with the crown or with
the royal counselors. The Prussian monarchy has, consequently, passed
through the revolutionary period without abandoning its political
leadership of the Prussian state. It has created a national
representative body; but it has not followed the English example and
allowed such a body to tie its hands; and it has remained, consequently,
the most completely responsible and representative monarchy in Europe.

Up to the present time this responsibility and power have on the whole
been deserved by the manner in which they have been exercised. German
nationality as an efficient political and economic force has been
wrought by skillful and patriotic management out of materials afforded
by military and political opportunities and latent national ties and
traditions. During the eighteenth century the Prussian monarchy came to
understand that the road to effective political power in Germany was by
way of a military efficiency, disproportionate to the resources and
population of the Kingdom. In this way it was able to take advantage of
almost every important crisis to increase its dominion and its
prestige. Neither was Prussian national efficiency built up merely by a
well-devised and practicable policy of military aggression. The Prussian
monarchy had the good sense to accept the advice of domestic reformers
during its period of adversity, and so contributed to the economic
liberation and the educational training of its subjects. Thus the modern
German nation has been at bottom the work of admirable leadership on the
part of officially responsible leaders; and among those leaders the man
who planned most effectively and accomplished the greatest results was
Otto von Bismarck.

* * * * *

It requires a very special study of European history after 1848 to
understand how bold, how original, how comprehensive, and how adequate
for their purpose Bismarck's ideas and policy gradually became; and it
requires a very special study of Bismarck's own biography to understand
that his personal career, with all its transformations, exhibits an
equally remarkable integrity. The Bismarck of from 1848 to 1851 is
usually described as a country squire, possessed by obscurantist
mediaeval ideas wholly incompatible with his own subsequent policy. But
while there are many superficial contradictions between the country
squire of 1848 and the Prussian Minister and German Chancellor, the
really pec