Wolfgang Menzel

“ Architecture flourished during the Middle Ages, painting at the time of the Reformation, and music in modern times. The same spirit that spoke to the eye in the eternal stone now breathed in transient melody to the ear. The science of music, transported by Dutch artists into Italy, had been there assiduously cultivated; the Italians had speedily surpassed their masters, and had occupied themselves with the creation of a peculiar church-music and of the profane opera, while the Netherlands and the whole of Germany were convulsed by bloody religious wars. ”

“ In those times of Germany's deepest degradation and suffering, men for the first time again heard speak of a great and common fatherland, of national fame and honor; and liberty, that glorious name, was uttered not only by those who groaned beneath the rule of the despotic foreigner, but even by those who deplored the loss of the internal liberty of their country, the gradual subjection of the proud and free-spirited German to native tyranny. ”

“ Have your taxes been thereby decreased? Do you enjoy greater security in your persons and property?" The proclamation of the Archduke Charles "to the German nation," declared: "We have taken up arms to restore independence and national honor to Germany. Our cause is the cause of Germany. Show yourselves deserving of our esteem! The German, forgetful of what is due to himself and to his country, is our only foe." An anonymous but well-known proclamation also declared: "Austria beheld—a sight that drew tears of blood from the heart of every true-born German—you, O nations of Germany! ”

“ Napoleon's star was on the wane, whole nations stood like to a dark and ominous cloud threatening on the horizon, and Count Metternich prudently chose rather to attempt to guide the storm ere it burst than trust to a falling star. Austria had, as early as the 27th of June, 1813, signed a treaty, at Reichenbach in Silesia, with Russia and Prussia, by which she bound herself to declare war against France, in case Napoleon had not, before the 20th of July, accepted the terms of peace about to be proposed to him. ”

“ This great object, free from every interested motive and therefore alone worthy of their Majesties, has solely induced the advance and solely guides the movements of their armies.—These armies, led by generals under the eyes of both monarchs, trust in an omnipotent, just God, and hope to free the whole world and Germany irrevocably from the disgraceful yoke they have so gloriously thrown off. They press forward animated by enthusiasm. Their watchword is 'Honor and Liberty.' May every German, desirous of proving himself worthy of the name, speedily and spiritedly join their ranks. ”

“ Footnote 9: "How can France, with her solemn assurances of liberty, arbitrarily interfere with the government of a country already possessing a representative elected by the people? How can she proclaim us as a free nation, and, at the same moment, deprive us of our liberty? Will she establish a new mythology of nations, and divide the different peoples on the face of the earth, according to their strength, into nations and demi-nations?"—Protest of the Provisional Council of the City of Brussels. ”

“ Prussia was still too much weakened, her fortresses were still in the hands of the French, and Austria inspired but little confidence, while the Rhenish confederation solely aimed at aggrandizing itself by fresh wars at the expense of that empire, and, notwithstanding the inclination to revolt evinced by the people in different parts of Germany, more particularly in Westphalia, the terror inspired by Napoleon kept them, as though spellbound, beneath their galling yoke. ”

“ Napoleon's grand army was scattered over the boundless snow-covered steppes, whose dreary monotony was solely broken by some desolate half-burned village. Gaunt forms of famine, wan, hollow-eyed, wrapped in strange garments of misery, skins, women's clothes, etc., and with long-grown beards, dragged their faint and weary limbs along, fought for a dead horse whose flesh was greedily torn from the carcass, murdered each other for a morsel of bread, and fell one after the other in the deep snow, never again to rise. Bones of frozen corpses lay each morn around the dead ashes of the night fires. ”

“ England, grounded, as upon a rock, on her self-gained constitution, produced men of the rarest genius in all the higher walks of science and literature, and her philosophers, naturalists, historians, and poets exercised the happiest influence over their Teutonic brethren, who sought to regain from them the vigor of which they had been deprived by France. The power and national learning of Germany break forth in Klopstock, whose genius vainly sought a natural garb and was compelled to assume a borrowed form. ”

“ The popular feeling at that time prevalent throughout Switzerland was, however, of far greater import than these petty events. The oligarchies had everywhere suppressed public opinion; the long peace had slackened the martial ardor of the people; the ridiculous affectation of ancient heroic language brought into vogue by John Muller rendered the contrast yet more striking, and, on the outburst of the French Revolution, the tyrannized Swiss peasantry naturally threw themselves into the arms of the French, the aristocracy into those of the Austrians. ”

“ A great change had, meanwhile, taken place in France. The republic existed merely in name. The first consul, Bonaparte, already possessed regal power. The world beheld with astonishment a nation that had so lately and so virulently persecuted royalty, so dearly bought and so strictly enforced its boasted liberty, suddenly forget its triumph and restore monarchy. Liberty had ceased to be in vogue, and had yielded to a general desire for the acquisition of fame. The equality enforced by liberty was offensive to individual vanity, and the love of gain and luxury opposed republican poverty. ”

