Gems (?) of German Thought Part 12

313. The order in which the nations take rank cannot be determined in time of peace, by standards of reason, not only because the majority of overfed ruminants would always keep the Lion encaged, but because only in war can the Lion prove his lionlikeness to others, and--what is still more important--to himself.--O.A.H. SCHMITZ, D.W.D., p. 3.

314. [Materialism and millionairism were playing havoc in Germany.] At last the spectre of materialism penetrated into the palaces of the dynastic leaders of our people, and from that day began the preaching of the blessings of everlasting peace. At the same time there began a hateful campaign of slander against all true patriots, against all ethical champions of war (_Ethiker des Krieges_.)--K.A. KUHN, W.U.W., p. 6.

315. The laurels of this bloodless victory [the victory of the war spirit] belong to that part of the German teaching profession which has remained true to its patriotic duties!--K.A. KUHN, W.U.W., p. 8.

316. Though clever writers sometimes speak of the Kaiser's romantic proclivities, his earnest searching of the Scriptures has brought him to such a sober way of thinking that he has steered clear of all Utopias, and has not allowed himself to be led astray by the empty dreams of pacifist enthusiasm.--PASTOR M. HENNIG, D.K.U.W., p. 16.

317. We have no knowledge of pacifist utterances of representative Germans of any time. The wretched book of the aged Kant, on "Perpetual Peace" ... is the only inglorious exception. Such utterances would indeed amount to a sin against the holy spirit of Germanism, which, from the depths of its heroism, cannot possibly arrive at any view other than a high appreciation of war.--PROF. W. SOMBART, H.U.H., p.

93.

318. One or other of the English swashbucklers has recently said that the Allies are not fighting against the Germany of Beethoven and Goethe, but against the Germany of Bismarck, of which they have had too much.... But Faust and the Ninth Symphony strongly resemble the mighty works of the great artsmith, Bismarck.--K. ENGELBRECHT, D.D.D.K., p. 61.

319. How far our cla.s.sic age ... was removed from a depreciation and rejection of war is shown by the att.i.tude a.s.sumed by a spirit so pathetically calm and aloof as Jean Paul, who nevertheless called war the strengthening iron cure of humanity, and maintained, indeed, that this held good more for the side which suffers than for that which wins. The fever caused by the wounds of war was, in his opinion, better than the jail fever of a loathsome peace.--PROF. W. SOMBART, H.U.H., p. 94.

320. It is monstrous that even high spiritual dignitaries can be found, in our days, to tell their adherents that war is a misfortune, and that such utterances can actually be printed by the official press.--K.A. KUHN, W.U.W., p. 7.

321. Just imagine our humanity of to-day--I mean, of course, our German humanity--without its military education. Non-German humanity gives us some idea of what that would mean!--H. v. WOLZOGEN, G.Z.K., p. 60.

322. If we are to carry on the warlike education of our people--and we are resolved to do so--then we by that very fact affirm our constant readiness again to enter upon a war, as soon as our honour, our inward or outward growth, or the expansive tendencies rooted in the inmost nature of our people, demand it.--PASTOR D. BAUMGARTEN, D.R.S.Z., No.

24, p. 17.

323. The incomparably greater efficiency of army administration, even in questions of civil life, has everywhere made a deep impression during the present war, and has opened the eyes of many. One has constantly heard people exclaim: "Oh, it could only continue after the war!"--H.S. CHAMBERLAIN, P.I., p. 116.

324. Oh, that Germany would learn from this war to send out soldiers only--Generals and ex-officers of the General Staff--as German diplomatists, amba.s.sadors and consuls!--K.L.A. SCHMIDT, D.E.E., p. 17.

325. We must not look for permanent peace as a result of this war.

Heaven defend Germany from that.--O.A.H. SCHMITZ, D.W.D., p. 19.

_See also Nos. 91, 192a, 195, 217._

FOOTNOTES:

[26] Down to this point Burckhardt is condensing a paragraph from Ernst v. Lasaulx, "Philosophie der Geschichte," 1856 p. 85.

[27] Quoted in original.

[28] Written in 1885.

[29] Klaus Wagner (_Krieg_, p. 223) has a long statistical argument to the same effect. He says that 41,000 men lost their lives in 1870-71, and estimates on this basis that, in a repet.i.tion of that war, the Germany of his own time (1906) would lose only one man in every 1,600 of her population. The confident a.s.sumption that the next war could be nothing but 1870 over again underlies all German speculation on the subject.

[30] From Schiller's _Wallensteins Lager_.

IV

RUTHLESSNESS

IV

RUTHLESSNESS

(BEFORE THE WAR.)

326. War is an act of violence whose object is to constrain the enemy, to accomplish our will.... Insignificant limitations, hardly worthy of mention, which it imposes on itself, under the name of the law of nations, accompany this violence without notably enfeebling it.--GENERAL C v. CLAUSEWITZ, V.K., Vol. i., p. 4.

327. I warn you against pity: from it will one day arise a heavy cloud for men. Verily, I am weatherwise!--FR. NIETZSCHE, Z. _Of the Pitiful._

328. The Germans let the primitive Prussian tribes decide whether they should be put to the sword or thoroughly Germanized. Cruel as these processes of transformation may be, they are a blessing for humanity.

It makes for health that the n.o.bler race should absorb the inferior stock.--H. v. TREITSCHKE, P., Vol. i, p. 121.

