If the government were to
carry their measure in the new Reichstag the vote of
the Centre was essential, for without the hundred votes
of the Centre, whatever might be the result of the General
Election, the military policy of the government must be
defeated.
carry their measure in the new Reichstag the vote of
the Centre was essential, for without the hundred votes
of the Centre, whatever might be the result of the General
Election, the military policy of the government must be
defeated.
Robertson - Bismarck
What is Bulgaria
to us? It is nothing to us who rules in Bulgaria, or even what
becomes of Bulgaria. . . . The difficulty of our position is not
to keep peace with Austria and Russia, but between Russia and
Austria. . . . With words I can do nothing. Words are not
soldiers, nor are speeches battalions. When we have the enemy
in the Fatherland, and read them speeches they will laugh at us.
The possibility of a French attack, which to-day is not imminent,
will recur as soon as France thinks she is stronger than we are,
either by alliances or being better armed. . . . In case of an
unsuccessful war, the peace of 1870 would be mere child's play
as compared with the peace of 1890. We should have the same
French against us whom we met from 1807 to 1813, and who
would again suck our blood so that we should be paralysed for
thirty years. . . . We have interests which do not affect Austria,
and Austria has interests which are far removed from us, and
each must go therefore its own way. '--(January II, 1887. )
'We cannot trust the existence of the army to a vacil-
lating majority. If the status of the army is to depend on
Parliament and Budget grants, we shall be compelled to
say: "videat Imperator ne quid. detrimenti capiat Res-
publica" and "salus Reipublica will become suprema lex"
(January 14, 1887). On January 14, an amendment
limiting the proposed increase to three years was carried
by 183 to 154 votes, the Centre voting with the Liberals
in the majority. Bismarck quietly drew a paper from his
portfolio and filled in the date. 'I have,' he said to the
Reichstag, excited by the results of the division, 'an
Imperial Message to communicate. ' He read from the
piece of paper a decree dissolving the Reichstag.
Six weeks later the elections justified the Chancellor's
prediction ' that I shall carry the Army Bill, because the
Progressists are against it. ' The Liberal opposition was
badly beaten. The Liberals lost thirty-three seats, the
Socialists sixteen, the Clerical Centre only two--but the
reconstituted National Liberals, now really a branch of
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? 444
BISMARCK
moderate Conservatism, gained nearly fifty seats, and
the Government Party of a hundred and fifty-four was
increased to two hundred and twenty. The Army
Bill was reintroduced on March 9 and passed, the
Centre abstaining from voting, for reasons discussed
below. On April 28 Schnaebele was released. There
had been a regrettable misunderstanding. It is diffi-
cult to avoid the conclusion that the 'Schnaebele inci-
dent' was deliberately planned, possibly to provoke the
French into a serious indiscretion, certainly to assist the
passage of the Army Bill by driving into the German
elector's mind the peril from France. The British reader
will recall how in 1901 during the Boer War certain naval
incidents were employed to emphasise the tyranny of
Great Britain, and the impotence of the German Navy,
in order to promote the passage of the Naval Bill, then
before the Reichstag.
In the spring, Bismarck had succeeded in renewing the
Triple Alliance (March 1887). Crispi, who had succeeded
as Premier on the death of Depretis (July) in the early
autumn, ostentatiously paid a visit to Count Kalnoky at
Vienna (September 14), and had then gone on to Friedrichs-
ruhe (October 2). On the return journey, he informed a
German journalist of the Frankfurter Zeitung that Italy
wished well to Bulgaria, but ' there can be no doubt that
Italy, like every other European State, has every reason
to fear Russia's advances to Constantinople. We cannot
allow the Mediterranean to become a Russian lake. ' This
carefully prepared ' aside' drew its significance from the
peril that the situation in Bulgaria still involved.
The relations of Austria and Russia and of Germany and
Russia were the crucial questions for Bismarck. He had
provoked a storm of criticism at Vienna by deliberately
revealing in the semi-official North German Gazette the
agreement of January 15, 1877, between Austria and
Russia by which the Austrian occupation of Bosnia-
Herzegovina had been provisionally arranged in advance.
Europe was as much puzzled as Austrian public opinion at
the revelation. Why should Bismarck select this moment
to let out secrets which embarrassed the Austrian ministry,
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 445
and embittered the relations of Germany and Austria,
and of Austria and Russia, when his avowed policy was to
keep the peace between them--Germany as the tertius
gaudens duobus litigantibus i Had Bismarck not got the
renewal of the Triple Alliance safely in his pocket? The
explanation is probably \o be found first in Bismarck's
desire to remind Austria-Hungary that her Balkan policy
must be dependent on German goodwill; secondly, in the
relations of Germany and Russia, and of Bismarck and the
Tsar. Austria had continuously to be kept in control, Russia
convinced that Germany might, under certain eventualities,
prefer a Russian to an Austrian policy in the Balkans.
The Compact of 1884 had run out in the spring of
1887 and had not been renewed. Since 1884 the Pan-
Slavist, anti-German party in Russia had slowly regained
its ascendency, in spite of Katkoff's death in the August
of 1887. Count Tolstoi, General Ignatieff, Pobodonostzev
and General Bogdanovitch (author of the pamphlet which
caused a great stir, Ualliance Franco-Russe et la Coalition
Europeenne), utilising the crisis in Bulgaria and the Tsar's
envenomed hostility to Prince Alexander of Battenberg,
and marked disapproval of the election of Prince Ferdinand
of Coburg in Prince Alexander's place, combined to pro-
duce a serious anti-German movement in Russia. The
military preparations and movements of Russian troops
on the Austrian frontier, replied to by military prepara-
tions and movements of troops in Galicia and Hungary,
seemed to foreshadow a war between Austria and Russia;
and when the Tsar, at Copenhagen in September, pointedly
omitted to visit the German Emperor at Stettin the
warfare in the press on all sides became fiercer. The
Tsar, however, did come to Berlin (November 18), and
Bismarck has related how he convinced Alexander in. that
forged documents were responsible for the Russian mis-
interpretation of German policy in Bulgaria. It is pro-
bable, indeed almost certain, that the 'Re-insurance
Treaty,' the existence and non-renewal of which were
revealed by Bismarck in 1896, was concluded (November
18, 1887) at this time. 1 But the conclusion of this pecu-
1 Sec Appendix B.
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? 446
BISMARCK
liarly Bismarckian convention, behind the backs of his
allies, Austria and Italy, did not diminish the tension in
the Near East. The year closed with little relief to the
strained relations of Austria and Russia, while the hostile
relations between Great Britain and Russia were such as
completely to satisfy Bismarck.
The German government took (December 16, 1887)
another characteristic step. Not content with the Army
Law of March 1887, another military Reorganisation Bill
was introduced, which by the recasting of the period of
service in the Reserve and the two classes of the Landwehr
and of the Landsturm was calculated to add 700,000
men to the army, when mobilised on a war footing.
Warned by the chastisement of the General Election of
1887, the opposition was naturally shy of resisting these
fresh demands, involving a loan for military purposes of
? 14,000,000 (280,000,000 marks). Bismarck made the
debate on the second reading of the Bill (February 6, 1888)
the occasion for one of the greatest of his speeches--an
elaborate review of German foreign policy and the Euro-
pean situation--a demonstration of Germany's unique
military strength and a consummate proof of his own
personal ascendency. The second reading of the Bill
was passed en bloc without a division on February 6--
a superb testimony to the Chancellor's unchallenged
supremacy--and the enthusiasm of a delirious crowd re-
peated the homage of the Reichstag by escorting him home
and continuing the demonstration under the windows of
the Chancellor's residence. The third reading was passed
on February 8, 1888. It was the zenith of Bismarck's
career. Two years later he was on the eve of a com-
pulsory resignation, forced on him by a conflict with his
sovereign on the principles of German policy both in
home and foreign affaiis, laid down in 1888.
