BOOK THE FOURTH

Bismarck shows himself master at quelling a meeting, checking a mob, stamping out a rebellion, and heading off a king.

¶ And after the Frankfort radicals found themselves unable to make Bismarck pick the German crown “out of the gutter,” they turned and tried to establish—what do you think?—a republic!

By Autumn, the forces of Revolution spent themselves andMetternich drove the rebels before him, as the hurricane blows chaff. Order was re-established in Vienna and in the Italian states.

The uncompromising Metternich restored the “Old Diet,” originally ordered by the Congress of Vienna, 1815, as the one authentic source of political legitimacy for the clashing German states. It was a clever Austrian by-play.

¶ We now return to Berlin. In May, the blood-letting was over, but no prospect of political reform seemed immediately possible.

Bismarck began using what might be called underground methods to head off the demand for that long-promised democratic Constitution.

¶ Already the King began to see more clearly. It struck him that this brazen-faced giant might be useful, later on. Had not Bismarck said in his now widely quoted speech: “Soon or late, the God who directs the battle will cast his iron dice!” It gave His Majesty courage!

¶ The King looked to right and left, dissolved one Diet after the other, till he had one to suit him. Otto nudged his King. That momentary weakness of marching with the democrats was something His Majesty wished to forget!

¶ Bismarck’s position must be clearly set forth. He was no mere reactionary, brandishing his fists at new leaders, who favored the common people. He knew all about this liberty, equality and fraternity business, from across the Vosges—and he despised the cure-all.

Here is the idea in a few words: Bismarck was not fighting political liberalism, as an end; instead, he protested with his giant’s strength at the implied destruction of the Old Regime.

¶ He laid the revolt largely to the bureaucratic system, which he characterized as “The animal with the pen!”

He stood fast by his good old Prussian dogma, as outlined in “I am a Prussian!” paralleling “Rule Britannia,” and other national hymns.

The song is sung with wild martial vigor, akin to the furious appeal of ancient Polish melodies:

I am a Prussian! see my colors gleaming—The black-white standard floats before me free;For Freedom’s rights, my fathers’ heart-blood streaming,Such, mark ye, mean the black and white to me!Shall I then prove a coward? I’ll e’er be marching forward!Though day be dull, though sun shine bright on me,I am a Prussian, will a Prussian be!

Sixteen years later, when endeavoring with all his strength to bring about German National unity, his “Prussians we are and Prussians we will remain” was used against him with mocking effect.

¶ By October, nerves were steadied. The King sent Gen. Wangrel to occupy Berlin and disperse the radicals—with cannon, if necessary.

That speech has the right sound; but William has before this veered around many times, like a weather-vane, and may he not shift again?

For the instant, he stood for the Old Regime and Divine-right.

¶ The following month William appointed Brandenberg, an old-line Prussian aristocrat, Prime Minister. The siege of Berlin was declared; the Assembly protested but finally gave in. Along in December, without consulting the Assembly, William invited the states to send delegates to Berlin and made an alliance of three kings—Prussia, Saxony and Hanover.

¶ What is going to happen next?

At last the people have a share in their government, but Bismarck sees to it that the radicals are not favored.

¶ William’s “Tri-regal alliance” failed as fail it must on account of jealousies. Then Wuertemberg replied with a “quadruple” affair, composed of herself, Hanover, Bavariaand Saxony, side by side, under a constitution acceptable to Austria. Quite a stroke, that.

In turn, William set up his Erfurt parliament, March 20, 1850. Bismarck was fast becoming a “practical politician.” Through deft stacking of the cards, the radical delegates drew only the low cards, and the Kreuz-Zeitung crowd and other ultra-conservatives were well supplied with aces and kings.

Bismarck naturally urged more concessions to the Prussian spirit; he tried also to muzzle the press gallery, calling newspapers “fire-bellows of democracy.”

Later, he even started newspapers for his political purposes. In this he was not inconsistent, merely logical; his attitude was based on the fact that, at this particular time, he felt called on to fight hostile editors; but made terms wherever it seemed worth while. Such was the man’s discriminating glance.

¶ The Erfurt “tongue tournament” Bismarck called the whole affair. He did not oppose the King’s position in this matter, because, as Bismarck said, “it makes no difference.” He spoke contemptuously of the mystical high-flown speeches. Its “Constitution” was quickly forgotten!

¶ Bismarck’s course would have been made somewhat easier had he not openly refused to sit with President Simpson, at the Erfurt convention, denouncing the President as “a converted Jew!”

