The Malady of the Century

by Max Simon Nordau

"That is so," stammered Patke, turning very red. "In these terrible times, when the Socialists and the enemies of the country—"

"Silence, Herr Patke," interrupted the magistrate angrily; "that has nothing to do with the business on hand." He reflected for awhile, and then said with the most deeply grudging manner—"The statement of the one witness—seeing too that it is indefinite in some important points—is not sufficient to warrant me in passing a sentence, in spite of many good grounds for suspicion afforded by your past history and known opinions. I will therefore dismiss the charge, if only to avoid the public scandal of a Member being accused of lese majeste."

Schrotter was boiling with rage, and had the greatest difficulty in restraining his naturally passionate temper. "Many thanks for your kindness," he said in a choking voice, "and for this scoundrel you have no reprimand?"

"Sir," screamed the magistrate, springing out of his chair with fury, "leave this room instantly; and you, Herr Patke, if you wish to bring an action for libel against the gentleman you may call upon me as a witness."

Patke was too modest to avail himself of this friendly offer. Wilhelm dragged Schrotter out of the office as fast as he could, and even outside they still heard the magistrate's grunts of wrath.

Dark days followed, in which Schrotter seemed to live over again the worst horns of the "wild year." A moral pestilence—the craze for denunciation—spread itself over the whole of Germany, sparing neither the palace nor the hut. No one was safe, either in the bosom of the family, at the club table, in the lecture room, or in the street, from the low spy who, from fanaticism or stupidity, from personal spite or desire to make himself conspicuous, took hold of some hasty or imprudent word, turned it round, mangled it, and brought it redhot to the magistrates, who seldom had the courage to kick the informer downstairs. Such unspeakable depths of human baseness came to light, so full of corruption and pestilence, that the eye turned in horror from the incredible spectacle. The newspapers brought daily reports of denunciations for "lese majeste," and when Schrotter read them he clasped his hands in horrified dismay and exclaimed, "Are we in Germany? are these my fellow-countrymen?" He became at last so disgusted that he gave up reading the German papers, and derived his knowledge of what was going on in the world from the two London papers which, from the habit of a quarter of a century, he still took in. He wished to hear no more about denunciations by which, with the aid of police and magistrates, every kind of cowardice and vileness, social envy and religious hatred, rivalry, spite, and inborn malevolence, sought a riskless gratification, and usually found it in full measure. But it took away all pleasure in social intercourse. One learned to be cautious and suspicious. One grew accustomed to see an enemy in every stranger, and to be upon one's guard before a neighbor as before some lurking traitor. Hypocrisy became an instinct of self-preservation; every one carefully avoided speaking of those things of which the heart was full, and Berlin afforded an insight into the mental condition of the people of Spain during the most flourishing period of the Inquisition, or of Venice in the days when anonymous denunciations poured into the yawning jaws of the Lions of St. Mark's square.

The Reichstag was dissolved, the people of Germany must choose new representatives, and the chief, if not the sole question to be decided by the election was, Are the Socialists to be dealt with under a special act, or to come under the common law? Schrotter now felt it justifiable, nay, that it was his duty, to throw off the reserve he had maintained since his return to the Fatherland, and come forward as a candidate for the Reichstag, though for a suburban district, as the city district to whose poor he had been an untiring benefactor as physician and friend, with help, counsel, and money, was not available.

At a meeting of his constituents he laid down his confession of faith. A special act, he explained, was in no way justified, would indeed be ineffectual, and lead away from the object they had in view. The government would be guilty of libel if it made the Socialists answerable for a crime committed by two half or wholly insane persons; it was the duty of the government to prove that these attacks were the work of the Socialists: that proof, however, it had been unable to discover. Moreover, no special act in the world could hinder people of unsound mind from committing insane deeds—the crimes of a Hodel or a Nobiling could not be predicted, but neither could they be prevented by any kind of precautionary measure. The sole result of a special act would be to make the Socialists practically outlaws in their own country. That would constitute not only a terrible severity against a large class of their fellow-citizens, but a frightful danger to the State. In hundreds and thousands of hearts it would destroy the sense of fellowship with the community in which they lived; they would look upon themselves as outcasts, and become the enemies of their pursuers. It would be exactly as if some thousands of Frenchmen were set down in the midst of the German population—in the army, in the cities, the factories, the arsenals and railways, where they would only wait for a favorable opportunity to revenge themselves on their conquerors. That would be the inevitable result if the Socialists were deprived of the security of the common law. He considered the Socialist doctrines false and mischievous, and their aims senseless and—fortunately—unattainable, and for that very reason he did not fear them. But deprive the Socialists of the possibility of expressing themselves freely in word and print, and their grievances, which now found vent in harmless speechifying, would assume the form of practical violence.

His speech made an impression, but that of a rival candidate a still greater, for he succeeded in rousing the deepest and most powerful emotions of his hearers, by the plain statement that whoever refused the government the right of adopting such measures as it thought necessary for the safety of the public, simply delivered the life of their aged and beloved sovereign into the hands of assassins. At the election, Schrotter had on his side only a small number of independent-minded voters, who were able to remain unmoved by sentimental arguments. The workingmen would not vote for him, knowing him to be an opponent of Socialism. The rival candidate was returned by a large majority.

The Reichstag assembled, the Socialist Act was passed, Berlin declared to be in a state of semi-siege, and a great number of workmen dismissed from the city. It was November, and winter had set in with unusual severity. On a dark and bitterly cold afternoon, old Stubbe, who had been agent in the Eynhardts' house for twenty years, entered Wilhelm's room.