German Problems and Personalities

by Charles Sarolea

On approaching the study of Treitschke’s works, we are at once impressed by the inexorable logic of his political and moral creed. There is, perhaps, no other instance of a system so splendidly consistent in its principles. We are told that the great French naturalist, Cuvier, was able to reconstruct the whole anatomy of an animal merely through examining the structure of a tooth or the fragment of a bone. Applying to the German historian the method which Cuvier applied to the antediluvian mastodon, we can reduce the whole complex political philosophy of Treitschke from a few fundamental principles which he follows with a single mind, and which the Prussian State has applied with an equally relentless consistency both in its internal and in its foreign policy.

It is this magnificent consistency, this confident dogmatism, which gives us the secret of the enormous influence of Treitschke on his countrymen, as it explains the hypnotism of Jean-Jacques Rousseau on a previous generation. I do not think it would be easy to overestimate the extent of that influence. It is true that in one sense Treitschke’s political philosophy only expresses the Prussian policy, and that he did not create it. But when a political ideal is expounded with such clarity and such force, when it is propagated with such enthusiasm, when it takes such exclusive hold of the mind, it becomes a hundred times more efficient and more dangerous; it acquires the compelling force and inspires the fanaticism of religion. Those readers who will follow Treitschke’s close reasoning to the end will probably agree with me that the political creed of which he has been the apostle and prophet is substantially the same creed which has plunged Europe into the present world war, and that, more than any one thinker, much more certainly than Nietzsche, Treitschke must be held responsible for the catastrophe.

I have confined myself to expounding the doctrines of Treitschke. I have not attempted to refute them. It is not my object to denounce: there is always a sufficient number of publicists ever ready to undertake the task of denunciation. I am only trying to understand. Nor have I dwelt on any side-issues. I have restricted myself to those simple and fundamental axioms which have directed the policy of Prussia. Almost invariably in human history it is only the simple, sweeping dogmas which obtain universal acceptance.

I.—Treitschke as the Representative Prussian.

There exist in the realm of fiction certain literary types which are an equal joy to the creative artist and to the student of human nature. There are certain malignant diseases which are an inspiration to the pathologist. And there are criminal cases which are a revelation to the lawyer: test cases which lead up to new discoveries and illustrate fundamental principles. What those classical types of Balzac or Dostoievski are to the critic, what those diseases and criminal cases are to the surgeon and the lawyer, the writings of Treitschke are to the student of history and politics; they throw a new and vivid light on the dark and hidden depths of the Prussian mind. They reveal like no other German writings the meaning of German policy, the spirit which inspires it. They explain what without them would have remained unexplained. He is much more than the historian of the Prussian State, he is the champion of its ideals. Much better than Bismarck, or the Kaiser, or than the “Clown Prince,” he makes clear to us the aims and the aspirations of the Hohenzollern monarchy and of the German nation.

In the history of literature and thought it is given to but very few writers thus to become the spokesmen of a whole people. To achieve such importance a writer must possess many qualifications. He must possess a strong and dominating character. He must be a great literary artist. He must be a clear, a bold, and an independent thinker. The following pages will show in how eminent a degree Treitschke possessed all those qualities and how unreservedly they were placed at the service of the Prussian cause.

II.—Treitschke’s Personality.

The first quality which challenges attention is the commanding strength of his personality. He combines the most contradictory gifts: the temperament of the artist, the imagination of the poet, the inspiring faith of the idealist, the practical sense of the realist, and the enthusiasm of the apostle. He always impresses you with that magnetic sense of power into which Carlyle impresses his readers. Like Carlyle, he is a firm believer in the heroic, and he has himself the temper of a hero. Three of his volumes of essays bear the significant title, “Deutsche Kämpfe” (“German Battles”). All through his career Treitschke has been fighting his patriotic battles. Obsessed by his ideals, he always has the courage of his convictions, and is always ready to suffer for them. In his early youth he had a painful quarrel with his father, a Saxon General and a loyal servant of the Saxon dynasty, because the son would not refrain from his attacks on Saxon “particularism” and would not abstain from championing the Prussian cause. Treitschke never evades a difficulty. He is never swayed by outside influences. He never dreads contradiction. When facts do not tally with his favourite theories, he brushes them away. And he never accepts any compromise. He is all made of one piece. He has the hardness of granite. He has never been afraid of unpopularity. He has always been a loyal friend and an equally staunch hater.

III.—Treitschke as a Writer.

“Le style est l’homme.” Never was Buffon’s dictum more strikingly verified, and never did any literary style reveal so completely the personality of the man. Treitschke’s style is imperious and aggressive. It has the ring of the General who gives the word of command. His sentences are not involved, as German sentences generally are. They are pregnant and concise. Treitschke often reminds one of a writer whom of all others he most cordially detests. Like Heine, Treitschke is incisive, epigrammatic. His phrase has always muscle and nerve: it has warmth and fervour. Treitschke has not the gift of humour. A German seldom possesses that redeeming gift. But he wields the weapon of trenchant irony with terrible force, and he adds the poet’s power of vision and the true historian’s sense of reality and sense of individuality. He has Macaulay’s gift of orderly narrative. He is equally masterly in describing a battle scene, a meeting of diplomatists, a revolutionary movement. His picture of the Congress of Vienna is unsurpassed in historical literature. Like Saint-Simon, he can sum up a character in a few lines. German historians are seldom skilful portrait-painters. Treitschke forms an exception. His portraits of Talleyrand, of Metternich, of Tsar Alexander I., of Leopold I., King of the Belgians, are masterpieces of the literary craft.