German Discipline
Chapter 4 of The Character of Peoples by André Siegfried
Germany is an essential part of the European system and has had more influence on its modern development than any other country. He sees Germany as essentially continental, with a contact with Eastern Europe that the French do not possess, further noting its great penetration by Slav elements. He considers Germany authentically European but questions whether it is integrally western.
Sigfried finds it difficult to study Germany because behind an apparently rigid structure, it is a country of indecision and perpetual change, a passive country prepared to accept any new saviour, and fundamentally revolutionary despite its passion for orderliness. These characteristics, he believes, have been exaggerated by recent history. What remains after the upheavals is the German people themselves.
A striking thing about German territory, according to Sigfried, is its lack of geographical individuality, with no natural frontiers making it difficult to know where the country begins and ends. On the other hand, there is a German people whose unity resides not in a bond with a certain territory, as in France, but in the consciousness or desire to be a race with its own tongue, culture, and sense of unity.
This perpetual tendency to spill over into the territory of others renders it a permanent danger to its neighbours. From this arises a problem for Europe, unresolved even now, as at its heart lies a Germany that sometimes invades and is sometimes invaded, a country both malleable and aggressive, without which no lasting continental political structure is possible.
Sigfried divides Germany into three natural regions: Rhinish Germany, central and south Germany, and the Germany of the great glacial plains of the north and east, each with a different atmosphere. However, the fundamental division is less between north and south than between west and east, with the Rhinish axis and South Germany having western tendencies and the Berlin axis belonging rather to Eastern Europe, insidiously penetrated by Eastern influences.
For Frenchmen, the Rhine Valley remains familiar. Rhinish Germany, with its connections to Alsace, Switzerland, and Austria, is related to some French provinces.
Sigfried argues that central Europe exists as a unit of civilisation extending beyond political frontiers, its axis passing through the Rhineland and Switzerland, extending east to Vienna and west to France. Rhinish Germany and South Germany are considered an integral part of Western civilisation, influenced decisively by the Roman presence. Here, the French Revolution also brought a wind from the west, leading to a conception of democracy and of individual property akin to the French.
Sigfried notes that a German from the west, and even more so from the southwest, understands France and the French spirit better than a Saxon or a Prussian. He identifies a better organisation of comfort, what Germans call civilisation(distinct from culture), in these western districts, which prior to the recent catastrophe were more advanced than France or England in terms of social amenities, town life, and material progress. He mentions the German sentiment of well-being, Gemütlichkeit, as something hardly existing elsewhere.
The atmosphere in East Germany, beyond a frontier roughly along the Elbe, is quite different.
Here begins the immense plane of glacial formation stretching to Russia and Siberia, a country never dominated by the Romans. Sigfried feels like entering a new continent, the Asia of steppes and forests, immense, monotonous, flat, and melancholy, where nature has not been humanised by civilisation.
While the west is authentically present in the form of magnificent, modern towns built with Prussian rigor, the countryside remains wild, appealing to German romanticism. He argues that the Germans have preserved a contact with nature to a greater extent than the French, influencing their minds. The attraction for Germany lies in the east, in the immensity of the Russian space, akin to what the frontier meant for the Americans.
Sigfried believes we should never leave the map of Rome's domination out of account when considering Germany, and a second significant map is that of Christianity's progress.
The Christian conquest reached the Rhine in the 5th century and the Elbe in the 9th, with the area between the Elbe and Russia Christianised later, between the 9th and 12th centuries. This relatively recent Christianisation of Germany east of the Elbe meant that the German spirit there possessed a font of youth that France, Romanised and Christianised for almost 2,000 years, did not.
He contrasts the deep historic past of France with the relatively short history of Berlin, suggesting a similarity in historical outlook between Berliners and Californians. From this viewpoint, the historic role of Germany in the "fundamentally barbarian regions" to the east has been to establish a western order, although Germany ultimately failed because it interpreted its action as colonisation and exploitation. Today, central Europe is again a frontier area, and its former role in continental equilibrium is diminished. The eastern limits of Anglo-American occupation are approximately the same as the limits of Charlemagne's empire.
Despite talking much about race, Sigfried contends that the German people do not represent an ethnic unity, distinguishing at least three different races: Teutons, Alpines, and Slavs.
The Germanic element forms the fundamental basis, descending from the Germanic tribes of the Roman invasion. He notes the traditional west-to-east order of Teutons, Alpines, Slavs, and Tartars.
