life of Germany. Austria, although associated with the Empire, could no longer feel sure of her predominance, and it was inevitable that the jealousies of the two states should lead to a final conflict for supremacy. Even before the Seven Years' War there were signs that the German people were beginning to tire of incessant imitation of France, for in literature they welcomed the early efforts of Klopstock, Wieland and Lessing; but the movement received a powerful impulse from the great deeds of Frederick. The nation, as a whole, was proud of him, and began, for the first time since the Thirty Years' War, to feel that it might once more assume a commanding place in the world. Partition of Poland. In 1772 the necessities of Frederick's position compelled him to join Russia and Austria in the deplorable partition of Poland, whereby he gained West Prussia, exclusive of Danzig and Thorn, and Austria acquired West Silesia. After this he had to watch closely the movements of the emperor Joseph II., who, although an ardent admirer of Frederick, was anxious to restore to Austria the greatness she had partially lost. The younger branch of the Wittelsbach line, which had hitherto possessed Bavaria, having died out in Joseph II. 1777, Joseph asserted claims to part of its territory. Frederick intervened, and although no battle was fought in the nominal war which followed, the emperor was obliged to content himself with a very unimportant concession. He made a second attempt in 1785, but Frederick again came forward. This time he formed a league (Fürstenbund) for the defence of the imperial constitution, and it was joined by the majority of the small states. The memory of this league was almost blotted out by the tremendous events which soon absorbed the attention of Germany and the world, but it truly indicated the direction of the political forces which were then at work beneath the surface, and which long afterwards triumphed. The formation of the league was a distinct attempt on the part of Prussia to make herself the centre for the national aspirations both of northern and of southern Germany, French Revolu tion. The French Revolution was hailed by many of the best minds of Germany as the opening of a new era. Among the princes it excited horror and alarm, and in 1792 the emperor Leopold II. and Frederick William II., the unworthy successor of Frederick the Great, met at Pillnitz, and agreed to support by arms the cause of the French king. A more important resolution was never taken. It plunged Europe into a conflict which cost millions of lives, and which overthrew the entire states system of the continent. Germany herself was the principal sufferer. The structure which the princes had so laboriously built up crumbled into ruins, and the mistakes of centuries were expiated in an agony of disaster and humiliation. End of the Holy Roman Empire. of Napoleon for the Empire was illustrated by his occupation of Prussia defeated at Jena. Germany now seemed fairly in the grip of Napoleon. Early in November 1806 he had contemptuously deposed the elector of Hesse and added his dominions to Jerome's kingdom Napoleon of Westphalia; on the 21st of the same month he in power. issued from Berlin the famous decree establishing the "continental system," which, by forbidding all trade with England, threatened German commerce with ruin. His triumph seemed complete when, on the 11th of October 1807, Metternich signed at Fontainebleau, on behalf of Austria, a convention that conceded all his outstanding claims, and seemed to range the Habsburg monarchy definitely on his side. There was, however, to be one final struggle before Napoleon's supremacy was estab lished. The submission of Austria had been but an expedient for gaining time; under Count Stadion's auspices she set to work increasing and reorganizing her forces; and when it became clear from Napoleon's resentment that he was meditating fresh designs against her she declared war (1809). The campaign ended in the crushing defeat of Wagram (July 6) and the humiliat ing treaty of peace dictated by Napoleon at the palace of Schönbrunn in Vienna (October 14). Austria, shorn of her fairest provinces, robbed of her oversea commerce, bankrupt and surrounded on all sides by the territories of the French emperor and his allies, seemed to exist only on sufferance, and had ceased to have any effective authority in Germany-now absolutely in the power of Napoleon, who proved this in 1810 by annexing the whole of the northern coast as far as the Elbe The states of the Empire joined Austria and Prussia, and, had there been hearty co-operation between the allies, they could scarcely have failed of success.. While the war was in progress, in 1793, Prussia joined Russia in the second partition of Poland. Austria considered herself overreached, and began negotiations with Russia for the third and final partition, which was effected by the three powers in 