Pictures of German Life in the XVIIIth and XIXth Centuries Volume Ii Part 10

The whole people feel like a great family. The difference of cla.s.ses, the variety of avocations, no longer divide; joy and sorrow are felt in common, and goods and gains are willingly shared. The prince's daughter stands in union with the wife of the artisan, and both zealously co-operate together; and the land junker who, only a few months before, considered every citizen as an intruder in his places of resort, now rides daily from his property to the city in order to smoke his war pipe with his new friends, the alderman or manufacturer, and to chat with them over the news; or, what was still more interesting to them, over the regiment in which their sons were fighting together. Men became more frank, firmer and better in this time; the morose pedantry of officials, the pride of the n.o.bleman, and even the suspicious egotism of the peasant, were blown away from most, like dust from good metal; selfishness was despised by everyone; old injustice and long-nourished rancour were forgotten, and the hidden good in man came to light. According as every one bestirred himself for his Fatherland, he was afterwards judged. With surprise did people, both in town and country, see new characters suddenly rise into consideration among them; many small citizens who had hitherto been little esteemed, became advisers, and the delight and pride of the whole city. But he who showed himself weak seldom succeeded in regaining the confidence of his fellow citizens; the stain clung to him during the life of that generation. And this free and grand conception of life, this hearty social tone, and the unconstrained intercourse of different cla.s.ses lasted for years after the war. There are some still living who can speak of it.

When after the armistice, the glorious time of victories came, Grossbeeren, Hagelsberg, Dennewitz, and the Katzbach; when particular Prussian Generals rose higher in the eyes of the people, and millions felt pleasure and pride in their army and its leaders; when at last the battle of nations was fought, and the great aim attained--the overthrow and flight of the hated Emperor, and the delivery of the country from his armies--then was the highest rapture that could be felt in this world enjoyed with calm intensity. The people hastened to the churches and listened reverentially to the thanksgivings of the ecclesiastics, and in the evening they illuminated their streets.

This kind of festivity was nothing new. Wherever, in the last years, the enemy's troops entered in the evening into a city, they had called out for lights; wherever there was a French garrison, the citizens had to illuminate for every victory which was announced by the hated ally of their King. Now this was done voluntarily; everyone had experience in it, and the simple preparation was in every house. Four candles in a window were then thought something considerable; even the poorest spared a few kreutzers for two, and if he had no candlestick, employed, according to old custom, the useful potato; the more enterprising ventured upon a transparency, and a poor mother hung out, together with the candles, two letters which her son had written from the field.

These festivities were then simple and unpretending; now we do the same kind of thing far more splendidly.

The great rising began in the eastern provinces of the Prussian State; how it showed itself among the people there we have endeavoured to portray. But the same strong current flowed in the country on the other side of the Elbe, not only in the old Prussian districts, but with equal vigour on the coasts of the North Sea, in Mecklenburg, Hanover, Brunswick, Thuringia, and Hesse, almost in every district up to the Maine. It comprehended the districts which, in the eighteenth century, had attained a greater military capacity; in the provinces of the old Empire it was only partial. The new States which arose there under French influence, discovered later, and in an indirect way, the necessity of a closer connection with the larger portion of the nation.

For Austria, this war was an act of political prudence.

Still two years followed of high strained exertion and b.l.o.o.d.y battles; again did the rising youth of the country, who in the first year had been wanting in age and strength, throng with enthusiasm into the ranks of the army. It was another war, and another victory had to be achieved, it was, however, no longer a struggle for the existence of Prussia and Germany, but for the ruin and life of the foreign Emperor.

The year 1813 had freed Germany from the dominion of a foreign people.

Again did the Prussian eagle float over the other side of the Rhine, on the old gates of Cleve. It had made a b.l.o.o.d.y end to an insupportable bondage. It had united most of the German races in brotherly ties by a new circle of moral interests. It had produced for the first time in German history an immense political result by a powerful development of popular strength. It had entirely altered the position of the nation to their Princes; for, above the interests of dynasties, and the quarrels of rulers, it had given existence to a stronger power which they all feared, honoured, and must win, in order to maintain themselves. It had given a greater aim to the life of every individual, a partic.i.p.ation in the whole, political feeling, the highest of earthly interests, a Fatherland, a State for which he learnt to die and by degrees to live.