The Reichstag heard, and Europe read, the speech,
ignorant that behind it lay 'the Re-insurance Treaty,'
which guaranteed the reciprocal neutrality of Russia or
Germany in case either should be attacked by a third
Power. This placed Bismarck precisely in the position
that he desired, that of arbiter between Russia and Austria;
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 447
for to Bismarck's diplomatic fertility of resource nothing
was easier than to prevent or secure, as German policy
required it, Austria or Russia being the aggressor in the
Eastern issues that continued to cause military councils,
movements of troops, and increased armaments on both
sides of theGalician frontiers. The secret convention tight-
ened the control over Vienna, without relaxing the frailer
control on Russia. It also prevented a Franco-Russian
alliance. The third Power contemplated in the secret
convention of November 18, 1887, might not be Austria
but France. The Tsar, in fact, by making the convention
really renounced the possibility of making France an ally,
should Bismarck force a war on the French Republic.
Yet, in Bismarck's deliberate judgment, a demonstration
of German strength in February 1888 was desirable, and
his speech of February 6 was preceded (February 3) by
the official publication simultaneously at Berlin and at
Vienna of the text of the Austro-German alliance of 1879,
as renewed in 1887. It is significant that the text of the
treaties on which the Triple, as distinct from the Dual,
Alliance, was based, was not published, and it is fair to infer
that the publication in question was not so much a hint to
Russia as a warning to France and a skilful counter-stroke
intended to deceive Austria, perturbed at rumours about
what had passed at Berlin between Bismarck and the Tsar.
Had the Ball-Platz been cognisant of the secret convention
of November 18, 1887, the publication in the Vienna
Gazette of February 3, 1888, would have been ridiculous.
For the Dual Alliance precisely provided against the con-
tingency that made the Secret Convention an operative
agreement.
The great speech of February 6,1888, is remarkable, not
merely for its magisterial breadth of view, range of survey,
felicity of phrasing, and pontifical sureness of touch--
the qualities evinced in all Bismarck's considered ex-
positions of principles in foreign policy--but also for its
clear indication of the speaker's mind and temper. Ger-
man relations with Russia rested, he told the Reichstag,
not on the press, nor on a gullible and ignorant public
opinion, not even on peace-loving or war-desiring ministers
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? 448
BISMARCK
but on the Tsar. 'In opposition,' he said, ' to the views
expressed by the Russian press, I have the unqualified word
of the Tsar Alexander himself' (and, he did not add, his
pledge in writing). France, he pointed out with unmistak-
able emphasis, was unreconciled and irreconcilable. She
was more peaceful in 1888 than in 1887, as was proved
by Carnot's election to the Presidency, but ' no wars are
waged from mere hatred,' for 'otherwise France would have
to be at war with Italy and England and the whole world,
for France hates all its neighbours'--deliberate words not
intended to pacify France, and a passionate appeal to the
worst passions in the German heart. As for Bulgaria,
Germany's policy was clear. 'If Russia attempts to make
good her rights (in Bulgaria) I should consider it the duty
of a loyal German policy to hold purely and simply to the
stipulations of the Berlin Treaty. . . . If Russia makes
official application to us to support steps for the re-estab-
lishment of the situation in Bulgaria, as it was created at
the Congress . . . I shall have no hesitation in advising
His Majesty the Emperor to comply with the request.
This is demanded of our treaty--loyalty to our neighbour,
with whom, whatever his prevailing mood, we must still
cherish neighbourly relations, and make common cause
against the foes of Social and Monarchical order in Europe,
a task of which the Sovereign of Russia has a full ap-
preciation. ' The significance of these passages is un-
mistakable. They announced publicly Bismarck's share
of the bargain in the Secret Convention--a general support
of Russian policy alike against Great Britain or an un-
reasonable Austria.
The peroration was a finely worded summary of
Bismarck's gospel of power, evincing his grip on the
secrets of German strength and the indissoluble unity of
strategy and policy which made its ringing appeal a text
for every German household :--
'The European pond is too full of pikes for Germany ever to
become a carp. . . . Behind our army stand our reserves. It
must not be said " others can do the same. " That is just what
they cannot do. We have the material, not only for forming
an enormous army, but for furnishing it with officers. We have
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
a corps of officers such as no other Power has. When we under-
take a war it must be a people's war which all approve, as in
1870. If we are attacked then the juror teutonicus will flame out,
and no one can make head against that. . . . We base our
alliance on the strength of our army. If we have no cause to
use it, all the better, but we must make our arrangements with
the idea that we do use it. . . . Every country in the long run is
responsible for the windows broken by its newspapers; the bill
will be presented one day in the ill-temper of a neighbour. We
can be easily influenced by love and sympathy--perhaps too
easily--but by threats, never! We Germans fear God and
nothing else in the world; and it is the fear of God that causes
us to love peace and ensue it. . . . He who attacks the German
nation will find it armed to a man, and every soldier with the
firm belief in his heart that "God is with us. "'
The most scholarly and accomplished of the French
biographers of Bismarck, M. Matter,1 has held that this
speech was, for all its resounding success, a proof of failing
powers in Bismarck, and ultimately responsible for the
breach between Russia and Germany, and for the Franco-
Russian Alliance. 'II avait brise net Palliance russo-
allemande et prepare l'entente franco-russe. ' It is difficult
to concur in this judgment. The failure to renew the
secret Reinsurance of 1887 in 1890 was due to the Emperor
and Chancellor Caprivi, not to Bismarck. As is indicated
further on, Bismarck's quarrel with the Emperor was
partly the result of a fundamental difference in foreign
policy. Neither in 1890 nor in 1887 was Bismarck ready
to support Austria at all costs against Russia, nor to throw
away the opportunity of a close (if secret) understanding
between Berlin and Petersburg by backing Austrian policy
in the Balkans without reserve. The more closely that
the speech of February 6 is studied, the more clearly do its
veiled inferences stand out. It was intended to be, and
remains, a classic and magisterial review by Bismarck at
the end of his life of the principles of his policy that he
had followed since 1871. The action of the German
1 M. Matter {Bismarck et Son Tempi, iii. p. 524 et seq. ), usually singularly
accurate, gives the date (pp. 538 and 5+0) of the great speech as February 8.
Bismarck did not speak on February 8 (the third reading). The correct date is
February 6, as is clear from any of the collected editions of Bismarck's speeches
and the accounts in the daily newspapers of that date.
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? 456 BISMARCK
government in 1890 was the first of a series of departures
from the Bismarckian system both at home and abroad.
Those departures may have been justifiable or the reverse,
but Bismarck cannot fairly be held responsible either for
their consequences in the Franco-Russian Entente of 1891
or for making that alliance inevitable when it is demon-
strable that he resisted to the last the policy that in-
augurated them.
The years 1887 and 1888, so crowded with crises, had
witnessed another great Bismarckian stroke, belonging both
to home and to foreign policy, which measured by its
results was more momentous than the brilliant strokes that
impressed Europe. In 1887 Bismarck was winding up the
Kulturkampf. Elaborate negotiations in 1886 had con-
tinued between Berlin and the Vatican. On January 14,
1887, the Centre under Windthorst agreed with the
Liberals under Richter to vote nof for the Septennate, but
for a limitation of the government demands to three years,
and, as has been stated, the Centre and Liberals threw out
the government proposal.