1795. Prussia, irritated by the proceedings of her rival, did as little as possible in the war with France; and in 1795 she retired from the struggle, and by the treaty of Basel ceded to the French republic her possessions on the left bank of the Rhine. The war was continued by Austria, but her power was so effectually shattered by blow after blow that in 1797 she was forced to conclude the peace of Campo Formio. Napoleon Bonaparte, to whose genius the triumph of France was mainly due, began separate negotiations with the states of the Empire at Rastadt; but, before terms could be agreed upon, war again began in 1799, Austria acting on this occasion as the ally of Great Britain and Russia. She was beaten, and the peace of Lunéville added fresh humiliations to those imposed upon her by the previous war. France now obtained the whole of the left bank of the Rhine, the dispossessed princes being compensated by grants of secularized church lands and of mediatized imperial cities (1803). The contempt I to his empire. Germany. The very completeness of the humiliation of Germany was | princes for the restoration of their "liberties," no attempt was the means of her deliverance. She had been taught self-respect made to reverse the essential changes in the territorial disposition by Frederick II., and by her great writers in literature of Germany made during the revolutionary epoch. Of the Revival of and philosophy; it was felt to be intolerable that 300 odd territorial sovereignties under the Holy Empire only in politics she should do the bidding of a foreign 39 survived, and these were readjusted on the traditional prinmaster. Among a large section of the community patriotism ciples of "compensations," "rectification of frontiers" and became for the first time a consuming passion, and it was "balance of power." The most fateful arrangements were stimulated by the counsels of several manly teachers, among naturally those that affected the two leading powers, Austria whom the first place belongs to the philosopher Fichte. The and Prussia. The latter had made strenuous efforts, supported governments cautiously took advantage of the national move- by Alexander I. of Russia, to obtain the annexation of the whole ment to strengthen their position. Even in Austria, where on of Saxony, a project which was defeated by the opposition of the 8th of October 1809 Metternich had become minister for Great Britain, Austria and France, an opposition which resulted foreign affairs and the dominant influence in the councils of the in the secret treaty of the 3rd of January 1815 for eventual empire, some timely concessions were made to the various armed intervention. She received, however, the northern part populations. Prussia, under the guidance of her great minister of Saxony, Swedish Pomerania, Posen and those territoriesStein, reorganized her entire administration. She abolished formerly part of the kingdom of Westphalia-which constitute serfdom, granted municipal rights to the cities, established her Rhine provinces While Prussia was thus established on an admirable system of elementary and secondary education, the Rhine, Austria, by exchanging the Netherlands for Lombardoand invited all classes to compete for civil offices; and ample Venetia and abandoning her claims to the former Habsburg means were provided for the approaching struggle by drastic possessions in Swabia, definitively resigned to Prussia the task military reform. Napoleon had extracted an engagement of defending the western frontier of Germany, while she that the Prussian army should be limited to 42,000 men. This strengthened her power in the south-east by recovering from was fulfilled in the letter, but in spirit set aside, for one body Bavaria, Salzburg, Vorarlberg and Tirol. Bavaria, in her turn, of men was trained after another until the larger part of the male received back the greater part of the Palatinate on the left bank population were in a position, when a fitting opportunity should of the Rhine, with a strip of territory to connect it with the main occur, to take up arms for their country. body of her dominions. For the rest the sovereigns of Württemberg and Saxony retained the title of king bestowed upon them by Napoleon, and this title was also given to the elector of Hanover; the dukes of Weimar, Mecklenburg and Oldenburg became grand dukes; and Lübeck, Bremen, Hamburg and Frankfort were declared free cities. War of The disastrous retreat of the French from Moscow in 1812 gave Germany the occasion she desired. In 1813 King Frederick William, after an agony of hesitation, was forced by the patriotic initiative of General Yorck, who concluded with the Russians the convention of Tauroggen on his own responsibility, and by the pressure of public opinion supported by Queen Louise and by Hardenberg, to enter into an alliance with Russia. All now depended on the attitude of Austria; and this was for some time