¶ The convention broke up, to meet again in Berlin, where a Prussian Constitution was drawn up.

¶ Events moved rapidly. Austria now stood forth for resumption of authority by the Old Diet, established by the Congress of Vienna, while from Berlin one heard of a plan for a “restricted union.”

Talk, talk, talk. Finally, in September, 1850, Austria invited Prussia to a seat in the Old Diet. Prussia refused, and the cat was out of the bag.

It meant that German Unity must come through Prussian supremacy and Austrian humiliation—otherwise all might well be forgotten.

But Austria was by no means so easily disposed of. There was much life and fighting blood in her yet!

¶ Bismarck’s opinions during his years of preparation were, on the whole, unchanging, though often presented in different dress. In 1848, he bitterly objected to the King’s softness in recalling his troops from Berlin, instead of definitely crushing the March rebellions; in ’49, he stood steadily beside the King in refusing the people’s crown, from Frankfort; in 1850, he deplored the Prussian diplomatic defeat at Olmuetz, but swallowed his mortification because he saw that Prussia was not ready to strike; “and he thereon assisted in reconciling his party to a policy which he deplored.”

This situation convinced Bismarck that the first duty of a Prussian statesman is to strengthen the army, “that the King’s opinions can be upheld at home; likewise backed by the mailed fist, Prussian authority will be respected abroad.”

¶ “My idea,” he says in his Memoirs, “was that we ought to prepare for war, but at the same time to send an ultimatum to Austria, either to accept our conditions in the German question, or to look out for our attack.”

¶ Thus out of the Revolution of 1848, Prussia emerged with a written Constitution, establishing a legislative assembly and giving the people a share in their government.

¶ Bismarck’s inconsistencies? Yes, by the score, but he was playing a deep game of politics, for his King, and for his beloved German Unity. Always, you must understand that Bismarck scorned the political Millennium alleged to have been brought in by the French Revolution; with the political ideas from over the Vosges Bismarck would have nothing to do. That old war-cry “the people” made him sick! He believed in discipline and not in mob-rule. But he would not rush unprepared into the war.

¶ It is a fact that, in 1850, Prussia had cause for war far more just than that on which she seized in 1866. But Bismarck made his famous anti-war speech!

¶ “Woe to the statesman who does not look about for a reason for the war that will be valid, when the war is over!” were his astonishing sentiments.

¶ What he really meant was that Prussia was not just thenready to fight; hence, he painted war as detestable; later on, however, we shall see how he looks upon war, when Prussia is ready!

¶ Prussia, through her political endorsement of the people (1850) did not suddenly become a Parliamentary state, despite William’s new Constitution. Broad privileges were granted, but Prussia remained an absolute monarchy. While there was henceforth to be a certain restricted cooperation between Crown and Crowd, the Divine-right theory that had come down through the ages was not weakened or its authority compromised; in short, by conciliating certain hostile popular elements, led by fire-breathing first-cousins of the French Revolutionists, a large part of the hated Liberal programme was done away with, in turn consolidating the power of the Prussian kings.

¶ This situation also defines the political evolution essential before Germany could become a Nation. Despite various historians, Germany could not at this hour have proclaimed herself a Republic.

¶ Bismarck realized more and more, as he grew in experience and power, that the Germans were sick unto death of political experiments; they wanted unity, as a matter of course, but by unity they really meant a head to the National house; a strong father, to advise, protect and punish his children. The parallel extends to the German idea of National rule; thoroughness, efficiency, discipline take the place of political expediency, job-holding for the mere sake of job-holding; in church, in state and in family life the idea of a great central Authority alone satisfies the German mind.

¶ Thus, the German conception of a Nation is intensely practical; the state is not merely an aggregation of office-holders, but the state is primarily a vast institution, efficiently administered by the best minds, and these servants of the people are instantly responsible to the great central authority, whose power of removal for cause may be exercised as the father corrects his children, for the good of the family.

¶ To these fundamental ideas, based on the soul of the German people, Bismarck now addressed himself for many yearsto come. He knew what the German race demands; his analysis was psychologically correct, although few patriots of ’48 could see it that way.

¶ As his years of apprenticeship pass, Bismarck carries on his mission in a new way: is decided to lead Prussia to the conquest of Germany; is done with political platform-making except in so far as the alignments of politics lend themselves to his final purpose.

¶ With political instinct for gigantic projects carried out with realism, the King’s Man now determined the bold outlines of his National policy.

