As a result of Luther's treason to humanity, his church became
the state church of Prussia, and Bible-worship and Devil-terror
played their part, along with the Mass and the Confessional, in
building up the Junker dream. A court official--the
Oberhofprediger--was set up, and from that time on the
Hohenzollerns were the most pious criminals in Europe. Frederick
the Great, the ancestral genius, was an atheist and a scoffer,
but he believed devoutly in religion for his subjects. He said:
"If my soldiers were to begin to think, not one would remain in
the ranks." And Carlyle, instinctive friend of autocrats, tells
with jocular approval how he kept them from thinking:
He recognizes the uses of Religion; takes a good deal of pains
with his Preaching Clergy; will suggest texts to them; and for
the rest expects to be obeyed by them, as by his Sergeants and
Corporals. Indeed, the reverend men feel themselves to be a body
of Spiritual Sergeants, Corporals, and Captains, to whom
obedience is the rule, and discontent a thing not to be indulged
in by any means.
So the soldiers stayed in the ranks, and Frederick raided Silesia
and Poland. His successors ordered all the Protestant sects into
one, so that they might be more easily controlled; from which
time the Lutheran Church has been a department of the Prussian
state, in some cases a branch of the municipal authority.
In 1848, when the people of various German states demanded their
liberty, it was an ultra-pious king of Prussia who sent his
troops and shot them down--precisely as Luther had advised to
shoot down the peasants. At this time the future maker of the
German Empire rose in the Landtag and made his bow before the
world; a young Prussian land-magnate, Otto von Bismarck by name,
he shook his fist in the face of the new German liberalism, and
incidentally of the new German infidelity:
Christianity is the solid basis of Prussia; and no state erected
upon any other foundation can permanently exist.
The present Hohenzollern has diligently maintained this tradition
of his line. It was his custom to tour the Empire in a train of
blue and white cars, carrying as many costumes as any stage
favorite, most of them military; with him on the train went the
Prussian god, and there was scarcely a performance at which this
god did not appear, also in military costume. After the failure
of the "Kultur-kampf," the official Lutheran religion was ordered
to make friends with its ancient enemy, the Catholic Church. Said
the Kaiser:
I make no difference between the adherents of the Catholic and
Protestant creeds. Let them both stand upon the foundation of
Christianity, and they are both bound to be true citizens and
obedient subjects. Then the German people will be the rock of
granite upon which our Lord God can build and complete his work
of Kultur in the world.
And here is the oath required of the Catholic clergy, upon their
admission to equality of trustworthiness with their Protestant
confreres:
I will be submissive, faithful and obedient to his Royal
Majesty,--and his lawful successors in the government,--as my
most gracious King and Sovereign; promote his welfare according
to my ability; prevent injury and detriment to him; and
particularly endeavor carefully to cultivate in the minds of the
people under my care a sense of reverence and fidelity towards
the King, love for the Fatherland, obedience to the laws, and all
those virtues which in a Christian denote a good citizen; and I
will not suffer any man to teach or act in a contrary spirit. In
particular I vow that I will not support any society or
association, either at home or abroad, which might endanger the
public security, and will inform His Majesty of any proposal
made, either in my diocese or elsewhere, which might prove
injurious to the State.
And later on this heaven-guided ruler conceived the scheme of a
Berlin-Bagdad railway, for which he needed one religion more; he
paid a visit to Constantinople, and made another debut and
produced another god--with the result that millions of Turks are
fighting under the belief that the Kaiser is a convert to the
faith of Mohammed!
Der Tag.
All this was, of course, in preparation for the great event to
which all good Germans looked forward--to which all German
officers drank their toasts at banquets--the Day.
This glorious day came, and the field-gray armies marched forth,
and the Pauline-Lutheran God marched with them. The Kaiser, as
usual, acted as spokesman:
Remember that the German people are the chosen of God. On me, the
German emperor, the spirit of God has descended. I am His sword,
His weapon and His viceregent. Woe to the disobedient and death
to cowards and unbelievers.
As to the Prussian state religion, its attitude to the war is set
forth in a little book written by a high clerical personage, the
Herr Consistorialrat Dietrich Vorwerk, containing prayers and
hymns for the soldiers, and for the congregations at home. Here
is an appeal to the Lord God of Battles:
Though the warrior's bread be scanty, do Thou work daily death
and tenfold woe unto the enemy. Forgive in merciful
long-suffering each bullet and each blow which misses its mark.
Lead us not into the temptation of letting our wrath be too tame
in carrying out Thy divine judgment. Deliver us and our ally from
the Infernal Enemy and his servants on earth. Thine is the
kingdom, the German land; may we, by the aid of Thy steel-clad
hand, achieve the fame and the glory.
It is this Herr Consistorialrat who has perpetrated the great
masterpiece of humor of the war--the hymn in which he appeals to
that God who keeps guard over Cherubim, Seraphim, and Zeppelins.
You have to say over the German form of these words in order to
get the effect of their delicious melody--"Cherubinen,
Seraphinen, Zeppelinen!" And lest you think that this too-musical
clergyman is a rara avis, turn to the little book which has been
published in English under the same title as Herr Vorwerk's
"Hurrah and Hallelujah." Here is the Reverend S. Lehmann:
Germany is the center of God's plans for the world. Germany's
fight against the whole world is in reality the battle of the
spirit against the whole world's infamy, falsehood and devilish
cunning.
And here is Pastor K. Koenig:
It was God's will that we should win the war.
And Pastor J. Rump:
Our defeat would mean the defeat of His Son in humanity. We fight
for the cause of Jesus within mankind.
And here is an eminent theological professor:
The deepest and most thought-inspiring result of the war is the
German God. Not the national God such as the lower nations
worship, but "our God," who is not ashamed of belonging to us,
the peculiar acquirement of our heart.