In place of the military protection
which Prussia had afforded the country up till then,
was substituted a moral protection, by which the
great Powers undertook a common responsibility
for the neutrality of the Grand Duchy.
which Prussia had afforded the country up till then,
was substituted a moral protection, by which the
great Powers undertook a common responsibility
for the neutrality of the Grand Duchy.
Treitschke - 1914 - His Doctrine of German Destiny
When he married the English Princess
Royal, all the circles of Liberalism expected from
his rule a time of prosperity for the nations, for
England was still reckoned to be the model land
of freedom, and the halo of political legend still
encircled the heads of Leopold of Belgium and of
the House of Coburg, who were delighted at the
marriage. It was soon evident that the Crown
Prince could neither reconcile himself to those
infringements of formal rights which were caused
by the struggle about the constitution, nor to the
plan for incorporating Schleswig-Holstein with
Prussia. But he never consented, like most
English heirs to the throne, to place himself at
the head of the Opposition ; and he rejected as un-
Prussian the thought that there could ever be a
party of the Crown Prince. In the Danish War
he accomplished his first great service for the
State; his powerful co-operation helped the still
unexperienced and often hesitating commanders
to decide on a bolder procedure.
Then came the brilliant days of his fame as
Commander-in-Chief, which have secured for
him for ever his place in German history. He
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? 228 Treitschke
helped towards winning the victory of Koniggratz
by the bold attacking skirmishes of his Silesian
Army and made it decisive by his attack on
Chlum. He delivered the first crushing blows
in the war against France ; his fair Germanic giant
figure was the first announcement to the Alsatians
that their old Fatherland was demanding them
back; through his martial deeds and the heart-
moving power of his cheerful popular kindness,
the Bavarian and Swabian warriors were for the
first time quite won over to the cause of German
unity. Never in the German Army will the day
be forgotten when, after fresh and glorious victo-
ries, "Our Fritz," distributed the iron crosses to
his Prussians and Bavarians before the statue of
Louis XIV, in the courtyard of the Palace of
Versailles.
After peace was concluded, the position of the
famous Commander-in-Chief was not an easy one.
As a Field-Marshal he was already too high in
military rank and had too little interest in the
daily duties of a time of peace for it to be easy to
find him a suitable command. Only the most
important of the German military inspections,
the oversight of the South German troops, was
assigned to him, and every year he performed this
duty for some weeks with so much insight, firm-
ness, and friendliness, that he won almost more
affection in the South than in his Northern home.
The South Germans saw him fully occupied and
exerting all his energies; at home he only seldom
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? Two Emperors 229
appeared in public life. He was the victim of his
father's extraordinary greatness, and it was that
which constituted his tragic destiny. He passed in
a life of retirement long years of manly vigour,
which according to all human computation he
would have had to pass upon the throne. This
long period indeed brought him a fulness of pater-
nal happiness and gave him frequent opportunities
for displaying his fine natural eloquence and for
pursuing benevolent projects that were fraught
with blessing for the common weal, but it did not
provide adequate scope for his virile energy.
Already, when a young Prince, the Emperor
William cherished strict and well-weighed prin-
ciples regarding the unavoidable limits which
the heir to the throne must impose upon himself;
he knew that the first subject in the Kingdom
must not join in discussion, if he is not to be
tempted to join in rule. Like all the great mon-
archs of history, and all the Hohenzollerns with
the solitary exception of King Frederick William
III, he allowed the heir to the throne no partici-
pation in affairs of State.
Only once, after the last attempt on the Em-
peror's life, was the Crown Prince commissioned
to represent his father. It was an eventful time;
the Berlin Congress had just assembled, the nego-
tiations with the Roman Curia had hardly begun,
and the law regarding Socialists was on the point
of being passed. The Crown Prince carried out
all his difficult tasks with masterly discretion,
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? 230 Treitschke
and Germany should never forget how he, con-
trary doubtless to the dictates of his own mild
heart, caused the executioner's axe to fall on the
neck of the Emperor's assailant. By this brave
act he re-enforced the half -obsolete death-punish-
ment and gave it the weight which it should have
in every properly ordered State.
On the Emperor's recovery the Crown Prince
withdrew to the quiet life of his home, and the
spirit of criticism which pervades the Courts of
all heirs-apparent could not fail to find expression
now and then, but it did so always in a modest
and respectful way. His exertions on behalf of
art were many and fruitful; without him the
Hermes of Praxiteles would not have been awak-
ened to new life, and the Berlin Technological
Museum would not have been completed in such
classical purity of form. He was the first in the
succession of the Prussian heirs to the throne who
had received a University education and he was
proud to wear the purple mantle of the Rector
of the old Albertina University. In his long life
of retirement, however, the Crown Prince some-
times lost touch with the powerful progressive
movements of the time and could not fully follow
the new ideas which were in vogue. He thought
to arrest with a few words of angry censure the
anti-semitic movements, the sole cause of which
was the over-weening presumption of the Jews,
and he warned the students of Konigsberg against
the dangers of Chauvinism, a sentiment which
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? Two Emperors 231
after two hundred years of cosmopolitanism, is
as unfamiliar to the Germans as its foreign
name.
But the course of human things looks different
from a throne than when viewed from below. The
nation, knowing the well-beloved Prince as they
did, hoped that, as in the case of his father, his
character would develop with his life-tasks and
that he would show as much energy as a sovereign
as he had displayed when representing his father.
Then the catastrophe overtook him. Three Ger-
man physicians Professors Gerhardt, von Berg-
mann, and Tobold recognized at once the char-
acter of the disease, and spoke the truth fearlessly
as we are accustomed to expect from German men
of science. A cure was still possible and even
probable. But the resolve which would have
saved the patient was lacking, and who can
venture to utter a word of blame, since al-
most every layman in similar circumstances
would have made a similar choice. Then the
patient was handed over to an English physi-
cian, who at once, by the unparalleled false-
hood of his reports, cast a stain on the good
name of our ancient and honourable Prussia.
With growing anxiety the Germans began to
surmise that this precious life was in bad hands.
The result was more tragic than their worst fears.
When the Emperor William closed his eyes, a
dying Emperor came up to succeed to the lofty
inheritance.
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? 232 Treitschke
The greatness of the monarchy, and its superi-
ority to all republican forms of government rests
essentially on the well-assured and long duration
of the princely office. Its power is crippled when
this assurance is lacking. The reign of the dying
Emperor could only be a sad episode in the history
of the Fatherland, sad on account of the inex-
pressible sufferings of the noble patient, sad on
account of the deceitful proceedings of the English
doctor and his dirty journalistic accomplices, and
sad on account of the impudence of the German
Liberal party who obtruded themselves eagerly
on the Emperor as though he belonged to them,
and certainly gained one success, the fall of the
Minister von Puttkamer. The monarchical par-
ties on the other hand both by a feeling of loyalty
and the prospect of the approaching end were
compelled to preserve comparative silence. At
such times of testing, all the heart-secrets of parties
are revealed. Those who did not know it before
were now obliged to recognize what sycophancy
lurks beneath the banner of free thought, and
how everyone who thought for himself would be
tyrannized over if this party ever came into power.
Fortunately for us, in the whole Empire they have
behind them only the majority of Berlin people,
some learned men who have gone astray in politics,
the mercantile communities of some discontented
trading towns, and the certainly considerable
power of international Judaism. But let us banish
these dark pictures which history has long left
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? Two Emperors 233
behind. Let us hold fast in reverent recollection
that which lends moral consecration to the tragic
reign of the Emperor Frederick. With a religious
patience, whose greatness only a few of the initi-
ated can thoroughly understand, with an heroic
strength which outshines all the glories of his
victories on the battlefield, he bore the tortures
of his disease, and bereft of speech he still pre-
served in the face of death the old fidelity to duty
of the Hohenzollerns and his warm enthusiasm
for all the unchanging ideals of humanity. In a
way worthy of his father he departed to ever-
lasting peace, and so long as German hearts beat,
they will remember the royal sufferer who once
appeared to us the happiest and most joyful of
the Germans and now was doomed to end his life
in so much suffering.