doubtful. The diplomacy of Metternich (q.v.), untouched by the patriotic fervour which he disliked and distrusted, was directed solely to gaining time to enable Austria to intervene with decisive effect and win for the Habsburg monarchy the position it had lost. When the time came, after the famous interview with Napoleon at Dresden, and the breakdown of the abortive congress of Prague, Austria threw in her lot with the allies. The campaign that followed, after some initial reverses, culminated in the crushing victory of the allies at Leipzig (October 16-18, 1813), and was succeeded by the joint invasion of France, during which the German troops wreaked vengeance on the unhappy population for the wrongs and violences of the French rule in Germany. Long before the issue of the War of Liberation had been finally decided, diplomacy had been at work in an endeavour to settle the future constitution of Germany. In this matter, as in others, the weakness of the Prussian government played into the hands of Austria. Metternich had been allowed to take the initiative in negotiating with the princes of the Confederation of the Rhine, and the price of their adhesion to the cause of the allies had been the guarantee by Austria of their independent sovereignty. The guarantee had been willingly given; for Metternich had no desire to see the creation of a powerful unified German empire, but aimed at the establishment of a loose confederation of weak states over which Austria, by reason of her ancient imperial prestige and her vast non-German power, would exercise a dominant influence. This, then, was the view that prevailed, and by the treaty of Chaumont (March 1, 1814) it was decided that Germany should consist of a confederation of sovereign | | The federal diet. As the central organ of this confederation (Bund) was established the federal diet (Bundestag), consisting of delegates of the several states. By the terms of the Final Act this diet had very wide powers for the development of the mutual relations of the governments in all matters of common interest. It was empowered to arrange the fundamental laws of the confederation; to fix the organic institutions relating to its external, internal and military arrangements; to regulate the trade relations between the various federated states. Moreover, by the famous Article 13, which enacted that there were to be "assemblies of estates" in all the countries of the Bund, the constitutional liberties of the German people seemed to be placed under its aegis. But the constitution of the diet from the first condemned its debates to sterility. In the so-called narrower assembly (Engere Versammlung), for the transaction of ordinary business, Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, Württemberg, Baden, Hesse-Cassel, Hesse-Darmstadt, Holstein and Luxemburg had one vote each; while the remaining twenty-eight states were divided into six curiae, of which each had but a single vote. In this assembly a vote of the majority decided. Questions of more than usual importance were, however, to be settled in the general assembly (Plenum) where a two-thirds majority was necessary to carry a resolution. In this assembly the voting power was somewhat differently distributed; but the attempt to make it bear some proportion to the importance of the various states worked out so badly that Austria had only four times the voting power of the tiny principality of Liechtenstein. Finally it was laid down by Article 7 that a unanimous vote was necessary for charging "fundamental laws, organic institutions, individual rights, or in matters of religion," a formula wide enough to embrace every question of importance with which the diet might be called upon to deal. Austria, in virtue of her tradition, received the perpetual presidency of the diet. It was clear that in such a governing body neither Austria nor Prussia would be content with her constitutional position, and that the internal politics of Germany would resolve themselves into a diplomatic duel for ascendancy between the two powers, for which the diet would merely serve as a convenient arena. In this duel the victory of Austria was soon declared. The Prussian government believed that the effective government of Germany could only be secured by a separate understanding | Württemberg, in Bavaria, the sovereigns and the chambers between the two great powers; and the indiscretion of the Prussian plenipotentiary revealed to the diet a plan for what meant practically the division of Germany into Prussian and Austrian spheres of influence. This threw the lesser princes, already alarmed at the growth of Prussian military power, into the arms of Austria, which thus secured a permanent majority in the diet. To avoid any possible modification of a situation so satisfactory, Count Buol, the Austrian president of the diet, was instructed to announce that the constitution as fixed by the Final Act, and guaranteed