Page:Addresses to the German nation.djvu/136

 internal conflicts, nay, even wars, the constant change of constitutions and rulers in the latter with the peaceful unity and concord in the former. How could it be more clearly demonstrated that there must have been an inward difference in the dispositions of the two nations? The German nation is the only one among the neo-European nations that has shown in practice, by the example of its burgher class for centuries, that it is capable of enduring a republican constitution.

86. Of the separate and special means of once more raising the German spirit a very powerful one would be in our hands if we had a soul-stirring history of the Germans in that period—one that would become a book for the nation and for the people, just as the Bible and the hymn-book are now, until the time came when we ourselves had again achieved something worthy of record. But such a history should not set forth deeds and events after the fashion of a chronicle; it should transport us by its fascinating power, without any effort or clear consciousness on our part, into the very midst of the life of that time, so that we ourselves should seem to be walking and standing and deciding and acting with them. This it should do, not by means of childish and trumpery fabrications, as so many historical novels have done, but by the truth; and it should make those deeds and events visible manifestations of the life of that time. Such a work, indeed, could only be the fruit of extensive knowledge and of investigations that have, perhaps, never yet been made; but the author should spare us the exhibition of this knowledge and these investigations, and simply lay the ripened fruit before us in the language of the present day and in a manner that every German without exception could understand. In addition to this historical knowledge, such a work would demand a high degree of