He did not worry about details: these he would fill in, as time passed; but he would on one side hold fast to German National unity and on the other side would sustain Prussian kingcraft as the very voice of God for Germany; one of Bismarck’s strongest ideas was that the King of Prussia was the vicegerent of Christ on this earth. In short, Germany must come through Prussian supremacy, and incidentally exalt Prussian supremacy, otherwise it might not come at all.

¶ To clear William’s Divine-right once for all, so far as our story goes, let it be known that German historians have always laid stress on the respect of Teutonic tribesmen, from ancient days, for the leadership of a strong fighting man. Tacitus, the earliest writer of importance, detailing the lives of Teutonic tribes, sets forth that it was the custom of the German warriors in times of crises to select their strong man and endow him with the power of rulership; looking to him in turn to lead the tribe to war against the common enemy. This reliance upon kings who were also powerful war lords continuing through the centuries, satisfied the fundamental aspirations of the Germans in their will to military power; but as the generations passed the old story of human nature was proved anew, that is to say, what begins as a “privilege” ends as a “demanded right.” On the side of the kings, was now proclaimed more loftily than ever that monarchy is the voice of God.

Perfecting himself in political intrigue and in vituperative debating, also in caustic letter-writing; all is necessary grist for the Bismarck mill.

¶ We come now to the year 1851.

¶ The entrance of Emperor Francis Joseph, at this time, on the politico-military stage of Austria was followed by still another era of political reaction; the Liberal Austrian constitution, wrested during the riots, was revoked; as were also those Democratic constitutions pledged for almost every German state.

¶ The Germanic Confederation, with political legitimacy vested in the curious Frankfort Parliament, again took the field. It was an Austrian plan to get the advantage of Prussia.

¶ “If I do not do well, you can recall me,” Bismarck told William. The King decided in his extremity to hazard the appointment of the unknown Bismarck, as Prussian delegate to Frankfort. William remembered those bold “White Saloon” speeches.

¶ Now get this straight: Bismarck was a land-owner of ancient days; estates won by the sword had been in the Bismarck family for 600 years; nay, the Bismarcks traced their knighthood to the far-distant year 1200. The force of this appeal in the blood was at once profound and irresistible.

¶ Bismarck to the day he died was always an Alt Mark vassal to his liege lord and master, the Margrave of Brandenburg, the King of Prussia. So much is clear.

Bismarck was also much more than this. We repeat, he was a leader of men. The King of Prussia could command old families in scores if not in hundreds, to support the Ancient Regime, socially and politically, but where find that rare man, a born leader for the cause?

¶ Duty and self-interest prompted Bismarck to hold up the royal hand, but after all is said, the vital force of Bismarck’s endorsement was found in the man’s genius for leadership. It was not so much the cause as it was the man. For had Bismarck gone over to the other side the history of Germany would have been vastly different.

¶ This Frankfort parliament, a hydra-headed political creation dedicated to liberty, was in secret doing the purposes of Austrian plutocracy and reaction; it was to be the last stand of the Old Regime, against Democracy.

But it was necessary to move with cautious foot. The sappers were at work under the thrones, and at any instant the mines might be touched off.

¶ Bismarck thus, quite by accident, finds himself the representative of William IV, in Frankfort Diet or Bundestag, the political Punch and Judy show originally set up by Metternich, in 1815, to rule the quarreling thirty-nine German states. Their intense individualism was such that Metternich, who dominated at the Congress of Vienna, after the downfall of Napoleon, did not know what was best.

All other parts of Europe, and even the islands of the seas had been reassigned, but no human being could tell what to do with the turbulent thirty-nine German states.

¶ “Here, then, was a mysterious ‘Court of Chance,’ where things dragged on for years, a political circumlocution office, hopelessly bound by its own interminable seals, parchments and red tape.”

The secret object was to do nothing that would not favor Austria; with the idea that, in the end, the devious course of politics would bring Austria final control of the German lands, everywhere.

¶ It was in this absurd Parliament that Bismarck was to perfect himself in political intrigue. Frankfort made noorganic laws; these were mysteriously settled at Vienna; the meetings of the Diet were held in secret; at best, the voting was along lines that gave to Austria and not to Prussia the deciding voice.

¶ It did not take Bismarck long to find that at Frankfort the King of Prussia was but a cipher. Furthermore, what raised Bismarck’s ire was the impotence of the Parliament. Frankfort had been unable to put down the blood-letting of ’48, and Bismarck detested weakness of any kind, mental, physical or spiritual.

He was, and always remained, a profound extremist; but his position was tempered by massive common sense.

¶ The world dearly loves a flunkey—and flunkeyism was universal at Frankfort.

The many members fluttered about in gay military dress, wore stars of sham authority, gold crosses, medals dangling from bright ribbons.

Names prefixed by count, duke, margrave—crests on the coach door and Latin mottoes—hyphenated family names, indicated all manner of political marriages de convenience. Bestarred gentlemen, one and all, if you please!

¶ Bismarck wrote home soon enough, for he was choking with anger, not on account of the aristocratic airs of Frankfort (for Bismarck dearly loved a title), but choking with anger because his beloved King of Prussia was a Nobody in this crazy Parliament. “I find them a drowsy, insipid set of creatures, only endurable when I appear among them as so much pepper,” are his sarcastic words.

¶ Had Bismarck not been a diplomat, he might have made his mark as a radical writer. His letters very often show almost anarchistic dissent. At vulgar characterization, no man could outsnarl Bismarck.

Also this Pomeranian giant’s correspondence at times fairly stinks with frightful smells. When in these black moods, he released nasty fumes around the heads of rivals.

We are surprised, likewise, to find growing in the mire ofhis thoughts, here and there, violets worthy of the poet Freiligrath. The man’s power to be poetical or insulting, as he willed, is indeed as strange as it is rare.

¶ Bismarck’s pen pictures of fellow ambassadors—how they flirted, danced, drank to excess, their maudlin ideas of government, although regarding themselves as veritable political seers—show the powerful satirical and analytical side of Bismarck’s brain.

And although Bismarck mocked with sardonic immensity his colleagues, yet with an under-play worthy of the Devil, our Otto proceeded to make these owlish and absurd gentlemen puppets in the hands of Prussia.

¶ Alas, time does not permit us to set forth the charming letters Bismarck writes home. There is that moonlight swim in the Danube; the interview with Metternich, the old war-horse of kings; the gypsy ball and the weird fiddling gypsies; his visits to robber-infested parts of Hungary, making the trip in part in a peasant’s cart, “loaded pistols in the straw at our feet, and near by a company of lanciers carrying cocked carbines, against the imminent visits of robber bands.”

He describes how he visited Ostend, going sea-bathing at that famous resort; rambling on through Holland, smoking a long clay pipe; then on to Sweden for the shooting; next to Russia for wild boars.

¶ His letters often have a lyrical quality, telling of waterfalls of the Pyrenees, the fascinating fairyland of Mendelssohn, dark-eyed Spanish beauties, open-air concerts, London garroters, old musty houses with peculiar smells, or what you will. Bismarck dwells often on eating and drinking; and in one letter from Paris speaks of a dinner at which he drank St. Julien, Lafitte Branne, Mouton, Pichon, Larose, Latour, Margaux, and Arneillac!

¶ These, and hundreds of other letters comprise charming interludes between black moods of political intrigue, wherein he used his vitriolic pen to lampoon his beribboned, bejeweled farce-comedy fellow-ambassadors.

¶ “Germany is tied together with red tape,” writes Bismarck at this stage of his political apprenticeship, at Frankfort; and he hit the nail on the head.

¶ Promise yourself a delightful month reading Bismarck’s four octavo volumes telling of his change of heart toward Austria, as shown little by little in Frankfort dispatches, documents and proceedings, interspersed with satirical stories in Bismarck’s extremely individualistic style. Throughout, you receive glimpses of the man’s great mind. No less an authority than the Herr Prof. von Sybel tells us of these Bismarck writings, bearing on the formation of the German Empire: “They possess a classic worth, unsurpassed by the best German prose writers of any age.”

Applying Socratic methods to game of politics; Bismarck’s bold and masterful preparations for German unity.

¶ Now then, during these years 1851-’61, Bismarck was doing two things: Perfecting himself in the dastardly art of political intrigue; likewise, he was going about like a modern Socrates, talking with men of high or low degree everywhere; studying what might be called the human nature side of the German problem of unity and nationality; studying it, not in an aimless way, but to mould men to his own gigantic political ends, when the right time arrived.

¶ Thus, with the stiff wind of adverse political affairs straight in his teeth, remember that Bismarck’s great strength was always his knowledge of men.

During the years of which we now write he made it his business to visit the various petty German courts, to gaze on princelings who would be kings; busied himself with court gossip till he found out the inner political jealousies.