by Europe, must be regarded as final; that it might be interpreted, but not altered. The conception of the diet as a sort of international board of control, responsible in the last resort not to Germany but to Europe, exactly suited Metternich's policy, in which the interests of Germany were subordinate to the wider ambitions of the Habsburg monarchy. It was, moreover, largely justified by the constituent elements of the diet itself. Of the German states represented in it even Prussia, by the acquisition of Posen, had become a non-German power; the Habsburg monarchy was predominantly non-German; Hanover was attached to the crown of Great Britain, Holstein to that of Denmark, Luxemburg to that of the Netherlands. The diet, then, properly controlled, was capable of being converted into an effective instrument for furthering the policy of "stability" which Metternich sought to impose upon Europe. Its one effort to make its authority effective as the guardian of the constitution, in the matter of the repudiation of the Westphalian debt and of the sale of the domains by the elector of Hesse, was crushed by the indignant intervention of Austria. Henceforth its sole effective function was to endorse and promulgate the decrees of the government of Vienna. The question of constitutions. In this respect the diet fairly reflected the place of Germany in Europe. The constitution was the work of the powers, which in all matters arising out of it constituted the final court of appeal. The result was not wholly onesided. Until the congress of Troppau in 1820 "Jacobinism' was still enthroned in high places in the person of Alexander I. of Russia, whose "divine mission," for the time, included a not wholly disinterested advocacy of the due carrying out of Article 13 of the Final Act. It was not to Russia's interest to see Austrian influence supreme in the confederation. The lesser German princes, too, were quick to grasp at any means to strengthen their position against the dominant powers, and to this end they appealed to the Liberal sentiment of their peoples. Not that this sentiment was very deep or widespread. The mass of the people, as Metternich rightly observed, wished for rest, not constitutions; but the minority of thoughtful men-professors, students, officials, many soldiers-resented the dashing of the hopes of German unity aroused by the War of Liberation, and had drunk deep of the revolutionary inspiration. This sentiment, since it could not be turned to the uses of a united Germany, might be made to serve the purposes of particularism. Prussia, in spite of the promises of Frederick William in the hour of need, remained without a central constitution; all the more reason why the states of second rank should provide themselves with one. Charles Augustus, the enlightened grand duke of Weimar, set the example, from the best of motives. Bavaria, Baden, Württemberg and others followed, from motives less disinterested. Much depended on the success of these experiments. To Metternich they were wholly unwelcome. In spite of the ring-fence of censors, and custom-house officers, there was danger Metter the con stitutions. of the Liberal infection spreading to Austria, with nich and disintegrating results; and the pose of the tsar as protector of German liberties was a perpetual menace. The zeal and inexperience of German Liberals played into his hands. The patriotism and Pan-Germanism of the gymnastic societies (Turnvereine) and students' associations (Burschenschaften) expressed themselves with more noise than discretion; in the South-German parliaments the platitudes and catchwords of the Revolution were echoed. Soon, in Baden, in were at odds, united only in a common opposition to the central authority. To sovereigns whose nerves had been shattered by the vicissitudes of the revolutionary epoch these symptoms were in the highest degree alarming; and Metternich was at pains to exaggerate their significance. The "Wartburg The festival" of October 1818, which issued in nothing Wartburg worse than the solemn burning, in imitation of Dr festival, 1818. Martin Luther, of Kamptz's police law, a corporal's cane and an uhlan's stays, was magnified into a rebellion; drew down upon the grand duke of Weimar a collective protest of the powers; and set in motion the whole machinery of reaction. The murder of the dramatist Kotzebue, as an agent of this reaction, in the following year, by a fanatical student named Karl Sand, clinched the matter; it became obvious to the governments that a policy of rigorous repression was necessary if a fresh revolution were to be avoided. In October, after a preliminary meeting between Metternich and Hardenberg, in the course of which the latter signed a convention pledging Prussia to Austria's system, a meeting of German ministers was held at Carlsbad, the discussion of which issued in the famous Carlsbad Decrees (October 17, 1819). These contained