The world-empire of which I have dreamed shall consist in this, that the newly created German Empire shall first of all enjoy on all sides the most absolute confidence as a quiet, honorable, and peaceful neighbor; and that, if in the future they shall read in history of a German world-empire or of a Hohenzollern world-ruler, it shall not be founded upon acquisitions won with the sword but upon the mutual trust of the nations who are striving for the same goals. To express it briefly, as a great poet has said: “Limited outwardly, but with no limits upon inward development.”
You have mentioned the ships which here hang memorially from the ceiling of this beautiful old hall. The time in which I grew up was, in spite of the great war, not a great and glorious one for the seafaring part of our nation. I, too, have here drawn the logical conclusions from what my ancestors have done. In a military way much had been done within, as was necessary; now the equipment of the navy had to be brought forward.
I thank God that I do not have to make a desperate appeal here in this town hall as I once did in Hamburg.[41] The fleet is built and is on the seas; we have material for crews. The eagerness and the spirit are the same as those which filled the officers of the Prussian army at Hohenfriedberg, at Königgrätz, and at Sedan; and every German war-ship which leaves the slips is one more guarantee for peace on land. We are correspondingly more powerful as allies, and our opponents will be correspondingly less willing to offer us any aggression.
[41] The appeal referred to is the speech delivered at Hamburg on October 18, 1899, with its famous “Bitterly do we need a powerful fleet.”
To-day, as I scanned the citizens of Bremen, I saw the old and the young standing next each other—the old with their medals and their crosses, comrades in battle and in deeds under both the great leaders whose statues stand in this city, and before them stand the youth who shall grow up to the new empire and its tasks.
What will these tasks be? To develop steadily; to shun strife, hate, division, and jealousy; to rejoice in the German Fatherland as it is and not to strive after the impossible; to hold fast to the conviction that our God would never have taken such great pains with our German Fatherland and its people if he had not been preparing us for something still greater.
We are the salt of the earth, but we must also be worthy to be so. Therefore must our youth learn to give up and deny themselves what is not good for them, to put far from them the things which have slipped in from foreign peoples, and to preserve their morals, good conduct, reverence, and religion. Then some day may we write over the German people the motto on the helmet of the 1st Regiment of my guard: “Semper talis”—“Ever the Same.” Then we shall be looked upon from all sides with respect and in a measure with love as a safe and trustworthy people and can stand with our hand on our sword-hilt and with our shield grounded before us and say: “Tamen, come what will.”
I am sure that my words will fall upon good ground here in Bremen. Earnestly I hope that the golden peace which up to the present with God’s help we have maintained we may preserve still further and that under this peace Bremen may grow green, may bloom, and prosper. That is my innermost wish. Long life to Bremen—Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!