Heinrich Karl Schmitt

“ Unwieldy began to become the mass of the returned and wandering soldiers. Out of the great garrison localities into the capital, out of the capital into the villages. . . .and from the fronts into the interior. Not only were physical diseases communicated, but the pathological contagion of acts of coarseness impregnated into the nature during years of war. Threatening voices waxed loud. And ever more men poured in a satanic mass of undefined force whirled about the entire land, shaking like an earthquake all that stood. ”

“ It is no longer justified to describe as criminal everyone who in some measure stands apart from the Revolution. But especially blameable is it to offer to foreign countries the spectacle, the inevitable spectacle, of the same known individual, who has torn them to shreds in his enmity, being himself torn to shreds with the same enmity of criticism. ”

“ Ever sharper blazed up the flame of resistance which Hungary—people and independent parties—opposed to Felix Austria, and the first greater conflicts between Budapest and Vienna arose. Their origin is in the soul of the Hungarian nation, which with difficulty forgets. 1848 sprang out of the predicament into which Austrian speculation drove Hungary's industry, and blow upon blow was added to the quarrel. Who, engaged in strife, can claim Right as his sole objective? ”

“ Count Julius Andràssy is a personage of European fame, whom Hungary is impotent to abolish politically: he can only be deprived of power, which, however, does not touch his worth. To so violent a belittling of him the logical retort abroad must have been, how then was it possible that this man, if he really had all the faults ascribed with shrieks to him, could have been for ten years the political leader that he was. The reply that it was all politics-by-force is unjust. Andràssy has known how to make himself, to maintain, and even quite highly to distinguish himself, as a politician ”

“ I had the impression that it was a puppet. But I soon saw my mistake, for, though men often speak like puppets, this puppet on the contrary spoke so clear and manlike, that he was keenly listened to. The constable spoke as a man of the people to the people. In some seconds jubilation was resounding over the place. A constable who was about, and yet arrested nobody, accosted nobody with blows and roughness. . . .the crowd was enchanted. The police, then, were on their side. ”

“ Men look like falling at present into the horrible mistake of driving a strong people to despair, of isolating, of strangling it, for the sake of certain systems—systems already shattered by the people itself—for the sake of certain persons or tendencies. The final consequence can only be pointed at as catastrophic.
What is at present being done by the small members of the Entente is a threat to European civilisation.
The Hungarian problem must be solved. The once Hungary is gone, and is most hated in Hungary itself. ”

“ Let men beware of such papers: and if to-day the Smallest of the Small with inflated arrogance regard the Fourteen Points, too, as merely "a scrap of paper," let not the catastrophe be lost sight of in the grotesque. A little more veering on the side of the Entente, a little more complacence and toleration must, as far as one can see, invoke an inner crisis in Hungary, essentially Hungarian and momentous, whose incertitudes the elements that aspire to Bolshevism will certainly take advantage of to their ends. ”

“ A troop of soldiers, who had tendered allegiance to the National Council, had marched to the Maria Theresa Barracks to overcome it. The first bloodshed was impending. Indescribable excitement: motors shot by hard on the skirts of the crowd, men in wild haste climbed the stairs, an unspeakable intensity filled all men and things. The National Council had been sitting in permanence for days now. All decisions were rapidly made. The fight at the barracks must be prevented. ”

“ He had much guilt in the matter of the war, doubtless very much guilt. Others, too: and precisely many among those who fell with wild howls upon the corpse and, anxious for themselves, damned the dead, to help the living to their "rights." Even in the first press comments was evidenced a lack of backbone not to have been expected from the numberless creatures who had basked in the sunshine of his power. They left the dead unburied, although they had sung praises to the living unconditionally, even when those praises were a shameful fraud on the people and betrayal of the truth. ”

“ The political constellations have transformed themselves; people who wish to have a hand in things will naturally have to adapt themselves: but proof by negation is ever a weak way of reasoning. The voice of the people does not now allow of entering into any understanding with any name of the old school; but the denial of genuine human worth is lamentable, and I pity the busy reporter (who in Budapest is too often permitted to meddle in politics) , because of his problem whether he shall pander to the mood of the moment, or shall follow his proper calling, which may run counter to that mood. ”