In those happy days when the picture of the
"Four Kings" 1 hung in all German shop-windows,
many a one said to himself in sorrowful foreboding
that "it was too great good-fortune. " Now the
equalizing justice of Providence has caused the
abundance of joy to be followed by such an excess
of grief as seems too hard for a monarchic people.
Of the four Kings two are no more. But life
belongs to the living. With hopeful confidence
the nation turns her eyes to her young Imperial
lord. All which he has hitherto said to his people,
breathes a spirit of strength and courage, piety
and justice. We know that the good spirit of the
1 William I, Frederick III, William II, Crown Prince William.
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? Treitschke
old Emperor's times still remains unlost to the
Empire, and even in the first days of mourning
we lived through a great hour of German history.
With German fidelity all our Princes gathered
around the Emperor and appeared with him
before the representatives of the nation. The
world learned that the German Emperor does not
die, whoever may wear the crown for the moment.
What a change of affairs since the times when on
each New Year's day the German Courts watched
anxiously for the utterances of the mysterious
Caesar on the Seine! To-day the German speech
from the throne makes no mention of these world-
powers which once presumed to be the only repre-
sentatives of civilization, for one can argue as
little with unteachable enemies as with pushing
and doubtful friends. Whether Europe accom-
modates itself peacefully to the alteration of the
old relations between the Powers, or whether the
German sword must again be drawn to secure
what has been won, in either case we hope to be
prepared.
Unless all signs are deceptive, this great century
which seemed to begin as a French one, will end
as a German one; by Germany's thoughts and
Germany's deeds will the problem be solved how
a strong hereditary sovereignty can be compatible
with the just claims of modern society. Some
day the time must come, when the nations will
realize that the battles of the Emperor William
not only created a Fatherland for the Germans
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? Two Emperors 235
but bestowed upon the community of European
States a juster and more reasonable arrangement.
Then will be fulfilled what Emmanuel Geibel once
said to the grey-haired conqueror.
"Some day through the German nation,
All the world will find salvation. "
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? GERMANY AND NEUTRAL STATES. 1
HEIDELBERG,
25th October, 1870.
NO hatred is so bitter as enmity against the man
who has been unjustly treated ; men hate in
him what they have done to him. That is as true
of nations as of individuals. All our neighbours,
some time or other, grew at Germany's expense,
and to-day, when we have at length smashed the
last remnants of foreign domination, and demand
a modest reward for righteous victories, a per-
manent guarantee of national freedom, angry
blame of German insatiability resounds throughout
the European press. Especially do those small
countries, which owe their very existence to the
dismemberment of the German Empire, e. g. ,
Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, complain loudly
that an arrogant Pan-Germanism has destroyed
our people's sense of fairness. It is hatred that
vents itself in these charges; no impartial person
can deny that the notion of Pan-Germanism is as
foreign to us Germans as its name, which originated
in the bogey-fears of foreign countries. No doubt
owing to the excitement of the times, a foolish
1 Preussisches Jahrbuch, vol. 26, p. 605, et seq.
236
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? Germany and Neutral States 237
boastfulness has here and there come into being;
out-and-out Teutons are imploring us to banish
all foreign words from the sanctuary of the Ger-
man language; men of picturesque talents among
the unemployed are drawing on the patient map
of Europe a kingdom of Armorica and Arelat
between France and Germany. However, such
ideas are simply the isolated absurdities of idle
heads; once in a while they may accidentally
stray into one of the bigger newspapers, but even
then they appear only in those insignificant col-
umns devoted to such subjects as sea-snakes and
triplets, children with fowls' heads,and the mythi-
cal Fusilier Kutschke. The great majority of
German politicians exhibit to-day a deliberate
moderation, which the Swiss and Belgians would
hold in greater respect if those nations, which
enjoy the more comfortable peace and quiet of a
neutrality protected by other Powers, were able
to put themselves in thought in the position of a
great warrior-nation which has been forced to
fight for its life by an unscrupulous attack.
Public opinion has become more quickly united
regarding the reward of our victory than ever
before in a complicated question. The boundary
line of the Government of Alsace, which has indeed
been drawn with a considerate hand and will pre-
sumably constitute Germany's boundary, meets
almost everywhere with agreement. People only
regret, and rightly so, that the splendid region of
the Breusch, which is abundant in springs, and
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? 238 Treitschke
the district around Schirmack, together with the
Steinthal, that essentially German tract of country
consecrated by the life-work of the unforgettable
Oberlin, are not included in the new boundary.
Blind lust of conquest is so alien to the Germans
that they even decide with much unwillingness
to demand the possession of Metz; but the obvious
impossibility of leaving right at our doors in the
hands of revengeful enemies this town, which is a
stronghold by its position, not by its walls, compels
us in this case to enter into occupation of French
territory.
The desire of robbing the neutral neighbouring
States, which imaginative persons in Bale and
Brussels are fond of attributing to us, is expressed
only by some isolated German Chauvinists. We
notice with anxiety, like all the thoughtful Swiss,
that those two decades of fresh prosperity which
Switzerland enjoyed since the Civil War are to-day
at an end. We ask, gravely, what shall eventually
be the outcome of a development which is tending
ever more and more to loosen every community
and every individual from the State? But we
honestly wish that the Confederation may succeed
in overcoming the disintegrating power of an
unbridled Radicalism; the role which this asylum
for all parties has long played, to the good of Eu-
rope, is not yet played out by any means. No in-
telligent German wants to increase the excessively
strong centrifugal powers, which are embraced
in our new Empire, by the inclusion of purely
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? Germany and Neutral States 239
Republican elements, and all free men are horror-
struck at the thought that Geneva and Lausanne,
which are to-day the centres of an independent
intellectual movement, would, by the dissolution
of the Swiss Confederation, be involved in the
horrible fall of France. We are also quite without
arriere-pensee in regard to the Netherland States,
which did so little to win Germany's friendship;
we certainly trust that the strengthening of the
German Empire will of itself bring it about, that
the foolish inclination at The Hague to France may
be moderated, and that the Flemish majority in
Belgium may find the courage to assert their race
beside the Walloon minority. Still, because we
do not want to shake the national constitutions
of these buffer-States, because we demand a
lasting arrangement on our Western boundary,
for that reason a question has now to be settled
once for all, which threatens to be continually
disturbing our good relations with our small
neighbours, although it has in very truth nothing
whatever to do with the independence of the Nether-
lands. The conclusion of peace with France may
and shall afford the opportunity of incorporating
Luxemburg in the German Empire.
It is repugnant to us to revive to-day the
memory of the odious transaction which deprived
us of that territory the single bitter memory in
the glorious history of the North German Confede-
ration. Suffice it that that German territory
which by the decision of Europe was once allotted
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? 240 Treitschke
to the House of Orange and the Crown of Prussia,
in order to protect it against France's lust of
piracy, was suddenly sold and betrayed to France
by its own rulers. When the Prussian Govern-
ment entered a protest, it was confronted by the
unconcealed partisan disfavour of all the European
Powers. The fear of France lay heavily on the
world; it reads to us to-day like a farce, when we
read in the documents of those days how Lord
Stanley and Count Beust outri vailed each other
in depicting to our Government the fearful superi-
ority of French power; the French fleet would
occupy the attention of the greater portion of
our forces, would make it impossible for us to
protect South Germany, etc. Prussia, which
was honestly trying to display its love of peace in
an affair not altogether free from doubt, and was,
moreover, fully busied with the founding of the
new Confederation, gave up its right of garrison-
ing, and contented itself with the inadequate
result, that France had to abandon her welcome
purchase.
