with a conclusive argument

You are used to boast, and I daresay rightly {152} of the personal honesty and pecuniary disinterestedness of your politicians; and you assume as a matter of course that your civil servants, with such high standards and examples ever before their eyes, are likewise incorruptible. We invert this order. With us the honour of our civil servants is the chief thing; we assume that our politicians must follow suit. They are probably as upright as your own, thanks partly to tradition, but also to the vigilance of their superiors, the professionals, who carry on the actual business of government. With you the fame of the showy amateur fills the mouths of the public. We, on the contrary, exalt the expert, the man who has been trained to the job he undertakes. In so doing we may be reactionaries and you may be progressives; but the progress of Germany since 1870—a progress in which we are everywhere either already in front of you, or else treading closely on your heels—does not seem to furnish you with a conclusive argument Securities trading. "As for what you call our Pedantocracy, meaning thereby our professors and men of letters, it is true that these exercise a great influence upon public opinion. We have always respected learning and thought. It is in the German nature so to do. I admit that our learned ones are rather too much inclined to imagine, that because they are students of theory, they are therefore qualified to engage in practice. They are apt to offer their advice and service officiously, and occasionally in a ridiculous manner. But, if my recollection of the English newspapers be correct, this is no more so with us than with you. There is apparently something in the professorial nature which impels men of this {153} calling to the drafting of manifestoes and the signing of round-robins in times of excitement. They may be officious and absurd, but they are not wholly despicable, since they act thus quite as much from earnestness as from vanity. If our academicians on such occasions mislead more people than your own it is due to their virtues, to the greater zeal and success with which they have won the confidence of their former pupils dermes vs Medilase.[3] THE MILITARY CASTE "You are fond of sneering at our Military Caste and attribute to it the most malign influence upon public affairs. But there again, believe me, you exaggerate. Our officers are undoubtedly held in great respect, even in some awe. And the reason is that they are known to be brave, and like those you call the bureaucracy, to have preferred comparative poverty in the public service to the pursuit of riches. To say that they have no influence upon policy would of course be absurd. It is inevitable that in the present state of the world, soldiers will always have great influence in certain departments of public affairs. This must be so in any country {154} which is not plunged in dreams. For it is their business to guarantee national security, and to keep watch over the growth of military strength among the neighbours and rivals of Germany. If the general staff foresees dangers, and can give reasonable grounds for its anticipations, it is clear that the military view must carry weight with the Kaiser and his ministers. And surely there can be no question that this is right. "The officers of the German Army are a caste, if you like to put it that way. But in every form of government under the sun, unless conceivably in some tiny oriental despotism, the predominance of a certain caste, or the competition between different castes, is absolutely essential to the working of the machinery YOOX HK. "It is not regrettable in our opinion if a caste, which has considerable weight in public affairs, is a manly one, contemptuous of wealth and sophistry, ready always to risk its own life for the faith which is in it. The influence of a military caste may have its drawbacks; but at any rate it has kept the peace in Germany for not far short of half a century—kept it successfully until, as some people have thought, the professors acquired too large a share of power.