If the government were to
carry their measure in the new Reichstag the vote of
the Centre was essential, for without the hundred votes
of the Centre, whatever might be the result of the General
Election, the military policy of the government must be
defeated. It is generally supposed that Bismarck 'went
to Canossa ' for the last time, and bought the support of
the Centre by the Law of 1887, which was a fresh set of
concessions to the Vatican, and that the Vatican thereby
won its final victory. The Papacy sold, it is commonly
asserted, the Centre vote for the Septennate in return
for the Law of 1887.
Bismarck, the Curia, and Windthorst could have told
a quite different story. On this occasion Bismarck did
not go to Canossa. Instead the Papacy went to Fried-
richsruhe. The Triple Alliance in the early spring of 1887,
and with it the inclusion of Italy, came up for renewal.
It was notorious in 1886 that the relations between the
Quirinal and the Vatican were severely strained, and that
both the Italian Monarchy and the- Papacy were working
against each other, and both in need of allies. And this
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
continued all through 1887. Bismarck saw his oppor-
tunity. His objects were purely political--the mainte-
nance of his system. He had negotiated with the Vatican
all through 1886, and the word went out from the Vatican
in a diplomatic note (January 3, 1887), from Cardinal
Jacobini, the Vatican Secretary of State, that the Catholic
Centre was to vote for the Septennate. Windthorst
defied the command on January 14, 1887, and the Sep-
tennate was defeated. This was rebellion in the eyes of
the Curia. A second warning note from Cardinal Jacobini
followed (January 21). The German Catholic bishops
were ordered to throw themselves into the fray on the
government side against Radicals and Socialists; and they
did so with exemplary obedience. They organised a great
pro-government campaign. In the new Reichstag the
Centre were again ordered to vote for the government's
Bill. Windthorst had both resisted and resented the
orders from Rome in a purely political matter and the
consequent split between the ecclesiastical and lay forces
of Catholicism within the Empire. But the alliance of
Bismarck and the Papacy was too strong for him. He
regarded the Bill as fatal to the principles of freedom that
he had represented since 1871, and he distrusted profoundly
the bargain that the Papacy had made, because he dis-
trusted Bismarck. Vote for the Bill he would not, despite
the Papal command. Vote against it he dared not; so
with eighty-three of his ninety supporters he walked out
and took no part in the division.
Only seven of the Centre voted with the government.
Bismarck had won--and won completely. Henceforward
through the Papacy he would command the Centre Party.
The Government Bill of 1887 to end the Kulturkampf
was, as Windthorst knew or guessed, not the complete
repeal that the Vatican desired,1 and Bismarck's speech
of March 23, 1887, in the Herrenhaus of the Prussian
> The Bill:
1. Empowered the opening of seminaries for priests;
2. Abolished the civil veto on the appointment of parish priests;
3. Restored the episcopal powers of discipline;
4. Permitted the return of purely religious, charitable, or contemplative
Orders. The Society of Jesus was not included.
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? 452
BISMARCK
Landtag, in which he reviewed the general situation, is
pervaded with a subdued note of triumph. The con-
cessions to the Papacy he argued were reasonable and did
not conflict with the authority of the State. What was
important was that the Papacy had crushed the alliance
of the Centre with the Radicals and had thrown itself on
the side of law and order. 'Pope and Emperor,' he as-
serted, 'have an identical interest and must make a
common front against Anarchy and Revolution. . . . I
consider the Pope more friendly to Germany than the
Centre. . . . The Pope is not a Guelph, a Pole, or a new
Liberal, nor has he anything to do with Social Democrats. '
The Triple Alliance was renewed. When Bismarck spoke
on March 23 the order of the Black Eagle had been con-
ferred on Count di Robilant for his share in the renewed
inclusion of Italy. If the Papacy had hoped by going to
Friedrichsruhe to obtain the complete repeal of the laws
against the Roman Church, the unqualified readmission
of the ecclesiastical orders, and the support of Germany
against the Quirinal in Italy it was bitterly mistaken. The
bargain had been dictated and interpreted by Bismarck,
not the Vatican. No less significant was the undoubted
fact that Great Britain had given specific pledges of pro-
tection to the Italian Kingdom--the preservation of the
status quo in the Mediterranean and the defence of Italy
from'invasion by sea. 'Our position,' Depretis said in
February 1887, 'is now secure both by land and sea. '
'Our friendly relations with England,' said the Italian
Foreign Minister, as late as 1896, 'are in our view the
natural complement of the Triple Alliance. '
Bismarck in 1887 might well feel triumphant. He had
secured Italy on such terms that he virtually secured Great
Britain also. 1 At Rome in the allied Italian Monarchy he
had a powerful check on the Vatican; he had compelled
1 See Chiala,' La Duplice e la Triplice Allianza,' Hansard (i888), vol. 322.
1172, et jeq. , and The Times for November 5, 1887. It was generally understood
that the renewal provided, 1, If France 'attacked' Germany or Italy both were
to join in defence; 2. If Russia 'attacked ' Germany or Austria both were to
unite in defence; 3. If France and Russia attacked any one of the three allies,
all three were to unite in defence. The re-organisation of the Italian army in
1887 and 1888 (particularly after the visit of the Emperor William it. to Rome
in 1888) was one of the consequences of the renewal of the Triple Alliance.
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
the Papacy to win a victory for the German government
in Germany, which enormously increased the power of
the civil and militarist government, and through the
Papacy and the German Catholic bishops he had destroyed
the independent and powerful political opposition of
Windthorst and the Clerical Centre in the Reichstag.
The Chancellor's political cartel was complete; it con-
sisted of the Conservatives, the old National Liberals,
and the Centre; and the union gave him a decisive and
obedient majority. 1
The year 1887, therefore, registered the final defeat of
Liberalism, and not merely political but also intellectual
Liberalism. Militarism and reaction won all along the line
and the commander-in-chief of Militarism and reaction
was Bismarck. The German Clerical Centre, like the old
National Liberals, shed its last rags of independence, and
became henceforward a party that stood for authority,
despotism, and Pan-Germanism, corrupted by the favour of
the government, demoralised by its dependence on the
Vatican, and allied with the Pan-German party in Austria.
The Papacy and its parties became the allies and agents of
Prussianism, as Bismarck understood the term. 'The
Anti-Christ,' denounced by Pio Nono and Antonelli had
become the champion for whom Popes and Nuncios would
work--and not only in Germany. The ring of interests
that buttressed up the Bismarckian system was now com-
pleted by the alliance between the Conservative Lutherans
of Junkertum and the Conservative Clericals of the Centre.