“ Austria had, notwithstanding her successive and numerous defeats, retained the greater share of independence, but her subjection, although to a lesser degree, was the more disgraceful on account of her former military glory and her preponderance as a political power in Germany. With steady perseverance and unfaltering courage she opposed the attacks of the foreign tyrant against the empire, and, France's first and last antagonist, the most faithful champion of the honor of Germany, she rose, with redoubled vigor, after each successive defeat, to renew the unequal struggle. ”

“ General Buxhovden overran Finland, inciting the people, as he advanced, to revolt against their lawful sovereign. But the brave Finlanders stoutly resisted the attempted imposition of the yoke of the barbarous Russ, and, although ill-supported by Sweden, performed prodigies of valor. Gustavus Adolphus was devoid of military knowledge, and watched, as if sunk in torpor, the ill-planned operations of his generals. While the flower of the Swedish troops was uselessly employed against Denmark and Norway, Finland was allowed to fall into the grasp of Russia. ”

“ The natural wit of the people, sharpened by daily oppression and emboldened by Voltaire's unsparing ridicule of objects hitherto held sacred, found ample food in the policy pursued by the government, and ridicule became the weapon with which the tiers-etat revenged the tyranny of the higher classes. As learning spread, the deeds of other nations, who had happily and gloriously cast off the yoke of their oppressors, became known to the people. The names of the patriots of Greece and Rome passed from mouth to mouth, and their actions became the theme of the rising generation ”

“ The light in which Stein viewed the Saxons may be gathered from the following passages in his letters: "My desire for the aggrandizement of Prussia proceeded not from a blind partiality to that state, but from the conviction that Germany is weakened by a system of partition ruinous alike to her national learning and national feelings."—"It is not for Prussia but for Germany that I desire a closer, a firmer internal combination, a wish that will accompany me to the grave: the division of our national strength may be gratifying to others, it never can be so to me." ”

“ Scarcely has the policy that made such immense concessions to Russian diplomacy, and scarcely has the party spirit that looked for salvation for Germany from France, yielded to a more elevated feeling of self-respect. And yet, whoever should say to the people of Alsace, Switzerland, and Holland, "Ye are Germans," would reap but derision and insult. Germany is on the point of being once more divided into Catholic and Protestant Germany, and no one can explain how the German Customs' Union is to extend to the German Ocean, on account of the restrictions mutually imposed by the Germans. ”

“ The decree of the imperial diet can scarcely be regarded as the ignominious close of a good old time, but rather as a violent but beneficial incisure in an old and rankling sore. With the petty states, a mass of vanity and pedantry disappeared on the one side, pusillanimity and servility on the other; the ideas of the subjects of a large state have naturally a wider range; the monasteries, those dens of superstition, the petty princely residences, those hotbeds of French vice and degeneracy, the imperial free towns, those abodes of petty burgher prejudice, no longer existed. ”

“ The more closely this work, in principle, features and outline, coincides with the once distinct character of the German nation, the more surely will united Germany retake her place with renovated and redoubled vigor among the empires of Europe.—His Majesty and his ally, between whom there reigns a perfect accordance in the sentiments and views hereby explained, are at all times ready to exert their utmost power in pursuance of their sacred aim, the liberation of Germany from a foreign yoke.—May France, strong and beauteous in herself, henceforward seek to consolidate her internal prosperity! ”

“ The English, aided by a large portion of the French population devoted to the ancient monarchy, attacked France by sea, and made a simultaneous descent on the northern and southern coasts. The Spanish and Portuguese troops crossed the Pyrenees; the Italian princes invaded the Alpine boundary; Austria, Prussia, Holland, and the German empire threatened the Rhenish frontier, while Sweden and Russia stood frowning in the background. The whole of Christian Europe took up arms against France, and enormous armies hovered, like vultures, around their prey. ”

“ A nation's self-forgetfulness is ever productive of national disgrace. The Netherlands were torn from the empire and placed partly beneath the tyranny of Spain, partly beneath the aegis of France; the dominion of Austria, at a later period, merely served to rouse their provincial spirit, and, during their subsequent annexation to France, the French element decidedly gained the ascendency among the population. When, in 1815, these provinces fell under the rule of Holland, it was hoped that the German element would again rise. But Holland is not Germany. ”

“ Napoleon, on his entry into Berlin, was received, not, as at Vienna, with mute rage, but with loud demonstrations of delight. Individuals belonging to the highest class stationed themselves behind the crowd and exclaimed, "For God's sake, give a hearty hurrah! Cry Vive l'empereur! or we are all lost." On a demand, couched in the politest terms, for the peaceable delivery of the arms of the civic guard, being made by Hulin, the new French commandant, to the magistrate, the latter, on his own accord, ordered the citizens to give up their arms "under pain of death." ”