his Majesty about summoning the Reichstag for the purpose of the
mobilization. As I passed through Wussow my friend Mulert, the old
clergyman, stood before the parsonage door and warmly greeted me; my
answer from the open carriage was a thrust in carte and tierce in the
air, and he clearly understood that I believed I was going to war. As
I entered the courtyard of my house at Berlin, and before leaving the
carriage, I received telegrams from which it appeared that the King
was continuing to treat with Benedetti, even after the French threats
and outrages in parliament and in the press, and not referring him
with calm reserve to his ministers. During dinner, at which Moltke and
Roon were present, the announcement arrived from the embassy in Paris
that the Prince of Hohenzollern had renounced his candidature in order
to prevent the war with which France threatened us. My first idea was
to retire from the service, because, after all the insolent challenges
which had gone before, I perceived in this extorted submission a
humiliation of Germany for which I did not desire to be responsible.
This impression of a wound to our sense of national honor by the
compulsory withdrawal so dominated me that I had already decided to
announce my retirement at Ems. I considered this humiliation before
France and her swaggering demonstrations as worse than that of Olmütz,
for which the previous history on both sides, and our want of
preparation for war at the time, will always be a valid excuse. I took
it for granted that France would lay the Prince's renunciation to her
account as a satisfactory success, with the feeling that a threat of
war, even though it had taken the form of international insult and
mockery, and though the pretext for war against Prussia had been
dragged in by the head and shoulders, was enough to compel her to draw
back, even in a just cause; and that even the North German
Confederation did not feel strong enough to protect the national honor
and independence against French arrogance. I was very much depressed,
for I saw no means of repairing the corroding injury I dreaded to our
national position from a timorous policy, unless by picking quarrels
clumsily and seeking them artificially. I saw by that time that war
was a necessity, which we could no longer avoid with honor. I
telegraphed to my people at Varzin not to pack up or start, for I
should be back again in a few days. I now believed in peace; but, as I
would not represent the attitude by which this peace had been
purchased, I gave up the journey to Ems and asked Count Eulenburg to
go thither and represent my opinion to his Majesty. In the same sense
I conversed with the Minister of War, von Roon: we had got our slap in
the face from France, and had been reduced, by our complaisance, to
look like seekers of a quarrel if we entered upon war, the only way in
which we could wipe away the stain. My position was now untenable,
solely because, during his course at the baths, the King, under
pressure of threats, had given audience to the French ambassador for
four consecutive days, and had exposed his royal person to insolent
treatment from this foreign agent without ministerial assistance.
Through this inclination to take state business upon himself in person
and alone, the King had been forced into a position which I could not
defend; in my judgment his Majesty while at Ems ought to have refused
every business communication from the French negotiator, who was not
on the same footing with him, and to have referred him to the
department in Berlin. The department would then have had to obtain his
Majesty's decision by a representation at Ems, or, if dilatory
treatment were considered useful, by a report in writing. But his
Majesty, however careful in his usual respect for departmental
relations, was too fond not indeed of deciding important questions
personally, but, at all events, of discussing them, to make a proper
use of the shelter with which the Sovereign is purposely surrounded
against importunities and inconvenient questionings and demands. That
the King, considering the consciousness of his supreme dignity which
he possessed in so high a degree, did not withdraw at the very
beginning from Benedetti's importunity was to be attributed for the
most part to the influence exercised upon him by the Queen, who was at
Coblenz close by. He was seventy-three years old, a lover of peace,
and disinclined to risk the laurels of 1866 in a fresh struggle; but
when he was free from the feminine influence, the sense of honor of
the heir of Frederick the Great and of a Prussian officer always
remained paramount. Against the opposition of his consort, due to her
natural feminine timidity and lack of national feeling, the King's
power of resistance was weakened by his knightly regard for the lady
and his kingly consideration for a Queen, and especially for his own
Queen. I have been told that Queen Augusta implored her husband with
tears, before his departure from Ems to Berlin, to bear in mind Jena
and Tilsit and avert war. I consider the statement authentic, even to
the tears.
