Page:Addresses to the German nation.djvu/35

 thereby to compromise with the call that summons them to action; but I assume such Germans as have already risen, or at least are capable of rising, above this justifiable pain to clear thought and meditation. I know that pain; I have felt it as much as anyone; I respect it. Apathy, which is satisfied if it find meat and drink and be not subjected to bodily pain, and for which honour, freedom, and independence are empty names, is incapable of it. Pain, however, exists merely to spur us on to reflection, decision, and action. If it fails in this ultimate purpose, it robs us of reflection and of all our remaining powers, and so completes our misery; while, moreover, as witness to our sloth and cowardice, it affords the visible proof that we deserve our misery. But I do not in the least intend to lift you above this pain by holding out hopes of any help which will come to you from outside, and by indicating all kinds of possible events and changes which time may perchance bring about. For even if this attitude of mind, which prefers to roam in the shifting world of possibilities rather than to stick to what must be done, and would rather owe its salvation to blind chance than to itself, did not already in itself afford evidence, as it really does, of the most criminal levity and of the deepest self-contempt, yet all hopes and indications of this kind have absolutely no application to our position. Strict proof can, and in due course will, be given that no man and no god and not one of all the events that are within the bounds of possibility can help us, but that we alone must help ourselves if help is to come to us. Rather shall I try to lift you above that pain by clear perception of our position, of our yet remaining strength, and of the means of our salvation. For that purpose I shall, it is true, demand of you a certain amount of reflection, some spontaneous activity, and some