Mein Kampf
pocrisy and malicious cruelty—if these qualities cannot be proved to exist from the beginning as a prerequisite of their state existence, so different in form. Originally, the very formation of a state takes place only through the exertion of these qualities. In the consequent struggle for self-preservation those peoples will succumb (that is, will be subjugated, and thus sooner or later die out) which show the less of heroic virtues in the conflict, or are not equal to the lying craft of the hostile parasites. But even here it is almost never a lack of wisdom so much as of courage and determination, which merely tries to hide under the cloak of humane principles.
How slight is the connection between economics and the state-building and state-preserving qualities we can best see from the fact that the inner strength of a state only very rarely coincides with its so-called economic flowering. On the contrary, countless examples seem to show that the flowering is a sign of approaching decline. But if the formation of human communities were due chiefly to economic forces or impulses, the highest economic development must surely mean the greatest strength of the state, and not the reverse.
Faith in the state-building or state-preserving power of economics is particularly hard to understand when it holds sway in a country that clearly and emphatically demonstrates the historical opposite in every detail. Prussia wonderfully proved that not material qualities, but ideals and virtues alone, make possible the creation of a state. Only under their protection can economic life flourish, until with the collapse of purely state-building capabilities the economic structure also topples—a process which we are now observing in the saddest of fashions. The material interests of mankind always flourish best while they remain in the shadow of heroic virtues; but when they attempt to take the highest place in life, they destroy the sine qua non of their own existence.
Whenever there has been progress in Germany of a strong power policy, economic life has always advanced; but whenever the economic system has become the sole content of our people’s
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