Thus fortified, Bismarck knew the one man or woman to touch in the various parts of Germany, to help along Prussian ambition—when the supreme moment to strike had come at last.

¶ This supreme moment he awaited with diabolical patience through the slow-going years.

No human being could hasten or retard Bismarck’s ultimate victory; for he remained the one truly masterful man in Europe.

He sat at gambling tables, he wheedled secrets from the prostitutes of princes; he stood by and egged on human dog-fights; he took part in church-rows about doctrines; he had inside glimpses of the venality of Austrian kept-press-writers, “the scum of the earth,” he calls them, “who sell opinions as the petty merchant sells butter and eggs.” Bismarck seemed to be the only man in Europe who really was able to grasp the solution of the German problem.

¶ Also, the granite soil of his heart is shown again and again. What a hater he was!

For example, refusing to go to Mass for the repose of Schwarzenberg’s soul, Bismarck gave the reason: “He is the man who said: ‘I will abuse Prussia and then abolish her.’”

¶ You see, our Otto is one of those uncomfortable Germans who in his own amazing personality expresses the National ideal of earnestness; Otto is frightfully in earnest in his cups, or over his half dozen eggs for breakfast—as you please. He frightens timid souls.

¶ His temper few men could curb, much less sit calmly by and receive without retiring in bad order. Incident after incident at Frankfort might be cited, but what is the use?

¶ With fiendish earnestness Bismarck plotted to break the bones of two democratic editors whose writings threw the Prussian mastiff into periodical black rages. Bismarck justified his cruelty by insisting that “bounds must be set for these infamous press scribblings.” He means that attacks on the Divine-right of kings must at all hazards be choked off. He always hated journalists, called the press “a poisoned well,” and as for himself he is on record to this effect: “I always approached the ink-bottle with great caution.”

¶ But mark this well: Our Otto, in his turn, craftily used the press to present the smooth side of his own political intriguing; indeed he had his very valuable Prussian press bureau; and we have authority for the statement that the Bismarckian idea of journalism was to have “hireling scribes well in hand, men who stabbed like masked assassins and mined like mobs.”

¶ During the decade we call Bismarck’s apprenticeship, 1851-’61,he was thus engaged: 1851, envoy at Frankfort Diet; 1852, Prussian ambassador at Vienna, during the illness of Count Arnim; St. Petersburg, 1859; Paris, 1862.

Thus, he had an opportunity to get acquainted with all the leading diplomatists on the European chessboard, to study them in their own haunts, and to perfect himself in playing with pitch without blackening his hands.

¶ Bismarck told Francis Joseph, “I am firm to put an end to the attacks on Prussia in the Austrian press!”

This boldness won the Emperor, and in confidence he remarked to a friend: “Ah, that I had a man of Bismarck’s audacity.”

¶ Also, he told Joseph, “Prussia will never yield in the matter of the commercial union, with Austria.”

The Emperor remarked on Bismarck’s youth—37 years—and was much impressed. “Bismarck had the wisdom of a man of 70!” was Joseph’s comment.

¶ You begin to get a clearer idea of what this thing called patriotism means? Nay, do not scoff at our Otto; he is only carrying on the old, old game called reaching out after place and power; is doing exactly what you would do yourself, if you had the will to rise to the mountain-tops where live the Bismarcks and the Cæsars.

Mask after mask Bismarck used to cover his real intent, from 1847 to 1870, the long years he was scheming to establish a German Empire; and he did his work well; more than that cannot be said of any man. Therefore, his fame is secure in the Valhalla of Mankind.

¶ Here is an amusing bit, showing the craft and cunning of our master: When Napoleon the Little, through his coup d’etat made himself Emperor of France, December 2, 1851, and while Frankfort’s Parliament was trying to decide “what” to say about it, officially, a French journal in Frankfort printed an enthusiastic endorsement of the new Emperor.

Bismarck suspected that it came straight from Prussia’s hated rival. Seeking out the proprietor of the newspaperBismarck congratulated him “on close relations with Napoleon.” The owner, taken off his guard, replied: “You are wrong; it came from Vienna!” This was exactly what Bismarck wished to ascertain, and his suspicions were verified.

To make assurance doubly sure, Bismarck leaving the journalist, did a little detective work. In the garden, from a secret place, he could see the French minister’s house. In half an hour, he spied the journalist ringing the French minister’s doorbell.

“Ah, ha!” was Bismarck’s comment.

¶ What did this giant not do to help his beloved Prussia, and to humiliate his detested Austria?