In place of the military protection
which Prussia had afforded the country up till then,
was substituted a moral protection, by which the
great Powers undertook a common responsibility
for the neutrality of the Grand Duchy. But
scarcely had the agreement been concluded, when
it at once lost all its value owing to the perfidious
interpretation put upon it by England. Amid
the exultant cheers of Parliament, Lord Stanley
declared that Great Britain would only take up
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? Germany and Neutral States 241
arms for Luxemburg's neutrality if the other
Great Powers did the same ; the press, drunk with
peace, rejoiced that England's obligations were
not extended, but limited, by the May Conven-
tion and the politics of the Sinking Island-
Kingdom had taken a fresh step downwards.
After such words no description is requisite of the
deeds that might be expected from British states-
men ; nobody doubts that England would not have
let itself be disturbed in its neutral complacency,
even if a victorious French army had penetrated
into Luxemburg last August.
The joint European guarantee was from the
start an empty form, and the position of the little
neutral country has been rendered completely
untenable by the mighty revolutionary events of
recent weeks. If the German boundary advances
as far as Metz and Diedenhof, Luxemburg be-
comes surrounded in the south, as in the north and
east, by German-Prussian territory, the country
no longer forms a buffer-State between France
and Prussia, and the object of the May^Convention,
the idea of preventing friction between the two
great military Powers, vanishes of itself. Con-
sidering the deadly enmity which will threaten
us yet a long time from Paris, the Prussian
Government could hardly tolerate seeing the
communications between Treves and Metz in-
terrupted by neutral territory; serious military
considerations compel Prussia's desire to plant
its standard again on those Luxemburg fortifica-
16
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? 242 Treitschke
tions on which it stood for fifty years, a screen
for Germany.
And is not the neutrality of the little country,
the artificial creation of a "nation luxembour-
geoise," in very truth a disgrace to Germany?
Polyglot countries, like Belgium and Switzerland,
may justly be declared neutral, because their
mixed populations prevent them from taking par-
tisan parts in the national struggles of this century.
But to cut off two hundred thousand German
persons from their Fatherland in order to place
them under European guardianship, that was a
crime against common-sense and history, an insult
which could be offered only to this our hard-
struggling Germany. The little State is German
to the last hamlet, belongs to us by speech and
customs, by the memories of a thousand-years-
old history, as well as by the community of ma-
terial interests. And this country, which presented
us with three Emperors, which once revolted
against Philip of Burgundy in order to preserve
its German language, which, further, in the days
of the French Revolution, twice joined in the
national war against the hated French, this root-
and-branch German country is to-day under
French rule! The official language is French, the
laws of the country are derived from France and
Belgium. Since the injurious nine-years' treaty
with Belgium, people in Luxemburg have grown
accustomed, as in Brussels and Ghent, to admire
French methods as a mark of distinction. The
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? Germany and Neutral States 243
officials, who are moulded in French and Belgian
schools, introduce French arrogance from their
alien environment, radically oppose the German
spirit, change the honest old German place-names
of Klerf and Liebenbrunn into Clerveaux and
Septfontaines. The people are alienated from
the German system of government by the sins
of the Diet; they cannot forget that the German
Confederation once abandoned a half of the coun-
try in undignified fashion to Belgium, and then
obligingly all the governmental pranks of reaction-
ary ministers. A fanatical clergy, a lying press
conducted by French and Belgians, no doubt
also maintained by French gold, foster their hatred
for the great Fatherland, and the Netherland
States gaze with indifference at the decline of the
German civilization.
Under such unhealthy conditions every kind of
political corruption of which the German nature
is capable has spread over this small people.
Whilst the German youth are shedding their
blood for the Eternal, for the Infinite, the Luxem-
burgers are wallowing in the mire of materialism;
a superstitious belief in the life of this world has
emasculated their minds, they know nothing,
they want to know nothing except business and
pleasure. Whilst in Germany, amid hard strug-
glings, a new, a more moral conception of liberty
is arising, which is rooted in the idea of duty,
there an existence without duties is praised as the
highest aim of life. They want to derive advan-
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? 244 Treitschke
tage from the Customs Union, to which the country
owes the essence of its prosperity, without doing
the least service for Germany. They let the
Germans bleed for the freedom of the left bank of
the Rhine including Luxemburg they loudly
boast they have no fatherland, and reserve it to
themselves to heap abuse on Germans as slaves,
to shout to the German tide-waiters a scornful
"mer de pour la Prusse! "
Ought Germany any longer to endure this
European scandal, this parasitic plant without a
fatherland, which is battening on the trunk of
our Empire? The national State has the right
and duty of protecting its nationals all over the
world; it cannot endure that a German race should
be gradually transformed into a German-French
mongrel without any reason except the perversity
of a degenerate bureaucracy. There is only one
way of preventing it, as things are, namely, the
inclusion of the country in the German Empire.
The Reichstag, however, can allow this inclu-
sion only under two conditions: it must require
that the German tongue be used again as the
official language, and that the agreement binding
the Grand Duchy to the Kingdom of the Nether-
lands shall be broken off. The bond of union
between the two States is certainly very loose;
still, in our Diet we got to know only too thor-
oughly the unhallowed consequences of the blend-
ing of German and foreign politics; although the
constitution of the Confederation says nothing
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? Germany and Neutral States 245
about it, we must set up for our new Empire the
infrangible principle: no foreign sovereign can
be a member of the German Confederation.
We do not mean that Germany should right-
away declare the May Convention to be nullified
in consequence of the present war. Much rather
do we desire the free unanimity of all the parties
concerned. The support hitherto afforded by
France to Luxemburg independence is to-day
disappearing of itself. The infatuated resistance
of the French will presumably oblige the Confeder-
ate general to increase his demands ; it would then
be all the easier for the French Government,
upon the conclusion of peace, to make a binding
declaration, in return for some fair concession,
that it recognizes in advance the entry of Luxem-
burg into the German Confederation. For the
conversion of the Luxemburgers themselves would
suffice a definite assurance, that henceforth Ger-
many's customs-boundary coincides with its po-
litical boundary, and the customs-convention can-
not be renewed unless the Grand Duchy again
undertakes the duties of a Confederate territory.
Such will scarcely fail of its effect in that country,
where ideal reasons find no response, despite the
fiery enthusiasm for independence which is to-day
again turning the heads of the little people. Their
industries cannot flourish without the blessings
of German commercial freedom; they would be
bound to be ruined if the Small State tried to
form an independent market-region, and the same
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? 246 Treitschke
would happen if it entered the Belgian customs
area.
Serious opposition can hardly be expected from
the Dutch Government, which has long been
weary of its troublesome neighbour. But the
head of the House of Orange has long been con-
verted to the commercial neutrality of those
patricians of Amsterdam, whom his great an-
cestors formerly fought against; his heart, however
warmly it may beat for France, will find to-day
the clink of Prussian dollars quite as pleasant as
that of golden napoleons four years ago. An
understanding must also be possible with the
magnates of the joint House of Nassau, whose
rights were expressly reserved in the May Con-
vention. The simplest solution of the question
would certainly be arrived at if Prussia were to
acquire the country by purchase. Already the
Prussian State numbers fifty thousand Luxem-
burgers among its citizens in the districts around
Bittburg and St. Vith; if the Grand Duchy and
French- Luxemburg, together with Diedenhof , were
to be taken over in addition, that misgoverned
and mutilated country would at last be united
again under one Crown up to the Belgian portion.