Success, like misfortune, makes strange political bed-
fellows. The 'white international of- the dynasties,' true
to the solidarity of legitimate autocracy, was seconded
by 'the yellow international of High Finance,' the
Kaiserjudtn and the Industrials (Schlot-Junkertum), and
the 1 black international of the Clericals. ' After 1887
the penetration and capture of the Curia by the
diplomacy of Bavaria, Prussia, and Austria, was only a
question of time--proved up to the hilt when it became
necessary to elect a successor to Leo xm, Germany, says
1 'Peace with the Catholic Church,' Bismarck said,' will strengthen our rela-
tions with foreign countries, especially Austria. '
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? 454
BISMARCK
Naumann, became 'a prosperous Spain. ' A passage in
Bismarck's speech of March 23 is very significant: 'The
sharpest and bitterest opponents of the government,' he
asserted, 'have been pupils of the German Universities,
not of the Seminaries. . . . A seminary under a peace-
loving, well-disposed bishop, with a good German mind,
is far preferable to a course of study at a German Univer-
sity, where no one is responsible for the education with all
its influences which uncontrolled mould the student. '
In other words, minds made to order and on a pattern
prescribed by the government for its own political ends
are preferable to minds formed by free and critical in-
quiry. It is the prescription and the ideal of reaction and
authority and always will be. But it was a sorry and
sinister ending to the struggle for intellectual and political
freedom with Vaticanism--an unexpected close to the
conflict that Bismarck had commenced in 1873--and it
opened a chapter in the intellectual history of the German
universities and of the German mind, dreaded alike by
Mommsen and Virchow--the two greatest figures in the
German world of intellect. That chapter was not closed
when Bismarck died in 1898. It is not closed yet. It
was therefore wholly consonant to Bismarck's policy that
in the spring of 1888 a new anti-Socialist Bill prolonged
the exceptional powers conferred on the Central Executive
until September 30, 1893. The power to deprive of
civic rights all Socialists convicted under the law was
enlarged, and the Minister of the Interior, Herr von
Puttkamer, announced openly that the German Secret
Police extended their efforts to Switzerland, and acted as
voluntary agents in the struggle of Russian absolutism with
Nihilists and refugees. The bill passed on February 17.
On March 9 the change long foreseen took place. The
death of the Emperor William on that day opened the
last phase for Bismarck.
? 6. The Last Phase--Bismarck's Resignation,
March iSSS-March 1890
The death of the Emperor William 1. removed the
sovereign whom Bismarck had served for twenty-five years
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 455
with a personal devotion, as sincere as it was deep. The
brief speech in which the Chancellor announced to the
Reichstag that the first Prussian Emperor was dead is the
best proof of the grief that the national loss stirred within
him. And even that official effort was too great a strain.
For the first and the last time Bismarck broke down. He
resumed his seat broken with emotion, after a few rugged
sentences, in which both words and strength failed him.
The failure was a far more impressive tribute to his royal
and imperial master than any funeral oration. The simple
Soldier-King and the mighty Minister-President of Prussia
had worked together through a heroic epoch for great
and heroic ends; and profoundly as they differed in
character and gifts, sharp as had been on notable occasions
the collision of their wills, the personal bond of loyalty,
service, and affection, forged at Schloss Babenberg on
September 22, 1862, had deepened and tightened with
every year until it had become indissoluble, except by
death. William 1. never forgot that the two things in life
which summed up his political creed--the House of Hohen-
zollern and the Prussian army--were the two things which
his minister had saved from ruin and made the two most
puissant and indisputable forces in Germany and Europe.
Bismarck and Bismarck's policy had unified Germany, but
unified it in such a way that the head of the House of
Hohenzollern was the greatest sovereign on the Continent
of Europe, while the power and stability of the dynasty
rested on the unified nation in arms, of which the King-
Emperor was the War-Lord by acknowledged right. In
1888 as he lay dying William could remember his mother
Queen Louisa and Jena--he could remember 1848 and his
brother, Frederick William iv. --only forty years ago.
In the spring of 1888 'the March days' of '48 were as
unthinkable as the recurrence of a Jena or the visit of a
French conqueror to the tomb of Frederick the Great.
William could die in peace, full of years, with a nation
following him in mourning to his grave. The minister
who had achieved was indeed mighty, but the sceptre and
the prerogative that passed so rapidly to son and grandson
were mightier than the minister, who had made them
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? 456
BISMARCK
what they were. Within two years the Prussian Crown
had broken the Chancellor. Bismarck could not work
without the Prussian Crown: but the sequel showed that
the Prussian Crown would and could work without
Bismarck. And it was Bismarck who had made this
possible.
Had fate decided differently, the strength of that
Prussian Crown might have been convincingly exem-
plified in the reign of the Emperor Frederick. In De-
cember 1887, however, sentence of death had in reality
been passed on the Crown Prince, and when the new
Emperor arrived in Berlin on March 12 from San Remo
--unable to reach his capital until three days after his
father's death--he was a dying man. On June 8, Herr von
Puttkamer, the reactionary Minister of the Interior ' re-
signed. ' On June 15, the Emperor Frederick was dead.
* What a world is this, and how does fortune banter us! '
It is a commonplace, but one of those commonplaces
that enshrine notable truths, to pronounce the Emperor
Frederick's reign to be a tragedy. The tragedy does not
lie in the physical suffering, so heroically borne, nor in the
premature death of one cut off in the prime of a superb
manhood, but in the misery of frustrated purposes and
baffled hopes. All his life, since the days of a generous
and exultant youth, the Crown Prince had been inspired
by high and noble purposes. Through the dreary'era of
conflict,' through Kfiniggratz, Worth, Gravelotte, Sedan,
and Versailles, through the Kulturkampf and the establish-
ment of the Dual and Triple Alliance, the heir to the
throne had cherished the ideal of proving to Prussia,
Germany, and the world that a soldier-sovereign of the
Hohenzollern House, who believed in the Prussian army
and had played his part as became a Hohenzollern in the
unification of Germany by victory in the field, could also
be a liberal and constitutional ruler, whose duty it was to
give to Prussia and Germany a government, a policy, and
an outlook truly Liberal. And when at last Providence
had placed the sceptre in his hands, and a great work
awaited the new ruler which could only be done by
a Liberal sovereign, fate struck him down impotent and
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 457
tortured, yet haunted by the splendours of the ideal that
had made his life an apprenticeship in self-suppression
and a consecration to duty.
Death can be very bitter. Had Frederick's three
months of rule been dogged by prolonged physical pain
and the knowledge of failure to realise his dreams, they
would have been a martyrdom; but to the bitterness of
pain and defeat were added, in the mystery of human
things, the rebellion and treachery of an ungrateful son,
and the unpardonable tyranny of his Chancellor to all
whom the Emperor loved or cared for--and his own help-
lessness to protect or to punish. Insolence, intrigue, de-
famation, and defiance are never so detestable as when
they are employed against the dying and by those who
reckon on the security that the Angel of Death at
the door will bring to their authors. There are black
pages in Bismarck's record and black places in his char-
acter, but the blackest that no extenuation can obliterate
are recorded in the three months from March 13 to
June 15, 1888. And it is fitting, perhaps, that the
chapter and verse should be supplied in the amazing pages
of Busch's chronicles,1 though Busch's revelations are
only a fragment of the evidence. Richter's speech in the
Prussian Landtag (May 27), evoked by the infamous article
on 'Petticoat Government,' was a scathing exposure of
the campaign of libel opened (certainly with Bismarck's
knowledge, probably at his inspiration) by the Conser-
vative and National Liberal parties, and also of the
intimidation and bribery practised by the government
officials. It led to the Imperial rescript enjoining free-
dom at the elections, which caused Puttkamei's dismissal
(June 8). Bismarck promptly paid a visit to, and then
entertained the dismissed minister at a dinner at the
Imperial Chancery (June 11). 2 The Emperor was known
1 Butch, Bismarck, Srcret Pages, see particularly iii. pp. i63-189 (Eng. ed. ).
'Circumstances here, notes Hohenlohe laconically on May 26, at Berlin, 'dis-
pleased me intensely. It is a pity that I could not retire now as a strong protest
against all these goings on. ' Hohenlohe was an honourable gentleman.