One day, he found a fiery anti-Prussian review in an Austrian member’s desk. He thought nothing of ransacking a desk. Richelieu had a system of espionage unrivaled in history. Bismarck in this respect is the Cardinal’s close second. Each man regarded himself as a patriot. Bismarck was obstinately loyal to Prussia. Her aggrandizement became henceforth his life’s passion. Nay, Bismarck did not ask that the member be dismissed! That would be punishment too coarse. Instead, Bismarck decided that the best revenge would be to print the address piecemeal and thus keep the member in suspense;—something like twisting the cords a little each day till the victim meets strangulation in frightful form.

¶ During the eight years that Bismarck was a member of the freakish Frankfort Diet set up by Austria to “rule” the quarreling thirty-nine German states, Bismarck, the Prussian giant, came to see the necessity of controlling the press.

¶ Frankfort stupidities decided Bismarck to appeal directly to the common people (whom also he politically despised!) and hence we find that he now meets Austria’s hired journalists by urging the utmost press-freedom. “In this,” says Lowe, “Bismarck was an opportunist,” as he often was. “I learned something,” he used to say when his enemies accused him of shifting ground.

¶ Bismarck now demanded “open discussion” of German policies; saw that hired press agents vigorously set forth thePrussian side. In this connection it is interesting to draw a parallel between Bismarck’s ideas of journalism, in 1852, and the American conception (1915).

¶ “In the press, truth will not come to light through the mists conjured into life by the mendacity of subsidized newspapers, until the material wherewith to oppose all the mysteries of the Bund (Frankfort) shall be supplied to the Prussian press, with unrestricted liberty to use it.”

¶ This idea is precisely what extremists like Roosevelt set up (1915), battling against “trusts,” endeavoring to make them audit their books on the curbstone! So, what is new under the sun?

Ox-like patience of Prussian peasantry sorely tried—The incessant call for the strong man to end political miseries.

¶ As the result of all this deep study, Bismarck came to the conclusion that Prussia in the great moral idea of a United Germany could win, only by fighting Austria. We might as well get at the core of this thing, in short order. The complications are amazing; but the more we probe into Bismarck’s gigantic problem, the larger grows the stature of our modern German giant.

¶ From this time till the hour of his death, many years later, Bismarck remains the one great central will power of Germany, the source of political legitimacy, dealing out with his brawny hands favors where they would do the most good, setting men up or casting them down; and in the end, through a series of profound political combinations the inner currents of which to this hour no human being has been able to chart and classify, our strong man at last is to set up his United Germany, placing the imperial crown on William’s head in the palace of the French kings, at Versailles.

¶ Oh, how unforgivable all this is to the French. Not only that defeat should come in ’70, but that the palace of the Bourbons, costing some $200,000,000, should be used in solemn mockery by the super-man Bismarck, as the stage-settingwhereby to complete the imperial German holiday! Centuries must pass before this, the profound mortification to French feelings, is forgotten. That is to say, the worst thing you can do to a man is to hurt his pride. Had the German Empire come to pass without wounding French pride (not to add the French pocketbook) the French would long since have gone on their way in peace, rejoicing in German prosperity. Why not? The French are Christians, not the slightest doubt of that; and as Christians do not envy the German ox, ass or maid-servant. Indeed, that is as it should be in a Christian world.

¶ At home, up in Prussia, Bismarck’s sullen glances surveyed Europe afar, and in the ’50’s, of which we are writing, this is his problem:

He sees Germany still a mere crazy-quilt of clashing states. There are warring ecclesiastical barons, free cities, petty princelings; Catholic Bavaria against Protestant Prussia; nobles against the people; the people against themselves, divided by God knows what controversies, sane or insane; poets writing their hymns of liberty then dying unheroically by a brickbat flung wildly in some street brawl; jurists trying to hammer together some constitution that will not be blown to pieces by the first explosion of gunpowder;—and all failing! With pugnacious Prussia on the North, with rapacious Austria on the South, with insolent Bavaria hanging off on the Southwest, and the others fighting tooth and nail for the land, that will eventually fall to the strongest—the German problem became an exhibition over many years of the noblest, likewise of the darkest, passions of the human breast.

Three dreadful wars were to be fought, 80,000 lives were to be sacrificed, during twenty years of turbulence; and in the blood-drenched interim various monarchs are to make a plaything of the thirty-nine disunited German states.

¶ But the thing had to be gone through with. The historical evolution could not be hastened, although it was often set back. Sick Germany had many a hideous nightmare before the fever passed.

