The Caldwell tribune. [volume] (Caldwell, Idaho Territory [Idaho]) 1883-1928, 1915-04-09

think only in the present, but which |
appear strange to those who are ac-
customed to take backward glance in |
history and literature.
Curious as it may now seem to
many Englishmen, and possibly
Americans, also. little less than half
century ago, such an eminent pub
licist and thinker as the late Professor /
Goodwin Smith was lauding Germany
and warning England against the de-
signs and ambitions of France. In a
letter to The London Daily News in
1866 on the Prussian-Austrian war,
Goodwin Smith made strong plea for
united Germany under Prussian
| leadership and an alliance between
| England and Germany to curb the
ambitions of France under Louis Ma
poleon, then generally regarded as the
''arbiter of Europe" What he advo-
Gated in 1866 was accomplished in re-
spect to united Germany as the re-
suit of the~Franco-Pr ussian war a
few years later and without the aid of
! England and Germany before or at
ter that great event might have had
upon the deStinies of Europe must be
left now to conjecture. United Ger
many since 1870 has grown so strong
that now almost united Europe is
engaged in combating her.
As shown by events, Matthew
Arnold had, perhaps surer grasp
upon the trend of English opinion
and a better realization of the pre-
JUDGES and diSlikeS of England and
Germany than Goodwin Smith. In
letter in 1866 to The Pail Mall Gaz-
cite, Arnold, in a half humorous. half
serious way, described a visit to him
by an intelligent Berliner, of whom he
wrote: He has the harsh, arrogant
Prussan way of turning up his nose
at things and laying down the law
about them'-a way which English
men themselves sometimes illustrate
and naturally resent when it is eXhi
bited by others. 1t is the manner of
what has been called the imperial
race" of which both Germans and
Englishmen are members. 1t is also
an illustration of the cockSureneSS
and selfconidence so we'll character
lied in the play "Disraeli," and is at
bottom the secret which has enabled
the Englishmen, and in less degree.
the German also. TO impose his opin-
ions upon others and enables re-
latively small country to rule and
sway the greatest empire in the world.
In that letter of nearly fifty years
ago Matthew Arnold also caught with
sure grasp the distinctive difference
between German culture of that day
and that of England. He found that
clue in the words Geist and Ungeist,
concerning which he quotes his Ber-
lin visitor as saying:
We oppose "Geist"-intelli-
gence as you or the French
might say-to "Ungeist," The
victory OF "Geist" over "Ungeist"
we think the great matter in the
world The same idea is at the
bottom of democracy, the vic
tory of reason and intelligence
over blind custom and prejudice,
We North Germans
have worked for "Geist" in our
way by loving knowledge, by
I having the best educated middle
and lower class in the world.
. You see what this has just done
for us, Gin the victory of Prus-
. STA over Austria) France has
) "Geist" in her democracy. and
: Prussia in her education
"Geist" has used the King and
BiSmark and the Junkers and
= "Ungeist in uniform" all for its
own ends; and "Geist" will con
tinue so to use them till it has
, triumphed.
1 The boast was no idle one. No coun