But this solution, which is in every respect most
desirable, is not absolutely a necessity; German
interests primarily extend only so far that the
Principality be again adopted into our line of
defence, into the life of our State and culture.
Should, therefore, the joint House prefer to raise
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? Germany and Neutral States 247
up a Nassau Prince as a Prince of the Confedera-
tion to the throne of Luxemburg, Germany cannot
refuse; such an arrangement would at any rate
be far preferable to the unreal conditions of to-
day. Lastly, we are yet in need of the agreement
of the European Powers. That also is obtainable ;
for right and fairness are obviously on our side,
if we intend to impose similar charges on all
members of the Customs Union; moreover, Eng-
land has long felt the guarantee undertaken for
the neutrality of Luxemburg to be a wearisome
burden. However, everything depends entirely
on not commencing negotiations prematurely,
so that the neutral Powers may not find welcome
occasion to interfere in the Franco- German
negotiations.
Alsace, Lorraine, Luxemburg! What wounds
have been inflicted on German life in those
Marches of the Empire through the crimes of
long centuries, and how perseveringly will all the
healthy forces of the German State be obliged
to bestir themselves in order to keep in peace
what the sword has won ! The task seems almost
too heavy for this generation, which has only just
rescued our Northern March from alien rulers.
Still, what is being accomplished to-day is but the
ripe fruit of the work of many generations. All
the industry, all the honesty and active power, all
the moral wealth, which our fathers awoke anew
in the deteriorated Fatherland, will work on our
side if we now dare to adapt the degenerate sons
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? 248 Treitschke
of our West to German life; and the best that
we can achieve in peace can yet never ap-
proach the deeds and sufferings of the heroes
who paid with their blood for the dawn of the
new times.
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? AUSTRIA AND THE GERMAN EMPIRE.
HEIDELBERG,
i$th Dec. , 1871.
ONCE more Austria has emerged from a severe
ordeal. The Hohenwarte Cabinet has re-
signed ; the plans of the Slavs to upset the rights and
the policy of the Germans have been frustrated, and
under the auspices of the Magyars a Ministry has
been formed which, to say the least, may be cred-
ited with just intentions towards the Germans and
an honest desire for the preservation of the State.
But the cries of joy from German breasts to
greet the deliverance from threatening danger
are isolated. Hitherto, it was customary that
our countrymen on the Danube in days of stress
should lose faith in their Government only to
regain confidence as soon as the political clouds
lifted again, and for a long time past we Germans
of the Empire have been accustomed to this
sudden change of feeling in German Austria, just
as we are accustomed to laws of nature. For
the first time, however, the old rule no longer
applies; the news from our Austrian friends reads
gloomier than ever, despite the slight change for
the better which has now taken place, and the
249
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? 250 Treitschke
question is wonderingly asked how in such a
country reckless men are still found ready to
accept a ministerial portfolio. What a weird
spectacle to behold! a great empire whose own
people have lost faith in themselves. Let us
calmly examine these serious matters. It does
not admit of doubt what we for the sake of Ger-
many wish for Austria. We German Unity-
makers were never the enemies of Austria; we
only contested the preponderating power which
Austria exercised on German and Italian soil to
the detriment of all parties. Now, having fought
victoriously, we are more in favour of Austria
than many Austrians themselves. Nowhere dur-
ing the last few weeks have so many warm and
genuine wishes been exchanged for the continu-
ance of Austria as in the lobbies of the German
Parliament. Our Empire's ambition must simply
be directed towards the building up of an inde-
pendent and solid commonwealth within our
boundaries, which will suffice to us all completely.
We have Italy's hasty agitation for unity as a
warning example before us, and must not desire
to embody, in addition to the strong centrifugal
powers fermenting in the interior of Germany and
to the inhabitants of our Polish, Danish, and
French frontiers, yet another eight million Czechs
as our fellow-citizens. In the days of Frederick
the Great, when ideas of a Slav Empire lay dor-
mant, it was perhaps not very difficult to turn
over Bohemia entirely to German ideals. The old
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? Austria and the German Empire 251
race-hatred having, however, now been aroused
again with terrific ferocity, even the united forces
of Germany might have to spend scores of years
on this difficult and perhaps sterile task, should we
ever step into the sad heritage of the Hapsburgs.
We already have more than enough ultramontane
enemies of the Empire, and we will keep them in
check; our Empire is, however, well balanced only
because of the preponderance of Protestants. We
should commit a crime against the future liberty
of thought were we to contemplate absorbing
fourteen million Catholics. Germany longs for
peace ; the vapourings of the democracy regarding
the war-fanaticism of our Government are lying
statements, disbelieved even by their originators.
The collapse of Austria, however, would mean an
upheaval unexampled in history, which would
embroil us in endless wars and threaten to destroy
the development of a peaceful policy for a long
time to come.
We Germans have never understood the prin-
ciple of nationality in the crude and overbearing
sense that all German-speaking Europeans must
belong to our Empire. We consider it a boon for
the peaceful intercourse of the world that the
boundaries of nations are not engraved with a
knife in the shell of the earth, that millions of
French live outside France, and outside the Ger-
man Empire millions of Germans. If the present-
day situation in Middle Europe consolidates, if
in the middle of the Continent there are two great
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? 252 Treitschke
Empires, the one uniform and purely German, the
other Catholic and polyglot, yet permeated by
German ideas who will contend that such a state
of affairs is humiliating to German national pride?
More magnificent and more brilliant than the day
of Koniggratz shines the glory of Sedan; but the
firm basis of our power to-day, the creative
thoughts of a new German policy have been engen-
dered by the blessings of 1866. "Down with
Austria," was then our battle-cry, and Germany
breathed as if freed from a nightmare when we
separated from Austria. Every day of German
history has proved since then that this separation
was a necessity, and that only through it we have
found ourselves again. In order to satisfy un-
bridled greed are we to demolish again the struc-
ture of 1866, the foundations of our Empire?
Are we to discard like old rubbish that rich treasure
of historic-political importance amassed during
half a century by our serious thinkers as common
property of the Germans solely because our
countrymen in Austria do not immediately succeed
in adjusting themselves to the new order of things?
Not an inch of land was taken by the victor of
1866 from the vanquished; such moderation not
only arose from the desire to reconcile the adver-
sary, it was also clearly evident that those Austrian
provinces which were for four centuries estranged
from German life and interdependent through
political ties, as well as through mutual commercial
interests, have a good right to stand side by side
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? Austria and the German Empire 253
independently with Germany. Austrian pessi-
mists might give as an example Moscow and
Warsaw. The opinion that the capital on the
Danube is to become a German provincial town
is ridiculed as ludicrous in sober- thinking Berlin.
The German idealists of the Danube speak lightly
of the disruption of Austria as if a Great Power
could easily be annihilated ; we but ask what is to
become of the territories of the Crown of St.
Stephen after the collapse of the monarchy, and,
unable to find a satisfactory reply, we desire the
continuance of Austria as a Power.
The dualism which so often is depicted as the
beginning of the end appears to us in a different
light. The agreement of 1867 has not exactly
created a new state of affairs, but merely recon-
nected the thoughts of the only Austrian sovereign
who intelligently and successfully understood the
handling of internal reforms. To leave the lands
of the Hungarian Crown under their former con-
stitution, and to form the Crown lands of the west
into one political unit, were the plans formerly of
Maria Theresa. It is due to Deak that this long-
forgotten policy has been renewed in modern form.
