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Updated: June 19, 2025
On the other hand, the nation is doomed to suffer which bases its traditions of greatness upon such acts as the seizure of Silesia by Frederick or Bismarck's manipulation of the Ems telegram.
This was not Bismarck's plan; he fulfilled all the technical requirements in the strictest way; he carefully abstained from any action which he could not justify by an appeal to the letter of the Constitution; the government of the country was carried on with vigour and success; he allowed no loophole by which his opponents might injure his influence with the King.
Hans Blum is obviously a partisan of the great Chancellor's, but he may also be referred to for a fairly connected account of the fall and the events that succeeded it up to the time of Bismarck's death on July 30, 1898. Apart from the differences in the ages and temperaments of the Emperor and the Chancellor, there were differences in their views as to certain measures of policy.
The wars against Denmark, Austria, and France would hardly have taken place without Bismarck's initiative. Even under a most wretched government which commits the grossest blunders great states can exist for a long time; but advancement, real progress is only possible through the intervention of a strong personality." "I am not quite of your opinion.
Bismarck used to say that, under the Triple Alliance, an Italian bugler and drummer boy posted on the Franco-Italian frontier would immobilise four French Army Corps. The Alliance disappointed the expectations of Bismarck's successors.
But the Ambassador's second telegram was held back several hours and did not reach its destination until the mischief was irremediable. That curious incident is of a piece with the Bismarck's Ems telegram. It is by such devices that the German Government is wont to launch into war.
One wonders, as one pokes about in odd corners of Germany even now, whether Herder's caustic contempt, and Bismarck's cavalry boots, have made every German proud to be a German, as now he surely ought to be. The tribal feeling still exists there. Fichte's lectures on Nationality were suppressed and Fichte himself looked upon askance.
In considering Bismarck's diplomatic work we must not suppose that he ever deceived himself into thinking that he would be able clearly to foresee all that would happen; he knew too well the uncertain nature of the pieces with which he had to deal: no one could quite foretell, for instance, the result of the struggle which was going on in the English Ministry or the votes of the House of Commons; equally impossible was it to build on the assurances of Napoleon.
In 1866, under the breath of ministerial arguments and oratorical onslaughts Napoleon III.'s policy weakly wavered, thereby giving to Bismarck's statecraft a decisive triumph all along the line. Bismarck replied to this challenge of the French orator by publishing five days later the hitherto secret military alliances concluded with the South German States in August 1866.
He will exert all his energies to remove every obstacle from out of the way of his poorer brethren; he will preach wise economy, and facilitate it by personal sacrifices and legislative inducements; but he will not tempt the government of his country to act as a second providence for the operative classes. Quite the reverse is Bismarck's opinion.
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