329. Much that is dreadful and inhuman in history, much that one hardly likes to believe, is mitigated by the reflection that the one who commands and the one who carries out are different persons--the former does not behold the sight, therefore does not experience the strong impression on the imagination; the latter obeys a superior and therefore feels no responsibility.--FR. NIETZSCHE, H.T.H., section 101.

330. The warrior has need of pa.s.sion. It must not ... be regarded as a necessary evil; nor condemned as a regrettable consequence of physical contact; nor must we seek to restrain it and curb it as a savage and brutal force.--GENERAL v. HARTMANN, D.R., Vol. XIII., p. 122.

331. One must ... resist all sentimental weakness: life is _in its essence_ appropriation, injury, the overpowering of whatever is foreign to us and weaker than ourselves, suppression, hardness, the forcing upon others of our own forms, the incorporation of others, or, at the very least and mildest, their exploitation.--FR. NIETZSCHE, B.G.E., section 259.

332. We may depend upon the re-Germanizing of Alsace, but not of Livonia and Kurland. There no other course is open to us but to keep the subject race in as uncivilized a condition as possible, and thus prevent them from becoming a danger to their handful of conquerors.--H. v. TREITSCHKE, P., Vol. i, p. 122.

333. A morality of the ruling cla.s.s [has for] its principle that one has duties only to one's equals; that one may act towards beings of a lower rank, towards all that is foreign, just as seems good to one ...

and in any case "beyond good and evil."--FR. NIETZSCHE, B.G.E., section 260.

334. The "argument of war" permits every belligerent State to have recourse to all means which enable it to attain the object of the war; still, practice has taught the advisability of allowing in one's own interest the introduction of a limitation in the use of certain methods of war, and a total renunciation of the use of others.... If in the following work the expression "the law of war" is used, it must be understood that by it is meant only ... a limitation of arbitrary behaviour which custom and conventionality, human friendliness and a calculating egoism have erected, but for the observance of which there exists no express sanction, but only "the fear of reprisals"

decides.--G.W.B., pp. 52, 53.

335. A new type of philosophers and commanders will some time or other be needed, at the very idea of which everything that has existed in the way of occult, terrible and benevolent [!] beings might look pale and dwarfed. The image of such leaders hovers before our eyes.... The conditions which one would have partly to create and partly to utilize for their genesis [include] a transvaluation of values, under the new pressure and hammer of which a conscience should be steeled and a heart transformed to bra.s.s, so as to bear the weight of such responsibility.--FR. NIETZSCHE, B.G.E., section 203.

336. Since the tendency of thought of the last century was dominated essentially by humanitarian considerations which not infrequently degenerated into sentimentality and weak emotionalism, there have not been wanting attempts to influence the development of the usages of war in a way which was in fundamental contradiction with the nature of war and its object. Attempts of this kind will also not be wanting in the future, the more so as these agitations have found a kind of moral recognition in some provisions of the Geneva Convention and the Brussels and Hague Conferences.... The danger can only be met by a thorough study of war itself. By steeping himself in military history an officer will be able to guard himself against excessive humanitarian notions, it will teach him that certain severities are indispensable to war, nay, more, that the only true humanity very often lies in a ruthless application of them.--G.W.B., pp. 54, 55.

337. Those very men who are so strictly kept within bounds by good manners ... who, in their behaviour to one another, show themselves so inventive in consideration, self-control, delicacy, loyalty, pride and friendship--those very men are to the outside world, to things foreign and to foreign countries, little better than so many uncaged beasts of prey. Here they enjoy liberty from all social restraint ... and become rejoicing monsters, who perhaps go on their way, after a hideous sequence of murder, conflagration, violation, torture, with as much gaiety and equanimity as if they had merely taken part in some student gambols.... Deep in the nature of all these n.o.ble races there lurks unmistakably the beast of prey, the _blond beast_, l.u.s.tfully roving in search of booty and victory.--FR. NIETZSCHE, G.M., i., II.

338. However much it may ruffle human feeling to compel a man to do harm to his own Fatherland, and indirectly to fight his own troops, none the less no army operating in an enemy's country will altogether renounce this expedient.--G.W.B., p. 117.

339. A still more severe measure is the compulsion of the inhabitants to furnish information about their own army, its strategy, its resources, and its military secrets. The majority of writers of all nations are unanimous in their condemnation of this measure.

Nevertheless it cannot be entirely dispensed with; doubtless it will be applied with regret, but the argument of war will frequently make it necessary.--G.W.B., p. 118.

340. That the lambs should bear a grudge against the great birds of prey is in no way surprising; but that is no reason why we should blame the great birds of prey for picking up the lambs.... To demand of strength that it should _not_ manifest itself as strength, that it should _not_ be a will for overcoming, for overthrowing, for mastery, a thirst for enemies, for struggles and triumphs, is as absurd as to demand of weakness that it should manifest itself as strength.--FR.

NIETZSCHE, G.M., i., 13.

341. It is a gratuitous illusion to suppose that modern war does not demand far more brutality, far more violence, and an action far more general than was formerly the case.--GENERAL v. HARTMANN, D.R., Vol.

xiv., p. 89.

342. The enemy State must not be spared the want and wretchedness of war; these are particularly useful in shattering its energy and subduing its will.--GENERAL v. HARTMANN, D.R., Vol. xiii., p. 459.