Having decided to resign, in spite of the remonstrances which Roon
made against it, I invited him and Moltke to dine with me alone on the
13th, and communicated to them at table my views and projects for
doing so. Both were greatly depressed, and reproached me indirectly
with selfishly availing myself of my greater facility for withdrawing
from service. I maintained the position that I could not offer up my
sense of honor to politics, that both of them, being professional
soldiers and consequently without freedom of choice, need not take the
same point of view as a responsible Foreign Minister. During our
conversation I was informed that a telegram from Ems, in cipher, if I
recollect rightly, of about 200 "groups," was being deciphered. When
the copy was handed to me it showed that Abeken had drawn up and
signed the telegram at his Majesty's command, and I read it out to my
guests,[36] whose dejection was so great that they turned away from
food and drink. On a repeated examination of the document I lingered
upon the authorization of his Majesty, which included a command,
immediately to communicate Benedetti's fresh demand and its rejection
both to our ambassadors and to the press. I put a few questions to
Moltke as to the extent of his confidence in the state of our
preparations, especially as to the time they would still require in
order to meet this sudden risk of war. He answered that if there was
to be war he expected no advantage to us by deferring its outbreak;
and even if we should not be strong enough at first to protect all the
territories on the left bank of the Rhine against French invasion, our
preparations would nevertheless soon overtake those of the French,
while at a later period this advantage would be diminished; he
regarded a rapid outbreak as, on the whole, more favorable to us than
delay.
In view of the attitude of France, our national sense of honor
compelled us, in my opinion, to go to war; and if we did not act
according to the demands of this feeling, we should lose, when on the
way to its completion, the entire impetus towards our national
development won in 1866 while the German national feeling south of the
Main, aroused by our military successes in 1866, and shown by the
readiness of the southern states to enter the alliances, would have to
grow cold again. The German feeling, which in the southern states
lived long with the individual and dynastic state feeling, had, up to
1866, silenced its political conscience to a certain degree with the
fiction of a collective Germany under the leadership of Austria,
partly from South German preference for the old imperial State, partly
in the belief of her military superiority to Prussia. After events had
shown the incorrectness of that calculation, the very helplessness in
which the South German states had been left by Austria at the
conclusion of peace was a motive for the political Damascus that lay
between Varnbüler's "_Væ victis_" and the willing conclusion of the
offensive and defensive alliance with Prussia. It was confidence in
the Germanic power developed by means of Prussia, and the attraction
which is inherent in a brave and resolute policy if it is successful,
and then proceeds within reasonable and honorable limits. This nimbus
had been won by Prussia; it would have been lost irrevocably, or at
all events for a long time, if in a question of national honor the
opinion gained ground among the people that the French insult, _La
Prusse cane_, had a foundation in fact.
In the same psychological train of thought in which during the Danish
war in 1864 I desired, for political reasons, that precedence should
be given not to the old Prussian, but to the Westphalian battalions,
who so far had had no opportunity of proving their courage under
Prussian leadership, and regretted that Prince Frederick Charles had
acted contrary to my wish, did I feel convinced that the gulf, which
diverse dynastic and family influences and different habits of life
had in the course of history created between the south and north of
the Fatherland, could not be more effectually bridged over than by a
joint national war against the neighbor who had been aggressive for
many centuries. I remembered that even in the short period from 1813
to 1815, from Leipzig and Hanau to Belle-Alliance, the joint
victorious struggle against France had rendered it possible to put an
end to the opposition between a yielding Rhine-Confederation policy
and the German national impetus of the days between the Vienna
congress and the Mainz commission of inquiry, days marked by the names
of Stein, Görres, Jahn, Wartburg, up to the crime of Sand. The blood
shed in common from the day when the Saxons came over at Leipzig down
to their participation at Belle-Alliance under English command had
fostered a consciousness before which the recollections of the
Rhine-Confederation were blotted out. The historical development in
this direction was interrupted by the anxiety aroused by the
over-haste of the national craving for the stability of state
institutions.