Our political pride may revolt, yet we cannot think
it unnatural that Hungarians have finally assumed
political direction in the dual Empire. Those
six million Magyars, together with the two million
Hungarian-Germans who obey the former almost
blindly, form the biggest political entity of the
Empire. They have the firm legal basis of an old
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Royal, all the circles of Liberalism expected from
his rule a time of prosperity for the nations, for
England was still reckoned to be the model land
of freedom, and the halo of political legend still
encircled the heads of Leopold of Belgium and of
the House of Coburg, who were delighted at the
marriage. It was soon evident that the Crown
Prince could neither reconcile himself to those
infringements of formal rights which were caused
by the struggle about the constitution, nor to the
plan for incorporating Schleswig-Holstein with
Prussia. But he never consented, like most
English heirs to the throne, to place himself at
the head of the Opposition ; and he rejected as un-
Prussian the thought that there could ever be a
party of the Crown Prince. In the Danish War
he accomplished his first great service for the
State; his powerful co-operation helped the still
unexperienced and often hesitating commanders
to decide on a bolder procedure.
Then came the brilliant days of his fame as
Commander-in-Chief, which have secured for
him for ever his place in German history. He
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? 228 Treitschke
helped towards winning the victory of Koniggratz
by the bold attacking skirmishes of his Silesian
Army and made it decisive by his attack on
Chlum. He delivered the first crushing blows
in the war against France ; his fair Germanic giant
figure was the first announcement to the Alsatians
that their old Fatherland was demanding them
back; through his martial deeds and the heart-
moving power of his cheerful popular kindness,
the Bavarian and Swabian warriors were for the
first time quite won over to the cause of German
unity. Never in the German Army will the day
be forgotten when, after fresh and glorious victo-
ries, "Our Fritz," distributed the iron crosses to
his Prussians and Bavarians before the statue of
Louis XIV, in the courtyard of the Palace of
Versailles.
After peace was concluded, the position of the
famous Commander-in-Chief was not an easy one.
As a Field-Marshal he was already too high in
military rank and had too little interest in the
daily duties of a time of peace for it to be easy to
find him a suitable command. Only the most
important of the German military inspections,
the oversight of the South German troops, was
assigned to him, and every year he performed this
duty for some weeks with so much insight, firm-
ness, and friendliness, that he won almost more
affection in the South than in his Northern home.
The South Germans saw him fully occupied and
exerting all his energies; at home he only seldom
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? Two Emperors 229
appeared in public life. He was the victim of his
father's extraordinary greatness, and it was that
which constituted his tragic destiny. He passed in
a life of retirement long years of manly vigour,
which according to all human computation he
would have had to pass upon the throne. This
long period indeed brought him a fulness of pater-
nal happiness and gave him frequent opportunities
for displaying his fine natural eloquence and for
pursuing benevolent projects that were fraught
with blessing for the common weal, but it did not
provide adequate scope for his virile energy.
Already, when a young Prince, the Emperor
William cherished strict and well-weighed prin-
ciples regarding the unavoidable limits which
the heir to the throne must impose upon himself;
he knew that the first subject in the Kingdom
must not join in discussion, if he is not to be
tempted to join in rule. Like all the great mon-
archs of history, and all the Hohenzollerns with
the solitary exception of King Frederick William
III, he allowed the heir to the throne no partici-
pation in affairs of State.
Only once, after the last attempt on the Em-
peror's life, was the Crown Prince commissioned
to represent his father. It was an eventful time;
the Berlin Congress had just assembled, the nego-
tiations with the Roman Curia had hardly begun,
and the law regarding Socialists was on the point
of being passed. The Crown Prince carried out
all his difficult tasks with masterly discretion,
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? 230 Treitschke
and Germany should never forget how he, con-
trary doubtless to the dictates of his own mild
heart, caused the executioner's axe to fall on the
neck of the Emperor's assailant. By this brave
act he re-enforced the half -obsolete death-punish-
ment and gave it the weight which it should have
in every properly ordered State.
On the Emperor's recovery the Crown Prince
withdrew to the quiet life of his home, and the
spirit of criticism which pervades the Courts of
all heirs-apparent could not fail to find expression
now and then, but it did so always in a modest
and respectful way. His exertions on behalf of
art were many and fruitful; without him the
Hermes of Praxiteles would not have been awak-
ened to new life, and the Berlin Technological
Museum would not have been completed in such
classical purity of form. He was the first in the
succession of the Prussian heirs to the throne who
had received a University education and he was
proud to wear the purple mantle of the Rector
of the old Albertina University. In his long life
of retirement, however, the Crown Prince some-
times lost touch with the powerful progressive
movements of the time and could not fully follow
the new ideas which were in vogue. He thought
to arrest with a few words of angry censure the
anti-semitic movements, the sole cause of which
was the over-weening presumption of the Jews,
and he warned the students of Konigsberg against
the dangers of Chauvinism, a sentiment which
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? Two Emperors 231
after two hundred years of cosmopolitanism, is
as unfamiliar to the Germans as its foreign
name.
But the course of human things looks different
from a throne than when viewed from below. The
nation, knowing the well-beloved Prince as they
did, hoped that, as in the case of his father, his
character would develop with his life-tasks and
that he would show as much energy as a sovereign
as he had displayed when representing his father.
Then the catastrophe overtook him. Three Ger-
man physicians Professors Gerhardt, von Berg-
mann, and Tobold recognized at once the char-
acter of the disease, and spoke the truth fearlessly
as we are accustomed to expect from German men
of science. A cure was still possible and even
probable. But the resolve which would have
saved the patient was lacking, and who can
venture to utter a word of blame, since al-
most every layman in similar circumstances
would have made a similar choice. Then the
patient was handed over to an English physi-
cian, who at once, by the unparalleled false-
hood of his reports, cast a stain on the good
name of our ancient and honourable Prussia.
With growing anxiety the Germans began to
surmise that this precious life was in bad hands.
The result was more tragic than their worst fears.
When the Emperor William closed his eyes, a
dying Emperor came up to succeed to the lofty
inheritance.
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? 232 Treitschke
The greatness of the monarchy, and its superi-
ority to all republican forms of government rests
essentially on the well-assured and long duration
of the princely office. Its power is crippled when
this assurance is lacking. The reign of the dying
Emperor could only be a sad episode in the history
of the Fatherland, sad on account of the inex-
pressible sufferings of the noble patient, sad on
account of the deceitful proceedings of the English
doctor and his dirty journalistic accomplices, and
sad on account of the impudence of the German
Liberal party who obtruded themselves eagerly
on the Emperor as though he belonged to them,
and certainly gained one success, the fall of the
Minister von Puttkamer. The monarchical par-
ties on the other hand both by a feeling of loyalty
and the prospect of the approaching end were
compelled to preserve comparative silence. At
such times of testing, all the heart-secrets of parties
are revealed. Those who did not know it before
were now obliged to recognize what sycophancy
lurks beneath the banner of free thought, and
how everyone who thought for himself would be
tyrannized over if this party ever came into power.
Fortunately for us, in the whole Empire they have
behind them only the majority of Berlin people,
some learned men who have gone astray in politics,
the mercantile communities of some discontented
trading towns, and the certainly considerable
power of international Judaism. But let us banish
these dark pictures which history has long left
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? Two Emperors 233
behind. Let us hold fast in reverent recollection
that which lends moral consecration to the tragic
reign of the Emperor Frederick. With a religious
patience, whose greatness only a few of the initi-
ated can thoroughly understand, with an heroic
strength which outshines all the glories of his
victories on the battlefield, he bore the tortures
of his disease, and bereft of speech he still pre-
served in the face of death the old fidelity to duty
of the Hohenzollerns and his warm enthusiasm
for all the unchanging ideals of humanity. In a
way worthy of his father he departed to ever-
lasting peace, and so long as German hearts beat,
they will remember the royal sufferer who once
appeared to us the happiest and most joyful of
the Germans and now was doomed to end his life
in so much suffering.
