which would secure it against attack from without. Knowing that attack could come only from France in a possible alliance with Russia, he drew Austria and Italy with Germany into a triple alliance (1879) against any assault, meanwhile manifesting his own policy as distinctly one of peace for Europe. Fearing the influence of the Church of Rome as rivalling the power of the state with its doctrine of papal infallibility, he was led-most observers deem unfortunately-into the long and bitter struggle with the Vatican known as the Kulturkampf. Under his lead, laws of great severity, known as the Falk laws or May laws, were passed by parliament, beginning in 1873, by which many hundred Jesuits were banished and several Roman Catholic bishops were imprisoned for refusal of obedience, and many schools and churches were closed. Whether right or wrong in his theories as to danger from ecclesiastics, and however irritating may have been the papal claims, his measures amounted to persecution and a campaign against conscience, and therefore failed; and after a few years they were modified on grounds of political expediency, though it was not until December 1, 1893, that the anti-Jesuit decree of July, 1873, was formally stricken from the statute-book. A conciliatory policy on both sides resulted in what was really a papal victory, which the Pope could well afford to emphasize by conferring on the chancellor in 1886 the decoration of the Order of Christ. Not even the Iron Hand could wield with success the weapon of persecution against any religious sentiment. It was to the chancellor, who never could brook opposition, a grievous discovery that, in at least one sphere the sphere of laws against conscience-the Middle Ages had passed.

The terrifying spectre of Socialism rapidly gathering shape and hovering darkly over Germany, may probably be deemed the occasion for many measures in Bismarck's administrative policy. Whether he saw the spectre justly or not may be a question, though in its earlier German forms it seems indeed not the Socialism which we know as usually claiming a hearing in the court of reason and proposing a line of movements amenable to the law. He saw it, perhaps rightly, in that time and country, as at bottom one with Nihilism and Anarchism or irresistibly verging toward them; and, after finding the spectral foe too elusive and indefinite to be smitten with the Iron Hand, he sought to add to his repressive measures those which should be remedial by removal of its evil causes

in the social and governmental structure. Therefore he proceeded to lighten the burden of direct taxation and to advance home industry by a protective tariff (1879) in contradiction of his former adherence to the theories of the "Manchester school;" to provide state insurance of workingmen against suffering from accidents, poverty, and old age; and to nationalize the Prussian railways, as the first step in nationalizing those of the whole empire. In principle, his scheme was Imperial Socialism, or Nationalism of industries to be developed and administered by the emperor. It has actually involved from time to time measures also of extreme severity against certain Socialistic manifestations unauthorized by government. It is too early to state the result of all this startling policy; though his protective tariff has certainly been followed by an immense decrease in the alarming German emigration to the United States, and, as is believed, by a decided check to the former veering of German Socialists toward Anarchism. As to the annual emigration, it has fallen from 250,000 in 1879 to about 92,000 in 1890 (U. S. census), and to 74,000 in 1892 (as reported).

Other prominent points in his policy were reform in the coinage, readjustment of the fiscal system of the empire as related to that of the several states, and codification of the laws. Most notable and quite inexorable was his insistence that Germany should keep its place at the head of Europe as a military power. In order to this he made constant and unyielding demands for increase of the army on the peace establishment. This body of about half a million of perfectly trained and equipped soldiers, he would have standing always on guard, ready on a day's notice to spring to the frontiernot to aggrandize the empire, but to defend it against the revenge of France or the ambition of Russia. To be called swiftly to the support of these, he would have the great trained reserve; and behind that, for the last desperate resort, the entire nation, whose male citizens are required by law to receive through a period of military service actual training in the art of war. His theory was: -As we shall attack nobody, we shall have peace if we show ourselves so strong that nobody will attack us. 1888 he delivered in the reichstag a memorable speech in support of a measure for adding 700,000 to the war strength of the empire. It was like all his speeches, without rhetorical polish or oratorical attempt; and his

In

voice, always strangely weak for so massive and robust a frame, had not gained power by age; but in its vigorous, trenchant, masterful diction, the speech was a model for direct and powerful expression of thought.

Prince Bismarck had for many years been one of the most laborious workers in Europe. His astounding success compelled him to add administrative tasks of unparalleled difficulty to his momentous diplomacy as minister of foreign affairs. Unless he would see all his work undone he must govern the empire that he had builded. It is no easy task for any man to govern in the nineteenth century on feudal principles, especially one whose nature is imperious, whose will is unbending in its pride, and whose realm is yet but an agglomerated mass of states partially welded in the fierce heat and under the mighty forging-strokes of war. In the adverse circumstances his foreign policy must be pronounced a success scarcely rivalled in all history, To his domestic administration, the same rank cannot be given. It was masterful; it was intensely patriotic; it was as a whole successful; but it was not without evident flaws, some of which ran deep. Annoyance at the balking of his plans at certain points, joined with his herculean labors and vast responsibilities, and with the burden of advancing age, to reduce his strength, though he had retained a vigor scarcely impaired till he had passed his seventieth year. The Emperor William I. died March 8, 1888, at the age of ninety-one years, and when, three months later, his son and successor Frederick William died amid a sympathy that throbbed around the world, leaving the throne, June 15, 1888, to his son William II., twenty-nine years of age, the prince chancellor at the age of seventy-three found himself confronted with a new era.