This retrospect strengthened me in my conviction, and the political
considerations in respect to the South German states proved applicable
likewise, _mutatis mutandis_, to our relations with the populations of
Hanover, Hesse, and Schleswig-Holstein. That this view was correct is
shown by the satisfaction with which, at the present day, after a
lapse of twenty years, not only the Holsteiners, but likewise the
people of the Hanse towns, remember the heroic deeds of their sons in
1870. All these considerations, conscious and unconscious,
strengthened my opinion that war could be avoided only at the cost of
the honor of Prussia and of the national confidence in it. Under this
conviction I made use of the royal authorization communicated to me
through Abeken, to publish the contents of the telegram; and in the
presence of my two guests I reduced the telegram by striking out
words, but without adding or altering, to the following form: "After
the news of the renunciation of the hereditary Prince of Hohenzollern
had been officially communicated to the imperial government of France
by the royal government of Spain, the French ambassador at Ems further
demanded of his Majesty the King that he would authorize him to
telegraph to Paris that his Majesty the King bound himself for all
future time never again to give his consent if the Hohenzollerns
should renew their candidature. His Majesty the King thereupon decided
not to receive the French ambassador again, and sent to tell him
through the aide-de-camp on duty that his Majesty had nothing further
to communicate to the ambassador." The difference in the effect of the
abbreviated text of the Ems telegram as compared with that produced by
the original was not the result of stronger words but of the form,
which made this announcement appear decisive, while Abeken's version
would only have been regarded as a fragment of a negotiation still
pending, and to be continued at Berlin.
After I had read out the concentrated edition to my two guests, Moltke
remarked: "Now it has a different ring; it sounded before like a
parley; now it is like a flourish in answer to a challenge." I went on
to explain: "If in execution of his Majesty's order I at once
communicate this text, which contains no alteration in or addition to
the telegram, not only to the newspapers, but also by telegraph to all
our embassies, it will be known in Paris before midnight, and not only
on account of its contents, but also on account of the manner of its
distribution, will have the effect of a red rag upon the Gallic bull.
Fight we must if we do not want to act the part of the vanquished
without a battle. Success, however, essentially depends upon the
impression which the origination of the war makes upon us and others;
it is important that we should be the party attacked, and this Gallic
overweening and touchiness will make us if we announce in the face of
Europe, so far as we can without the speaking-tube of the Reichstag,
that we fearlessly meet the public threats of France."
This explanation brought about in the two generals a revulsion to a
more joyous mood, the liveliness of which surprised me. They had
suddenly recovered their pleasure in eating and drinking and spoke in
a more cheerful vein. Roon said: "Our God of old lives still and will
not let us perish in disgrace." Moltke so far relinquished his passive
equanimity that, glancing up joyously towards the ceiling and
abandoning his usual punctiliousness of speech, he smote his hand upon
his breast and said: "If I may but live to lead our armies in such a
war, then the devil may come directly afterwards and fetch away the
'old carcass.'" He was less robust at that time than afterwards, and
doubted whether he would survive the hardships of the campaign.
How keenly he wanted to put in practice his military and strategic
tastes and ability I observed not only on this occasion, but also in the
days before the outbreak of the Bohemian war. In both cases I found my
military colleague in the King's service changed from his usual dry and
silent habit; he became cheerful, lively, even merry. In the June night
of 1866, when I had invited him for the purpose of ascertaining whether
the march of the army could not be begun twenty-four hours sooner, he
answered in the affirmative and was pleasantly excited by the hastening
of the struggle. As he left my wife's drawing-room with elastic step, he
turned round at the door and asked me in a serious tone: "Do you know
that the Saxons have _blown up_[37] the bridge at Dresden?" Upon my
expression of amazement and regret he replied: "Yes, with water, for the
dust." An inclination to innocent jokes very seldom, in official
relations like ours, broke through his reserve. In both cases his love
of combat and delight in battles were a great support to me in carrying
out the policy I regarded as necessary, in opposition to the
intelligible and justifiable aversion in a most influential quarter. It
proved inconvenient to me in 1867, in the Luxemburg question, and in
1875 and afterwards on the question whether it was desirable, as regards
a war which we should probably have to face sooner or later, to bring it
on _antici-pando_ before the adversary could improve his preparations. I
have always opposed the theory which says "Yes"; not only at the
Luxemburg period, but likewise subsequently for twenty years, in the
conviction that even victorious wars cannot be justified unless they are
forced upon one, and that one cannot see the cards of Providence far
enough ahead to anticipate historical development according to one's own
calculation. It is natural that in the staff of the army not only
younger officers, but likewise experienced strategists, should feel the
need of turning to account the efficiency of the troops led by them, and
their own capacity to lead, and of making them prominent in history. It
would be a matter of regret if this effect of the military spirit did
not exist in the army; the task of keeping its results within such
limits as the nations' need of peace can justly claim is the duty of the
political, not the military, heads of the State. That at the time of the
Luxemburg question, during the crisis of 1875, invented by Gortchakoff
and France, and even down to the most recent times, the staff and its
leaders have allowed themselves to be led astray and to endanger peace,
lies in the very spirit of the institution, which I would not forego. It
only becomes dangerous under a monarch whose policy lacks sense of
proportion and power to resist one-sided and constitutionally
unjustifiable influences.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 26: From _Bismarck: The Man and the Statesman._ Permission
Harper & Brothers, New York.]