The Prussians did the greater part of the work of this year, which will never be forgotten by the rest of Germany.

It would not be becoming in us, the sons of the generation of 1813, to disparage the glorious struggle of our fathers, because they have left us something to do.

Almost all who pa.s.sed through that great time of struggle and self-sacrifice consider the memory of it the greatest possession of their later life, and it encircled the heads of many with a bright glory. And thousands felt what the warm-hearted Arndt expressed, "We can now die at any moment, as we have seen in Germany what is alone worth living for, that men, from a feeling of the eternal, and imperishable, have been able to offer, with the most joyful self-devotion, all their temporalities and their lives as if they were nothing."

But in the churches of the country a simple tablet was put up as a memorial to later generations, on which was the iron cross of the Great Time, and the names of those who had fallen.

As in these pages it has been attempted to portray, in the words of men who have pa.s.sed away, a picture of the time in which they lived, so here we will give a record from the year 1813.

"Our son George was struck by a ball, at the age of two-and-twenty, on the 2nd of April, at the ever-memorable engagement at Luneburg. As a volunteer rifleman in the light battalion of the first Pommeranian regiment, he fought, according to the testimony of his brave leader, Herr Major von Borcke, by his side, with courage and determination, and thus, died for his Fatherland, German freedom, national honour, and our beloved King. To lose him so early is hard; but it is comforting to feel that we also have been able to give a son for this great and holy object. We feel deeply the necessity of such a sacrifice.

"The Regierungsrath and Ober-Commissarius Hase and his Wife."[59]

"Berlin, 9th April, 1813."

That portion of the people also who were not in the habit of expressing their feelings in writing felt the same. When the Lutzower Gutike,[60]

in the Summer of 1813, was on his march from Berlin to Perleberg, he found at Kletzke the landlady in mourning; she was waiting silently upon him, and at last said suddenly, pointing with her hand to the ground, "I have one there,--but Peter's wife has two." She felt that her neighbour had superior claims to sympathy.

CHAPTER XII.

THE ILLNESS AND RECOVERY.

(1815-1848.)

When the volunteers of 1813 went to the field, their hope was, at some time, to live as citizens, with their friends, in the liberated Fatherland, enjoying the freedom, peace, and happiness, which they had won. But it is sometimes easier to die for freedom than to live for it.

A few years after victory had been achieved, and Napoleon was prisoner in his distant rocky island, Schliermacher said in the pulpit to his paris.h.i.+oners: "It was an error when we hoped to rest in comfort after the peace. A time is now come, when guiltless and good men are persecuted, not only for what they do, but also for the views and projects which are attributed to them. But the brave Christian should not be faint-hearted, but in spite of danger and persecution remain true to truth and virtue." And police spies copied these words, and did not forget to add to their report that such and such persons had been in the church, or that four bearded students had knelt down at the altar after the communion, and had prayed fervently.

The intrepid Arndt was watched and removed. Jahn was put into prison, and many of the leaders of the patriotic movement of 1813 were persecuted as dangerous men; police officers disturbed the peace of their homes, and their papers were seized. A special commission outrageously violated the forms of law, acting with mean hate, arbitrarily, tyrannically, and perfidiously, like a Spanish Inquisition.

It is a sorrowful page in German history. Independent characters withdrew, deeply disgusted with the narrow-minded rule which now began in most of the States of Germany; common mediocrity again took the helm. Prussia's foreign policy was dictated from Vienna and St.

Petersburgh, and before long its political influence on the history of Europe was again less than it had been under the Elector Frederic William. When the people rose in war against a foreign enemy, they little thought what the result would be when the independence of Germany was secured. They themselves brought to the struggle unbounded devotion, and supposed a similar feeling in all who had to shape the future, in their princes, and even in the allied powers. To no one scarcely was it clear how the new Germany was to be arranged. Any clear-sighted person could perceive, in the first year of the war, that a remodelling of Germany, which would make a great development of the power of the nation possible, was not to be hoped for. For it was not the people, nor the patriotic army of Blucher that were to decide, but the dynasties and cabinets of Europe, according to the position of affairs,--Austria, the new States of the Rhineland, the English, Hanover, France, Sweden, and above all Russia, each endeavouring to guard their own interests. The antagonism between Prussia and Austria had already broken out in the negotiations; the Prussians had by an immense effort obtained an honourable position in Europe, but neither in the opinion of nations nor of cabinets were they considered ent.i.tled to the leaders.h.i.+p. There was hardly a person not Prussian who ever thought of excluding Austria from a new confederation; even Prussia itself did not think of it.

