"Very well; but you must first stand up, papa, and be file-leader, or
I can't do it."
Then he would actually rise from his seat on the sofa and in true military fashion take his position before me as file-leader of the Old Guard, while I myself, little stick-in-the-mud that I was, assumed the part of the roll-calling officer. Then I began to call the names:
"Latour d'Auvergne!"
"He is not here," answered my father in a basso profundo voice.
"Where is he, pray?"
"He died on the field of honor."
Once in awhile my mother attended these peculiar lessons—the one about Latour, however, was never ventured in her presence—and she did not fail to give us to understand, by her looks, that she considered this whole method, which my father with an inimitable expression of countenance called his "Socratic method," exceedingly dubious. But she, by nature wholly conventional, not only in this particular, but in others, was absolutely wrong, for, to repeat, I owe in fact to these lessons, and the similar conversations growing out of them, all the best things, at least all the most practical things, I know. Of all that my father was able to teach me nothing has been forgotten and nothing has proved useless for my purposes. Not only have these stories been of hundredfold benefit to me socially throughout my long life, they have also, in my writing, been ever at hand as a Golden Treasury, and if I were asked, to what teacher I felt most deeply indebted, I should have to reply: to my father, my father, who knew nothing at all, so to speak, but, with his wealth of anecdotes picked up from newspapers and magazines, and covering every variety of theme, gave me infinitely more help than all my Gymnasium and Realschule teachers put together. What information these men offered me, even if it was good, has been for the most part forgotten; but the stories of Ney and Rapp have remained fresh in my memory to the present hour.
My father's method, which, much as I feel indebted to it, was after all somewhat peculiar and utterly devoid of logic and consistency, would in all probability have led to violent quarrels between my parents, if my critical mother, who saw only its weaknesses and none of its virtues, had attached any special significance to it in general. But that was not the case. She only felt that my father's way of teaching was totally different from the usual way, in that it would not lead to many practical results, i.e., would not give me much preparation for an examination, and in this respect she was perfectly right. However, as she herself attached so little value to knowledge in general, she contented herself with smiling at the "Socratic method," as she saw no reason for becoming seriously wrought up over it. According to her honest conviction there were other things in life of far greater importance than knowledge, to say nothing of erudition, and these other things were: a good appearance and good manners. That her children should all present a good appearance was with her an article of faith, so to speak, and she considered it a natural consequence of their good appearance that they either already had or would acquire good manners. So the only essential was to present a good appearance. Serious studies seemed to her not a help, but, on the contrary, a hindrance to happiness, that is to say, real happiness, which she looked upon as inseparable from money and property. A hundred-thousand-dollar man was something, and she respected, even honored him, whereas chief judges and councillors of the chancery commanded very little respect from her, and would have commanded even less, if the State, which she did respect, had not stood behind them. She was incapable of bowing in good faith to any so-called spiritual authority, not because she cherished too exalted an opinion of herself—she was, on the contrary, entirely without vanity and arrogance—but solely because, constituted as she was, she could not recognize an authority of knowledge, much less of erudition, in a practical field of life—and with her the non-practical fields never entered into consideration.
I still remember the time, some twenty years after the events just narrated, when my parents were thinking of separating and of eventually being divorced. A separation actually came about, the divorce idea was dropped. But the latter was for a time considered in all seriousness, and a friend of our family, Pastor Schultz, the then preacher at Bethany, who made a specialty of divorce questions—it was in the reign of Frederick William IV., when such problems were treated with revived dogmatic severity—Pastor Schultz, I say, opposed the plan, as soon as he heard of it, with all his power and eloquence. My mother had a great deal of admiration for him and knew, besides, the respect he enjoyed of "those highest in authority," and "those highest in authority" meant something to her; nevertheless his severe presentation of the matter made not the slightest impression upon her; in fact his argument was so fruitless that, as soon as he finished, she said with a reposeful air of superiority: "My dear Schultz, you understand this question thoroughly; but whether or not I have a right to secure a divorce is a question which no human being in the whole world can answer so well as I myself." With that she closed the conversation.
She was similarly skeptical of every kind of authority, and had no confidence whatever in the ability of the three university faculties. For example, since patriarchal conditions were her ideal, she questioned whether mankind derived any material advantages from jurisprudence. It settled everything, as she thought, by favoritism or personal advantage, or at least in a mechanical way. Riches, property, especially landed property, accompanied if possible by the airs of a legation attaché—that was something that unlocked the world and the hearts of men, that was real power. Everything else was comedy, illusion, a soap-bubble, that threatened to burst any moment. And then nothing was left. One can readily understand why my mother, with such views, insisted upon taking me out of the barefoot school, and did not consider an interim, with no regular school instruction, any special misfortune. The evil in it was that it violated the rule. As for the rest, the little bit of learning lost could be made up at any time. And if not, then not….