And so the storm is unchained, this time on account of a king being sought for a vacant throne, and as the consequence of a negotiation undertaken between two monarchs! Must Kant then be right in his first definitive condition for everlasting peace? “The civil constitution in every state should be republican.” To be sure, the effect of this article would be to remove many causes of war; for history shows how many campaigns have been undertaken for dynastic questions, and the whole establishment of monarchical power rests assuredly on successful conduct of war—still republics also are warlike. It is the spirit, the old savage spirit which lights up hatred, lust of plunder, and ambition of conquest in peoples, whether governed in one form or another.
I recollect what an altogether peculiar humour seized me at this time, when the Franco-German war was in preparation and then broke out. The stormy sultriness before, the howling tempest after its declaration. The whole population was in a fever, and who can keep himself aloof from such an epidemic? Naturally, according to old custom, the beginning of the campaign was at once looked on as a triumphal procession—that is no more than patriotic duty. “À Berlin, à Berlin,” was shouted through the streets and from the outside of the omnibusses—the Marseillaise at every street corner, “Le jour de gloire est arrivé”. At every theatrical representation the first actress or singer, at the opera it was Marie Sass, had to come before the curtain in a Jeanne d’Arc costume, waving a flag, and sing this battle song, which was received by the audience standing, and in which they often joined. We also were among the spectators one evening, Frederick and I, and we also had to rise from our seats. I say “had to,” not from any external pressure, for we could of course have withdrawn into the back of the box, but “had to,” because we were electrified.
“Look, Martha,” Frederick explained to me, “a spark like that which runs from one man to another and makes this whole mass rise to one united and excited heart-beat, that is love.”
“What do you mean? It is surely a song of hatred:—
That their unholy blood
May sink into our furrows.”
“That is no matter, united hatred also is one form of love. Wherever two or more unite in one common feeling, they love each other. Let but a higher conception than that of the nation, i.e., of mankind and of humanity, once be seized as the general idea, and then——”
“Ah,” I sighed, “when will that be?”
“When? that is a very relative term. In regard to the duration of our life, never; in regard to that of our race, to-morrow.”
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
When war has broken out all the subjects of neutral states divide themselves into two camps, one takes the side of the one, the other of the opposite party; it is like a great fluctuating wager, in which every one has a share.