“ While the Emperor-King, far from the theatre of events, withdrew himself, full of anxiety, in the critical hours, while decisions as to the destinies of generations were being made over the telephone, the Press joined in with the general opinion. A world of stinging criticism whipped the shortcomings of the régime that called itself the government. ”

“ It was satisfactory to see in these hours how the Revolution made innumerable people its unselfish friends—not friends in theory merely, but men with strong arms who were ready to prevent any discredit attaching to what had been won, and, withstanding a thousand temptations, remained true to their service in the cause of order. ”

“ Brute force undisguised, scorn, derision, abuse, hailed upon the young Hungary, attacked for hoer past, although no land can more thoroughly expiate the sins of the past, and even herself judge them, than Hungary. ”

“ The Emperor-King had become fond of the jewel of the love and warm co-operation of the people, even while he let himself be led ever farther into half-measures—in spite of a marked and quite genuine love of peace. ”

“ In the countries of the late revolutions, with national representations forming a centralised system, the intention to retain power in their own hands has been made evident; but in the young Hungary there was a better way discovered, and it was the National Council itself which devolved every sort of executive function, and reserved for itself only the clearly defined, political duties which, as the point of organisation of the Revolution, belonged to it. ”

“ I went along the Donauquai, and, before the Parliament House, remembered the monster demonstration, which had passed off quietly, but only thanks to the merit of the crowd, for all had been done to goad the people to frenzy. This demonstration for Kàrolyi, whose aim was merely to convince the "ruling classes" that Kàrolyi was the only man in whose person all confidence was concentrated, presented a distressing picture. ”

“ If against all the arguments of reason and logic a chaos were created in Hungary, such a thing must result in an ever new conflagration. The intention of putting essentially Magyat districts under foreign rule, an intention evident enough in the violent steps then taken, will, if persisted, in, lead to the severest conflicts, and besides, stop development in the industrial direction. There will arise a new Balkans, a second Balkans, and therewith a second hot-bed of crises, and what this prospect promises for the future can be well enough measured by the past. ”

“ He evinced a clear understanding and keen discernment, and riot to the least part of the worth of his personality are to be attributed many sympathies which Hungary now enjoys. Andràssy is now a branch sawn off, and the former régime of force has now emphatically become an affair of personal politics. But to want to make a Jack-pudding of a man whom the outer world values, respects, prizes, and looks upon as a representative person, of a man, in short, of the statesman-class by his innate capacity—this is a beginning that can only result in discredit. ”

“ Heavy military motors hummed about the streets, echoes of numerous shots cracked from the walls, electric vehicles stood abandoned about the streets, like children's playthings of which they have become tired, soldiers gay with flowers were going about the city, and the people were tutoying one another. ”

“ The Entente should clearly understand that Hungary is the solidest of the fore-Balkan countries and, whatever the opinion may be at present, I hardly think that any one intimate with the facts could be found who would venture to deny that the Magyars are more culturally advanced than the Roumanians, Servians, Croats, Bulgarians, Slovaks and Mixed Races, more advanced, not only in respect of their knowledge of the alphabet, as clearly proved by statistics, but also especially as regards writing, newspaper circulation, respect for culture, and extent, of culture. ”

“ I wound among a throng that one could hardly see over, people eating, chattering, enjoying themselves. It was as if all these people in a body wanted to insist that they could be gay. . . .Arm in arm we went thence through the Inner Town, which seemed quite deserted. Toward half-past nine we went back to the Gizellatér, in a house of which the Kàrolyi-party had their quarters—some rooms quite modestly furnished.
Before the house were some people, but still there might have been no party headquarters there. Slowly assembled a small throng of men. ”