elaborate provisions for supervising the universities and muzzling the press, laying down that no constitution "inconsistent with the monarchical principle" should be granted, and setting up a central commission at Mainz to inquire into the machinations of the great revolutionary secret society which existed only in the imagination of the authorities. The Carlsbad Decrees, hurried through the diet under Austrian pressure, excited considerable opposition among the lesser sovereigns, who resented the claim of the diet to interfere in the internal concerns of their states, and whose protests at Frankfort had been expunged from the records. The king of Württemberg, ever the champion of German "particularism," gave expression to his feelings by issuing a new constitution to his kingdom, and appealed to his relative, the emperor Alexander, who had not yet been won over by Metternich to the policy of war à outrance against reform, and took this occasion to issue a fresh manifesto of his Liberal creed. At the conference of ministers which met at Vienna, on the 20th of November, for the purpose of "developing and completing the Federal Act of the congress of Vienna," Metternich found himself face to face with a more formidable opposition than at Carlsbad. The "middle" states, headed by Württemberg, had drawn together, to form the nucleus of an inner league of "" German States pure against Austria and Prussia, and of Liberal particularism" against the encroachments of the diet. With Russia and, to a certain extent, Great Britain sympathetic, it was impossible to ignore their opposition. Moreover, Prussia was hardly prepared to endorse a policy of greatly strengthening the authority of the diet, which might have been fatal to the Customs Union of which she was laying the foundation. Metternich realized the situation, and yielded so gracefully that he gave his temporary defeat the air of a victory. The result was that the Vienna Final Act (May 15, 1820), which received the sanction of the diet on the 8th of June, was not unsatisfactory to the lesser states while doing nothing to lessen Austrian prestige. This instrument merely defined more clearly the principles of the Federal Act of 1815. So far from enlarging the powers of the diet, it reaffirmed the doctrine of non-intervention; and, above all, it renewed the clause forbidding any fundamental modification of the constitution without a unanimous vote. On the vexed question of the interpretation of Article 13 Metternich recognized the inexpediency of requiring the South German states to revise their constitutions in a reactionary sense. By Articles 56 and 57, however, it was laid down that constitutions could only be altered by constitutional means; that the complete authority of the state must remain united in its head; and that the sovereign could be bound to co-operate with the estates only in the exercise of particular rights. These provisions, in fact, secured for Metternich all that was necessary for the success of his policy: the maintenance of the status quo. So long as the repressive machinery instituted by the Carlsbad " " Decrees worked smoothly, Germany was not likely to be troubled with the numerous enclaves, made the effective enforcement by revolutions. Revolu tions of 1830. of a high tariff impossible. In these circumstances it was decided The period that followed was one, outwardly at least, of to introduce a system of comparative free trade; raw materials political stagnation. The Mainz Commission, though hampered were admitted free; a uniform import of 10% was levied on by the jealousy of the governments (the king of Prussia refused manufactured goods, and 20% on "colonial wares," the tax to allow his subjects to be haled before it), was none the less being determined not by the estimated value, but by the weight effective enough in preventing all free expression of opinion; of the articles. It was soon realized, however, that to make while at the universities the official "curators" kept Liberal this system complete the neighbouring states must be drawn enthusiasts in order. The exuberance of the epoch of Liberation into it; and a beginning was made with those which were gave place to a dull lethargy in things political, relieved only by enclaves in Prussian territory, of which there were no less than the Philhellenism which gave voice to the aspirations of Germany thirteen. Under the new tariff laws light transit dues were under the disguise of enthusiasm for Greece. Even the July imposed on goods passing through Prussia; and it was easy revolution of 1830 in Paris reacted but partially and spasmodic- tó bring pressure to bear on states completely surrounded by ally on Germany. In Hanover, Brunswick, Saxony and Prussian territory by increasing these dues or, if need were, Hesse-Cassel popular movements led to the granting by forbidding the transit altogether. The small states, though of constitutions, and in the