In those happy days when the picture of the
"Four Kings" 1 hung in all German shop-windows,
many a one said to himself in sorrowful foreboding
that "it was too great good-fortune. " Now the
equalizing justice of Providence has caused the
abundance of joy to be followed by such an excess
of grief as seems too hard for a monarchic people.
Of the four Kings two are no more. But life
belongs to the living. With hopeful confidence
the nation turns her eyes to her young Imperial
lord. All which he has hitherto said to his people,
breathes a spirit of strength and courage, piety
and justice. We know that the good spirit of the
1 William I, Frederick III, William II, Crown Prince William.
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? Treitschke
old Emperor's times still remains unlost to the
Empire, and even in the first days of mourning
we lived through a great hour of German history.
With German fidelity all our Princes gathered
around the Emperor and appeared with him
before the representatives of the nation. The
world learned that the German Emperor does not
die, whoever may wear the crown for the moment.
What a change of affairs since the times when on
each New Year's day the German Courts watched
anxiously for the utterances of the mysterious
Caesar on the Seine! To-day the German speech
from the throne makes no mention of these world-
powers which once presumed to be the only repre-
sentatives of civilization, for one can argue as
little with unteachable enemies as with pushing
and doubtful friends. Whether Europe accom-
modates itself peacefully to the alteration of the
old relations between the Powers, or whether the
German sword must again be drawn to secure
what has been won, in either case we hope to be
prepared.
Unless all signs are deceptive, this great century
which seemed to begin as a French one, will end
as a German one; by Germany's thoughts and
Germany's deeds will the problem be solved how
a strong hereditary sovereignty can be compatible
with the just claims of modern society. Some
day the time must come, when the nations will
realize that the battles of the Emperor William
not only created a Fatherland for the Germans
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? Two Emperors 235
but bestowed upon the community of European
States a juster and more reasonable arrangement.
Then will be fulfilled what Emmanuel Geibel once
said to the grey-haired conqueror.
"Some day through the German nation,
All the world will find salvation. "
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? GERMANY AND NEUTRAL STATES. 1
HEIDELBERG,
25th October, 1870.
NO hatred is so bitter as enmity against the man
who has been unjustly treated ; men hate in
him what they have done to him. That is as true
of nations as of individuals. All our neighbours,
some time or other, grew at Germany's expense,
and to-day, when we have at length smashed the
last remnants of foreign domination, and demand
a modest reward for righteous victories, a per-
manent guarantee of national freedom, angry
blame of German insatiability resounds throughout
the European press. Especially do those small
countries, which owe their very existence to the
dismemberment of the German Empire, e. g. ,
Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, complain loudly
that an arrogant Pan-Germanism has destroyed
our people's sense of fairness. It is hatred that
vents itself in these charges; no impartial person
can deny that the notion of Pan-Germanism is as
foreign to us Germans as its name, which originated
in the bogey-fears of foreign countries. No doubt
owing to the excitement of the times, a foolish
1 Preussisches Jahrbuch, vol. 26, p. 605, et seq.
236
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? Germany and Neutral States 237
boastfulness has here and there come into being;
out-and-out Teutons are imploring us to banish
all foreign words from the sanctuary of the Ger-
man language; men of picturesque talents among
the unemployed are drawing on the patient map
of Europe a kingdom of Armorica and Arelat
between France and Germany. However, such
ideas are simply the isolated absurdities of idle
heads; once in a while they may accidentally
stray into one of the bigger newspapers, but even
then they appear only in those insignificant col-
umns devoted to such subjects as sea-snakes and
triplets, children with fowls' heads,and the mythi-
cal Fusilier Kutschke. The great majority of
German politicians exhibit to-day a deliberate
moderation, which the Swiss and Belgians would
hold in greater respect if those nations, which
enjoy the more comfortable peace and quiet of a
neutrality protected by other Powers, were able
to put themselves in thought in the position of a
great warrior-nation which has been forced to
fight for its life by an unscrupulous attack.
Public opinion has become more quickly united
regarding the reward of our victory than ever
before in a complicated question. The boundary
line of the Government of Alsace, which has indeed
been drawn with a considerate hand and will pre-
sumably constitute Germany's boundary, meets
almost everywhere with agreement. People only
regret, and rightly so, that the splendid region of
the Breusch, which is abundant in springs, and
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? 238 Treitschke
the district around Schirmack, together with the
Steinthal, that essentially German tract of country
consecrated by the life-work of the unforgettable
Oberlin, are not included in the new boundary.
Blind lust of conquest is so alien to the Germans
that they even decide with much unwillingness
to demand the possession of Metz; but the obvious
impossibility of leaving right at our doors in the
hands of revengeful enemies this town, which is a
stronghold by its position, not by its walls, compels
us in this case to enter into occupation of French
territory.
The desire of robbing the neutral neighbouring
States, which imaginative persons in Bale and
Brussels are fond of attributing to us, is expressed
only by some isolated German Chauvinists. We
notice with anxiety, like all the thoughtful Swiss,
that those two decades of fresh prosperity which
Switzerland enjoyed since the Civil War are to-day
at an end. We ask, gravely, what shall eventually
be the outcome of a development which is tending
ever more and more to loosen every community
and every individual from the State? But we
honestly wish that the Confederation may succeed
in overcoming the disintegrating power of an
unbridled Radicalism; the role which this asylum
for all parties has long played, to the good of Eu-
rope, is not yet played out by any means. No in-
telligent German wants to increase the excessively
strong centrifugal powers, which are embraced
in our new Empire, by the inclusion of purely
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? Germany and Neutral States 239
Republican elements, and all free men are horror-
struck at the thought that Geneva and Lausanne,
which are to-day the centres of an independent
intellectual movement, would, by the dissolution
of the Swiss Confederation, be involved in the
horrible fall of France. We are also quite without
arriere-pensee in regard to the Netherland States,
which did so little to win Germany's friendship;
we certainly trust that the strengthening of the
German Empire will of itself bring it about, that
the foolish inclination at The Hague to France may
be moderated, and that the Flemish majority in
Belgium may find the courage to assert their race
beside the Walloon minority. Still, because we
do not want to shake the national constitutions
of these buffer-States, because we demand a
lasting arrangement on our Western boundary,
for that reason a question has now to be settled
once for all, which threatens to be continually
disturbing our good relations with our small
neighbours, although it has in very truth nothing
whatever to do with the independence of the Nether-
lands. The conclusion of peace with France may
and shall afford the opportunity of incorporating
Luxemburg in the German Empire.
It is repugnant to us to revive to-day the
memory of the odious transaction which deprived
us of that territory the single bitter memory in
the glorious history of the North German Confede-
ration. Suffice it that that German territory
which by the decision of Europe was once allotted
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? 240 Treitschke
to the House of Orange and the Crown of Prussia,
in order to protect it against France's lust of
piracy, was suddenly sold and betrayed to France
by its own rulers. When the Prussian Govern-
ment entered a protest, it was confronted by the
unconcealed partisan disfavour of all the European
Powers. The fear of France lay heavily on the
world; it reads to us to-day like a farce, when we
read in the documents of those days how Lord
Stanley and Count Beust outri vailed each other
in depicting to our Government the fearful superi-
ority of French power; the French fleet would
occupy the attention of the greater portion of
our forces, would make it impossible for us to
protect South Germany, etc. Prussia, which
was honestly trying to display its love of peace in
an affair not altogether free from doubt, and was,
moreover, fully busied with the founding of the
new Confederation, gave up its right of garrison-
ing, and contented itself with the inadequate
result, that France had to abandon her welcome
purchase.
