be. If one did not know a man one must not
speak to him; if one knew him, one might borrow a hundred marks from
him, but one must not ask him for a penny. Whoever had wealth
displayed it in order to be admired; whoever had a social position
displayed his unapproachability and the weight of his dignity, as, for
instance, when with an absent look and lost in the burden of his own
existence he entered a dining-hall. From inferiors one demanded a
degrading attitude and forms of speech, and presented to them a face
of stone; towards those in higher position one came to life and
displayed an attentive civility. It was--or shall we say
is?--permissible to lavish in an hour the monthly income of a poor
family. "One had it to spend" and "what business was it of theirs?" In
the lower ranks there was much of genuine revolt against these abuses
and also much envy and malice, much open imitation, and much of secret
admiration. Every silly craze was cheapened in hideous imitations, the
suburb and the village made a display which in quality, indeed, fell
below the model, but in quantity not at all.

It may be said that these were excrescences or city fashions; that one
must not generalize. These are empty phrases. To understand the spirit
of a society it is not hermits that one must study. And, moreover, let
any one ask himself whether this society was really based on the idea
of solidarity and human friendliness or upon unscrupulous personal
interests and exploitation, on shows and shams, on the demand for
service and the claim to command. If anything can explain the
eagerness with which we Germans flung ourselves into a war whose
origins we did not know and did not want to know, then besides the
conscious objects, advantage, rehabilitation, and renown, we must also
take into account the obscure impulse of the national conscience which
in the midst of evil individualism and of personal and class egoism
yearned for the sense of solidarity and fusion.

Is it objected that all this lies deeply rooted in human nature, that
it has been there from time immemorial, and it is impossible to alter
it at one stroke? Pedantic drivel! Many things lie deep in human
nature, and it depends on which of these the will chooses to develop.
And who talked of altering things at one stroke? Our judgment of
values is to be transformed, and if human nature never changed, much
that now flaunts itself in the sunshine would be creeping in the
shade. This tran