sorts of protests against his anecdotes were raised
after each publication. It is notorious how cir-
cumstantially he subsequently had to explain or
contradict the story of the silver spoon of Prince
Wrede, the Red Order of the Eagle of Privy Coun-
cillor Schmalz, and many other things, and much
more frequently still he promised correction in the
subsequent edition to those who had lodged com-
plaints. We were very much annoyed at the injus-
tice with which he, in the fifth volume, character-
ized the Grand Duke Leopold, who was exceedingly
conscientious and benevolent. When attacking
him for it in our domestic circle, he declared that
every petty State had its idol, and that we ought
to break ourselves of it as others had done.
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? His Life and Work 71
Treitschke's tales from the Reichstag provided
a rich source of amusement. When entering
Parliament, in 1871, all friends were of opinion
the deaf man would not stand it long, and his
enemies mockingly remarked: "It is right he
should be there. " But the canvassing tour in
itself proved a great recreation for him, and if he
had achieved nothing beyond the strengthening,
by his fiery speeches, of the German sentiment of
people on the Hunsruck and in the Nahe Valley,
this gain alone was worth the trouble. His effi-
ciency in Berlin exceeded all expectations. He
sat next to the shorthand writers, and after having
grasped their system of abbreviations, he followed
the speeches, and thus was often better informed
than those who sneered at the deaf deputy. It
was more difficult for him to attend at Committee
sittings, but his friend Wehrenpfennig kept him
informed as far as possible. As all parties decided
in committee how to vote, Treitschke's speeches
in plenum really were of value for the public only,
but the reputation of the Reichsrath certainly was
considerably enhanced by the fact that people who
liked reading the parliamentary proceedings were
able to find the speeches reproduced in the news-
papers. The orations of "the deaf man who had
no business in Parliament" are, with the exception
of Bismarck's, after all, the only ones which, after
his death, have been edited in book form from the
protocols, and even to-day they are a source of
political information and patriotic elevation. It
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? 72 Treitschke
was a great event when the circle of friends in
Heidelberg heard that Treitschke had delivered
his maiden speech in the Reichstag, and great was
our joy when we read that in this first speech he
had vehemently attacked the Ultramontanes.
Deputy Reichensperger moved that, with a
view to safeguarding the liberty of the Press,
Unions and the Church Articles III-V of the Frank-
fort fundamental laws should be incorporated
in the Constitution of the Empire. Treitschke
started by declaring that the nation's hope of a
temporary continuance, at any rate in Parliament,
of the noble spirit of unanimity which, during the
war, had raised Germany above other nations,
had been defeated by the Ultramontanes. At the
beginning of the German Reichstag, we have
heard the Empire of the Papal King, the Republic
of Poland, and the Empire of the Guelfs discussed,
while I had hoped we should now have firmly es-
tablished progress in our territory, and would look
hopefully towards the future. It is impossible to
believe that the great question of State and Church
could be solved by a four-line sentence. In order
to bring about the Constitution every party was
obliged to make sacrifices. The disturbers of the
peace are now exactly those gentlemen who always
assert that they are the oppressed minority. Now,
gentlemen, if this were true, I must say that they
endured their oppression with a very small
measure of Christian patience. If fundamental
laws should become incorporated with the New
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? His Life and Work 73
Constitution, he continued, why have Mr. Reichen-
sperger and his associates forgotten the principal
ones? The article is lacking ; "science and its dog-
ma are free," a principle the adoption of which
would be highly beneficial to the Catholic Theo-
logic Faculties. Why is the definition lacking
respecting civil marriage law? In this way he
ruthlessly tore off the opponents' masks, as if they
had aimed at liberty. When Bishop Kettler had
uttered a warning to speak a little more modestly,
and with less confidence of the future of an Empire
which had as yet to be founded, Treitschke ironi-
cally pointed to the great progress made consider-
ing that Kettler no longer sat in Parliament as
Bishop of Mayence, but owed his seat to the
poll of an electoral district. If the movers of
the bill were to point out they demanded nothing
beyond what the Prussian Constitution had taken
over long before from the Frankfort Constitution,
they betrayed thereby their intention to give the
Bishops in this article the possibility of scoffing
at the laws of the country by appealing to the law
of the Empire. In Baden they had undergone too
many experiences in this respect to be deceived
any longer. But the German nation is sensible and
honest enough to understand that these poor
articles are not fundamental laws, but aim at
procuring, by a side-issue, an independent position
for the Catholic Church as regards the State. He
therefore thought he did no injustice to the
movers of the bill when he expressed the belief that
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? 74 Treitschke
the Press and Unions were only a momentary
addition to their proposal, but that their real in-
tention was directed to the independence of the
Catholic Church. The defeat of the Ultramon-
tanes was as complete as possible, and there ex-
isted no other more pressing matter for which
Treitschke could have acted as champion on behalf
of Baden. In parliamentary matters he was now,
likewise, recognized as the worthy successor of
Hausser. The general belief that Treitschke owed
his great success to mannerism was dispelled by
his speeches in the Reichstag. It was not rhetoric
or pathos which scored, but the force of conviction.
He spoke better than others because he had
grasped the thought of liberty, and of nationality,
with more ardour than they had. To him more
than to any other speaker the words of Cato
senior applied: "Keep firmly in mind the subject
and the words will follow. "
In a further speech on the law on July 9, 1871,
he woefully surrendered his ideal to see Alsace
Lothing a province of Germany, but all the more
energetically he opposed the desire of a party,
supported by Roggenbach, to form Alsace into a
State. If it was not to become part of the Prussian
State it should, at least, be a province of the Ger-
man Empire, reigned over by the Emperor, and
not become a new Small State. The Alsatian
public servants should frequently be transferred,
even to Schwelm, and to Stalluponen, so that they
should get to know Germany. Neither was he in
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? His Life and Work 75
favour of having a Lord Lieutenant appointed.
