. Not even in Russia, perhaps, were the reins of power
held in the hands of so few men as in Germany and Austria-Hungary.

A few years before the World War started one of the leading European
statesmen told me that there was everything to be feared for the
future of Europe where some three hundred millions, the inhabitants
of Russia, Germany and Austria-Hungary, about two-thirds of the whole
continent, were governed in an almost irresponsible manner by a man
without will or intelligence, the Tsar of Russia; a madman without a
spark of genius, the German Kaiser, and an obstinate old man hedged in
by his ambition, the Emperor of Austria-Hungary. Not more than
thirty persons, he added, act as a controlling force on these three
irresponsible sovereigns, who might assume, on their own initiative,
the most terrible responsibilities.

The magnificent spiritual gifts of the Germans gave them an Emanuel
Kant, the greatest thinker of modern times, Beethoven, their greatest
exponent of music, and Goethe, their greatest poet. But the imperial
Germany which came after the victory of 1870 had limited the spirit of
independence even in the manifestations of literature and art. There
still existed in Germany the most widely known men of science, the
best universities, the most up-to-date schools; but the clumsy
mechanism tended to crush rather than to encourage all personal
initiative. Great manifestations of art or thought are not possible
without the most ample spiritual liberty. Germany was the most highly
organized country from a scientific point of view, but at the same
time the country in which there was the least liberty for individual
initiative. It went on like a huge machine: that explains why it
almost stopped after being damaged by the war, and the whole life of
the nation was paralysed while there were very few individual impulses
of reaction. Imperial Germany has always been lacking in political
ability, perhaps not only through a temperamental failing, but chiefly
owing to her militaristic education.

Before the War Germany beat her neighbours in all the branches of
human labour: in science, industry, banking, commerce, etc. But in one
thing she did not succeed, and succeeded still less after the War,
namely, in politics. When the German people was blessed with a
political genius, such as Frederick the Great or Bismarck, it achieved
the height of greatness and glory. But when the same people, after
obtaining the maxim