Political Considerations of Vienna Period
side began to hope for and expect miracles which naturally never happened and never could happen. They very shortly became impatient; for even what they heard from their own deputies by no means suited the expectations of the voters. This was easily explained, since the hostile press took good care not to give the people a truthful picture of the Pan-German deputies’ work.
But the more taste the new representatives acquired for the even gentler style of “revolutionary” struggle in Parliament and Landtag, the less willing they were to return to the more dangerous work of enlightening the broad masses of the common people.
For this reason the mass meeting, the only truly effective (because directly personal) way of exerting an influence on, and thus possibly winning over, any great part of the people, was more and more neglected.
When the beer-table of the meeting-hall was finally exchanged for the auditorium of Parliament, and the speeches were poured out not to the people but into the heads of the so-called “chosen,” the Pan-German movement ceased to be a people’s movement, and shortly sank into a more or less serious club for academic discussions.
Accordingly the bad impression given in the newspapers was no longer corrected by personal activity of the various gentlemen at meetings, so that finally the word “Pan-German” got a very bad taste in the mouths of the common people.
One thing all the ink-stained knights and fools of today should take particularly to heart: the great upheavals in this world have never been guided by a goose-quill.
No, the only thing left over for the pen has been to explain them in theory.
But the force that sent down the great religious and political landslides of history has since the beginning of time been only the magic power of the spoken word.
The great masses of a people, in particular, yield only to the force of speech. All great movements are people’s movements; they are volcanic eruptions of human passions, set off either by
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