In place of the military protection
which Prussia had afforded the country up till then,
was substituted a moral protection, by which the
great Powers undertook a common responsibility
for the neutrality of the Grand Duchy. But
scarcely had the agreement been concluded, when
it at once lost all its value owing to the perfidious
interpretation put upon it by England. Amid
the exultant cheers of Parliament, Lord Stanley
declared that Great Britain would only take up
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? Germany and Neutral States 241
arms for Luxemburg's neutrality if the other
Great Powers did the same ; the press, drunk with
peace, rejoiced that England's obligations were
not extended, but limited, by the May Conven-
tion and the politics of the Sinking Island-
Kingdom had taken a fresh step downwards.
After such words no description is requisite of the
deeds that might be expected from British states-
men ; nobody doubts that England would not have
let itself be disturbed in its neutral complacency,
even if a victorious French army had penetrated
into Luxemburg last August.
The joint European guarantee was from the
start an empty form, and the position of the little
neutral country has been rendered completely
untenable by the mighty revolutionary events of
recent weeks. If the German boundary advances
as far as Metz and Diedenhof, Luxemburg be-
comes surrounded in the south, as in the north and
east, by German-Prussian territory, the country
no longer forms a buffer-State between France
and Prussia, and the object of the May^Convention,
the idea of preventing friction between the two
great military Powers, vanishes of itself. Con-
sidering the deadly enmity which will threaten
us yet a long time from Paris, the Prussian
Government could hardly tolerate seeing the
communications between Treves and Metz in-
terrupted by neutral territory; serious military
considerations compel Prussia's desire to plant
its standard again on those Luxemburg fortifica-
16
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? 242 Treitschke
tions on which it stood for fifty years, a screen
for Germany.
And is not the neutrality of the little country,
the artificial creation of a "nation luxembour-
geoise," in very truth a disgrace to Germany?
Polyglot countries, like Belgium and Switzerland,
may justly be declared neutral, because their
mixed populations prevent them from taking par-
tisan parts in the national struggles of this century.
But to cut off two hundred thousand German
persons from their Fatherland in order to place
them under European guardianship, that was a
crime against common-sense and history, an insult
which could be offered only to this our hard-
struggling Germany. The little State is German
to the last hamlet, belongs to us by speech and
customs, by the memories of a thousand-years-
old history, as well as by the community of ma-
terial interests. And this country, which presented
us with three Emperors, which once revolted
against Philip of Burgundy in order to preserve
its German language, which, further, in the days
of the French Revolution, twice joined in the
national war against the hated French, this root-
and-branch German country is to-day under
French rule! The official language is French, the
laws of the country are derived from France and
Belgium. Since the injurious nine-years' treaty
with Belgium, people in Luxemburg have grown
accustomed, as in Brussels and Ghent, to admire
French methods as a mark of distinction. The
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? Germany and Neutral States 243
officials, who are moulded in French and Belgian
schools, introduce French arrogance from their
alien environment, radically oppose the German
spirit, change the honest old German place-names
of Klerf and Liebenbrunn into Clerveaux and
Septfontaines. The people are alienated from
the German system of government by the sins
of the Diet; they cannot forget that the German
Confederation once abandoned a half of the coun-
try in undignified fashion to Belgium, and then
obligingly all the governmental pranks of reaction-
ary ministers. A fanatical clergy, a lying press
conducted by French and Belgians, no doubt
also maintained by French gold, foster their hatred
for the great Fatherland, and the Netherland
States gaze with indifference at the decline of the
German civilization.
Under such unhealthy conditions every kind of
political corruption of which the German nature
is capable has spread over this small people.
Whilst the German youth are shedding their
blood for the Eternal, for the Infinite, the Luxem-
burgers are wallowing in the mire of materialism;
a superstitious belief in the life of this world has
emasculated their minds, they know nothing,
they want to know nothing except business and
pleasure. Whilst in Germany, amid hard strug-
glings, a new, a more moral conception of liberty
is arising, which is rooted in the idea of duty,
there an existence without duties is praised as the
highest aim of life. They want to derive advan-
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? 244 Treitschke
tage from the Customs Union, to which the country
owes the essence of its prosperity, without doing
the least service for Germany. They let the
Germans bleed for the freedom of the left bank of
the Rhine including Luxemburg they loudly
boast they have no fatherland, and reserve it to
themselves to heap abuse on Germans as slaves,
to shout to the German tide-waiters a scornful
"mer de pour la Prusse! "
Ought Germany any longer to endure this
European scandal, this parasitic plant without a
fatherland, which is battening on the trunk of
our Empire? The national State has the right
and duty of protecting its nationals all over the
world; it cannot endure that a German race should
be gradually transformed into a German-French
mongrel without any reason except the perversity
of a degenerate bureaucracy. There is only one
way of preventing it, as things are, namely, the
inclusion of the country in the German Empire.
The Reichstag, however, can allow this inclu-
sion only under two conditions: it must require
that the German tongue be used again as the
official language, and that the agreement binding
the Grand Duchy to the Kingdom of the Nether-
lands shall be broken off. The bond of union
between the two States is certainly very loose;
still, in our Diet we got to know only too thor-
oughly the unhallowed consequences of the blend-
ing of German and foreign politics; although the
constitution of the Confederation says nothing
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? Germany and Neutral States 245
about it, we must set up for our new Empire the
infrangible principle: no foreign sovereign can
be a member of the German Confederation.
We do not mean that Germany should right-
away declare the May Convention to be nullified
in consequence of the present war. Much rather
do we desire the free unanimity of all the parties
concerned. The support hitherto afforded by
France to Luxemburg independence is to-day
disappearing of itself. The infatuated resistance
of the French will presumably oblige the Confeder-
ate general to increase his demands ; it would then
be all the easier for the French Government,
upon the conclusion of peace, to make a binding
declaration, in return for some fair concession,
that it recognizes in advance the entry of Luxem-
burg into the German Confederation. For the
conversion of the Luxemburgers themselves would
suffice a definite assurance, that henceforth Ger-
many's customs-boundary coincides with its po-
litical boundary, and the customs-convention can-
not be renewed unless the Grand Duchy again
undertakes the duties of a Confederate territory.
Such will scarcely fail of its effect in that country,
where ideal reasons find no response, despite the
fiery enthusiasm for independence which is to-day
again turning the heads of the little people. Their
industries cannot flourish without the blessings
of German commercial freedom; they would be
bound to be ruined if the Small State tried to
form an independent market-region, and the same
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? 246 Treitschke
would happen if it entered the Belgian customs
area.
Serious opposition can hardly be expected from
the Dutch Government, which has long been
weary of its troublesome neighbour. But the
head of the House of Orange has long been con-
verted to the commercial neutrality of those
patricians of Amsterdam, whom his great an-
cestors formerly fought against; his heart, however
warmly it may beat for France, will find to-day
the clink of Prussian dollars quite as pleasant as
that of golden napoleons four years ago. An
understanding must also be possible with the
magnates of the joint House of Nassau, whose
rights were expressly reserved in the May Con-
vention. The simplest solution of the question
would certainly be arrived at if Prussia were to
acquire the country by purchase. Already the
Prussian State numbers fifty thousand Luxem-
burgers among its citizens in the districts around
Bittburg and St. Vith; if the Grand Duchy and
French- Luxemburg, together with Diedenhof , were
to be taken over in addition, that misgoverned
and mutilated country would at last be united
again under one Crown up to the Belgian portion.