states already constitu- | jealous of their sovereign independence, found it impossible to tional Liberal concessions were made or promised. hold out. Schwarzburg-Sondershausen was the first to succumb But the governments of Prussia and Austria were unaffected; (1819); Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt (1822), Saxe-Weimar and and when the storm had died down Metternich was able, with the Anhalt-Bernburg (1823), Lippe-Detmold and Mecklenburgaid of the federal diet, to resume his task of holding "the Revolu- Schwerin (1826) followed suit so far as their "enclaved" tion" in check. No attempt was, indeed, made to restore the territories were concerned; and in 1826 Anhalt-Dessau and deposed duke of Brunswick, who by universal consent had | Anhalt-Cöthen, after several years' resistance, joined the richly deserved his fate; but the elector of Hesse could reckon Prussian Customs-Union. In 1828 Hesse-Cassel entered into on the sympathy of the diet in his struggle with the chambers a commercial treaty with Prussia. Meanwhile, alarmed at this (see HESSE-CASSEL), and when, in 1837, King Ernest Augustus tendency, and hopeless of obtaining any general system from of Hanover inaugurated his reign by restoring the old illiberal the federal diet, the "middle" states had drawn together; by constitution abolished in 1831, the diet refused to interfere. a treaty signed on the 18th of January 1828 Württemberg and It was left to the seven professors of Göttingen to protest; Bavaria formed a tariff union, which was joined in the following who, deprived of their posts, became as famous in the con- year by the Hohenzollern principalities; and on the 24th of stitutional history of Germany as the seven bishops in that of September 1828 was formed the so-called "Middle German England. Commercial Union" (Handelsverein) between Hanover, HesseYet this period was by no means sterile in developments Cassel, the Saxon duchies, Brunswick, Nassau, the principalities destined to produce momentous results. In Prussia especially of Reuss and Schwarzburg, and the free cities of Frankfort and the government continued active in organizing and Bremen, the object of which was to prevent the extension of consolidating the heterogeneous elements introduced the Prussian system and, above all, any union of the northern into the monarchy by the settlement of 1815. The Zollverein with that of Bavaria and Württemberg. It was task was no easy one. There was no sense of national soon, however, found that these separate systems were unworkunity between the Catholics of the Rhine provinces, long sub-able; on the 27th of May 1829 Prussia signed a commercial mitted to the influence of liberal France, and the Lutheran treaty with the southern union; the Handelsverein was broken squires of the mark of Brandenburg, the most stereotyped class up, and one by one the lesser states joined the Prussian Customsin Europe; there was little in common between either and the Union. Finally, on the 22nd of March 1833, the northern and Polish population of the province of Posen. The Prussian southern unions were amalgamated; Saxony and the Thuringian monarchy, the traditional champion of Protestant orthodoxy, states attached themselves to this union in the same year; found the new Catholic elements difficult to assimilate; and and on the 1st of January 1834 the German Customs- and premonitory symptoms were not wanting of a revival of the Commercial-Union (Deutscher Zoll- und Handelsverein) came secular contest between the spiritual and temporal powers which into existence, which included for tariff purposes within a single was to culminate after the promulgation of the dogma of papal frontier the greater part of Germany. Outside this, though not infallibility (1870) in the Kulturkampf. These conditions formed in hostility to it, Hanover, Brunswick, Oldenburg and Schaumthe excuse for the continual postponement of the promised burg-Lippe formed a separate customs-union (Steuerverein) by constitution. But the narrow piety of Frederick William III. treaties signed on the rst of May 1834 and the 7th of May 1836, was less calculated to promote the success of a benevolent and to this certain Prussian and Hessian enclaves were attached. despotism than the contemptuous scepticism of Frederick the Subsequently other states, e.g. Baden and Nassau (1836), FrankGreat, and a central parliament would have proved a safety fort and Luxemburg (1842), joined the Prussian Zollverein, to valve for jarring passions which the mistaken efforts of the king which certain of the members of the Steuerverein also transferred to suppress, by means of royal decrees and military coercion, themselves (Brunswick and Lippe, 1842). Finally, as a counteronly served to embitter. Yet the conscientious tradition of move to the Austrian efforts to break up the Zollverein, the latter Prussian officialism accomplished much in the way of administra- came to terms with the Steuerverein, which, on the 1st of January tive reform. 1854, was absorbed in the Prussian system. Hamburg was to remain outside until 1883; but practically the whole of what now is Germany was thus included in a union in which Prussia had a predominating influence, and to which, when too late, Austria in vain sought admission.1 The Prussian system. The Zoll verein. Even in the earlier stages of its development the Zollverein had a marked effect on the condition of the country. Its Above all it evolved the Customs-Union (Zollverein), which gradually attached the smaller states, by material interests if not by sympathy, to the Prussian system. A reform Prussian of the tariff conditions in the new Prussian monarchy had been from the first a matter of urgent necessity, and this was undertaken under the auspices of Baron Heinrich von Bülow (1792-1846), minister in the foreign depart-growth coincided with the introduction of railways, and enabled ment for commerce and shipping, and Karl Georg Maassen (1769-1834), the minister of finance. When they took office there were in Prussia sixty different tariffs, with a total of nearly 2800 classes of taxable goods: in some parts importation was free, or all but free; in others there was absolute prohibition, or duties so heavy as to amount to practical prohibition. Moreover, the long and broken line of the Prussian frontier, together the nation to derive from them the full benefit; so that, in spite of the confusion of political powers, material prosperity increased, together with the consciousness of national unity and a tendency to look to Berlin rather than to Vienna as the centre of this unity. 1 The best account, in English, of the development of the Zollverein is in Percy Ashley's Modern Tariff History (London, 1904). William IV. This tendency was increased by the accession to the throne | of Prussia, in 1840, of Frederick William IV., a prince whose conspicuous talents and supposed "advanced" views Frederick raised the hopes of the German Liberals in the same degree as they excited the alarm and contempt of Metternich. In the end, however, the fears were more justified than the hopes. The reign began well, it is true, notably in the reversal of the narrow ecclesiastical policy of Frederick William III. But the new king was a child of the romantic movement, with no real understanding of, and still less sympathy with, the modern Liberal point of view. He cherished the idea of German unity, but could conceive of it only in the form of the restored Holy Empire under the house of Habsburg; and so little did he understand the growing nationalist temper of his people that he seriously negotiated for a union of the Lutheran and Anglican churches, of which the sole premature offspring was the Protestant bishopric of Jerusalem. Meanwhile the Unionist and Liberal agitation was growing in strength, partly owing to the very efforts made to restrain it. The emperor Nicholas I. of Russia, kept informed by his agents of the tendencies of opinion, thought it right to warn his kinsman of Prussia of the approach of danger. But Frederick William, though the tsar's influence over him was as great as over his father, refused to be convinced. He even thought the time opportune for finishing "the building begun by Papa' by summoning the central assembly of the diets, and wrote to the tsar to this effect (December 31, 1845); and he persevered in this intention in spite of the tsar's paternal remonstrances. On the 13th of February 1847 was issued a patent summoning the united diet of Prussia. But, as Metternich had prophesied, this only provided an organ for giving voice to larger constitutional aspirations. The result was a constitutional dead-lock; for the diet refused to sanction loans until its "representative' character was recognized; and the king refused to allow "to come between Almighty God in heaven and this land a blotted parchment, to rule us with paragraphs, and to replace the ancient, sacred bond of loyalty." On the 26th of June the diet was dissolved, nothing having been done but to reveal the widening gulf between the principle of monarchy and the growing forces of German Liberalism. The strength of these forces was revealed when the February revolution of 1848 in Paris gave the signal for the outbreak of popular movements throughout Europe. The effect of the revolution in Vienna, involving the fall of Metternich (May 13) and followed by the nationalist movements in Hungary and Bohemia, was stupendous in Germany. Accustomed to look to Austria for guidance and material support, the princes everywhere found themselves helpless in face of the popular clamour. The only power which might have stemmed the tide was Prussia. But Frederick William's emotional and kindly temperament little fitted him to use " the mailed fist "; though the riot which broke out in Berlin on the 15th of March was suppressed by the troops with but little bloodshed, the king shrank with horror from the thought of fighting his "beloved Berliners," and when on the night of the 18th the fighting was renewed, he entered into negotiation with the insurgents, negotiations that resulted in the withdrawal of the troops from Berlin. The next day, Frederick William, with characteristic histrionic versatility, was heading a procession round the streets of Berlin, wrapped in the German tricolour, and extolling in a letter to the indignant tsar the consummation of "the glorious German revolution." Frankfort Germans who then were, or who had formerly been, members of diets, as well as some other public men, to meet at Frankfort for the purpose of considering the question of national reform. About 500 representatives accepted the invitation. They constituted themselves a preliminary parliament (Vorparlament), and at once began to provide for the election of a national assembly. It was decided that there should be a representative for every group of 50,000 inhabitants, and that the election should be by universal suffrage. A considerable party wished that the preliminary parliament should continue to act until the assembly should be formed, but this was overruled, the majority contenting themselves with the appointment of a committee of 50, whose duty it should be in the interval to guard the national interests. Some of those who were discontented with this decision retired from the preliminary parliament, and a few of them, of republican sympathies, called the population of Upper Baden to arms. The rising was put down by the troops of Baden, but it did considerable injury by awakening the fears of the more moderate portion of the community. Great hindrances were put in the way of the elections, but, as the Prussian and Austrian governments were too much occupied with their immediate difficulties to resist to the uttermost, the parliament was at last chosen, and met at Frankfort on the 18th May. The old diet, without being formally dissolved, (an omission that was to have notable consequences) broke up, and the national representatives had before them a clear field. Their task would in any case have been one of extreme difficulty. The new-born sentiment of national unity disguised a variety of conflicting ideals, as well as deep-seated pariiatraditional local antagonisms; the problem of con- meat. structing a new Germany out of states, several of which, and those the most powerful, were largely composed of non-German elements, was sure to lead to international complications; moreover, the military power of the monarchies had only been temporarily paralysed, not destroyed. Yet, had the parliament acted with promptitude and discretion it might have been successful. Neither Austria nor Prussia was for some time in a position to thwart it, and the sovereigns of the smaller states were too much afraid of the revolutionary elements manifested on all sides to oppose its will. But the Germans had had no experience of free political life. Nearly every deputy had his own theory of the course which ought to be pursued, and felt sure that the country would go to ruin if it were not adopted. Learned professors and talkative journalists insisted on delivering interminable speeches and on examining in the light of ultimate philosophical principles every proposal laid before the assembly. Thus precious time was lost, violent antagonisms were called forth, the patience of the nation was exhausted, and the reactionary forces were able to gather strength for once more asserting themselves. The very first important question brought out the weaknesses of the deputies. This related to the nature of the central provisional executive. A committee appointed to discuss the matter suggested that there should be a directory of three members, appointed by the German governments, subject to the approval of the parliament, and ruling by means of ministers responsible to the latter body. This elaborate scheme found favour with a large number of members, but others insisted that there should be a president or a central committee, appointed by the parliament, while another party pleaded that the parliament itself should exercise executive as well as legislative functions. At last, after a vast amount of tedious and useless discussion, it was agreed that the parliament should appoint an imperial vicar (Reichsverweser) who should carry on the government by means of a ministry selected by himself; and on the motion of Heinrich von Gagern the archduke John of Austria was chosen by a large majority for the office. With as little delay as possible he formed an imperial cabinet, and there were hopes that, as his appointment was generally approved both by the sovereigns and the people, more rapid progress would be made with the great and complicated work in hand. Unfortunately, however, it was necessary to enter upon the discussion of the fundamental laws, a subject |