The young emperor, who wished no instruction from any one, and who early presented himself as one of the eminent public puzzles of this century, may well have seemed to even the astute but wearied Bismarck a problem whose solution he would prefer to leave to time and to other investigators rather than to hasten it actively in his own person. He might well choose to wait till the young man had solved himself. There is no occasion to question William's patriotism of intention; and there can be no question of his entire self-confidence, which, if due to his lack of experience, is curable. We incline to criticize him, and are under much temptation to show our wisdom therein, until we reflect that a bet

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ter wisdom may be in patience and hopefulness. whatever we or the world may hereafter find or miss in him, Bismarck instantly found him impulsive, enthusiastic, chivalric, eager to assume the personal control of all matters relative to the empire, ambitious to emulate the career of Charlemagne and of his own grandfather, speaking like Bismarck himself in the spirit of the middle ages, yet using some words recognizable as the familiar outcries of the very latest extreme of Liberalism. When the emperor, wilful and restive under the restraint of the veteran master-diplomatist, announced his determination to exercise absolute control of all public affairs, and further declared that the rights claimed by Bismarck as chancellor and president of the ministry under the cabinet order of 1852 were an encroachment on the prerogatives of the sovereign, then the creator of the united German empire did the only thing possible-he resigned his offices March 17, 1890, and five days afterward departed from Berlin to his estate at Friedrichsruh. The emperor immediately accepted his resignation, with warm thanks and commendation for his services and assurances of the highest personal esteem, created him duke of Lauenburg (which title he declined), and promoted him to the military rank of field marshal-general. General George Leo von Caprivi de Caprera was appointed his successor as chancellor. Certain criticisms by Bismarck of the policy of the government, caused governmental newspaper organs to threaten legal prosecution, to which he naturally replied with defiant assertion of his liberty of speech.

The break between the two men was as unavoidable in its occurrence as it was unfortunate in its manner and incidents. The old man, imperious by nature and for twenty-five years the virtual dictator of the realm, could not easily divest himself of his unlimited power. The young man could not be expected to concede his sovereign right; though indeed, had he been less eager and more judicious, he might have asserted himself gradually instead of with a single, sudden stroke.

The prince in his retirement was still a commanding figure in the thought of the German people, who had not failed to note some recent slights of him on public occasions which seemed almost vindictive. Whether as a measure to please the public sentiment, or as the dictate of a magnanimous nature, or more probably as both combined, the emperor resolved that the aged statesman

should not end his days without at least a personal reconciliation with the man who owed to him his imperial throne. An urgent invitation was sent him to visit the emperor's palace at Berlin. Bismarck, with whom loyalty to his sovereign had been through life a cardinal principle, could do nothing else than obey an invitation which from a soldier's superior officer was also a command. He came January 26, 1894. The whole city rose to meet him and to display the signals of popular regard. The demonstration was overwhelming. The emperor went to the utmost point allowable to the etiquette of his rank in his warm welcome and his respectful attention to his guest. The whole incident, though probably without any intended political bearing, was most refreshing and happy in its general indications and in its popular effect.

Prince Bismarck has already taken his permanent place among the wonders of the world's history. Wonder, however, will be due not to any mystery in which the man enveloped himself and his plans and his guiding principles, nor to any cheap theatrical display with which he sought to amaze or beguile the minds of men. He was indeed strategist enough not to advertise the details of his purpose and so to subject it to defeat; and his career was indeed dramatic enough for the great stage on which embattled nations are the actors. But the man himself was too proud to be vain; too haughty to seek popular applause, which he knew to be but the breath of the moment; too conscious of his reserves of inner power to be other than scornful of adverse opinions; too large to put his main trust in secresy and in the intrigues that are the natural paths of petty souls. His frankness was always the amazement of all that had to do with him, and served him often for a sufficient concealment. In a conference of diplomatists, when he perceived that all were full of lies, he would sometimes utter the exact truth, sure that all present would instantly convince themselves that his intention was the exact opposite of his words. It is not strange that he believed in truth: it served him. He was lacking not in strength of conscience, but only in that symmetry and spiritual equipment of conscience wherewith the conscience is able to discriminate itself from the will and to act freely in that realm whose laws are not cold justice but the golden links of a divine and universal sympathy. Beyond narrow, well-defined limits he showed no genius for sympathy. The wonder in his case is like that