"Such a prince makes the worst public servant,
because he is obliged to act as if his house '/were a
Court. The elements of Society which could be
attracted by these countless gewgaws are such
that I, at any rate, would with pleasure dispense
with their support. " Neither in Strasburg nor
in Heidelberg or Berlin did this particular speech
meet with great approbation, but who will assert
to-day that he was wrong? All the more ap-
proved was his speech of November 2, 1871, in
which he demanded the intervention of the Empire
to procure for Mecklenburg the privileges of the
Estates of the Realm. A great impression was
produced when he pointed out that, of half a
million inhabitants, no less than 60,000 people had
emigrated within the last fifteen years from this
little country richly blessed by nature. In his
indignation he ever adopted a tone which, hitherto,
one was wont to hear only at democratic meetings.
He pointed out that conditions in Mecklenburg
had become the butt of humour. " It is dangerous
when the patient German people begin to sneer.
That scornful laughter over the old German Diet
and the King of the Guelfs carried on for many
years has led to very serious consequences; it has
brought about the well-known end of all things.
The star of unity is in the ascendant. Woe betide
the State which wilfully secludes itself from this
mighty and irresistible impulse ; sooner or later the
catastrophe will overtake it. " In the same way as
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? 76 Treitschke
these threatening words had created a great im-
pression in Parliament, so they found an enthusi-
astic echo in our circle; and equally great was his
success when he supported the supplementing of
the Penal Code by the so-called Pulpit Paragraph,
by which he again told the bitter truth to the
Ultramontanes. For the last time before proroga-
tion of Parliament he spoke on November 29, 1871,
when the progressive party renewed the old
controversy on parliamentary co-operation regard-
ing Army Estimates. Treitschke was strongly in
favour of the War Minister's views; he availed
himself, however, of this occasion to attack
strongly von Muhler, the Minister of Public In-
struction, and when called to order by the Con-
servatives he replied: "See that a capable man is
appointed at the head of the Ministry of Public
Instruction who bestows only the tenth part of
that energy which the Minister for War is in the
habit of bestowing upon his department; you will
then have practical experience that one thing can
be done, and that another cannot be left undone. "
On the whole, the Baden Deputies returned from
Berlin in a very dejected mood. Of Bluntschli,
the Berlin newspapers had written that his delivery
gave the impression he was dictating his speeches.
He had remained obscure that he knew; but
consoled himself with the thought that it took
time to find the tone for such a big assembly. Of
Roggenbach, who, with all his brilliant conver-
sational gifts, completely lacked oratorical powers,
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? His Life and Work 77
a gay Palatine country judge, who was also a
member of the Reichstag, said: "If this is your
most brilliant statesman I should like to come
across your most stupid one. " In the same way
the others returned like a beaten army, for not the
remotest comparison existed between the part
played by them in Berlin and the one played by
them in Karlsruhe at the Municipal Hall. Only
one appeared with laurels, and this one was
Treitschke, who had saved our reputation. He
was also welcomed home as heartily as possible;
although Baumgarten said at the time, in a morose
tone, that Treitschke never considered a law pro-
posal favourably unless he had delivered a speech
on it. The Ul tramontanes, however, considered
the game unevenly matched. While he over-
whelmed them with the strongest expressions, they
could not hit back because he did not hear them.
In an identical fashion the second session, 1873-
1874, passed, which Treitschke still attended from
Heidelberg, and the "round table" applauded his
brilliant passages of arms. Many of his winged
words have survived to the present day, as, for
instance, his explanation of the request of German
issuing banks for paper (money) "based on a
deeply founded desire in human nature"; or
"making debts without getting interest on them";
or his sneering remarks about the predilection of
South Germans for Bavarian military helmets and
dirty florin notes. His patriotism again rose to its
full height when discussions on the septennate took
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? 78 Treitschke
place, when the same party, whose chaplains in
the Black Forest had falsely told the constituents
that "septennate" meant serving for seven
successive years, complained in Parliament that
they were called the enemies of the Empire, he
referred to their behaviour, and for simplicity's
sake began with the Pope.
"Who was it who expressed the devout Chris-
tian wish that a little stone might fall from heaven
to shatter the feet of the German Colossus? Those
who consider the author of this ingenious pro-
nouncement infallible would only have confessed
publicly to this wish after Germany had lost a
battle, and which God forbid. Meanwhile, Prussia
was the little stone which had opened the doors
of the Eternal City to united and free Italy, and at
the same time had annihilated the most sinful
Small State of that part of the globe. In similar
strain he spoke on December 17, 1874, to Deputy
Winterer, who demanded the abolition of the
School Law granted the preceding year to Alsace
Lothing. In opposition to Winterer's hymns on
the achievements of the school brethren he read
extracts from their rules which prescribed in which
case the brother has to rise before the superior,
in which case to kneel down, and in which case he
only had to kiss the floor. " Gentlemen, " he asked
the Ultramontanes, "I am indeed curious to know
whether there is anything worse than the naked
floor the devout school brother is to kiss. " When
the gentlemen of the clerical party expressed the
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? His Life and Work 79
wish to save the ecclesiastical and French spirit
of their public schools he replied in unmistakable
fashion: "We have the intention to Germanize
this newly acquired German province ; we have the
intention and will carry it out.