The truly Germanic populations are chiefly found in the northwest between the Elbe, Thuringia, and the North Sea, considered the real home of the Nordic race. Gobineau's doctrine of Nordic superiority, which aligns with German and Anglo-Saxon ideas of their own value and role, posits the Nordic as superior in character and leadership, not necessarily intelligence. Sigfried states that Germans consider themselves a superior race, comparing themselves proudly with the "degenerate" Latins and the "inferior" Slavs, viewing their hegemony over the latter as almost statutory.
He identifies a second type of German, the Alpine (sometimes called Celt), inhabiting Bavaria, Württemberg, and Baden, who are brachycephalic, dark-haired, and of medium height, related to Austrians and Swiss. Despite not being of Nordic origin, they share in the general Germanic pride. Sigfried also argues that the German is much more Slav than generally believed, with Slavs invading Eastern Germany up to the Elbe between AD 400 and 700.
The population of central and East Prussia, Silesia, and Saxony are mixed with Slavs. This non-Germanic area was conquered by the Germans in the Middle Ages by the Teutonic Knights. Even the appearance of the countryside was transformed by Prussian administration.
Today, a counter-tide is sweeping away those old traces, and the presence of the Slavs, even in the psychology of the Germans, remains latent. He notes the fugitive suppleness under the outward rigidity of the Berliner and the similarity of the Prussian French accent to Polish or Russian. Sigfried has the impression that Eastern Germany is a Germanic superstructure built on piles driven into a Slav marshland.
Furthermore, Sigfried considers the influence of the Jews, even after the Nazi persecutions. He distinguishes two waves: the largely westernised Jews of the 19th century, particularly those of Frankfurt and Berlin, and a new, more "exotic" wave after World War I, concentrated mainly in Berlin, who were influential in business, artistic, and intellectual affairs under the Weimar regime.
This "insidious intervention" projected a subtle Soviet influence into the German capital. While the Jewish influences have been deeply plowed up, Sigfried believes it is impossible to ignore the Jewish ferment in the German makeup, quoting Bismarck's observation that Jews have contributed a muso not to be despised.
He argues that a German Jew remains different, thinking, feeling, and expressing himself according to his own racial genius, possessing a "denationalised clarity". However, the Israelitic element developed to such an extent that it became part of the Germanic complex. Thus, the centre of gravity of German psychology was disputed between the west and the east. The existence of two Germanies with an indescribable admixture of races does not fundamentally change this situation.
Two main conclusions result from these ethnic observations for Sigfried. Firstly, the importance of race in the German nation's concept of itself, contrasting it with the French view of the nation as a civilization based on territory. For Germany, destiny is that of the Germans, not of Germany itself.
Sigfried sees something imperialistic in a race's desire to dominate others it considers inferior, noting that the French feeling of equality among human races is foreign to the Germanic spirit, posing a grave obstacle to a permanently peaceful system in Europe, particularly Eastern Europe.
Secondly, Germany, neither completely western nor completely Nordic, is in a position to establish contact with Russia in a way closed to the French, being physically close to the "Muscovite atmosphere" despite Poland.
This explains German influence in Petersburg and Moscow, as the German knows how to deal with these "easterners in Europe or westerners in Asia" and is readily accepted as a technician, broker, agent, and even official. Despite a lack of love between Russians and Germans, there has always been a sort of obscure complicity.
Sigfried wonders how Germany suffered such a total collapse with such an abundance of ethnic elements. He attributes it to a lack of fusion or happy combination of these heterogeneous elements, each going its own way and becoming a factor of disorder.
While the Latin contact brought analytical capacity, the Prussian element organisation, and the Slav element mystique, there was no healthy combination but an explosive juxtaposition. Like Pirandello's six characters in search of an author, the German spirit is rich in possibilities but always seeking a form outside itself, unable to furnish it from within.
While France expresses herself perfectly in her civilisation, Germany has suffered a succession of saviours, none viable in the end, remaining in a perpetual state of becoming, a pathological incapacity. Sigfried suspects that Germans secretly prefer this indeterminateness, as even at the bottom of the abyss, it leaves open paths to the future.
Two opposed philosophical conceptions and temperaments separate the French and the Germans: the French with a static view, the Germans with a dynamic view. For the Frenchman, the static is what has been achieved; for the German, the achieved is finished, unchangeable, and therefore dead and without interest. The dynamic, the perpetual state of becoming, represents the very essence of life to him. This misunderstanding, based on contradictory senses of the same words, is insoluble.
