cellor the title of arm and head
connatural with the Caesarian institution. I know of no statesman in
history who has given, under analogous circumstances, such proof of
want of foresight as was given by Bismarck, comprehensible only if the
body could assume the authority of the will, as did his, and if the
intelligence could disappear, as did his, in an hydropic and
unquenchable desire for power. Frederick, holding progressive ideas
opposed to those of Bismarck and of William, would have greatly
considered public opinion, and on account of that consideration would
have perhaps respected, till the hour of his death, the Pilot, who,
dejected by the new direction of public government, inferred that
irreparable evil must result therefrom. When Maurice of Saxony trod on
the heels of Charles V., whom he had defeated at Innsbruck, he was
asked why he did not capture so rich a booty, and replied: "Where
should I find a cage large enough for such a big bird?" Assuredly the
conscience and mind of such a parliamentarian and philosopher as was
Frederick III., must have addressed to him a similar question when he
inwardly meditated sacrificing the Chancellor's person and prescinding
his power: "Where should I find a place outside the government for
such a man, who would struggle under bolts and chains, making the
whole state tremble in sympathy with his own agitation?" The
experience and talent of Frederick, together with his respect for
public opinion, led him to retain Bismarck at his post, subject only
to some slight restrictions. But the Chancellor, in his
shortsightedness, filled young William's head with absolutist ideas;
spurred and excited him to display impatience with his poor father;
and when thus nurtured, his ward opened his mouth to satisfy his
appetite, he swallowed up the Chancellor as a wild beast devours a
keeper.

It was the hand of Providence!

III.

The onus of blame devolves on Bismarck's native ideas, which persisted
in him from his cradle and resisted the revelations of his own
personal experience as well as the spirit of our progressive age. In
Bismarck there always subsisted the rural fibre of the Pomeranian
rustic, in unison with the demon of feudal superstition and
intolerance. In politics and religion he was born, like certain of the
damned in "Dante's Inferno," with his head turned backwards by
destiny. A quarrelsome student, a haughty noble, pleased only with his
lands and with the privileges a