We know, therefore, that the "German question" was even then hopeless, and we do not regret that the old Empire under its Emperor was not restored.

But easily as we can now understand how invincible were the difficulties, to contemporaries the feeling of disappointment was bitter, and an unprejudiced estimate of their position difficult. Among the patriots of 1813, a small minority were then full of enthusiastic sentimentality; they contrasted their poetical ideas of the old splendour of the German Empire with the bad reality; these _Deutschthumler_--Teuto-maniacs--as they were called after 1815, had been without influence in the great movement Jahn's great beard was seldom admired, and the worthy Karl Muller found no favour when he began to banish all foreign words from military language. Now after the peace these enthusiasts, for the most part not Prussians, collected together in small communities at the German universities. They sorrowed and hoped, expressed violent indignation, and gave zealous advice; they were agreed together that something great must happen, and they were ready to stake life and property upon it; only, what was to be done was not clear. Between varying moods and wavering projects they came to no conclusion. Politically considered this movement was not dangerous, till the odious persecution of the governments goaded them into hatred and opposition, and throwing a gloom over the minds of some, led to fanatical resolves.

It was not the fault of the Prussian government that the hopes of the nation for a new German State were disappointed. But it had incurred another debt. The King had promised to give his people a const.i.tution.

If ever a nation had acquired a right to a partic.i.p.ation in the government, it was the Prussian; for it had raised the State from the deepest depression. If the greatest State in Germany had, by legal forms, obtained the possibility of a political development of its power, every sensible Prussian would have been contented. The press and a parliament would gradually have given the loyal nation a feeling of prosperity and safe progress, opposing parties would have contended publicly, and those who demanded more for Germany than could at present be attained, would have been restrained by Prussia. The character of the Germans was now freed from the weakness which had pervaded it through a whole generation. The State also could no longer do without the partic.i.p.ation of the people, if it was not to fall back into the old state of feebleness, which only a few years before had brought it to the verge of ruin. Now, when life was impressed with new ideas, when in hundreds of thousands a pa.s.sionate interest in the State had sprung up, the safest support for the throne itself was a const.i.tution. For the Prussians were no longer a nation without opinions or will, whose destiny an individual could dispose of by his will.

But the King, however honest he might be, who wished to continue to govern in the old way through pliant officials, was in danger from this new condition of the world of becoming the tool of a noxious faction, or the victim of foreign influence. He required a strong counterpoise against the preponderating power of Russia, and diplomatic entanglements with Austria. This he could only find in the strength of an attached people, who in union with him would deliberate on the policy and support of his State.

King Frederic William III. never felt the incongruous position in which he had placed himself, in respect to the necessities of the time, for his image was closely bound up with the grandest reminiscences of the people; and the private virtues of his life made him, during a long reign, an object of reverence to the rising generation. But his successor was to suffer fearfully from the circ.u.mstance that he himself, his officials, and his people had grown up under a crippled system of State.

But that the Prussians of 1813 should so quietly have borne their disappointed hopes, that--whilst already in the States of the Rhenish Confederation parties were in vehement struggle--the "great State" lay so lifeless, is to be attributed to other reasons besides loyalty to the Hohenzollerns. The nation was exhausted to the uttermost by the war and what had preceded it, and wearied to death. Scarcely had it strength to cultivate its land. Years pa.s.sed over before the live stock could be fully replaced. Cities and village communities, landed proprietors and peasants were all deeply in debt. The price of landed properties sank lower than they had been before 1806. It often happened that n.o.ble estates remained without masters for many years, when the last proprietor had wasted the live stock, and that auctions were often unattended by solvent bidders. Commerce and industry had been destroyed by the Continental blockade, for the old outlets for linen, cloth, and iron, the great branches of Prussian trade, were lost--foreigners had appropriated them. And capital also was wanting. Intercourse, also, with the Sclavonian eastern districts, a vital question to the old provinces, was gradually almost annihilated by the new Russian commercial system. But a still greater hindrance arose from the waste of men through the war. The whole youth of the country had been under arms, a large portion had fallen on the battle-fields, and the survivors had been torn away from their citizen life. Many remained in the army: full a third part of the Prussian officers who commanded the army in the following thirty years consisted of volunteer rifles of 1813. He who returned to his former vocation found himself reduced in circ.u.mstances, and his relatives helpless and impoverished. He was at last glad to become an unpretending official, and thus to obtain a livelihood for himself and his family in the exhausted country. The b.l.o.o.d.y work of three campaigns, and the habits of soldierly obedience had not diminished his vigour, but the genial warmth, which enables youth to look victoriously upon life, had pa.s.sed away. He began now a struggle for a respectable home, probably with patience and devotion to duty, but in the narrow sphere into which he now entered, he could not but look back to the mighty past which he had gone through. Thus had the manly energy of the generation been spent. The youths also that grew up in their families had no longer the advantage of being influenced by great impressions, enthusiasm, and devotion.