But this solution, which is in every respect most
desirable, is not absolutely a necessity; German
interests primarily extend only so far that the
Principality be again adopted into our line of
defence, into the life of our State and culture.
Should, therefore, the joint House prefer to raise
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? Germany and Neutral States 247
up a Nassau Prince as a Prince of the Confedera-
tion to the throne of Luxemburg, Germany cannot
refuse; such an arrangement would at any rate
be far preferable to the unreal conditions of to-
day. Lastly, we are yet in need of the agreement
of the European Powers. That also is obtainable ;
for right and fairness are obviously on our side,
if we intend to impose similar charges on all
members of the Customs Union; moreover, Eng-
land has long felt the guarantee undertaken for
the neutrality of Luxemburg to be a wearisome
burden. However, everything depends entirely
on not commencing negotiations prematurely,
so that the neutral Powers may not find welcome
occasion to interfere in the Franco- German
negotiations.
Alsace, Lorraine, Luxemburg! What wounds
have been inflicted on German life in those
Marches of the Empire through the crimes of
long centuries, and how perseveringly will all the
healthy forces of the German State be obliged
to bestir themselves in order to keep in peace
what the sword has won ! The task seems almost
too heavy for this generation, which has only just
rescued our Northern March from alien rulers.
Still, what is being accomplished to-day is but the
ripe fruit of the work of many generations. All
the industry, all the honesty and active power, all
the moral wealth, which our fathers awoke anew
in the deteriorated Fatherland, will work on our
side if we now dare to adapt the degenerate sons
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? 248 Treitschke
of our West to German life; and the best that
we can achieve in peace can yet never ap-
proach the deeds and sufferings of the heroes
who paid with their blood for the dawn of the
new times.
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? AUSTRIA AND THE GERMAN EMPIRE.
HEIDELBERG,
i$th Dec. , 1871.
ONCE more Austria has emerged from a severe
ordeal. The Hohenwarte Cabinet has re-
signed ; the plans of the Slavs to upset the rights and
the policy of the Germans have been frustrated, and
under the auspices of the Magyars a Ministry has
been formed which, to say the least, may be cred-
ited with just intentions towards the Germans and
an honest desire for the preservation of the State.
But the cries of joy from German breasts to
greet the deliverance from threatening danger
are isolated. Hitherto, it was customary that
our countrymen on the Danube in days of stress
should lose faith in their Government only to
regain confidence as soon as the political clouds
lifted again, and for a long time past we Germans
of the Empire have been accustomed to this
sudden change of feeling in German Austria, just
as we are accustomed to laws of nature. For
the first time, however, the old rule no longer
applies; the news from our Austrian friends reads
gloomier than ever, despite the slight change for
the better which has now taken place, and the
249
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? 250 Treitschke
question is wonderingly asked how in such a
country reckless men are still found ready to
accept a ministerial portfolio. What a weird
spectacle to behold! a great empire whose own
people have lost faith in themselves. Let us
calmly examine these serious matters. It does
not admit of doubt what we for the sake of Ger-
many wish for Austria. We German Unity-
makers were never the enemies of Austria; we
only contested the preponderating power which
Austria exercised on German and Italian soil to
the detriment of all parties. Now, having fought
victoriously, we are more in favour of Austria
than many Austrians themselves. Nowhere dur-
ing the last few weeks have so many warm and
genuine wishes been exchanged for the continu-
ance of Austria as in the lobbies of the German
Parliament. Our Empire's ambition must simply
be directed towards the building up of an inde-
pendent and solid commonwealth within our
boundaries, which will suffice to us all completely.
We have Italy's hasty agitation for unity as a
warning example before us, and must not desire
to embody, in addition to the strong centrifugal
powers fermenting in the interior of Germany and
to the inhabitants of our Polish, Danish, and
French frontiers, yet another eight million Czechs
as our fellow-citizens. In the days of Frederick
the Great, when ideas of a Slav Empire lay dor-
mant, it was perhaps not very difficult to turn
over Bohemia entirely to German ideals. The old
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? Austria and the German Empire 251
race-hatred having, however, now been aroused
again with terrific ferocity, even the united forces
of Germany might have to spend scores of years
on this difficult and perhaps sterile task, should we
ever step into the sad heritage of the Hapsburgs.
We already have more than enough ultramontane
enemies of the Empire, and we will keep them in
check; our Empire is, however, well balanced only
because of the preponderance of Protestants. We
should commit a crime against the future liberty
of thought were we to contemplate absorbing
fourteen million Catholics. Germany longs for
peace ; the vapourings of the democracy regarding
the war-fanaticism of our Government are lying
statements, disbelieved even by their originators.
The collapse of Austria, however, would mean an
upheaval unexampled in history, which would
embroil us in endless wars and threaten to destroy
the development of a peaceful policy for a long
time to come.
We Germans have never understood the prin-
ciple of nationality in the crude and overbearing
sense that all German-speaking Europeans must
belong to our Empire. We consider it a boon for
the peaceful intercourse of the world that the
boundaries of nations are not engraved with a
knife in the shell of the earth, that millions of
French live outside France, and outside the Ger-
man Empire millions of Germans. If the present-
day situation in Middle Europe consolidates, if
in the middle of the Continent there are two great
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? 252 Treitschke
Empires, the one uniform and purely German, the
other Catholic and polyglot, yet permeated by
German ideas who will contend that such a state
of affairs is humiliating to German national pride?
More magnificent and more brilliant than the day
of Koniggratz shines the glory of Sedan; but the
firm basis of our power to-day, the creative
thoughts of a new German policy have been engen-
dered by the blessings of 1866. "Down with
Austria," was then our battle-cry, and Germany
breathed as if freed from a nightmare when we
separated from Austria. Every day of German
history has proved since then that this separation
was a necessity, and that only through it we have
found ourselves again. In order to satisfy un-
bridled greed are we to demolish again the struc-
ture of 1866, the foundations of our Empire?
Are we to discard like old rubbish that rich treasure
of historic-political importance amassed during
half a century by our serious thinkers as common
property of the Germans solely because our
countrymen in Austria do not immediately succeed
in adjusting themselves to the new order of things?
Not an inch of land was taken by the victor of
1866 from the vanquished; such moderation not
only arose from the desire to reconcile the adver-
sary, it was also clearly evident that those Austrian
provinces which were for four centuries estranged
from German life and interdependent through
political ties, as well as through mutual commercial
interests, have a good right to stand side by side
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? Austria and the German Empire 253
independently with Germany. Austrian pessi-
mists might give as an example Moscow and
Warsaw. The opinion that the capital on the
Danube is to become a German provincial town
is ridiculed as ludicrous in sober- thinking Berlin.
The German idealists of the Danube speak lightly
of the disruption of Austria as if a Great Power
could easily be annihilated ; we but ask what is to
become of the territories of the Crown of St.
Stephen after the collapse of the monarchy, and,
unable to find a satisfactory reply, we desire the
continuance of Austria as a Power.
The dualism which so often is depicted as the
beginning of the end appears to us in a different
light. The agreement of 1867 has not exactly
created a new state of affairs, but merely recon-
nected the thoughts of the only Austrian sovereign
who intelligently and successfully understood the
handling of internal reforms. To leave the lands
of the Hungarian Crown under their former con-
stitution, and to form the Crown lands of the west
into one political unit, were the plans formerly of
Maria Theresa. It is due to Deak that this long-
forgotten policy has been renewed in modern form.
Our political pride may revolt, yet we cannot think
it unnatural that Hungarians have finally assumed
political direction in the dual Empire. Those
six million Magyars, together with the two million
Hungarian-Germans who obey the former almost
blindly, form the biggest political entity of the
Empire. They have the firm legal basis of an old
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