* There is considerable evidence that Bismarck really desired Puttkamer's dis-
missal, and characteristically placed the odium on the Emperor, taking care tq ?
represent it as an 'English' and 'feminine' intrigue.
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to us? It is nothing to us who rules in Bulgaria, or even what
becomes of Bulgaria. . . . The difficulty of our position is not
to keep peace with Austria and Russia, but between Russia and
Austria. . . . With words I can do nothing. Words are not
soldiers, nor are speeches battalions. When we have the enemy
in the Fatherland, and read them speeches they will laugh at us.
The possibility of a French attack, which to-day is not imminent,
will recur as soon as France thinks she is stronger than we are,
either by alliances or being better armed. . . . In case of an
unsuccessful war, the peace of 1870 would be mere child's play
as compared with the peace of 1890. We should have the same
French against us whom we met from 1807 to 1813, and who
would again suck our blood so that we should be paralysed for
thirty years. . . . We have interests which do not affect Austria,
and Austria has interests which are far removed from us, and
each must go therefore its own way. '--(January II, 1887. )
'We cannot trust the existence of the army to a vacil-
lating majority. If the status of the army is to depend on
Parliament and Budget grants, we shall be compelled to
say: "videat Imperator ne quid. detrimenti capiat Res-
publica" and "salus Reipublica will become suprema lex"
(January 14, 1887). On January 14, an amendment
limiting the proposed increase to three years was carried
by 183 to 154 votes, the Centre voting with the Liberals
in the majority. Bismarck quietly drew a paper from his
portfolio and filled in the date. 'I have,' he said to the
Reichstag, excited by the results of the division, 'an
Imperial Message to communicate. ' He read from the
piece of paper a decree dissolving the Reichstag.
Six weeks later the elections justified the Chancellor's
prediction ' that I shall carry the Army Bill, because the
Progressists are against it. ' The Liberal opposition was
badly beaten. The Liberals lost thirty-three seats, the
Socialists sixteen, the Clerical Centre only two--but the
reconstituted National Liberals, now really a branch of
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? 444
BISMARCK
moderate Conservatism, gained nearly fifty seats, and
the Government Party of a hundred and fifty-four was
increased to two hundred and twenty. The Army
Bill was reintroduced on March 9 and passed, the
Centre abstaining from voting, for reasons discussed
below. On April 28 Schnaebele was released. There
had been a regrettable misunderstanding. It is diffi-
cult to avoid the conclusion that the 'Schnaebele inci-
dent' was deliberately planned, possibly to provoke the
French into a serious indiscretion, certainly to assist the
passage of the Army Bill by driving into the German
elector's mind the peril from France. The British reader
will recall how in 1901 during the Boer War certain naval
incidents were employed to emphasise the tyranny of
Great Britain, and the impotence of the German Navy,
in order to promote the passage of the Naval Bill, then
before the Reichstag.
In the spring, Bismarck had succeeded in renewing the
Triple Alliance (March 1887). Crispi, who had succeeded
as Premier on the death of Depretis (July) in the early
autumn, ostentatiously paid a visit to Count Kalnoky at
Vienna (September 14), and had then gone on to Friedrichs-
ruhe (October 2). On the return journey, he informed a
German journalist of the Frankfurter Zeitung that Italy
wished well to Bulgaria, but ' there can be no doubt that
Italy, like every other European State, has every reason
to fear Russia's advances to Constantinople. We cannot
allow the Mediterranean to become a Russian lake. ' This
carefully prepared ' aside' drew its significance from the
peril that the situation in Bulgaria still involved.
The relations of Austria and Russia and of Germany and
Russia were the crucial questions for Bismarck. He had
provoked a storm of criticism at Vienna by deliberately
revealing in the semi-official North German Gazette the
agreement of January 15, 1877, between Austria and
Russia by which the Austrian occupation of Bosnia-
Herzegovina had been provisionally arranged in advance.
Europe was as much puzzled as Austrian public opinion at
the revelation. Why should Bismarck select this moment
to let out secrets which embarrassed the Austrian ministry,
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 445
and embittered the relations of Germany and Austria,
and of Austria and Russia, when his avowed policy was to
keep the peace between them--Germany as the tertius
gaudens duobus litigantibus i Had Bismarck not got the
renewal of the Triple Alliance safely in his pocket? The
explanation is probably \o be found first in Bismarck's
desire to remind Austria-Hungary that her Balkan policy
must be dependent on German goodwill; secondly, in the
relations of Germany and Russia, and of Bismarck and the
Tsar. Austria had continuously to be kept in control, Russia
convinced that Germany might, under certain eventualities,
prefer a Russian to an Austrian policy in the Balkans.
The Compact of 1884 had run out in the spring of
1887 and had not been renewed. Since 1884 the Pan-
Slavist, anti-German party in Russia had slowly regained
its ascendency, in spite of Katkoff's death in the August
of 1887. Count Tolstoi, General Ignatieff, Pobodonostzev
and General Bogdanovitch (author of the pamphlet which
caused a great stir, Ualliance Franco-Russe et la Coalition
Europeenne), utilising the crisis in Bulgaria and the Tsar's
envenomed hostility to Prince Alexander of Battenberg,
and marked disapproval of the election of Prince Ferdinand
of Coburg in Prince Alexander's place, combined to pro-
duce a serious anti-German movement in Russia. The
military preparations and movements of Russian troops
on the Austrian frontier, replied to by military prepara-
tions and movements of troops in Galicia and Hungary,
seemed to foreshadow a war between Austria and Russia;
and when the Tsar, at Copenhagen in September, pointedly
omitted to visit the German Emperor at Stettin the
warfare in the press on all sides became fiercer. The
Tsar, however, did come to Berlin (November 18), and
Bismarck has related how he convinced Alexander in. that
forged documents were responsible for the Russian mis-
interpretation of German policy in Bulgaria. It is pro-
bable, indeed almost certain, that the 'Re-insurance
Treaty,' the existence and non-renewal of which were
revealed by Bismarck in 1896, was concluded (November
18, 1887) at this time. 1 But the conclusion of this pecu-
1 Sec Appendix B.
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? 446
BISMARCK
liarly Bismarckian convention, behind the backs of his
allies, Austria and Italy, did not diminish the tension in
the Near East. The year closed with little relief to the
strained relations of Austria and Russia, while the hostile
relations between Great Britain and Russia were such as
completely to satisfy Bismarck.
The German government took (December 16, 1887)
another characteristic step. Not content with the Army
Law of March 1887, another military Reorganisation Bill
was introduced, which by the recasting of the period of
service in the Reserve and the two classes of the Landwehr
and of the Landsturm was calculated to add 700,000
men to the army, when mobilised on a war footing.
Warned by the chastisement of the General Election of
1887, the opposition was naturally shy of resisting these
fresh demands, involving a loan for military purposes of
? 14,000,000 (280,000,000 marks). Bismarck made the
debate on the second reading of the Bill (February 6, 1888)
the occasion for one of the greatest of his speeches--an
elaborate review of German foreign policy and the Euro-
pean situation--a demonstration of Germany's unique
military strength and a consummate proof of his own
personal ascendency. The second reading of the Bill
was passed en bloc without a division on February 6--
a superb testimony to the Chancellor's unchallenged
supremacy--and the enthusiasm of a delirious crowd re-
peated the homage of the Reichstag by escorting him home
and continuing the demonstration under the windows of
the Chancellor's residence. The third reading was passed
on February 8, 1888. It was the zenith of Bismarck's
career. Two years later he was on the eve of a com-
pulsory resignation, forced on him by a conflict with his
sovereign on the principles of German policy both in
home and foreign affaiis, laid down in 1888.
