THE NEGLECT OF GERMAN
There are many urgent reforms needed in our national education; those
who are best qualified to speak could make many a startling revelation
if they only dared to speak out. And there is ample evidence that
almost every part of our educational machinery requires the most
thorough overhauling. In the words of Bacon, "Instauratio facienda ab
imis fundamentis." But I doubt whether there does exist any more
glaring proof of the present inefficiency of our Secondary Schools and
Universities than their scandalous attitude towards the study of the
German language and literature.
The plain and unvarnished truth is that at the beginning of this, the
twentieth century, when Germany is the supreme political and
commercial Power on the Continent of Europe, the study of German is
steadily going back in the United Kingdom. In some parts it is
actually dying out. In many important Secondary Schools it is being
discontinued. Even in the Scottish Universities, which pride
themselves on being more modern and more progressive than the English
Universities, there does not exist one single Chair of German. In
Oxford a Chair of German was only established through the munificence
of a patriotic German merchant.
And even when there are teachers there are very few students. In one
of the greatest British Universities, with a constituency of 3,500
students, there has been, for the last ten years, an average of five
to six men students. And the reluctance of young men to study German
is perfectly intelligible. The study of German does not pay. It brings
neither material rewards nor official recognition. All the prizes, all
the scholarships and fellowships, go to other subjects, and mainly to
the classics. Let any reader of _Everyman_ stand up and say that I am
exaggerating; I would only be too delighted to discover that I am
wrong.
Such being the attitude of those who are primarily responsible for our
national education, can we wonder at the attitude of the general
public? Can we expect it to take any more interest in German culture
than the educational authorities? Let those who have any doubt or
illusion on the subject make inquiries at booksellers', at circulating
libraries and public libraries, at London clubs. I have tried to make
such an investigation, and all those institutions have the same sorry
tale to tell. It is impossible to get an outstanding book which
appears in Germany, for it does not pay the publisher to stock such a
book. At Mudie's, for every hundred French books there may be two
German books. At the Royal Societies Club, with a membership of
several thousands, every one of whom belongs to some learned society,
you may get the _Revue de Deux Mondes_, or the _Temps_, or the
_Figaro_, but you cannot get a German paper. For the last twenty years
I have not once seen a copy of the _Zukunft_, or the _Frankfurter
Zeitung_, or the _Kölnische Zeitung_, at an English private house, at
an English club, at an English bookseller's, at an English library.
A few months ago the most popular and most enterprising daily paper of
the kingdom published some articles on the German elections, which
were justly rousing a great deal of attention in this country. I was
very much impressed by the cleverness of those articles, but my
admiration knew no bounds when the author confessed that he was
writing without knowing a word of German, and that when attending
political meetings he had to make out the meaning of the language by
the gestures and facial expression of the orators. Have we not here,
my classical friends, an exhilarating instance of the results of your
monopoly? _Ab uno disce omnes._
We are constantly being told that "knowledge is power," and that the
knowledge of a foreign language means not only intellectual power, but
commercial and political power. Yet those in authority do not budge an
inch to get possession of such power. We are constantly warned by
political pessimists that Germany is making gigantic strides, and that
we ought to keep a vigilant outlook. Yet we do nothing to obtain
first-hand information of the resources of a nation of sixty-five
millions, who is certainly a formidable commercial rival, and who
to-morrow may meet us in deadly encounter.[20] On the other hand, we
are told with equal persistence by political optimists that we ought
to be on the most friendly terms with a great kindred people from whom
nothing separates us except regrettable ignorance and superficial
misunderstandings. Yet, in order to dispel that ignorance and to
remove those misunderstandings, we do not make the first necessary
step--namely, to learn the language of the people whom we are said to
misunderstand.
[20] Written in 1912.
It is true that Members of Parliament and journalists are ready enough
to proceed to Germany on a mission of goodwill, and to be entertained
at banquets and international festivities. But how futile must be
those friendly demonstrations when we consider that the enormous
majority of those Parliamentarians and journalists are unable to read
a German newspaper! And how must it strike a citizen of Hamburg or
Frankfurt when their English guests have to reply in English to the
toasts of their German hosts! And how must a patriotic German feel
when he discovers that not five out of a hundred have taken the
trouble to master the noble language of the country whose friendship
they are seeking!
A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of attending, at the house of a
prominent political leader, a representative gathering of politicians,
diplomats, and journalists, who were met to consider the best means of
promoting Anglo-German friendship. In answer to a speech of mine, an
eminent German publicist and editor of an influential monthly review
delivered an eloquent address in broken French. To hear a German
address in French an audience of Germanophile Englishmen was certainly
a ludicrous situation! But the speaker realized that it would be
hopeless to use the German language, even to an assembly specially
interested in supporting Anglo-German friendship.
How long, my classical friends, are we going to submit to these
disastrous results of your monopoly? _Quousque tandem!_ How long are
we going to stand this scandal of international illiteracy and
ignorance, fraught with such ominous peril for the future? How long is
this nation going to be hoodwinked by an infinitesimal minority of
reactionary dons and obscurantist parsons, determined to force a
smattering of Greek down the throats of a reluctant youth? How long is
modern culture to be kept back under the vain pretence of maintaining
the culture of antiquity, but in reality in response to an ignoble
dread of enlightenment and progress, and in order to protect vested
interests and to maintain political, intellectual, and religious
reaction?