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Page 11
When C�sar made his conquest of Europe, he found the country north of
the Alps in the possession of two races--both Aryan. These two races
were as unlike then as they are now. The Gauls west of the Rhine were
proper material for the reception of Roman rule; but the Germans
beyond the Rhine were not receptive of any rule but their own. The
Gallic races became Romanized. Gaul was a part of the Roman Empire and
reasoning from the facts, we should have expected the Gaulish nations
to develop into the imperial form.
For like reason we should expect the Teutonic races to develop into
the greatest democracy of the modern world. Contrary to this double
expectation, we have a French Republic and a German Empire. In 1870
the Gallic race became suddenly democratic, and at the same time the
Germans became the greatest imperialists among civilized mankind! The
German Empire has arisen where we should have expected a democracy;
and the French Republic has arisen where we should have expected an
Empire.
The illogical Empire lies alongside of the illogical Republic. They
have a line of demarkation which, though drawn on the map, is not
drawn on the ground. The great antagonistic facts touch each other
through a long line of territorial extent, but the ethnic diversity
does not permit political union. The Teuton and the Gaul continue to
touch, but they are not one, and cannot be. Two neighbors living
between Verdun and Metz are only a quarter of a mile apart. They
cultivate their grounds in the same manner, raise the same fruits,
have vines growing on the two sides of the same trellis. They speak
the same language, exchange gossip and poultry; but their children do
not go to the same school! One of them is a French democrat; the
other, a German imperialist!
The reason for this reversal of expectation, by which the anticipated
institutions of France are found in Germany and those of Germany in
France, is this: It seems to be a law of human progress that mankind
moves forward by reactions against its own preceding conditions; that
is, Progress disappoints History _by doing the other thing_! The
French race has done the other thing; and so has the German race! They
who should have been logically the imperialists of Western Europe are
the republicans and democrats. They who should have been logically the
democrats and republicans of Europe--who should have converted
Germania into the greatest democracy of the world--have accepted
instead the most absolute empire. The phrase "German _Empire_" is, we
think, the greatest paradox of modern history; and the phrase "French
_Republic_" is another like it. But history has decreed it so; and the
reason is that human progress works out its highest results by doing
the other thing!
But this philosophical speculation or interpretation does not trouble
either the French or the Germans. They both seem to rejoice at what
has come to pass, and do not trouble themselves about the logistics of
history. They celebrate their quarter centennials, the one for the
Republic, and the other for the Empire, with profound enthusiasm,
shouting, _Vive_ for the one and _Hoch_ for the other with an
impulsive patriotism that has come down to them with the blood of
their respective races from before the Christian era!
Great Battles.
TRAFALGAR.
Lord Byron in his celebrated apostrophe to the ocean could hardly omit
a reference to the most destructive conflict of naval warfare within
the present century. In one of his supreme stanzas he reserves
Trafalgar for the climax:
"The armaments which thunderstrike the walls
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake
And monarchs tremble in their capitals,
The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make
Their clay creator the vain title take
Of lord of thee and arbiter of war,--
These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake,
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar
Alike the Armada's pride or spoils of Trafalgar."
The battle of Trafalgar, preceding by forty-two days the battle of
Austerlitz, holds the same relation to British ascendancy on the ocean
that Napoleon's victory over the Emperors Alexander and Francis held
to the French ascendancy on Continental Europe. Henceforth Great
Britain, according to her national hymn, "ruled the wave;" henceforth,
until after Waterloo, France ruled the land. Up to this date, namely,
1805, French ambition had reached as far as the dominion of the sea.
It appears that Napoleon himself had no genius for naval warfare, but
his ambition included the ocean; coincidently with his accession to
the Imperial throne a great fleet was prepared and placed under
command of Admiral Villeneuve for the recovery of the Mediterranean.
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