Convention after convention, diet after diet, contending monarchsusing any plea that will give the upper hand to Prussia or to Austria, or over princes and whimsical knights, from the one who holds his sovereignty because his ancestor had been a king’s barber, to another who in a lucky moment had found the queen’s lace handkerchief, and after that lived like a parasite on the land;—all these high contracting parties must be sent to the dump heap and the soil sprinkled with precious German brothers’ blood, mingling freely with vile blood, before the new political crop can grow.

¶ Between 1750 and 1870 the German problem had been settled over and over again, but was not finally settled till by Bismarck’s blood and iron. This means in Frederick the Great’s own obstinate way!

¶ We have heard from political fanatics, poets, lawyers, kings, thieves, church-people; all manner of men and not a few women have babbled and cackled; and there has been blood-letting, generation after generation, all up and down the Rhine, the Main, the Spree and the Elbe; then there would follow a lull brought about by some great Charter of Liberty framed by the Liberals, at their latest conference; and when it all went up in smoke, we would hear again that the Prussian government had its own plan, which, quite naturally Austria would never consent to advance.

¶ Indeed, the ox-like patience of the German people, with their great moral dream of “German National faith,” was strongly tried.

¶ It remained for the obstinate spirit of Frederick, through Bismarck, to find the only way, by blood and iron. Sentimentalists should not shed tears. It is no less an authority than Marshal Davout, the great French soldier who had for his watchword, “The world belongs to the obstinate.”

Was not the Great Frederick, in his youth, an idealist, and did he not write a touching essay on the evils of absolutism? But he ended by embracing the tyranny of kings—even as you and I, if we have the power.

¶ At the very outset, then, let it be made clear that it is short-sighted to call Bismarck Prussian tyrant. What wouldyou, please? Cakes for the child, when the child cries? That has often been tried, and always in vain.

Next time, the child wants two cakes instead of one. It will not do.

Frederick was dubbed the “last of the tyrants.” We are sorry if this were true.

Tyrants are exceedingly useful. Nay, we are glad to report that Frederick is not the last.

They still exist in every family, village, city, state, and nation.

For the most part, they exercise their tyranny in petty exactions, with no big plan such as distinguishes the dominating man from the little fellow with the mean temper and his childish ambition to rule, let us say, his dog or his wife.

¶ There is something pathetic in the incessant call this earth has for a strong man. It was so in Germany, and Bismarck was that man.

Cæsar was assassinated because he was said to be a tyrant, yet after his death for 400 years Rome sought in vain for a man strong enough to hold the Empire from going to pieces.

¶ Is there not something puzzling in the devotion of a people to their amiable oppressor? They may rebel against absolutism, as Bavarian hates Prussian, but if the political despot is strong enough to win against foreign foes, as Bismarck did at Koeniggraetz, Sedan and Gravelotte, the people kiss the hand that smites. What greater tests of loyalty do you ask of human nature?

¶ Before 1866, he was without doubt the “best-hated” man in Europe, lampooned, ridiculed, even the victim of attempted assassinations.

At Frankfort mothers sang their children to sleep by the following ditty:

Sleep, darling, sleep,Be always gentle and good,Or Vogel von Falkenstein will comeAnd carry you away in a sack;Bismarck too will come after him,And he eats up little children.

¶ Yet within a few years, in his character as Prussian Prime Minister, who against the will of the people achieved the greatness of Prussia, and thereby made possible United Germany, no adulation was too great for our self-same Bismarck, formerly sneered at, despised, vilified, and stoned.

So much for the value of public opinion. What then does it all mean?

Bismarck made his 30-years’ battle against the people and won; and the people, strange to say, turned a mental somersault and now saw no inconsistency in cheering Bismarck, as liberator.

¶ How strange this sounds!

Here is the Man of the Hour, depicted in all his naked realism.

¶ This amazing German problem called for a wise despot, to confront and overawe weak men, gathered in German parliaments in which there were worlds of cackling, but no wisdom.

The curse of Germany had been too much speechmaking, too much poetry, too much dreaming. The babble went on from 1815 to 1866, at least—fifty years!

¶ The times called for a hard-headed, dogmatic, tyrannical man with a plan large enough to subdue the thirty-nine warring parts, and weld the whole into a mighty Empire.

This meant a tyrant of the massive Frederick the Great type. It called for a man erect and proud, keen of speech, with absolute self-confidence, who in a pinch was master at underhand dealing, and who could deliberately use harshness and malice.