“ The Social Democrats filled their office with the greatest political self-control, and I heard from a really well-informed source that in these critical days no kind of difficulties had been made by any Party—difficulties whose consequences no one could have foreseen, because not only must they have brought with them the paralysis of the Administration, but the splitting of the energies of the labouring masses. ”

“ Some gendarmes were coming up on a huge motor-wagon, to take the oath of fealty to the National Council. The hated tuft-of-feathers was received as an enemy, someone cried out that they were coming against the people, and in the next instant fell the first sharp shots—well-aimed. ”

“ I hold, then, that the uncontested cultural superiority of the Magyars as compared with most of the minority nationalities—there were majorities in Hungary only in tho local sense, not on the whole—this superiority which by itself fashioned the Revolution, though the impulse to its explosion must have been given by the Nationalities, for from of old it is not the oppressor, the holder of power, who proceeds to revolution, but the Opposition—this superiority, I say, must form the basis for the settlement of the questions in dispute. ”

“ Hungary's revolution was the historical consequence of a biological principle. The sick place had to be removed by operation: a non-national Government, which managed the affairs of an Empire without any relation to the people, which throughout its whole structure was antediluvian in its reactionary trend, had, in the atmosphere of our time, to perish. ”

“ The Government, the National Council and the People had united here, and amid cares and trials, to support which a high love of country raises human strength, the foundation was laid on which is built Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. ”

“ That the Revolution should throw up some very curious people is almost a matter of course. Some sudden idea, indeed, is enough in such times to "make" a man. Beside phenomena of importance rose others of small account, arose and at once began to go under. ”

“ A man is only a man, and genius is powerless against the hydrophobia. Only some months earlier Kàrolyi could in truth have effected something, when, relying on a half-integral military power, he might have concluded a well-merited separate peace. ”

“ Against the Czech aspirations is to be set, not only the matter of fact that Slovakia is by no means Czechia, but also the fact that at any rate a great majority of the Slovaks—in spite of the most furious instigation—do not at all wish to become Czechish, but desire an independent Slovak Republic, whose Government was, already constituted. ”

“ Szterényi and Kursgenossen—were Count Andràssy, acting in Vienna, as Minister of the Exterior, and some gentlemen of the ancien régime, who as a body were exposed to the fiercest attacks.
At the time I thought to myself that this had to happen, in order to nip in the bud any possibility of the cropping up of conservative tendencies, this being accomplished by presenting every person at all prominent in an impossible light: I saw in it a system of self-defence through attack. ”

“ In the Hungarian Province the organised working-class at once set to work, and, from what I heard from the most diverse parts of the country, they contributed worthily to the support of the statement, which is hardly to be denied, that the Hungarian and German elements, among all the nationals of the country, evinced most discipline and self-culture. The Germans of Hungary, with their sobriety and sureness of comprehension, were solid supports of order in the first days of the new time. ”

“ Through sudden cries, through music and song, and gay men, and weary-grown thoughts, I made my way through to a better hope for the People, that is wondrous good in its heart and soul, that unspoiled and staunch and simple stands by its kind, that haggles in words, but is bountiful at heart, as once only sovereigns could be. ”

“ The Balkans were an eternal conflagration, while Hungary was the sure home of tranquility. A considerable railway system was operating beneficially in an industrial sense, a fast developing industry was improving the adjustment of imports and exports—and the root of the trouble was the conflict of nationalities, was the former oppression of them. Precisely this cardinal cause is now removed, is for ever put aside. The fullest autonomy is assured to the Nationalities. ”

“ Underneath the window of the National Council quarters in the Hotel Astoria, from whose balconies speakers without intermission wrought pacifically upon the crowd and lowered its temperature. An extract of the population of Budapest was in flux: clerks, workmen, servants, officers, ladies—every class. ”

“ Especially now that it could be fairly assumed that the Revolution was safe from the attacks of reaction, having considerable armed force at its disposal—especially now came out the shrinkers, who had not wished to venture all in the first moments. And precisely these came with the loudest words and the liveliest gestures. In this respect Man—that sort of Man—remains ever like himself. ”