_Summer sojourn in Switzerland.--My husband’s researches in the
history of the Geneva convention, and in international
law.--Seclusion and mourning.--Visit to Vienna.--Frederick enters a
new army, the army of peace.--Visit to Berlin.--On our way we visit
the battlefield of Sadowa on All Souls’ Day.--The emperor as a
mourner.--Aunt Cornelia: her grief and the consolations of
religion.--The army chaplain.--A military-theological
discussion.--We are summoned to Aunt Mary’s deathbed.--Retired life
at Vienna.--Minister “To-be-sure”.--Political talks.--Universal
liability to serve._
We passed the remainder of the summer in the neighbourhood of Geneva.
Dr. Bresser’s powers of persuasion had at last succeeded in moving us to
fly from the infected country. I at first strove against leaving so
quickly the graves of my family, and, as I have said, I was filled with
such a resignation to death that I had become wholly apathetic, and held
every attempt at flight to be useless; but in spite of all this Bresser
was certain to conquer when he represented to me that it was my maternal
duty to carry little Rudolf out of the way of danger as well as I could.
That we chose Switzerland as our place of refuge resulted from
Frederick’s wish. He wanted to become acquainted with the men who had
called the “Red Cross” into life, and to gain information on the spot
about the proceedings of the conferences which had been held, as well as
about the further aims of the convention.
Frederick had given in his resignation of the military service, and as
a preliminary had received half-a-year’s leave till his request should
be granted. I had now become rich, very rich. The death of my father,
and of my brother and two sisters, had put me in possession of Grumitz
and of the whole family property.
“Look here,” I said to Frederick, when the title deeds were delivered to
me from the notary’s, “what would you say if I were now to praise the
war which has just passed because of the advantages which have fallen to
my share from its consequences?”
“Why, that you would not then be my Martha. Still I understand what you
mean. The heartless egotism, which is capable of rejoicing over material
gains that proceed out of the ruin of others--this impulse which every
individual, even if he is base enough to feel it, still takes all
possible care to hide--is proudly and openly confessed by nations and
dynasties. ‘Thousands have perished in untold sufferings; but we have
thereby increased in territory and in power: so let there be praises and
thanks to Heaven for the successful war!’”
We lived very quietly, and retired, in a small villa situated on the
shore of the lake. I was so oppressed by the scenes through which I had
gone, that I would have absolutely no intercourse with any strangers.
Frederick respected my mourning, and made no attempt whatever to
recommend me the vulgar resource of “diversion” as a cure for it; I owed
it to the graves at Grumitz--and my tender husband saw this well--to
grieve over them for some time in perfect quiet. Those who had been
hurried so speedily and so cruelly out of this fair world should not be
equally quickly and coldly stolen also out of the place of memory which
they held in my mourning heart.
Frederick himself went often into the city, in order to follow up the
object of his stay here--the study of the Red Cross question. Of the
results of this study I do not retain any clear recollection. I did not
at that time keep any diary; and thus what Frederick communicated to me
of the experiences he met with has for the most part passed out of my
recollection. I only recollect clearly one impression which the whole
of my surroundings made on me--the quiet, the ease, the cheerful
activity of the people whom I happened to see, as if they were living in
a most peaceful, most good-humoured time. There was hardly anywhere even
an echo of the war that had just ended, or at the most in a
conversational tone, as if it had contributed one more interesting
event--nothing more--which might furnish pleasant matter for talk along
with the rest of European gossip: as if the awful thunder of the
cannonades on the Bohemian battlefields had had nothing more tragic in
them than a new opera by Wagner. The thing belonged now to history, and
had for its result some alterations in the atlas; but its horror had
passed out of recollection, or perhaps had never been present to these
neutrals; it was forgotten; the pain was over; it had vanished. The same
with the newspapers. I read French newspapers chiefly; all the interest
was concentrated about the Universal Exhibition in Paris which was in
preparation for 1867; about the court festivities at Compiègne; about
literary celebrities (two new geniuses had come to light who caused much
discussion, Flaubert and Zola); about the events of the drama--a new
opera by Gounod--a new leading part designed by Offenbach for Hortense
Schneider; and so forth. The little exciting duel which the Prussians
and Austrians had fought out _là bas en Bohème_ was an event that had
already become to some extent a thing of the past. Ah! what lies three
months back or at thirty miles’ distance, what is not being played out
in the domain of the Now and the Here, is a thing which the short
feelers of the human heart and the human memory cannot reach! We quitted
Switzerland towards the middle of October. We betook ourselves back to
Vienna, where the course of the business of my inheritance required my
presence. When this business was despatched, our intention was to stay
for a considerable time at Paris. Frederick had it in his mind to smooth
the way with all his power for the idea of a league of peace; and his
view was that the projected Universal Exhibition offered the best
opportunity for setting on foot a congress of friends of peace, and he
also thought Paris the most appropriate place for giving actual vitality
to what was a matter of international concern.
“I have,” he said, “renounced the trade of war, and that I have done
from convictions gained in actual war. I will now work for these
convictions. I enter the service of the peace army. A very small army
indeed, it is true, and one whose combatants have no other shield or
sword than the sentiment of justice and the love of humanity. Still,
everything which has ultimately become great has started from small or
invisible beginnings.”
“Ah!” I sighed; “it is a hopeless beginning. What can you--a single
man--achieve against that mighty fortress, thousands of years old, and
garrisoned by millions of men?”
“Achieve? I? I am not really so foolish as to hope that I personally
shall bring about a conversion. I was only saying just then that I
wished to enter the _ranks_ of the peace-army. When I had my place in
the army of war, did I, do you suppose, hope that _I_ should save my
country, that _I_ should conquer a province? No; the individual can only
_serve_. And still further, he _must_ serve. A man who is penetrated by
any cause cannot do better than work for it--than devote his life to it,
even if he knows how little this life, in and by itself, can contribute
towards its victory. He serves because he must; not only the state, but
our own conviction, if it is enthusiastic, lays on us the duty of
defending it.”