The man had to understand the delicate art of flattery, and at other times be blustering and outspoken.

The roar of cannon should make him as cold as ice, but underneath his frozen exterior he should have a fiery nature, full of craft and guile, like a Gascon.

He should have a torrent of cutting words, his eyes should flash and his blood should boil, yet he should be able to wagea secret war, masked under compliments, or draw his dagger and strike for the heart.

He should have thousands of enemies and prevail over them all.

He should have boundless ambition; action should be the zest of his life, and at crucial times he should display an uncontrollable temper.

He should seek the path of glory; a man of fiery enthusiasm, who never forgives an enemy; has fits of rage; is jealous; a great swordsman, fights duels; a master horseman, able to ride day and night without fatigue.

He should be at once cautious and headlong, realizing that in the end it is the bold play that wins. He should be able to live down public utterances that would cause other men years of disgrace. He should be able to quell a mutiny, check a mob or stamp out a rebellion. And, above all, whether admired or detested, he should justify his career by succeeding in what he started to do.

¶ In other words, he must be Bismarck, the greatest empire-builder since Cæsar’s day—yes, not even barring Napoleon, for Napoleon’s empire crumbled to dust, yet Bismarck’s, fresh with youth, still lives on!

Supporting Bismarck’s idea of the mailed fist; Democracy stems from and is supported by aristocracy.

¶ Why is it that, in the American Republic, there is aversion to acknowledging the services of men sprung from aristocracy, like Bismarck? Are the facts unrecognized, or is the silence only another form of political quackery?

¶ To bring the matter home, let us ask, “How is it in theUnited States?” Washington was an aristocrat of fortune, one of the richest men of his time, dispassionate, cold, aloof; Hamilton, an aristocrat of breeding, contributing his quota to democracy, as he saw it; Lafayette, an aristocrat of birth, helped us gain our liberty; and certainly Jefferson, an aristocrat of intellect as well as of fortune, the owner of 185 slaves, and the gifted author of the Declaration of Independence, offered inestimable services to the common people.

¶ Off-hand, the average biographer records this: “Bismarck had no confidence in the common people. He fought a written Constitution. He did not wish to see his King yield an inch to the masses. It was the Crown against the Crowd. Violently reactionary, he blocked progress—for there can be no progress without change. He was trying to force the stream of time backward, instead of going with the tide.”

¶ An American who for the first time follows the history of the Unifier of Germany begins very early in the investigation to have a feeling of apprehension. He is sure that Bismarck is a reactionary; his ideas are so out of “harmony” with the spirit of the times, the air full of the “liberty, equality and fraternity.”

Bismarck’s attempt to sustain the monarchial system, especially the idiotic conception of “Divine-right” of kings, as against the rising tide of “confidence in the people,” has about as much chance for success as that the slavery system could be re-introduced into the United States, after that question had been settled by five years’ war. Thus you conclude, from the American view!

¶ As you read on and on, you feel that on the very next page, Bismarck will surely go to the scaffold, or will fall by the dagger of some “friend of the people,” a thug ever after regarded as the veritable Savior of his country for the assassination of the enemy of the common people.

¶ The much ridiculed “Divine-right” of kings is cognizable as a right based on the survival of the fittest, backed by thesword; filled with human weaknesses and shortcomings, but defensible as a system, withal; just as the real intent of the words “captain of industry” should mean one whose fatherly care over his laborers, his judgment, his risk of capital, his foresight in weathering bad times—redounds to the immediate prosperity of the workers with whom he can have no quarrel.

¶ To those who make light of Bismarck’s theory of blood and iron, in government, it should be pointed out that all governments that endure, regardless of what theory you may work under, in the end fall to the strongest;—just as in a family fight the estate goes to the strongest, or in a partnership fight, or in religion, science, social affairs, love or war, the strong man has his way over the weak; and it is still to be proven that the American democracy, which at best is only another of manifold experiments in self-government, is to survive as long as have in the past royalist ideas—already that have persisted for thousands of years.

¶ So, we have invented Democracy out of a thousand costly expenditures of blood and treasure. We protest that this latest experiment in government is to endure forever more, but not one man in a thousand has any real conception of the Democracy in which all men shall work for a common National end.

Thus, Democracy is fully as large an experiment as any other in the Halls of Time; and today we are still nursing childish ideals, attempting to level men by legislation, and incidentally taking satisfaction in stoning our public servants, decrying wealth, and robbing the individual of any broad conception of responsibility.

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