The Reichstag heard, and Europe read, the speech,
ignorant that behind it lay 'the Re-insurance Treaty,'
which guaranteed the reciprocal neutrality of Russia or
Germany in case either should be attacked by a third
Power. This placed Bismarck precisely in the position
that he desired, that of arbiter between Russia and Austria;
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 447
for to Bismarck's diplomatic fertility of resource nothing
was easier than to prevent or secure, as German policy
required it, Austria or Russia being the aggressor in the
Eastern issues that continued to cause military councils,
movements of troops, and increased armaments on both
sides of theGalician frontiers. The secret convention tight-
ened the control over Vienna, without relaxing the frailer
control on Russia. It also prevented a Franco-Russian
alliance. The third Power contemplated in the secret
convention of November 18, 1887, might not be Austria
but France. The Tsar, in fact, by making the convention
really renounced the possibility of making France an ally,
should Bismarck force a war on the French Republic.
Yet, in Bismarck's deliberate judgment, a demonstration
of German strength in February 1888 was desirable, and
his speech of February 6 was preceded (February 3) by
the official publication simultaneously at Berlin and at
Vienna of the text of the Austro-German alliance of 1879,
as renewed in 1887. It is significant that the text of the
treaties on which the Triple, as distinct from the Dual,
Alliance, was based, was not published, and it is fair to infer
that the publication in question was not so much a hint to
Russia as a warning to France and a skilful counter-stroke
intended to deceive Austria, perturbed at rumours about
what had passed at Berlin between Bismarck and the Tsar.
Had the Ball-Platz been cognisant of the secret convention
of November 18, 1887, the publication in the Vienna
Gazette of February 3, 1888, would have been ridiculous.
For the Dual Alliance precisely provided against the con-
tingency that made the Secret Convention an operative
agreement.
The great speech of February 6,1888, is remarkable, not
merely for its magisterial breadth of view, range of survey,
felicity of phrasing, and pontifical sureness of touch--
the qualities evinced in all Bismarck's considered ex-
positions of principles in foreign policy--but also for its
clear indication of the speaker's mind and temper. Ger-
man relations with Russia rested, he told the Reichstag,
not on the press, nor on a gullible and ignorant public
opinion, not even on peace-loving or war-desiring ministers
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? 448
BISMARCK
but on the Tsar. 'In opposition,' he said, ' to the views
expressed by the Russian press, I have the unqualified word
of the Tsar Alexander himself' (and, he did not add, his
pledge in writing). France, he pointed out with unmistak-
able emphasis, was unreconciled and irreconcilable. She
was more peaceful in 1888 than in 1887, as was proved
by Carnot's election to the Presidency, but ' no wars are
waged from mere hatred,' for 'otherwise France would have
to be at war with Italy and England and the whole world,
for France hates all its neighbours'--deliberate words not
intended to pacify France, and a passionate appeal to the
worst passions in the German heart. As for Bulgaria,
Germany's policy was clear. 'If Russia attempts to make
good her rights (in Bulgaria) I should consider it the duty
of a loyal German policy to hold purely and simply to the
stipulations of the Berlin Treaty. . . . If Russia makes
official application to us to support steps for the re-estab-
lishment of the situation in Bulgaria, as it was created at
the Congress . . . I shall have no hesitation in advising
His Majesty the Emperor to comply with the request.
This is demanded of our treaty--loyalty to our neighbour,
with whom, whatever his prevailing mood, we must still
cherish neighbourly relations, and make common cause
against the foes of Social and Monarchical order in Europe,
a task of which the Sovereign of Russia has a full ap-
preciation. ' The significance of these passages is un-
mistakable. They announced publicly Bismarck's share
of the bargain in the Secret Convention--a general support
of Russian policy alike against Great Britain or an un-
reasonable Austria.
The peroration was a finely worded summary of
Bismarck's gospel of power, evincing his grip on the
secrets of German strength and the indissoluble unity of
strategy and policy which made its ringing appeal a text
for every German household :--
'The European pond is too full of pikes for Germany ever to
become a carp. . . . Behind our army stand our reserves. It
must not be said " others can do the same. " That is just what
they cannot do. We have the material, not only for forming
an enormous army, but for furnishing it with officers. We have
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
a corps of officers such as no other Power has. When we under-
take a war it must be a people's war which all approve, as in
1870. If we are attacked then the juror teutonicus will flame out,
and no one can make head against that. . . . We base our
alliance on the strength of our army. If we have no cause to
use it, all the better, but we must make our arrangements with
the idea that we do use it. . . . Every country in the long run is
responsible for the windows broken by its newspapers; the bill
will be presented one day in the ill-temper of a neighbour. We
can be easily influenced by love and sympathy--perhaps too
easily--but by threats, never! We Germans fear God and
nothing else in the world; and it is the fear of God that causes
us to love peace and ensue it. . . . He who attacks the German
nation will find it armed to a man, and every soldier with the
firm belief in his heart that "God is with us. "'
The most scholarly and accomplished of the French
biographers of Bismarck, M. Matter,1 has held that this
speech was, for all its resounding success, a proof of failing
powers in Bismarck, and ultimately responsible for the
breach between Russia and Germany, and for the Franco-
Russian Alliance. 'II avait brise net Palliance russo-
allemande et prepare l'entente franco-russe. ' It is difficult
to concur in this judgment. The failure to renew the
secret Reinsurance of 1887 in 1890 was due to the Emperor
and Chancellor Caprivi, not to Bismarck. As is indicated
further on, Bismarck's quarrel with the Emperor was
partly the result of a fundamental difference in foreign
policy. Neither in 1890 nor in 1887 was Bismarck ready
to support Austria at all costs against Russia, nor to throw
away the opportunity of a close (if secret) understanding
between Berlin and Petersburg by backing Austrian policy
in the Balkans without reserve. The more closely that
the speech of February 6 is studied, the more clearly do its
veiled inferences stand out. It was intended to be, and
remains, a classic and magisterial review by Bismarck at
the end of his life of the principles of his policy that he
had followed since 1871. The action of the German
1 M. Matter {Bismarck et Son Tempi, iii. p. 524 et seq. ), usually singularly
accurate, gives the date (pp. 538 and 5+0) of the great speech as February 8.
Bismarck did not speak on February 8 (the third reading). The correct date is
February 6, as is clear from any of the collected editions of Bismarck's speeches
and the accounts in the daily newspapers of that date.
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? 456 BISMARCK
government in 1890 was the first of a series of departures
from the Bismarckian system both at home and abroad.
Those departures may have been justifiable or the reverse,
but Bismarck cannot fairly be held responsible either for
their consequences in the Franco-Russian Entente of 1891
or for making that alliance inevitable when it is demon-
strable that he resisted to the last the policy that in-
augurated them.
The years 1887 and 1888, so crowded with crises, had
witnessed another great Bismarckian stroke, belonging both
to home and to foreign policy, which measured by its
results was more momentous than the brilliant strokes that
impressed Europe. In 1887 Bismarck was winding up the
Kulturkampf. Elaborate negotiations in 1886 had con-
tinued between Berlin and the Vatican. On January 14,
1887, the Centre under Windthorst agreed with the
Liberals under Richter to vote nof for the Septennate, but
for a limitation of the government demands to three years,
and, as has been stated, the Centre and Liberals threw out
the government proposal.
