Page:East European Quarterly, vol15, no1.pdf/8

 for leaving them to the plundering enemy, while selfishly seeking to save itself.

The other condition festering growing patriotism during the second half of the eighteenth century can be found in the ideas of the Enlightenment and in the political pressure of the Enlightened state. Without these external factors, the wars could not have transformed the national thought, feeling, and will into a new composition. Enlightened despotism exercised its influence in two different ways. On the one hand, it loosened the bonds of the guilds and serfdom, interfered with ecclesiastical and manorial administration. In this way, Enlightened Despotism encouraged the formation of a new social structure and new urban elements which could become the social base for a new form of Czech patriotic thinking. On the other hand, the cultural policy of linguistic and educational centralism which replaced the national language by German in the administration and in schools affected Czech national thinking negatively. These negative aspects, however, demonstrated the importance of a national language for patriotism and strengthened the elements important for the formation of patriotism and national thought.

The political and economic doctrines of the Enlightenment, which began replacing the theological approach with state-oriented thinking, emphasized the positive worth of the urban and rural classes of workers. The old social and ideological framework focusing on the church, religion, and the hierarchy of a feudal society loosened. Intellectuals took on a significant place in the new social and ideological sturcturestructure [sic]. They became the promoters, the chief champions and propagators of the national revival. The form of national thinking cultivated by the Czech intellectuals found receptive individuals among the Czech townsmen and the peasantry, spurred by general developments into a more profound social and ideological activity. As relations between these social groups advanced, patriotic thinking ceased to be the attribute of a limited number of educated individuals. Transformed into a kind of social movement, patriotism was accepted by a wide circle of people.

The origin of Czech patriotism was closely connected psychologically with widespread feelings of national and linguistic degeneration. This inferiority complex, embracing individuals as well as the collective mass, applied to everything Czech. The common people as well as educated individuals were painfully aware of the harsh reality of the fading cultural and ideological adherence to the national past, and of the fact that in world opinion the Czechs had ceased to present themselves as a vital nation possessing full rights. This complex was overcome in several ways.