4
My forevision, or rather expectation, of the war, was based on a careful observation of Austria-Hungary and Germany, and on a study of the Pangerman movement and its historical and political literature.
Pangermanism means etymologically the unification of all Germans, or, in a wider sense, of all the Germanic races; in a similar way were used the terms Panslavism, Panscandinavianism, and some others. To-day Pangermanism is mainly a philosophy of history, the history of the German nation and of all mankind; it is an attempt, through a systematic study of the historical development and conditions of Germany and other lands, to determine the place of the German nation among the nations in their historical development. Under Pangermanism we also include the political effort and the resultant movement based on Pangerman theory.
The Great French Revolution, with the reaction and restoration following it, likewise the smaller revolutions which were the continuation of the Great Revolution, drew the attention of wide circles to the contrast and the conflict between the old and new régimes, and engendered the theories and experiments towards a better, and, as far as possible, permanent, organisation of states, nations, Europe and humanity; this period witnesses the rise of conscious socialism. Theoretically the period finds its expression in the new scientific historiography. Philosophy of history is cultivated by all nations; history, economics, and all social sciences flourish; sociology is crystallised as a resultant of all these specialised attempts and seeks to become the general science of human society and its development. Simultaneously the study of politics receives scientific treatment.
3. The Germans stood well in the forefront of this theoretical and practical movement; philosophy of history beginning with Herder, and with it history, become directly national departments; German philosophy after Kant is substantially historical (Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, etc.). Socialism, and particularly Marxism, were distinctly historical with a fixed philosophy of history; evolutionism (Darwinism) strengthened this special historicism. The Germans excel also in all specialized social science, economics, and chiefly in the political science of the State and jurisprudence.
Not only social science but even natural science was devoted to the study of the conditions of the German nation. Biology, for instance, speculates as to the proper and cheap sustenance of the individual and the masses; chemistry serves the same purpose and aims at the improvement of the material basis of the entire national existence. On this broad scientific and philosophical foundation Pangermanism organised itself in recent days as the philosophical and political science of the German nation; Lagarde is its leading philosophical and theological representative; Treitschke is its historian, and Kaiser William is its statesman. A complete system, not only of theoretical but also of practical Pangermanism, has been organised—societies and associations, spreading the doctrine by the publication of treatises, maps, newspapers and reviews, pamphlets, etc.
I followed this movement carefully; I came into personal contact and correspondence with several prominent Pangermanists, with Constantine Frantz and Lagarde himself; acquaintance with the Pangerman movements and literature led me to expect this war. I wondered that the English and the French paid so little attention to Pangermanism; my own countrymen I warned by articles and lectures against the danger threatening us. I proposed to write a summary of Pangermanism and similar movements and tendencies in other nations, but the war got the start of me. During the war, having been deprived of my library and manuscripts, confiscated by the Austrian police, I could draw attention to this subject only roughly and more from memory.[1]
- ↑ I wrote a fuller account of the whole Pangerman movement in the London New Europe, No. 1, seq.; a general review of the doctrines laid down by the chief leaders of Pangermanism is given in Professor Charles Andler’s “Les Origines du Pangermanisme (1800–1888),” and “Le Pangermanisme Continental sous Guillaume II. (1888–1914),” 2nd edition, 1915. Mr. Andler correctly begins with the history of Pangermanism in the 18th century (Dietrich von Bülow, 1757–1807).