If the government were to
carry their measure in the new Reichstag the vote of
the Centre was essential, for without the hundred votes
of the Centre, whatever might be the result of the General
Election, the military policy of the government must be
defeated. It is generally supposed that Bismarck 'went
to Canossa ' for the last time, and bought the support of
the Centre by the Law of 1887, which was a fresh set of
concessions to the Vatican, and that the Vatican thereby
won its final victory. The Papacy sold, it is commonly
asserted, the Centre vote for the Septennate in return
for the Law of 1887.
Bismarck, the Curia, and Windthorst could have told
a quite different story. On this occasion Bismarck did
not go to Canossa. Instead the Papacy went to Fried-
richsruhe. The Triple Alliance in the early spring of 1887,
and with it the inclusion of Italy, came up for renewal.
It was notorious in 1886 that the relations between the
Quirinal and the Vatican were severely strained, and that
both the Italian Monarchy and the- Papacy were working
against each other, and both in need of allies. And this
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
continued all through 1887. Bismarck saw his oppor-
tunity. His objects were purely political--the mainte-
nance of his system. He had negotiated with the Vatican
all through 1886, and the word went out from the Vatican
in a diplomatic note (January 3, 1887), from Cardinal
Jacobini, the Vatican Secretary of State, that the Catholic
Centre was to vote for the Septennate. Windthorst
defied the command on January 14, 1887, and the Sep-
tennate was defeated. This was rebellion in the eyes of
the Curia. A second warning note from Cardinal Jacobini
followed (January 21). The German Catholic bishops
were ordered to throw themselves into the fray on the
government side against Radicals and Socialists; and they
did so with exemplary obedience. They organised a great
pro-government campaign. In the new Reichstag the
Centre were again ordered to vote for the government's
Bill. Windthorst had both resisted and resented the
orders from Rome in a purely political matter and the
consequent split between the ecclesiastical and lay forces
of Catholicism within the Empire. But the alliance of
Bismarck and the Papacy was too strong for him. He
regarded the Bill as fatal to the principles of freedom that
he had represented since 1871, and he distrusted profoundly
the bargain that the Papacy had made, because he dis-
trusted Bismarck. Vote for the Bill he would not, despite
the Papal command. Vote against it he dared not; so
with eighty-three of his ninety supporters he walked out
and took no part in the division.
Only seven of the Centre voted with the government.
Bismarck had won--and won completely. Henceforward
through the Papacy he would command the Centre Party.
The Government Bill of 1887 to end the Kulturkampf
was, as Windthorst knew or guessed, not the complete
repeal that the Vatican desired,1 and Bismarck's speech
of March 23, 1887, in the Herrenhaus of the Prussian
> The Bill:
1. Empowered the opening of seminaries for priests;
2. Abolished the civil veto on the appointment of parish priests;
3. Restored the episcopal powers of discipline;
4. Permitted the return of purely religious, charitable, or contemplative
Orders. The Society of Jesus was not included.
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? 452
BISMARCK
Landtag, in which he reviewed the general situation, is
pervaded with a subdued note of triumph. The con-
cessions to the Papacy he argued were reasonable and did
not conflict with the authority of the State. What was
important was that the Papacy had crushed the alliance
of the Centre with the Radicals and had thrown itself on
the side of law and order. 'Pope and Emperor,' he as-
serted, 'have an identical interest and must make a
common front against Anarchy and Revolution. . . . I
consider the Pope more friendly to Germany than the
Centre. . . . The Pope is not a Guelph, a Pole, or a new
Liberal, nor has he anything to do with Social Democrats. '
The Triple Alliance was renewed. When Bismarck spoke
on March 23 the order of the Black Eagle had been con-
ferred on Count di Robilant for his share in the renewed
inclusion of Italy. If the Papacy had hoped by going to
Friedrichsruhe to obtain the complete repeal of the laws
against the Roman Church, the unqualified readmission
of the ecclesiastical orders, and the support of Germany
against the Quirinal in Italy it was bitterly mistaken. The
bargain had been dictated and interpreted by Bismarck,
not the Vatican. No less significant was the undoubted
fact that Great Britain had given specific pledges of pro-
tection to the Italian Kingdom--the preservation of the
status quo in the Mediterranean and the defence of Italy
from'invasion by sea. 'Our position,' Depretis said in
February 1887, 'is now secure both by land and sea. '
'Our friendly relations with England,' said the Italian
Foreign Minister, as late as 1896, 'are in our view the
natural complement of the Triple Alliance. '
Bismarck in 1887 might well feel triumphant. He had
secured Italy on such terms that he virtually secured Great
Britain also. 1 At Rome in the allied Italian Monarchy he
had a powerful check on the Vatican; he had compelled
1 See Chiala,' La Duplice e la Triplice Allianza,' Hansard (i888), vol. 322.
1172, et jeq. , and The Times for November 5, 1887. It was generally understood
that the renewal provided, 1, If France 'attacked' Germany or Italy both were
to join in defence; 2. If Russia 'attacked ' Germany or Austria both were to
unite in defence; 3. If France and Russia attacked any one of the three allies,
all three were to unite in defence. The re-organisation of the Italian army in
1887 and 1888 (particularly after the visit of the Emperor William it. to Rome
in 1888) was one of the consequences of the renewal of the Triple Alliance.
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
the Papacy to win a victory for the German government
in Germany, which enormously increased the power of
the civil and militarist government, and through the
Papacy and the German Catholic bishops he had destroyed
the independent and powerful political opposition of
Windthorst and the Clerical Centre in the Reichstag.
The Chancellor's political cartel was complete; it con-
sisted of the Conservatives, the old National Liberals,
and the Centre; and the union gave him a decisive and
obedient majority. 1
The year 1887, therefore, registered the final defeat of
Liberalism, and not merely political but also intellectual
Liberalism. Militarism and reaction won all along the line
and the commander-in-chief of Militarism and reaction
was Bismarck. The German Clerical Centre, like the old
National Liberals, shed its last rags of independence, and
became henceforward a party that stood for authority,
despotism, and Pan-Germanism, corrupted by the favour of
the government, demoralised by its dependence on the
Vatican, and allied with the Pan-German party in Austria.
The Papacy and its parties became the allies and agents of
Prussianism, as Bismarck understood the term. 'The
Anti-Christ,' denounced by Pio Nono and Antonelli had
become the champion for whom Popes and Nuncios would
work--and not only in Germany. The ring of interests
that buttressed up the Bismarckian system was now com-
pleted by the alliance between the Conservative Lutherans
of Junkertum and the Conservative Clericals of the Centre.