“You are right, and if at length there are enough millions animated by
the enthusiasm of this duty, then that thousand-year-old fortress will
be abandoned by its garrison and must fall.”
From Vienna, I made a pilgrimage to Grumitz, whose mistress I had now
become. But I did not even enter the château. I only laid down four
wreaths in the churchyard, and drove back again. After my most important
matters of business were put in order, Frederick proposed a little
journey to Berlin, in order to pay a visit to Aunt Cornelia, who was so
much to be pitied. I assented. During our absence I put my little son
Rudolf in the charge of Aunt Mary. The latter had been cast down more
than I can describe by the events of the cholera week at Grumitz. Her
whole love, her whole interest in life, she now concentrated on my
little Rudolf. I even hoped that she might be somewhat diverted and
raised in her spirits by having the child with her for a time.
We left Vienna on November 1. We broke our journey in Prague, intending
to spend the night there. Next day, instead of pursuing our journey to
Berlin, we made a new pilgrimage.
“All Souls’ Day,” said I. “How many poor dead bodies are lying on the
battlefield in this neighbourhood, for whom even this day of honour to
the graves does nothing, because they have no graves. Who will pay them
a visit?”
I looked at him for a while in silence. Then, half aloud, I said:--
“Will you?”
He nodded. We understood one another, and in an hour we were on our way
to Chlum and Königgrätz.
* * * * *
What a prospect. An elegy of Tiedge came into my mind.
Oh, sight of horror! mighty prince, come, see,
And o’er this awful heap of mouldering clay
Swear to thy folk a gentler lord to be,
And give to earth the light of peaceful day.
Great leader, when thou thirstest for renown,
Come, count these skulls, before the solemn hour
When thine own head must lay aside its crown,
And in Death’s silence ends thy dream of power.
Let the dread vision hover o’er thee ever
Of these sad corpses here around thee strown,
And then say, does it charm thee, the endeavour
Upon men’s ruins to erect thy throne?
Yes, unfortunately it will charm men, so long as the histories of the
world, _i.e._, those who write them, build the statues of their heroes
out of the ruins of war, so long as they offer their crowns to the
Titans of public murder. To refuse the laurel crown, to give up fame,
would be nobler. Is that what the poet means? The first thing to do
should be to despoil the thing, which it should appear so beneficent to
renounce, of its glory, and then there would be no ambitious man any
longer to grasp after it.
It was twilight already when we got to Chlum, and from thence walked on,
arm in arm, to the battlefield, near at hand, in silent horror. A mist
was falling, mingled with very fine snowflakes, and the dull branches of
the trees were bent by the shrill-sounding pipe of a cold November wind.
Crowds of graves, and the graves of crowds, were all around us. But a
churchyard?--no. No pilgrim weary of life had there been invited to rest
and peace; there, in the midst of their youthful fire of life, exulting
in the fullest strength of their manhood, the waiters on the future had
been cast down by force, and had been shovelled down into their grave
mould. Choked up, stifled, made dumb for ever, all those breaking
hearts, those bloody mangled limbs, those bitterly-weeping eyes, those
wild shrieks of despair, those vain prayers.
On this field of war it was not lonely. There were many--very many--whom
All Souls’ Day had brought hither, from friends’ and enemies’ country,
who were come here to kneel down on the ground where what they loved
most had fallen. The train itself which brought us was full of other
mourners, and thus I had heard now for several hours weeping and wailing
going on around me. “Three sons--three sons, each one more beautiful and
better and dearer than the others, have I lost at Sadowa,” said to us an
old man who looked quite broken down. Many others, besides, of our
companions in the carriage mingled their complaints with his--for
brother, husband, father. But none of these made so much impression on
me as the tearless, mournful “Three sons--three sons” of the poor old
man.
On the field one saw on all sides, and on all the roads, black figures
walking, or kneeling, or painfully staggering along and breaking out
from time to time into loud sobs. There were only a few there who were
buried by themselves--few crosses or stones with an inscription. We bent
down and deciphered, as well as the twilight permitted, some of the
names.
“Major v. Reuss of the Second Regiment of the Prussian Guards.”
“Perhaps a relation of the one engaged to our poor Rosa,” I remarked.
“Count Grünne. Wounded, July 3. Died, July 5.”
What might he not have suffered in those two days! Was he, I wondered, a
son of the Count Grünne who uttered, before the war, the well-known
sentence: “We are going to chase the Prussians away--wet foot”? Ah, how
frantic and blasphemous! how shrilly out of tune sounds of a surety
every word of provocation spoken before a war when one stands on a place
like this! Words, and nothing more, boasting words, scornful words,
spoken, written and printed; it is _these_ alone that have sown the seed
of fields like these.
We walk on. Everywhere earth heaps, more or less high, more or less
broad, and even there where the earth is not elevated, even under our
feet, soldiers’ corpses are perhaps mouldering!
The mist grows thicker constantly. “Frederick, pray put your hat on, you
will take cold.”
But Frederick remained uncovered, and I did not repeat my warning a
second time.
Among the mourners who were wandering about here were also many officers
and soldiers, probably such as had themselves shared in the nobly
contested day of Königgrätz, and now were making a pilgrimage to the
place where their fallen comrades were sleeping.
We had now come to the spot where the largest number of warriors, friend
and foe together, lay entombed. The place was walled off like a
churchyard. Hither came the greatest number of mourners, because in this
spot there was most chance that their dear ones might be entombed.
Round this enclosure the bereaved ones were kneeling and sobbing, and
here they hung up their crosses and their grave-lights.
A tall, slender man, of distinguished, youthful figure, in a general’s
cloak, came up to the mound. The others gave place reverently to him,
and I heard some voices whisper: “The emperor”.