[Footnote 27: a gathering of, it is said, 30,000 at the Castle of
Hambach in the Palatinate; where speeches were made in favor of
Germany, unity, and the Republic.]
[Footnote 28: An attempt made by a handful of students and peasants to
blow up the Federal Diet in revenge for some Press regulations passed
by it. They stormed the guard house, but were suppressed.]
[Footnote 29: See the "Proceedings during my stay at Aachen" in
_Bismarck-Jahrbuch III.,_ and the "Samples of Examination for the
Referendariat" in _Bismarck-Jahrbuch II._]
[Footnote 30: Say "red tape."]
[Footnote 31: _Polstiche Reden_ (Cotta's edition), i. 9.]
[Footnote 32: See _Bismarck-Jahrbuch_, iii. 86.]
[Footnote 33: Cf. Bismarck's letter to Gerlach of October 7, 1855.]
[Footnote 34: Cf. Bismarck's utterance in the Imperial Diet on January
8, 1885. _Politische Reden_, x. 373.]
[Footnote 35: Gramont, _La France et la Prusse avant la guerre_.
Paris, 1872, p. 21.]
[Footnote 36: The telegram handed in at Ems on July 13, 1870, at 3.50
p. m. and received in Berlin at 6.9, ran as deciphered:
"His Majesty writes to me: "Count Benedetti spoke to me on the
promenade, in order to demand from me, finally in a very importunate
manner, that I should authorize him to telegraph at once that I bound
myself for all future time never again to give my consent if the
Hohenzollerns should renew their candidature. I refused at last
somewhat sternly, as it is neither right nor possible to undertake
engagements of this kind _à tout jamais_. Naturally I told him that I
had as yet received no news, and as he was earlier informed about
Paris and Madrid than myself, he could clearly see that my government
once more had no hand in the matter." His Majesty has since received a
letter from the Prince. His Majesty, having told Count Benedetti that
he was awaiting news from the Prince, has decided, with reference to
the above demand, upon the representation of Count Eulenburg and
myself, not to receive Count Benedetti again, but only to let him be
informed through an aide-de-camp: That his Majesty had now received
from the Prince confirmation of the news which Benedetti had already
received from Paris, and had nothing further to say to the ambassador.
His Majesty leaves it to your Excellency whether Benedetti's fresh
demand and its rejection should not be at once communicated both to
our ambassadors and to the press."]
[Footnote 37: Play on the word _gesprengt_.]
* * * * *
BISMARCK AS AN ORATOR
By EDMUND VON MACH, PH.D.
Bismarck was not an orator in the ordinary sense of the word, nor did
he wish to be one. On the contrary, he looked with mistrust on
silver-tongued orators. "You know," he said in the Diet on February 3,
1866, "I am not an orator.... I cannot appeal to your emotions with a
clever play of words intended to obscure the subject-matter. My speech
is simple and clear." And a few years later he said: "Eloquence has
spoiled many things in the world's parliaments. Too much time is
wasted, because everybody who thinks he knows anything wishes to
speak, even if he has nothing new to say. More breath is wasted on the
air than thought is bestowed on the questions under discussion.
Everything has been settled in party caucuses, and in the House the
representatives talk for no other purpose than to show the people how
clever they are, or to please the newspapers, which are expected to be
lavish with their praise in return. If things go on like this, the
time will come when eloquence will be considered a common nuisance,
and a man will be punished if he has spoken too long."