These misfortunes fell heaviest on the old provinces. The new acquisition demanded for many years great official power and much government care before it could be moulded into the Prussian commonwealth.

It is manifest that a free press and a const.i.tution were the best means of healing these weaknesses more rapidly, and of bringing a feeling of convalescence and coherence among the people; for warmth and enthusiasm are as necessary to the life of a nation as the light of heaven is to plants and dew to the clouds. The further its development advances, the greater becomes its need of exalted ideas, and of having intellectual interests in common. When the Reformation first roused the people to an intellectual struggle, it was as if a miracle had been worked upon them; their character became stronger, their morality purer, all the processes of the mind, all human energy had become stronger; and when the awakened need of a common aim was not satisfied in the State life of the German Empire, the people became inert and worse. Again, after a long and sorrowful time, a great Prince had given to at least a part of the Germans new enthusiasm and an ideal aim. The warm interest in the fate of their State, which enn.o.bled Frederic's time, and the liberation of the mind from the tutelage of the State and the Church, had been a second great progress; and again had this progress required an answering extension of general interests and a strengthening of political action. But in the spiritless and powerless rule of the next generation the popular energies again decayed. The fall of Prussia was the consequence. Now, for the third time, a great portion of the Germans had made a new progress, the nation had given its property and its blood for its State, and it had become a pa.s.sionate necessity to care for the Fatherland, and to take a share in its fate; and as this longing again met with no satisfaction, the people sank back for a time into weakness. The distractions of the year 1848 were the result.

In almost every domain of ideal life the malady became apparent, even in philosophy.

Extensive was the domain embraced by German philosophy; new branches of knowledge had sprung up with surprising rapidity; there was scarce a bygone people in the most distant regions of the earth whose history, life, arts, and language were not investigated; above all, the past of Germany. With hearty warmth was every expression of our popular mind, of which there remained a trace, laid hold of. A wonderful richness of life of the olden time was discovered and understood in all its specialities. Round the German inquirer arose from the earth the spirits of nations which had once lived; he learnt to comprehend what was peculiar to each, what was common to all--the action of the human mind on the highest phenomena of the globe. Equally did the knowledge of objective nature increase. The history of the creation of the earth, the organism of everything created, the countless objects invisible to the naked eye, and the countless things which arise from the combination of simple substances, became known; and again, beyond the boundaries of this earth, the life of the solar system, the cosmical unit, of which the solar world is an infinitesimal speck.

But the endless abundance of new knowledge which was infused by science into the life of the highly educated was dangerous to the character in one respect. The German learnt to understand the almost endless varieties of character of foreign nations; the most dissimilar kinds of culture became clear to him. Impartially, and with lively interest, did he enter into the policy of Tiberius, and the enthusiasm of Loyola, the gradual development of slavery in North America, and the pedantries and dreams of Robespierre. He was, therefore, in danger, in his considerate judgment, of forgetting the moral basis of his own life. He who would identify himself with so many foreign minds, needs not only the capacity to grasp the minds of others, but still more the power to keep himself free from the influence exercised over him by foreign conditions of life. He who would without prejudice estimate the relative value of a foreign point of view, must first know how to maintain firmly the moral foundation of his own life. This can only be effected by making his own will subservient to the duty of co-operating with his contemporaries, by joining in free a.s.sociations, by a free press, and by continuous partic.i.p.ation in the greatest political conceptions of his time. It was because the Prussians, whose capital at this time was the centre of German philosophy, were deprived of this regulator, that the cultivated minds of this period acquired a peculiar weakness of character, which will appear strange to the next generation.

This weakness of will was indeed no new failing of the educated German.

It was the two hundred years' malady of a people which had no partic.i.p.ation in the State, and, from its natural disposition, was not carried away by the impulse of pa.s.sion, but composedly deliberates on action, and is seldom prevented by vehement excitement from forming a moderate judgment. But in the first part of our century their old weakness became particularly striking amidst these rich treasures of knowledge. Oftener than formerly did the originality of a foreign form of life produce an overpowerful influence on them. Instead of withstanding some mighty influence, it might be that of Metternich, Byron, or Eugene Sue, popery, socialism, or Polish patriotism, being foreign, they yielded to its prestige, their own judgment being vacillating and uncertain. Though it was easy for the best amongst them to talk cleverly upon the most dissimilar subjects, it was difficult for them to act consistently.

This malady seized almost all the intellectual portion of the people.

The salons became _blase_, authors sensational, statesmen without fixed purpose, and officials without energy: these were all different forms of the same disease. It was everywhere destructive, nowhere more than in Prussia; it gave to this State a specially helpless, nay, even h.o.a.ry aspect, that was in striking contrast to the respectable capacity which was not lost in the smaller circles of the people.

But healing came, by degrees, and again in a circuitous way, sometimes bounding forwards, and then retrograding; but, on the whole, since 1830, in continual progress.

For, at the same time in which the July revolution again excited, throughout a wide circle of life, an interest in the State, a new development of German popular strength began in other spheres, especially through the industrious labours of countless individuals, in the workshop and the counter. The Zollverein--the greatest creation of Frederic William III.--threw down a portion of the barriers which had divided separate German States; the railroads and the steam-boats became the metallic conductors of technical culture from one end of the country to the other. With the development of German manufacturing activity came new social dangers, and new remedies had to be supplied by the spontaneous activity of the people. Bit by bit was the narrow system of government and of characterless officials destroyed; the nation acquired a feeling of active growth; everywhere there was a youthful interest in life; everywhere energetic activity in individuals. A free intelligence developed itself in independent men, as well as in the official order, together with other forms of culture and other needs of the people. The labour of the inferior cla.s.ses became more valuable; to raise their views and increase their welfare was no longer a problem for quiet philanthropists, but a necessity for all, a condition of prosperity even for those highest in position.

Whilst it was complained that the chasm between employers and the employed became greater, and the domination of capital more oppressive, great efforts were in fact being made by the zeal of literary men, the philanthropy of the cultivated, and by the monied cla.s.ses for their own advantage, to increase the knowledge of the people and improve their morals. A comprehensive popular literature began to work, commercial and agricultural schools were established, and men of different spheres of interests organised themselves into a.s.sociations. By example and by teaching it was endeavoured to raise the independence of the weaker, and the great principle of a.s.sociation was proclaimed. In the place of the former isolation, men of similar views worked together in every domain of earthly activity. It was a grand labour to which the nation now devoted itself, and it was followed by the greatest and most rapid change which the Germans have ever effected.

Both the sound egotism of this work and the practical benevolence of those who interested themselves in the welfare of the labouring cla.s.ses, a.s.sisted, after the year 1830, in curing the educated of their irresolution and feebleness of character. The south of Germany now exercised a wholesome influence on the north. Long had the countries of the old Empire lived quietly to themselves, receiving more than giving; they had sent to the north some great poets and men of learning, but considered them as their special property; they had endeavoured to protect their native peculiarities against north German influence, and they were unwillingly, by Napoleon and the Vienna and Paris treaties, apportioned among the greater princely houses of their country; and now they supplied what was wanting to the north. The const.i.tutional struggles of their little States formed a school for a number of political leaders, warm patriots, and energetic, warm-hearted men, sometimes with narrow-minded views, but zealous, unwearied, fresh, and hopeful. The Suabian poets were the first artist minds of Germany which were strengthened by partic.i.p.ation in the politics of their homes, and the philosophy of southern Germany maintained a patriotic tendency in contradistinction to the cosmopolitanism of the north. The people were saved from becoming _blase_, and from subtle formalism and sophistry, by warmth of heart, vigorous resolution, a solid understanding, which was little accessible to over-great refinements, and a pleasant good-humour. In the time from 1830 to 1848 the southern Germans were in the foreground of German life.

This hearty partic.i.p.ation in the life of the people found expression in the art of the southern Germans. The morbid spirit which prevailed in the society of the educated, drove the fine arts into the lower circles of the people. The popular painters endeavoured to represent the figures and occupations of lower life with humour and spirit; the poets endeavoured to embellish, with a genial interest, the character and condition of the countryman: their village tales, and the interest which they excited in the reading world are always considered as a symptom of how great was the longing in the educated for quiet comfort and a well-regulated activity.

A village tale shall be here given, descriptive of the condition of the people at this period; for the life of the southern German, which is related, is in many respects characteristic of the fate and inward changes in the best spirits of the time which has just pa.s.sed. The movement which, after the revolution of 1830, vibrated all over Europe, had excited in him also a lively interest in the national development of the Fatherland. The debates of the Chambers of his small country were his first auxiliaries. The struggles which took place there did not remain without fruit; they relieved agriculture and the peasant from the burdens which had hitherto oppressed them; they introduced munic.i.p.al inst.i.tutions and public and verbal proceedings, even a law against the censors.h.i.+p of the press. But the German Diet interposed, the law of the press was put an end to, and the complaints of the landed proprietors against the exemption laws found favour with it; and the Frankfort outrage of the 3rd of April, 1833, produced a re-action.

Then the author left his official position in a fiscal chamber and devoted his energies to the press. When he was deprived of even this share in the political destiny of his country, by the malicious chicanery of a lawless police, he settled for a few years in Switzerland. All his life it had been a pleasure for him to teach. As a student, as candidate for the service of the State, he had given instruction to young men; he was therefore not unprepared for the office of teacher; which he entered upon in that foreign country. He relates as follows:--

"On Easter Monday, 1838, in the church at Grenchen, in the canton of Solothurn, the Roman Catholic community appointed a Protestant and a German as teacher in the newly-erected district school. The community had chosen him, and the government had confirmed the choice; I was the teacher.

"It was a raw spring morning. The monotonous grey of the clouds covered the sides and summit of the Jura, large snow-flakes fell in thick drifts, and enveloped the procession that was moving towards the church. The words addressed by Father Zweili, superior of the Franciscans, and president of the education council, to those a.s.sembled, would have been suitable to any clergyman. He expressed to me that I need have no hesitation in speaking to the scholars on religion; 'it is only necessary for you to abstain from touching on the few points on which we differ.'

"The Franciscans were learned, industrious men, they lived as instructors of philosophy, and were therefore in open feud with the Jesuits. The government found in them, powerful supporters and co-operators in their exertions for the education of the people; in this respect everything had to be done, for the patrician rulers who had been overthrown in 1830 had done nothing. In the first place, they established preparatory schools, and training colleges for masters, and provided for the supervision and conduct of school life. The difficulties that had to be overcome were not trifling, but it was all accomplished in the course of four years. In the beginning of 1837, each parish had its school, each school its master and dotation, and each child suitable instruction; the law punished parents for not insisting on the regular attendance of their children at school. As soon as the preparatory schools were arranged, district schools were added; here there was no compulsion; they were established by the community, and the attendance of scholars who had left the preparatory schools, and had the necessary preliminary knowledge, was voluntary; the State a.s.sisted the inst.i.tution by grants, and maintained a superintendence. Grenchen was one of the first communities which determined on providing means for a district school; the government gave an annual contribution of 800 Swiss franks, about 305 thalers. The merit of this decision of the community is due above all to the physician, Dr. Girard, my dear friend. He could make only a small number of his fellow-citizens understand the utility of the undertaking, for they had not had the advantage of the instruction afforded to the present generation, but they trusted the man who had so often showed his unselfish desire to do good. But the desire of this people, who are by nature so energetic, to be in advance of other communities prevailed, and when it became a question whether Grenchen or Selzach should maintain the new school, the thing was decided; the inst.i.tution was to be at that place, whatever it might be. I had great pleasure in teaching, and the situation secured me a residence which I cared more for than maintenance which might be obtained by other work.