Success, like misfortune, makes strange political bed-
fellows. The 'white international of- the dynasties,' true
to the solidarity of legitimate autocracy, was seconded
by 'the yellow international of High Finance,' the
Kaiserjudtn and the Industrials (Schlot-Junkertum), and
the 1 black international of the Clericals. ' After 1887
the penetration and capture of the Curia by the
diplomacy of Bavaria, Prussia, and Austria, was only a
question of time--proved up to the hilt when it became
necessary to elect a successor to Leo xm, Germany, says
1 'Peace with the Catholic Church,' Bismarck said,' will strengthen our rela-
tions with foreign countries, especially Austria. '
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? 454
BISMARCK
Naumann, became 'a prosperous Spain. ' A passage in
Bismarck's speech of March 23 is very significant: 'The
sharpest and bitterest opponents of the government,' he
asserted, 'have been pupils of the German Universities,
not of the Seminaries. . . . A seminary under a peace-
loving, well-disposed bishop, with a good German mind,
is far preferable to a course of study at a German Univer-
sity, where no one is responsible for the education with all
its influences which uncontrolled mould the student. '
In other words, minds made to order and on a pattern
prescribed by the government for its own political ends
are preferable to minds formed by free and critical in-
quiry. It is the prescription and the ideal of reaction and
authority and always will be. But it was a sorry and
sinister ending to the struggle for intellectual and political
freedom with Vaticanism--an unexpected close to the
conflict that Bismarck had commenced in 1873--and it
opened a chapter in the intellectual history of the German
universities and of the German mind, dreaded alike by
Mommsen and Virchow--the two greatest figures in the
German world of intellect. That chapter was not closed
when Bismarck died in 1898. It is not closed yet. It
was therefore wholly consonant to Bismarck's policy that
in the spring of 1888 a new anti-Socialist Bill prolonged
the exceptional powers conferred on the Central Executive
until September 30, 1893. The power to deprive of
civic rights all Socialists convicted under the law was
enlarged, and the Minister of the Interior, Herr von
Puttkamer, announced openly that the German Secret
Police extended their efforts to Switzerland, and acted as
voluntary agents in the struggle of Russian absolutism with
Nihilists and refugees. The bill passed on February 17.
On March 9 the change long foreseen took place. The
death of the Emperor William on that day opened the
last phase for Bismarck.
? 6. The Last Phase--Bismarck's Resignation,
March iSSS-March 1890
The death of the Emperor William 1. removed the
sovereign whom Bismarck had served for twenty-five years
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 455
with a personal devotion, as sincere as it was deep. The
brief speech in which the Chancellor announced to the
Reichstag that the first Prussian Emperor was dead is the
best proof of the grief that the national loss stirred within
him. And even that official effort was too great a strain.
For the first and the last time Bismarck broke down. He
resumed his seat broken with emotion, after a few rugged
sentences, in which both words and strength failed him.
The failure was a far more impressive tribute to his royal
and imperial master than any funeral oration. The simple
Soldier-King and the mighty Minister-President of Prussia
had worked together through a heroic epoch for great
and heroic ends; and profoundly as they differed in
character and gifts, sharp as had been on notable occasions
the collision of their wills, the personal bond of loyalty,
service, and affection, forged at Schloss Babenberg on
September 22, 1862, had deepened and tightened with
every year until it had become indissoluble, except by
death. William 1. never forgot that the two things in life
which summed up his political creed--the House of Hohen-
zollern and the Prussian army--were the two things which
his minister had saved from ruin and made the two most
puissant and indisputable forces in Germany and Europe.
Bismarck and Bismarck's policy had unified Germany, but
unified it in such a way that the head of the House of
Hohenzollern was the greatest sovereign on the Continent
of Europe, while the power and stability of the dynasty
rested on the unified nation in arms, of which the King-
Emperor was the War-Lord by acknowledged right. In
1888 as he lay dying William could remember his mother
Queen Louisa and Jena--he could remember 1848 and his
brother, Frederick William iv. --only forty years ago.
In the spring of 1888 'the March days' of '48 were as
unthinkable as the recurrence of a Jena or the visit of a
French conqueror to the tomb of Frederick the Great.
William could die in peace, full of years, with a nation
following him in mourning to his grave. The minister
who had achieved was indeed mighty, but the sceptre and
the prerogative that passed so rapidly to son and grandson
were mightier than the minister, who had made them
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? 456
BISMARCK
what they were. Within two years the Prussian Crown
had broken the Chancellor. Bismarck could not work
without the Prussian Crown: but the sequel showed that
the Prussian Crown would and could work without
Bismarck. And it was Bismarck who had made this
possible.
Had fate decided differently, the strength of that
Prussian Crown might have been convincingly exem-
plified in the reign of the Emperor Frederick. In De-
cember 1887, however, sentence of death had in reality
been passed on the Crown Prince, and when the new
Emperor arrived in Berlin on March 12 from San Remo
--unable to reach his capital until three days after his
father's death--he was a dying man. On June 8, Herr von
Puttkamer, the reactionary Minister of the Interior ' re-
signed. ' On June 15, the Emperor Frederick was dead.
* What a world is this, and how does fortune banter us! '
It is a commonplace, but one of those commonplaces
that enshrine notable truths, to pronounce the Emperor
Frederick's reign to be a tragedy. The tragedy does not
lie in the physical suffering, so heroically borne, nor in the
premature death of one cut off in the prime of a superb
manhood, but in the misery of frustrated purposes and
baffled hopes. All his life, since the days of a generous
and exultant youth, the Crown Prince had been inspired
by high and noble purposes. Through the dreary'era of
conflict,' through Kfiniggratz, Worth, Gravelotte, Sedan,
and Versailles, through the Kulturkampf and the establish-
ment of the Dual and Triple Alliance, the heir to the
throne had cherished the ideal of proving to Prussia,
Germany, and the world that a soldier-sovereign of the
Hohenzollern House, who believed in the Prussian army
and had played his part as became a Hohenzollern in the
unification of Germany by victory in the field, could also
be a liberal and constitutional ruler, whose duty it was to
give to Prussia and Germany a government, a policy, and
an outlook truly Liberal. And when at last Providence
had placed the sceptre in his hands, and a great work
awaited the new ruler which could only be done by
a Liberal sovereign, fate struck him down impotent and
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 457
tortured, yet haunted by the splendours of the ideal that
had made his life an apprenticeship in self-suppression
and a consecration to duty.
Death can be very bitter. Had Frederick's three
months of rule been dogged by prolonged physical pain
and the knowledge of failure to realise his dreams, they
would have been a martyrdom; but to the bitterness of
pain and defeat were added, in the mystery of human
things, the rebellion and treachery of an ungrateful son,
and the unpardonable tyranny of his Chancellor to all
whom the Emperor loved or cared for--and his own help-
lessness to protect or to punish. Insolence, intrigue, de-
famation, and defiance are never so detestable as when
they are employed against the dying and by those who
reckon on the security that the Angel of Death at
the door will bring to their authors. There are black
pages in Bismarck's record and black places in his char-
acter, but the blackest that no extenuation can obliterate
are recorded in the three months from March 13 to
June 15, 1888. And it is fitting, perhaps, that the
chapter and verse should be supplied in the amazing pages
of Busch's chronicles,1 though Busch's revelations are
only a fragment of the evidence. Richter's speech in the
Prussian Landtag (May 27), evoked by the infamous article
on 'Petticoat Government,' was a scathing exposure of
the campaign of libel opened (certainly with Bismarck's
knowledge, probably at his inspiration) by the Conser-
vative and National Liberal parties, and also of the
intimidation and bribery practised by the government
officials. It led to the Imperial rescript enjoining free-
dom at the elections, which caused Puttkamei's dismissal
(June 8). Bismarck promptly paid a visit to, and then
entertained the dismissed minister at a dinner at the
Imperial Chancery (June 11). 2 The Emperor was known
1 Butch, Bismarck, Srcret Pages, see particularly iii. pp. i63-189 (Eng. ed. ).
'Circumstances here, notes Hohenlohe laconically on May 26, at Berlin, 'dis-
pleased me intensely. It is a pity that I could not retire now as a strong protest
against all these goings on. ' Hohenlohe was an honourable gentleman.
* There is considerable evidence that Bismarck really desired Puttkamer's dis-
missal, and characteristically placed the odium on the Emperor, taking care tq ?
represent it as an 'English' and 'feminine' intrigue.
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