Page:Bismarck and the Foundation of the German Empire (1899).djvu/448

388 ever, the struggle with the Catholic Church which achieved the separation; the complete subjection of the Church to the State, the new laws for school inspection, the introduction of compulsory civil marriage, were all opposed to the strongest and the healthiest feelings of the Prussian Conservatives. These did not seem to be matters in which the safety of the Empire was concerned; Bismarck had simply gone over to, and adopted the programme of, the Liberals; he was supporting that all-pervading power of the Prussian bureaucracy which he, in his earlier days, had so bitterly attacked. Then came a proposal for change in the local government which would diminish the influence of the landed proprietors. The Conservatives refused to support these measures; the Conservative majority in the House of Lords threw them out. Bismarck's own brother, all his old friends and comrades, were now ranged against him. He accepted opposition from them as little as from anyone else; the consent of the King was obtained to the creation of new peers, and by this means the obnoxious measures were forced through the unwilling House. Bismarck by his speeches intensified the bitterness; he came down himself to make an attack on the Conservatives. "The Government is disappointed," he said; "we had looked for confidence from the Conservative party; confidence is a delicate plant; if it is once destroyed it does not grow again. We shall have to look elsewhere for support."

A crisis in his relations to the party came at the end of 1872; up to this time Roon had still remained