Yes, it was Francis Joseph. It was the lord of the country, the supreme
lord of war, who had come on All Souls’ Day to offer up a silent prayer
for the dead children of his country, for his fallen warriors. He also
stood with uncovered and bowed head there, in agonised devotion, before
the majesty of Death.
Long, long he stood without moving. I could not turn my eyes away from
him. What thoughts must be passing through his soul, what feelings
through his heart, which after all was, as I knew, a good and a soft
heart? It came into my mind that I could feel with him, that I could
think the thoughts at the same time as he, which were passing through
that bowed head of his.
You, my poor, brave fellows, dead, and what for? No, we have not
conquered. My Venice--lost. So much lost--ah, so much! and your young
lives too. And you gave them so devotedly--for me. Oh, if I could give
them back to you! I, for my part, never desired the sacrifice; it was
for you, for your country, that you, the children of my country, were
led forth to this war! And not by my means; no, not though it was at my
order, for was I not _compelled_ to give the order? The subjects do not
exist for my sake. No, I was called to the throne for their sakes, and
any hour have I been ready to die for the weal of my people. Oh, had I
followed the impulse of my heart, and never said “Yes,” when all around
me were shouting “War!” “War!” Still, could I have resisted them? God is
my witness that I could not. What impelled me, what forced me, at this
moment, I do not know exactly, only so much I know, that it was an
irresistible pressure from without, from yourselves, ye dead soldiers!
Oh, how mournful, mournful, mournful! How I have suffered for it all!
and now you are lying here, and on other battlefields, snatched away by
grape-shot and sabre-cuts, by cholera and typhus! Oh, if I had said
“No!” You begged me to do so, Elizabeth. Oh, if I had said it! The
thought is intolerable that---- Oh, it is a miserable, imperfect
world--too much, too much of woe!
During the whole time that I was thinking thus for him, I fastened my
eyes on his features, and now--yes, just as I came to “too much--too
much of woe”--now he covered his face with both hands, and broke out
into a hot flood of tears.
So passed All Souls’ Day on the battlefield of Sadowa.
* * * * *
We found the city of Berlin in the height of jubilation. Every
counter-jumper and every street-loafer bore on his countenance a certain
consciousness of victory. “We have given the fellows there a good
licking.” That appears anyhow to be a very elevating feeling, and one
which may be spread over the whole population. Still, in the families
which we visited, we found many people deeply cast down, those, that is
to say, who had one never to be forgotten lying dead on the German or
Bohemian battlefields. For my own part, I feared most the meeting with
Aunt Cornelia again. I knew that her handsome son Godfrey was her idol,
her all, and I could judge of the pang which the poor bereaved mother
must now be experiencing. I had only to fancy to myself that my Rudolf,
if I had brought him up to manhood--no, that thought I absolutely
refused to think out.
Our visit was announced. With a beating heart I entered Fr. v. Tessow’s
house. Even in the ante-chamber, the mourning which reigned in the house
was perceptible. The footman who opened the door for us wore a black
livery; in the great reception-room, the chairs of which were covered
over with chair covers, there was no fire lighted; and the mirrors and
pictures on the walls were all covered with crape. From hence, the door
into Aunt Cornelia’s bedroom was opened for us, and she received us
there. It was a very large room, divided into two by a curtain, behind
which the bed stood; and it served Aunt Cornelia now as her regular
reception-room. She no longer quitted the house at all, except every
Sunday to go to the cathedral, and very seldom her room, except for one
hour every day, which she spent in what had been Godfrey’s study. In
this everything was left standing or lying as he had left it on the day
of his departure. She took us into it, in the course of our visit, and
made us read a letter, which he had laid on his portfolio.
“My own dear Mother,--I know well that you will come here after my
departure, and then you will find this letter. My personal
departure is over. So much the more will it please and surprise you
to find one _more_ line, to hear one more last word from me, and
indeed a joyful, hopeful one. Be of good cheer. I shall come back
again. Two hearts, that hang together so entirely as ours do, fate
will not tear asunder. I have settled that I am now going to serve
through a fortunate campaign, gain stars and crosses, and then make
you a grandmother six times over. I kiss your hand, I kiss your
dear soft forehead, O you most adored of all little mothers.”
“YOUR GODFREY.”
When we went into Aunt Cornelia’s room, she was not alone. A gentleman
in a long black coat, recognisable at the first glance as a clergyman,
was sitting opposite to her.
She got up and came to meet us. The clergyman rose at the same time from
his seat, but remained standing in the background.
What I expected occurred. When I embraced the old lady both of us, she
and I, broke out into loud sobs. Frederick also did not remain dry-eyed
as he pressed the mourner to his heart. In this first minute no word at
all was spoken. All that one can say at such a moment, at one’s first
meeting after a severe misfortune, is sufficiently expressed by tears.
She led us back to the place where they were sitting, and pointed us to
chairs that stood there. Then, after drying her eyes, she made the
introduction.
“My nephew, Colonel Baron Tilling--Herr Mölser, head military chaplain
and consistorial councillor.”
Silent bows were exchanged.
“My friend and spiritual adviser,” she proceeded, “who has allowed me to
lay on him the burden of instructing me in my trouble.”
“But who unfortunately has not succeeded in instilling into you the
proper resignation, the proper joy in bearing the cross, my valued
friend,” said he. “Why is it that I have always to witness a fresh
outburst of these very foolish tears?”
“Oh, forgive me! When I last saw my nephew with his sweet young wife, my
Godfrey was there.”
She could speak no further.
“Your son was there, in this sinful world, still exposed to all
temptations and dangers, while now he has gone into the bosom of the
Father, after meeting with the most glorious and most blessed of deaths
for king and country.
“You, colonel,” turning now to my husband, “who have just been
introduced to me as a soldier, can assist me to give to this afflicted
mother the consolation that her son’s fate is an enviable one. You must
know what delight in death animates the brave warrior; the resolve to
offer his life as a sacrifice on the altar of his country glorifies for
him all the pain of departing this life; and, though he sinks in the
storm of the battle amidst the thunder of the artillery, yet he expects
to be transferred to the great army on high, and to be present when the
Lord of Sabaoth holds muster above. You, colonel, have come back in the
number of those to whom Divine Providence has granted a righteous
victory.”
“Forgive me, reverend consistorial councillor, I was in the Austrian
service.”
“Oh, I thought---- Oh, really,” replied the other quite confused. “A
grand, brave army too is the Austrian.” He rose. “But I will not
intrude longer. You will be wishing, doubtless, to talk of family
matters. Farewell, dear lady; in a few days I will come again. Till
then, raise your thoughts to the All-merciful, without whose will not a
hair falls from our heads, and who causes all things to serve for the
good of those that love Him--even sorrow and suffering, even privation
and death. I salute you with all devotion.”
My aunt shook his hand.
“I hope I shall see you soon. Very soon, pray.”
He bowed to us all, and was stepping towards the door when Frederick
detained him.
“Reverend consistorial councillor, may I ask you a favour?”
“Pray, tell me what it is, colonel?”
“I conclude from your conversation that you are penetrated equally by
the religious and the military spirit. In that case you might do me a
great pleasure.”
I listened with interest. What could Frederick mean?
“The fact is,” he continued, “that my little wife here is full of
scruples and doubts of all sorts. Her opinion is that, from a Christian
point of view, war is not quite permissible. I, of course, know to the
contrary, for there is no alliance closer than that between the
professions of priest and soldier, but I have not the eloquence to make
this clear to my wife. Would you then, reverend consistorial councillor,
so far favour us as to give us, to-morrow or next day, an hour of your
conversation, with the view----”
“Oh, with great pleasure,” the clergyman said, interrupting him. “Will
you give me your address?”
Frederick gave him his card, and the day and hour of the visit he asked
for were fixed at once. Then we remained alone with our aunt.
“Does your intercourse with this friend really afford you consolation?”
asked Frederick.
“Consolation? There is no consolation for me any more here below. But he
speaks so much and so beautifully about the things which I like most to
hear of--about death and mourning, about the cross and sacrifice and
resignation--he paints the world which my poor Godfrey had to leave, and
from which I long to be released, as such a vale of misery, of
corruption, of sin, and of advancing ruin.... And so it seems to me a
little less mournful that my child has been called away. He is assuredly
in heaven, and here on this earth----”
“The powers of hell often prevail. That is true. I have again seen proof
of that close to me,” replied Frederick thoughtfully.
The poor lady next questioned him about the two campaigns that he had
passed through--the one with, the other against, Godfrey. He had to
relate hundreds of details, and in doing so he was able to give the
bereaved mother the same comfort that he once brought me back from the
war in Italy, namely, that the lamented one had died a rapid and
painless death. It was a long and a mournful visit. I also again
recounted there all the details of the horrible cholera week, and my
experiences on the Bohemian battlefields. Before we left, Aunt Cornelia
took us into Godfrey’s room, where I wept bitter tears anew at the
perusal of the letter which I have quoted above, and of which at a later
period I begged a copy.
* * * * *
“Now explain to me,” I said to Frederick, as we got into our carriage,
which was in waiting in front of Aunt Cornelia’s villa, “why you asked
the consistorial councillor----”
“To a conference with you? Do not you understand? That is to serve me as
material for study. I want to hear once more--and this time to take note
of--the arguments by which priests defend public murder. I put you
forward as the leader in the fray. It better becomes a young lady to
nourish a doubt from the Christian point of view as to the lawfulness of
war than a ‘gallant colonel’!”
“But you know that my doubt is not from a religious, but a humanitarian
point of view.”
“We must not lay this at all before the reverend consistorial
councillor, or else the discussion would be transferred to a different
field. The efforts after peace of free thinkers suffer from no internal
inconsistency, but it is this very inconsistency existing between the
maxims of Christianity and the orders of military authorities which I
should like to hear explained by a military chaplain, _i.e._, a
representative of militant Christianity.”
The clergyman was punctual in his arrival. The prospect was evidently an
inviting one for him of having to preach a sermon of instruction and
conversion. I on the contrary looked forward to the conversation with
somewhat painful feelings, for the part assigned to me in it was a
dishonest one. But, for the good of the cause to which Frederick had
devoted his services henceforth, I was easily able to put some
constraint on myself, and comfort myself with the proverb: “The end
justifies the means”.
After the first greetings--we were all three seated on low, easy-chairs
before the fire--the consistorial councillor began thus:--
“Allow me, dear lady, to enter on the object of my visit. The matter is
to remove from your soul some scruples, which are not destitute of some
apparent grounds, but which can easily be refuted as sophistical. You
think, for example, that Christ’s command to love your enemies, and also
the text, ‘He who takes the sword shall perish by the sword,’ are
inconsistent with the duties of a soldier, who no doubt is empowered to
injure the enemy in body and life.”
“Certainly, reverend councillor, this inconsistency seems to me
irreconcilable. Then there occurs also the express command of the
Decalogue, ‘Thou shalt not kill’.”
“Oh, yes, to a superficial judgment there is some difficulty in that,
but on penetrating deeper all doubt vanishes. As regards the fifth
commandment, it would be more correctly given (as it is actually in the
English version of the Bible): ‘Thou shalt not murder’. Killing for
necessary defence is not murder. And war is in reality only necessary
defence on a large scale. We can and we ought, following the gentle
precept of our Saviour, to love our enemies, but that does not mean
that we are not to venture to defend ourselves from open wrong and
violence.”
“Then does it not follow of course from this that only defensive wars
are justifiable, and that no sword-stroke ought to be given till the
enemy has invaded the country? But if the opposing nation proceeds on
the same principle, how then can the battle ever begin? In the late war
it was your army, reverend councillor, which first crossed the frontier,
and----”
“If one wishes to keep the foe off, dear lady, as we have the most
sacred right to do, it is utterly unnecessary to put off the favourable
opportunity, and to wait until he has first invaded one’s country. On
the contrary, the sovereign must, under all circumstances, have freedom
to anticipate the violent and unjust. In doing so he is following the
written word: ‘He who takes the sword shall perish by the sword’. He
presents himself as God’s servant and avenger on the enemy, because he
strives to make him, as he has taken the sword against him, perish by
the sword.”
“There must be some fallacy in that,” I said, shaking my head. “It is
impossible that these principles should justify both parties equally.”
“And as to the further scruple,” pursued the clergyman, without noticing
my remark, “that war is of and by itself displeasing to God, this must
depart from every Christian who believes in the Bible, for the Holy
Scriptures sufficiently prove that the Lord Himself gave commands to the
people of Israel to wage wars, in order to conquer the promised land,
and He granted them victory and His blessing on their wars. In Numbers
xxi. 14, a special ‘book of the wars of the Lord’ is spoken of. And how
often in the Psalms is the assistance celebrated which God has granted
to His people in war! Do you not know what Solomon says (Proverbs xxi.
31): ‘The horse is prepared against the day of battle, but safety is of
the Lord’? In Psalm cxliv. David thanks and praises the Lord, his
strength, ‘who teacheth his hand to war, and his fingers to fight’.”
“Then a contradiction prevails between the Old and the New
Testament--the God of the ancient Hebrews was a warlike Deity, but the
gentle Jesus proclaimed the message of peace, and taught love to
neighbour and to enemy.”
“In the New Testament also, Jesus speaks in a figure (Luke xiv. 31)
without the least blame of a king who is going to make war against
another king. And how often, too, does not the Apostle Paul use figures
from the military life? He says (Rom. xiii. 4) that the magistrate does
not bear the sword in vain, but if God’s servant--a revenger on him that
doeth evil.”
“Well, then, in that case the contradiction I mean exists in the Holy
Scripture itself. By your showing me that it is present in the Bible you
do not remove it.”
“There one sees the superficial and at the same time arrogant method of
judgment which seeks to exalt one’s own weak reason above the Word of
God. Contradiction is something imperfect, ungodlike; and if I show that
a thing is in the Bible the proof is complete that in itself--however
incomprehensible it may be to the human understanding--it can contain no
contradiction.”
“Unless the presence of contradiction does not much rather prove that
the passages in question cannot possibly be of Divine origin.” This
answer trembled on my lips, but I suppressed it, in order not to change
entirely the object of the discussion.
“Look here, reverend councillor,” said Frederick, now mingling in the
conversation, “a chief captain of artillery in the seventeenth century
has laid down much more forcibly than you have done the justifiability
of the horrors of war by an appeal to the Bible. I extracted the passage
and have read it to my wife, but she did not sympathise with the spirit
expressed in it. I confess the thing seems to me--well, a little
strong--and I should like to hear your view about it. If you will allow
me I will fetch the paper.” So he took a sheet of paper out of a drawer,
unfolded it, and read:--
War was invented by God Himself and taught to men. God posted the
first soldier with a two-edged sword in front of Paradise, to keep
out of it Adam, the first rebel. You may read in Deuteronomy how
God, by means of Moses, gives people encouragement to victory and
even gives them His priests for advanced guard.
The first stratagem was practised at the city of Ai. In this war of
the Jews the sun had to stand and show light in the firmament for
two whole days together in order that the war and the victory might
be followed up, and many thousands put to the sword and their kings
hung up. All the horrors of war are permitted by God, for the whole
of Holy Writ is full of them, and proves satisfactorily that
regular war is an invention of God Himself, and that therefore
every man can with a clear conscience serve in it, and can live and
die in it. He is permitted to burn his enemy, or brand him, flay
him, shoot him down, or hack him to pieces. All this is just, let
others judge as they please about it. God in these passages has
forbidden nothing, but has permitted the most horrible ways of
destroying men.
The prophetess Deborah nailed the head of Sisera, the leader in
that war, to the earth. Gideon, chosen by God as the leader of the
people, revenged himself on the princes of Succoth, who had refused
him some provisions, like a soldier; sword and fire were too poor,
they were thrashed and torn in pieces with thorns; and, as before,
this was righteous in the sight of God. The royal prophet David, a
man after God’s own heart, invented the most cruel tortures for the
vanquished children of Ammon at Rabboth--he had them hewed with
sabres, caused chariots to drive over them, cut them with knives,
and dragged them through the places where they made the bricks, and
so did he in all the towns of the children of Ammon. Besides this----
“That is horrible, abominable!” broke in the chief chaplain. “It could
only be a rough soldier of the savage times of the Thirty Years’ War to
whom it would appear natural to produce examples like these out of the
Bible, in order to found thereon a justification for their cruelties
against the enemy. We preach quite other doctrine now--nothing more is
to be striven for in war than to make your adversary incapable of
harm--even up to his death--but without any evil design against the life
of any individual. If any such design enters in, or even any murderous
desire or any cruelty against those who are defenceless, in such a case
killing in war is exactly as immoral and as impermissible as in peace.
No doubt in past centuries, when the adventurous delight in feud and
quarrel prevailed, when leaders of Landsknechts and vagrant persons
carried on war as a trade, in such times an artillery captain might
write in that style; but in the present day armies are not put into the
field for gold and booty, not without knowing for whom or for what, but
for the highest ideal objects of mankind--for freedom, independence,
nationality; for justice, faith, honour, purity and morality----”
“You, reverend consistorial councillor,” I interposed, “are at least
milder and more humane than the artillery captain. And thus you have no
proofs out of the Bible to allege for the lawfulness of cruelty, in
which our forefathers of the middle ages, and presumably also the
ancient Hebrews, took a pleasure; and yet it is the same book, and the
same Jehovah, and He cannot have become milder--and everybody still gets
from Him as much support as suits his views.”
On this I received a slight sermon of rebuke for my want of reverence
for the Word of God, and for my want of judgment in reading it.
Still I succeeded in leading the conversation back again to our especial
subject; and now the consistorial councillor launched out into a long
dissertation, and one which this time was allowed to be uninterrupted,
about the connection between the military and Christian spirits; he
spoke of the religious devotion “which is indwelling in the oath to the
standard, when the colours are carried solemnly, with the accompaniment
of music, into the church, with the guard of honour of two officers with
drawn swords; and there the recruit marches out for the first time in
public with helmet and side-arms, and for the first time follows the
colours of his company, unfolded now before the altar of the Lord torn
as they are and stained with the honourable marks of the battles in
which they have been carried”. He spoke of the prayer offered every
Sunday in church: “Preserve the royal commander of the army, and all
true servants of their king and country. Teach them as Christians to
think of their end, and grant that their service may be blessed, to the
honour and the good of the country.” “God with us,” he went on, “is, as
you know, the motto on the belt-buckle with which the foot-soldier
buckles on his side-arms, and this watchword should give him confidence.
If God be with us, who can be against us? Then there are also the
universal days of public prayer and humiliation which are ordered at the
commencement of a war that the people may beg for God’s help in prayer,
both in the comfortable hope of His support and in the confidence
through that support of gaining a victorious termination. What devotion
does there not lie in this for the departing warrior! How mightily does
this exalt his delight in battle and in death! He can with comfort enter
into the ranks of the warriors when his king calls for him, and can
reckon on victory and blessing for the cause of right. God the Lord will
no more deprive our people of this than His people Israel of old, if
only it is with prayers to Him that we carry on the work of battle. The
intimate alliance between prayer and victory, between piety and valour,
easily follows--for what can more assure one of joy in the prospect of
death than the confidence that if our last hour should strike in the
confusion of the battle we shall find favour at the hands of the Judge
in heaven? Fidelity and faith, in union with manliness and warlike
virtue, belong to the oldest traditions of our people.”
He went on in this tone for a long time more--now with oily mildness,
with sunken head, in the softest tones speaking of love, humility,
“little children,” salvation, and “precious things”--now with military
voice of command, with a proud, erect attitude, talking of strict morals
and stern discipline--sharp and cutting--of sword and shield. The word
“joy” was never used otherwise than in composition with death, battle,
and dying. From the point of view of the army chaplain, to kill and to
be killed seemed to be the most exquisite delights in life. Everything
else is exhausting, sinful pleasure. Verses, too, were recited. First
this of Körner:--
Father, do Thou guide me!
Guide me to victory--guide me to death!
Lord, I confess Thy command.
Lord, as Thou willest, so guide me!
God, I confess Thee.
Then the old popular song of the Thirty Years’ War:--
No happier death on earth can be
Than one good stroke from mortal foe,
On fresh green turf, in breezes free--
No woman’s tears, no cries of woe:
No grim deathbed, whence, lone and slow,
From life’s gay scene your soul must go.
Like swathes of grass, in lusty row,
’Mid shouting friends, Death lays you low.
And then the song by Lenau of the war-loving armourer:--
Peace steals on, and, mining slowly,
Saps our vigour, dims our story.
While she boasts her “influence holy,”
Cobwebs gather o’er our glory.
Hark! then sounds War’s joyous rattle.
Wounds may yawn, blood flow, in battle!
_We_ need yawn in sloth no longer,
War’s pruning makes mankind the stronger.
And, to conclude, the saying of Luther:--
“When I look at war as a thing that protects wife, child, house, land,
goods, and honour--and in doing so gains peace and secures it--in that
view war is a right precious thing”.
“Oh, yes; if I look at the panther as a dove, in that case the panther
is a very gentle beast,” I remarked unheard.
The military chaplain did not allow himself to be disturbed in his flow
of eloquence; and, when he ended and took leave, I found myself with two
convictions: that war from the Christian point of view is a justifiable,
and in and by itself is a precious, thing. It was visibly a very
agreeable thing to him to have, by means of this rhetorical victory,
both fulfilled the duty of his profession, and in doing so rendered a
considerable service to the foreign colonel; for, as he rose to go, and
we expressed to him our thanks for the trouble he had been so good as to
undertake, he deprecatingly rejoined:--
“It is for me to thank you for having given me an opportunity of chasing
away your doubts through my feeble word (whose entire efficacy is to be
ascribed to the Word of God, which I have so often quoted), doubts which
are of such a nature as to bring nothing but pain to a person who is not
only a Christian but a soldier’s wife. Peace be with you.”
“Oh,” I groaned, when he was gone, “that was a torture!”
“Yes,” said Frederick; “it was. Our want of straightforwardness
especially was uncomfortable to me, and particularly the false premises
under which we got him to display his eloquence. At one moment I was on
the point of saying to him: ‘Stop, reverend sir, I myself entertain the
same views against war as my wife, and what you are saying only serves,
as far as I am concerned, to enable me to see more clearly the weakness
of your arguments’. But I held my tongue. Why interfere with an honest
man’s conviction--a conviction which is besides the foundation of his
profession in life?”
“Conviction? Are you certain of that? Does he really believe that he is
speaking the truth, or does he purposely deceive his common soldiers,
when he promises them an assured victory through the assistance of a God
of whom he nevertheless must know this--that He is invoked in exactly
the same way by the enemy? These appeals to ‘our people’ and to ‘our
cause’ as the only righteous one, and one which is God’s cause too, were
surely only possible at a time when one people shut out all other
peoples, and considered itself as the only one entitled to exist--the
only one beloved of God. And then all these promises of heaven, with the
view of more easily procuring the sacrifice of earthly life, all these
ceremonies, consecrations, oaths, hymns which are intended to awaken in
the breast of the man ordered into war that ‘joy in death’ (repulsive
words to me!) which they so admire; is it not----”
“Everything has two sides, Martha,” said Frederick interrupting me. “It
is because we deprecate war that everything which supports and excuses
it, everything which veils its horrors, appears hateful to us.”
“Yes, of course; because the hateful thing is upheld thereby.”
“But not thereby only. All institutions stand on roots of a thousand
fibres, and as long as they exist it must be a good thing that those
feelings and methods of thought should persist by which they are
excused, by which they are rendered not only tolerable, but even
beloved. How many a poor fellow is helped through his death-agony by
that same ‘joy in death’ into which he has been educated! how many a
pious soul relies in all confidence on the help of God of which he has
been assured by the preacher! how much innocent vanity and proud feeling
of honour are awakened and satisfied by those ceremonies! how many
hearts beat higher at the sound of those hymns! From the total of the
pain which war has brought on men, we must at least deduct that pain
which war poets and war preachers have contrived to sing away and lie
away.”
* * * * *
We were summoned away from Berlin very hurriedly. A telegram announced
to me that Aunt Mary was very ill and wished to see me.
I found the old lady given up by her physicians.
“It is my turn now,” she said. “For my own part I am right willing to
go. Since my poor brother and the three children were snatched away,
this world has had no more joy for me. Apart from anything else, I shall
never more have the strength to bear up after such a blow. I shall find
the others there above. Conrad and Lilly are also united there; it was
not ordained that they should be united here on earth.”
“If they had finished their arrangements in proper time....” I was
disposed to say in opposition, but I stopped myself. I could not surely
raise any discussion with this dying person, and still less try to
unsettle her about her favourite theory of “pre-ordination”.
“I have one comfort,” she went on, “that you at least, dear Martha,
remain behind happy; the cholera has spared you, and that proves clearly
that it is ordained for you to grow old in company. Only try to make of
your little Rudolf a good Christian and a good soldier, so that his
grandfather up in heaven may still find his joy in him.”
Even on this point I preferred to keep silence, for I was firmly
resolved to make no soldier of my son.
“I will pray for you incessantly, so that you may live long and
happily.”
Of course I did not dwell on the inconsistency that an “inevitable
destiny” could be influenced in one’s favour by incessant prayer; but I
interrupted the poor creature by begging her not to exhaust herself with
talking, and, in order to distract her attention, told her about our
doings in Switzerland and Berlin. I also related how we met Prince
Henry, and that he had caused to be erected in the park of his castle a
marble monument in memory of the bride whom he had lost as soon as won.
Three days afterwards poor Aunt Mary fell asleep, resigned and calm,
fortified with the sacrament for the dying, which she had herself begged
for and which she received with devotion; and thus were all my relations
gone from the earth, all those in whose midst I had been brought up.
In her will the entire inheritance of her little fortune was left to my
son Rudolf, and as his trustee Minister “To-be-sure” was nominated.
This circumstance brought me now into frequent contact with this old
friend of my father. He was also pretty nearly the only visitor at our
house. The deep mourning into which the unhappy week at Grumitz had
plunged me caused me as a matter of course to live in perfect
retirement. Our plan of settling in Paris could not be carried out till
all my affairs were put in order, and in any case several months more
would be necessary for that.
Our friend the Minister, who, as I have said, formed almost the whole of
our society, had in these latter days either received or obtained his
discharge--I never quite fathomed the matter--but in short he had
withdrawn into private life, but he was still as fond as ever of busying
himself about politics. He continually contrived to turn the
conversation on to this his favourite theme, and we also willingly took
our share in it. As Frederick was now occupying himself so busily with
the study of international law, any discussion was welcome to him which
touched on this province. After dinner (Mr. “To-be-sure”--for we always
between ourselves made use of this nickname for him--was always asked to
dine at our house twice a week) the two gentlemen would plunge into a
long political conversation; but in doing this my husband took care not
to let this conversation turn into the political gossip which he so
hated, but was careful to lead it to views of more general interest. In
this, to be sure, Mr. “To-be-sure” could not always follow him, for in
his character as an inveterate diplomatist and official he had
accustomed himself to follow what is called “practical politics”--a
thing which is directed merely to the private interests which lie
nearest to hand and knows nothing about the theoretical questions of
social science.
I sat by, busy over some needlework, and took no share in the
conversation--a thing which seemed quite natural to the Minister; for
politics is, as is well known, far “too high a thing” for ladies; he was
sure that I was thinking all the time of other things, whilst I, on the
contrary, was listening very attentively, since it was my business to
impress the tenor of this dialogue on my memory, in order to transfer it
afterwards into the red book. Frederick made no secret of his opinions,
though he knew what a thankless part it is to set oneself to oppose what
is generally received, and to defend ideas whilst they are in the stage
when--even if they are not condemned as subversive--still they are
derided as fantastic.
“I am in a position to-day to communicate to you an interesting piece of
news, dear Tilling,” said the Minister one afternoon with an air of
importance. “People in government circles--that is to say, in the
ministry of war--are ventilating the idea of introducing a universal
liability to service amongst us also.”
“What? the same system which before the war was so universally condemned
and derided among us? ‘Tailors in arms,’ and so on?”
“To be sure we had a prejudice against it a short time since. Still, it
has rendered good service to the Prussians you must allow. And, in fact,
from the moral point of view, and even from the democratic and liberal
point of view, for which you occasionally appear so enthusiastic, it is
surely a just and elevating thing that every son of his fatherland,
without any regard to his position or stage of education, should have to
fulfil the same duties. And from a strategic point of view, could little
Prussia have been always victorious if she had not had the Landwehr; and
if the latter had been introduced amongst us before, should we have been
always beaten?”
“Well, the meaning of that is, that if we had had more material, the
material which our enemy had would not have served him. _Ergo_--if the
Landwehr were introduced everywhere it would not benefit anybody. The
war game would be played with more pieces, but the game nevertheless
depends still on the luck and the ability of the players. I will suppose
that all the European powers have introduced the obligation of universal
defence; the proportion of forces in that case remains exactly the same,
the only difference would be that, in order to come to a decision,
instead of hundreds of thousands, millions would have to be
slaughtered.”
“But do you think it just and fair that a part only of the population
should sacrifice themselves in order to protect the dearest possessions
of the others, and that these others, chiefly because they are rich,
should be entitled to stop quietly at home? No, no; that will cease with
this new law. Then there will be no more buying-off--every one will have
to take his part. And it is especially the educated--the
students--those who have some learning, who will contribute the
elements of intelligence and therefore of victory.”
“The other side has the same elements ready to hand, and so the
advantages to be gained from educated petty officers neutralise each
other. On the other hand, what remains (and equally to both sides) is
the loss of material of priceless mental worth, of which the country is
deprived by the fact that the most educated, those who might have
promoted its civilisation by means of inventions, works of art, or
scientific inquiry, are set up in rank and file to be marks for the
enemy’s shot----”
“Oh, well! for making inventions, and producing works of art, and
investigating skull-bones, and all sorts of things of that kind, which
do not advance the position of the state’s power one drachm----”
“Hm!”--“What?” “Oh, nothing; go on.”
“For all that there remains plenty of time for people. And besides they
need not serve for the whole of their life; but a few years of strict
discipline are assuredly good for everybody, and make them only so much
the more competent to fulfil their other duties as citizens. We must in
the present state of things pay the blood tax some time--so it ought to
be divided between all equally.”
“There would be something to say for that, if it fell less heavily on
individuals on that account. But that would not be the case; the blood
tax would not be _divided_ by that measure, but increased. I hope the
project may not be carried out. There is no seeing whither it may lead.
One state would then try to outvie the other in strength of army, till
at last there would no longer be any armies, but only armed nations.
More people would be constantly drawn into the service; the length of
service would be constantly increased; the incidence of war taxes and
the costs of armaments constantly greater;--so that without fighting
each other the nations would all come to ruin in making preparations for
war!”
“But, dear Tilling, you look too far.”
“One can never look too far. Everything a man undertakes he ought to
think out to its remotest consequence--at least as far as his mind
reaches. We were likening war just now to a game at chess. Politics also
is of the same nature, your excellency, and those are only very feeble
players who look no further forward than a single move, and are quite
pleased with themselves if they have got into a position in which they
can threaten a pawn. I want to develop the thought of defensive forces
constantly increasing and the universal extension of liability to
military service still more widely, till we reach the extremest verge,
_i.e._, where the mass becomes excessive. What then, if after the
greatest numbers and the furthest limits of age are reached, one nation
should take it into its head to recruit regiments of women too? The
others must imitate it. Or battalions of boys? The others must imitate
it. And in the armaments--in the means of destruction--where can the
limit be? Oh this savage, blind leap into the pit!”
“Calm yourself, dear Tilling. You are a genuine faddist. If you could
only point me out a means to do away with war it would be a perfect
benefit, to be sure. But as that is not possible, every nation must
surely endeavour to prepare itself for it as well as possible, in order
to assure itself of the greatest chance of winning in the inevitable
‘struggle for existence’--that is the cant word of the fashionable
Darwinism, is it not?”
“If I should choose to suggest to you the means of doing away with wars,
you would again call me a silly faddist, a sentimental dreamer rendered
morbid by the ‘humanitarian craze’--that, I think, is the cant word in
favour with the war party, is it not?”
“To be sure, I cannot conceal from you that no practical foundation
exists for the realisation of such an ideal. One must calculate with the
actual factors. In these are classed the passions of men; their
rivalries; the divergences of interests; the impossibility of coming to
an agreement on all questions.”
“But that is not necessary. When disagreements begin an arbitration
tribunal--not force--is to decide.”
“The sovereign states would never betake themselves to such a
tribunal--nor would the peoples.”
“The peoples? The potentates and diplomatists would not--but the people?
Just inquire, and you will find that the wish for peace is warm and true
in the people, while the peaceful assurances which proceed from the
governments are frequently lies, hypocritical lies--or at least are
regarded as such on principle by other governments. That is precisely
what is called ‘diplomacy’. And the peoples will go on ever more and
more calling for peace. If the general obligation of defence should
extend, the dislike of war will increase in the same proportion. A class
of soldiers animated with love for their calling is, of course,
imaginable; their exceptional position, which they take for a position
of honour, is offered to them as a recompense for the sacrifices which
it entails, but when the exception ceases the distinction ceases also.
The admiring thankfulness disappears which those who stay at home offer
to those who go out in their defence,--because then there will be no one
to stay at home. The war-loving feelings which are always being
suggested to the soldier--and in so doing are often awakened in
him--will be more seldom kindled; for who are those that are of the most
heroic spirit, who are most warm in their enthusiasm for the exploits
and dangers of war? Those who are safe against them--the professors, the
politicians, the beer-shop chatterers--the chorus of old men, as it is
called in ‘Faust’. When the safety is lost, that chorus will be
silenced. Besides, if not only those devote themselves to the military
life who love and praise it, but all those also are forcibly dragged
into it who look on it with horror, that horror must work. Poets,
thinkers, friends of humanity, timid persons, all these will, from their
own points of view, curse the trade they are forced into.”
“But they will beyond doubt have to keep silent about this way of
thinking, in order not to pass for cowards--in order not to expose
themselves to the displeasure of the higher powers.”
“Keep silence? Not for ever. As I talk--though I have myself kept
silence long--so will the others also break out into speech. If the
thought ripens, the word will come. I am an individual who have come to
the age of forty before my conviction acquired sufficient strength to
expand itself in words. And as I have required two or three decades, so
the masses will perhaps require two or three generations--but speak they
will at last.”