Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1895-04-05
I~sisln peech.

two years hence.
Bismarck's peech.
The Iron Chancellor gives a good in
sight into the qualities that make him
great in his speech to the German pro-
f~essors on his 8Oth birthday. He said:
"Your masters paid me a tribute of
acknowledgment of the past (referring to
the visit of the university professors this
mornings; your greetings are to me u
pledge of the future, that until the mid
die of the next century, when I shall long
have been dead. you will continue to
utter the same feelings which you pro.
claimed today. What a German is en-
Unused about in his youth he never let's
drop altogether III his mature age. That
which the government of William I in
stilled into Jul hearts will always bear
forth it's fruits, no matter what shape the
institutions of the state may take. The
national feeling remains even when one
dreds Of thousands of Germans at the
Cape of Good Hope, in America, and in
Australia cling with equal enthusiasm to
the old fatherland.
"We had to fight hard battles for our
national independence. The prologue
was the Holstein war. We had to en-.
bark in the Austrian wal III order to ar
rive at a definite entente with Austria
and to obtain, so to speak, judicial sepa-
ration from her. After Sadowa every n
foresaw a war with France. It was, how
ever, advisable not to undertake such a
war too soon, but to wait until the fruits
of the North German union had been
duly garnered. After that wal there was
talk that in five years more another war
would follow. That was to be feared, but
I used every endeavor to hinder it. We
had no ground for it. We had What we
wanted, and to continue fighting out of
sheer desire for conquest appeared to me
to be Bonapartist% instability and not u
German way.
"Since our house was built I have al
ways been a friend Of peace, and to that
end have not stunned small sacrifices. I
yielded in the Carolina and Samoa ISL
ands questions, in spite of the great
value attached to colonial expansion, in
order not to have to make war. There
lies the advantage of the German char
acter-seeing satisfaction in the value of
our possessions without seeking domin-
ion and privilege in political affairs.
sit is much easier to say what one
should avoid than what one should do.
Certain principles, honor and courage,
forbid one to do several things, just as
during army manuevers one is forbidden
to touch certain specified fields.
"But as to resolutions regarding what is
to happen in the future there is no exact
provision. They are dependent upon the
decision of others. If Your friends alter
their opinions the whole plan often mis-
carries. Positive undertakings are diff
cult in politics. If they succeed one
should thank God, and not find fault
because they fail in trifling points. Man
can neither set in motion nor control the
stream of time. He can only steer mis-
boat upon it with more or less skill. If
we have come safe into harbor, as we
may gather from the sounds of over
whelming approval, we must be content
and keep what we have gained for the
empire, the empire as it now is, and not
as many wish it to be, with additional
institutions. We want to preserve scrup-
ulously what We have.
Germany was a mighty empire under
the CarlOvinglans, the Saxons, and the
Hohenstaufens. When this position
was lost 500 or 900 years passed before
Germany got again upon it's legs. Po-
litical development is slow, like geological
strata, which lie one on another and form
new mounts and mountains.
II should like above all to ask YOU
young gentlemen not to give yourselves
too much to the German craving for
criticising. loud laughter. Accept
what God has given you and what we
have laboriousiy won before threatening
with guns the rest of Europe. That was
no light matter. If we had been in
those days cited before a conclave of the
elders OF Europe we would not have
come out SO we'll. It is true that there
still remains Justifiable claims worthy of
effort, but not too soon or too hasty. Let
us hold fast to what we have.
"Ihe greatest sacrifices made for the
re.establishment of the German empire
we're made by the German princes, the
Prussians not excluded. My old master
hesitated long before he consented to
give up the independence of his state to
the empire. Let us be thankful to those
princes for having made sacrifices to the
empire which must have come hard to
the reigning dynasties after their his
tory. Let us also be grateful to science
and to it's devotees for keeping alive the
fire OF unity on the hearth of knowledge.
Then the time came when the flame
burned high.
"Then you will see [ am an old con
sentative, but I repeat, let us keep to-
gether what we have. Let us not be
afraid of those who begrudge us what
we have. There have always been con.
tiicts in Germany, and .today's party
divisions are the after effects Of the old
tights in the peasants war. Without
lighting there is no life. Without our in
ternal conflicts we should eventually
come to the condition of the Chinese and
lapse into a fossilized state. But in all
our struggles we must have a r~allyine
point for ourselves, and that is the empire
not as some wish it, but as it is. T ask
you, therefore, to Join me in the cry
Long live the emperor and the empire.''
[Deafening cheers.
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