7. We are still child-like in our inmost feelings, innocent in our pleasures, simple in our inclinations, in spite of individual aberrations; we are still prolific, and our race multiplies, so that our own soil has long been insufficient to support us all. It is therefore doubly imperative for us to remain heroes, for who knows whether the Germanic migrations are destined to remain isolated phenomena in history! The peoples around us are either overripe fruits which the next storm may bring to the ground, such as the Turks, Greeks, Spaniards, Portuguese, and a great part of the Slavs; or they are, indeed, proud of their race, but senile and artificial in their Kultur, slow in their increase and boundless in their ambition, like the French; or, confident in the unassailability of their country, like the English and the Americans, they have forgotten justice and made their selfishness the measure of all things. Who knows whether we Germans are not the rod predestined for the chastening of these degeneracies, who knows whether we may not again, like our fathers in dim antiquity, have to gird on our swords and go forth to seek dwelling-places for our increase?—F. Lange, R.D., p. 159 (1893).
8. We are distinguished from other nations by our honourable love for outspoken convictions, which would make a cut-and-dried party system distasteful to us.—H. v. Treitschke, P., Vol. i., p. 148.
9. The surest means of serving the ends of humanity is to work at the elaboration of our national personality, and to develop the full strength of its crystalline radiance.—F. Bley, W.D.D., p. 23.
10. We have forced ourselves, though the last-comers, the virtual upstarts, between the States which have earlier gained their place, and now claim our share in the dominion of the world, after we have for centuries been paramount only in the realm of the intellect.—General v. Bernhardi, G.N.W., p. 13.
11. Why must teachers and schoolboys, year out, year in, worry about the old Greeks and Romans? To foster idealism in the young, we are told! But for that there is no need to go to Rome and Athens. Our German history offers us ideals enough, and is richer in deeds of heroism than Rome and Athens put together.—General Keim, at meeting of the German Defence League, Cassel, Feb., 1913; Nippold, D.C., p. 82.
12. History teaches us that supreme treasure of humanity, German idealism, can be preserved only in the stout bark of national development.—F. Bley, W.D.D., p. 23.
On Idealism, see also Nos. [45], [276], [442], [464].
13. A war fought and lost would destroy our laboriously gained political importance ... would shake the influence of German thought in the civilized world, and thus check the general progress of mankind in its healthy development, for which a flourishing Germany is the essential condition. Our next war will be fought for the highest interests of our country and of mankind. This will invest it with importance in the world's history. "World-power or downfall!" will be our rallying-cry.—General v. Bernhardi, G.N.W., p. 154.
14. In our German people, peaceful dispositions and war-like prowess are so happily mixed that in this respect no other people on the earth can rival us, and none seems so clearly predestined to light humanity on the way to true progress.—F. Lange, R.D., p. 158 (1893).
15. The Latin has no feeling for the beauty of a forest; when he takes his repose in it he lies upon his stomach, while we rest upon our backs.—H. v. Treitschke, P., Vol. i., p. 206.