Bismarck's most famous words against mere eloquence were uttered in
the Reichstag on April 29, 1881: "You must be something of a poet if
you wish to be a good orator, and you must possess the gift of
improvisation. When I was younger there were public entertainments in
which music alternated with oratorical improvisations. The
improvisator was given a theme of which he knew nothing, and on which
he discoursed, often brilliantly. It even happened that he was
altogether convincing until we remembered where we were. I am
merely saying this to show that we should not entrust the direction of
big affairs to the mere masters of eloquence any more than to the
improvisators. Least of all should these people be placed in charge of
bureaus, or be given a minister's portfolio. I only wish to prove that
eloquence is a gift which exerts today an influence out of proportion
to its worth. It is overestimated. A good orator must be something of
a poet, which means that he cannot be a stickler for truth and
mathematical accuracy. He must be inspiring, quick, and excitable,
able himself to kindle the enthusiasm of others. But a good orator I
fear will rarely play a good game of whist or of chess, and will be
even less satisfactory as a statesman. The emotional element and not
cool reason must predominate in his make-up. Physiologically, I
believe, the same man cannot be a good orator and a calm judge. I am
reminded of the list of qualities enumerated by Mephisto in Goethe's
_Faust_: 'The lion's strength, the deer's celerity.' Such things are
never found united in one human body. And thus we often find eloquence
overtopping and dangerously controlling reason, to the complete
satisfaction of thoughtless multitudes. But a man of discretion, cool
and accurate in his deliberations, to whom we are glad to entrust the
direction of big and weighty matters, can scarcely ever be a perfect
orator."
In this last sentence Bismarck apparently wished to draw a line of
distinction between himself and some of his parliamentary opponents
whom he admired as fluent orators, but whose leadership he deemed to
be unsafe. If he considered himself a poor public speaker he was
greatly mistaken. His contemporaries held different views, and several
of them fortunately were so deeply impressed by his power that they
analyzed the means with which he won his great parliamentary
victories. His bitter political opponent, Ludwig Bamberger, for
instance, said:
"Bismarck controls his audience by the noticeable force and the
exhaustiveness of his mental labor. He has improved with
practice, and the description of him given in 1866 is no longer quite
fair--'No charm of voice, no sonorous phrases, nothing to captivate an
audience. His voice while clear and distinct, is dry and
unsympathetic. He speaks monotonously, with many pauses, at times he
almost stutters, as if an obstinate tongue refused to obey orders, and
as if he had to wrestle for the adequate expression of his thoughts.
He rocks to and fro, somewhat restlessly, and in no relation to what
he is saying. But the longer he speaks the more he overcomes all
difficulties, he succeeds in adapting his words, without the least
waste, to his thoughts, and generally reaches a powerfully effective
end.' It is still true that his words advance at first slowly, then
with a rush, and again haltingly. But for all those who do not
consider the even and melodious flow of an address to be its greatest
perfection Bismarck's way of speaking is not without some charm. It
enables the hearer to follow the mental exertions of the speaker, and
thus rivets attention better than many a smooth and sonorous diction
which glides along nicely because it has no inner difficulties to
overcome. Often Bismarck succeeds in taking hold of his subject with
trenchant wit, and in illustrating it with arguments which he boldly
takes from every day life.... We must confess that his speeches, if
art-less, are yet full of imagery. His cool and clear mind does not
despise the charm of warm color, just as his robust constitution is
not void of nervous irritability. His ingenuous appearance, with which
he is apt to surprise an audience, should not win our ready
confidence, for all who have had to do with him know that his
astonishingly intimate remarks are calculated to mislead by their
excessive frankness, or their excessive lack of it. If he dissembles,
he often misses his mark by exaggeration, and one can truly say that
he has deceived his opponents more frequently by speaking the truth
than by making false pretenses. Behind his blustering behavior you can
often spy the merry wag. To his opponents he can be provoking,
malicious, even spiteful, but he is never false! He does not belong
to that class of public men who believe that the world can be governed
with sentimental phrases, or that evil conditions are alleviated when
the discussion is interspersed with pompous generalities. On the
contrary, he loves to turn his phrases so that everything will appear
in a strong and glaring light."
Another observer, quoted by Hans Kraemer in his "Speeches of Prince
Bismarck," sums up his impressions as follows: