“Before the closed gate of a beautiful garden stood a crowd of men, one thousand and one in number, looking in very longingly. The gatekeeper had orders to let the people in, in case the majority among them wished for admission. He called one of them to him, ‘Tell me—only speak honestly—do you wish to come in?’ ‘Oh yes, to be sure I do; but the other thousand, I am certain, do not.’ The careful gatekeeper wrote this answer in his notebook. Then he called up a second. He said the same. Again the other entered in the ‘Yes’ column the number 1, and in the ‘No’ column the number 1000. And so it went on up to the last man. Then he added up the figures. The result was—one thousand and one ‘Yes’; over a million ‘No’. So the gate remained shut, for the ‘Noes’ had a crushing majority; and that proceeded from the fact that every one considered himself obliged to answer for the others too, instead of for himself only.”
“To be sure,” began the Minister thoughtfully; and again Lori Griesbach turned her eyes on him with admiration. “To be sure, it would be a fine thing if a unanimous vote in favour of laying down one’s arms could be brought about; but, on the other side, what Government would dare to make the beginning? To be sure, there is nothing so desirable as concord; but, on the other side, how can lasting concord be thought possible so long as human passions, separate interests, and so forth, still continue?”
“I beg your pardon,” said my son Rudolf, now taking the word. “Forty millions of inhabitants in a state form one whole. Then why not several hundred millions? Can this be susceptible of logical and mathematical proof, that so long as human passions, separate interests, and so forth, still continue, it is indeed possible for forty millions of people to renounce the right to go to war with each other about them; nay, three states, like the present triple alliance, may ally themselves together, and form a ‘League of Peace’; but five states cannot do it, and must not do it. Truly, truly, our world of to-day gives itself out as wondrous wise, and laughs at the savages; and yet in many things we also cannot count up to five.”
Some voices made themselves heard: “What?” “Savages?” “That about us, with our over-refined culture?” “At the end of the nineteenth century?”
Rudolf stood up.
“Yes; savages. I will not recall the word. And so long as we cling to the past we shall remain savages. But we are already standing at the gate of a new period. Glances are directed forwards. All are pressing on strongly towards another, a higher form. Savagery, with its idols and its weapons—there are many who are already edging away gradually from it. If even we may be nearer to barbarism than most people believe, we are also perhaps nearer to our ennoblement than most people hope. The prince or statesman is perhaps already alive who is to bring to perfection the exploit which will live in all future history as the most glorious and most enlightened of all exploits—that which will carry universal disarmament. We have placed our feet already on the threshold of an age in which manhood is to raise itself into humanity—to the nobility of humanity, as Frederick Tilling used to say. Mother, I drink this glass now to the memory of your unforgotten, loved, and trusted one, to whom I too owe everything, all I think and all I am; and from that glass (and he threw it against the wall, where it shattered to pieces) shall no other drop ever be drunk again; and to-day, at my new-born child’s christening, shall no other toast be proposed than this—‘Hail to the future!’ To fulfil its tasks shall we clothe ourselves in steel? No. Shall we endeavour to show ourselves worthy of our fathers’ fathers, as the old phrase goes? No. But of our grandsons’ grandsons. Mother,” said he, breaking off, “you are weeping. What is the matter with you? What do you see there?”
My gaze had been directed to the open glass door. The rays of the setting sun had thrown a halo of tremulous gold round a rose-bush, and from this, rising up in life-like clearness, was my dream-picture. I saw the garden-shears glitter, the white hair shine. He smiled at me as he said, “Are we not a happy old couple?”
Ah, woe is me!
Finis
FOOTNOTES: