A reader
of German newspapers and tracts gets at last a feeling of nausea at the
very words _Wir Deutsche_, followed by the eternal _Helden, Heldenthum,
Heldenthat_, and is inclined to thank God if he indeed belong to a nation
sane enough to be composed of _Haendler_.
The very antithesis between _Helden_ (heroes) and _Haendler_ (hucksters),
with which all Germany is ringing, is an illustration of the romantic
quality that vitiates their intelligence. In spite of the fact that they
are one of the greatest trading and manufacturing nations of the world, and
that precisely the fear of losing their trade and markets has been, as they
constantly assert, a chief cause that has driven them to war, they speak
as though Germany were a kind of knight-errant, innocent of all material
ambitions, wandering through the world in the pure, disinterested service
of God and man. On the other hand, because England is a great commercial
Power, they suppose that no Englishman lives for anything but profit.
Because they themselves have conscription, and have to fight or be shot,
they infer that every German is a noble warrior. Because the English
volunteer, they assume that they only volunteer for their pay. Germany,
to them, is a hero clad in white armour, magnanimous, long-suffering, and
invincible. Other nations are little seedy figures in black coats, inspired
exclusively by hatred and jealousy of the noble German, incapable of a
generous emotion or an honourable act, and destined, by the judgment of
history, to be saved, if they can be saved at all, by the great soul and
dominating intellect of the Teuton.
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