Sigfried finds nothing more opposed to the French way of thinking than the German idea of the individual. While the German has a profound inner life, it is so confused and hidden that he cannot express it, a concentrated piety free of connection with action, which is left to politicians. This quasi-mystic element of communion with nature is inexpressible through analysis and words, finding outlet instead in music, song, and collective enthusiasm. This explains the astonishing power of Hitler's often unintelligible eloquence. German prose is mediocre, but German poetry, untranslatable, is splendid. The Frenchman would have to search back to early infancy to find an analogous state of soul before the intellect awakened.
The absence of personality and emptiness of ego strikes Sigfried most in the outward appearance of the German. Before their formidable will operates, they desire, expect, and claim nothing, remaining tentative, open to all possibilities, disposable, and malleable, making them easily led by the state. The German wants what someone else wants for him, and will takes the place of everything else, even in evil. Once let loose, this will knows no limit, reinforced by efficient methods.
The qualities the German is most proud of are those of a good pupil: diligence, industry, thoroughness (Gründlichkeit). This love of work for its own sake sometimes seems pathological, fulfilling a congenital emptiness rather than for the joy of producing. When a method seizes a Germanic spirit, it swallows it entirely, leading to perfect objectivity and a liberation from prejudices and moral scruples, resulting in revolutionary achievements. An Alsatian observer noted that the key to Germanic Schultigkeit lies in the word Wirtschaft (economy), which is primary over politics in Germany. The final aim through state power is still Wirtschaft, which Sigfried translates not as rational economy but as Sachlichkeit or Sachheit (thingism, substantialism), a sacrifice of the person to things.
Sigfried finds the spirit of measure and moderation lacking in this conception, leading to a dangerous loosening without passion, which itself is passionate. He echoes the common observation that the German lacks tact, his Gründlichkeitthrowing him off balance into the colossal and the infinitely petty, losing common and moral sense. This "flare for the total" leads to an obsession for information and analysis, often falsified by excess detail, resulting in disconcerting conclusions despite efficient methods. This inability to choose and fundamental lack of inner control is Germany's gravest defect. Like Napoleon's method in the service of passion, Germany, outside Roman Europe, did not share the heritage of classic discipline. A Swiss acquaintance described the German as tüchtig, g'schickt, aber dumm (capable, cunning, but stupid), perhaps explaining how the most efficient of states and powerful of armies led the country to ruin.
Despite conscientiousness, solidity, industry, and labour, Sigfried finds the moral conceptions of the Germans horrifying. A fundamentally pessimistic view of the world characterises them, influenced by Luther, who saw the laws of the world as bad and nature delivered to injustice and evil. In the worldly sphere, only the law of force applies, not biblical principles. The prince receives the right to use the sword and uphold the state according to rules beyond morality but in accordance with God's will.
The Christian in temporal matters is a humble servant of the state, not seeking to improve outward society, whose essence is evil. For the German, politics do not imply moral approval but have their own object: the life of the collective people. Force is neither moral nor immoral, it simply is.
The idea of introducing morality into politics is nonsensical to German thought, which believes force will always be decisive. This is accepted without protest, a submission to material power reminiscent of the Russian soul. Humanitarian idealism of justice or peace appears as hypocrisy or naivety. This standpoint applies to both foreign and domestic politics, except in certain southwest areas influenced by the French Revolution. Beyond the Rhine, the conception of man as an individual citizen with inherent sovereignty is hardly upheld.
Democracy expresses itself more in urban or cooperative groups after the medieval style, with spontaneity and a sense of collective liberty perhaps more developed than in France. The state itself is transcendent, not a community as in Anglo-Saxon democracies, but a distinct structure functioning in the hands of respected experts, none of the people's business.
As an isolated individual or citizen, the German leads a straightened life. It is different when joining a group, where his deficient personality finds a shell and his indeterminateness a frame. He cannot realize himself except by association. Unlike the Frenchman who feels he puts more into a group than he takes out, the German receives more and accepts the group's conditions eagerly. Discipline is not irksome but a relief. He feels at ease only in a group, where he acts, amuses himself, and indulges his enthusiasms.
Sigfried finds the sight of a German Sunday in summer typical: all ages marching out on hikes in organised groups with flags, an affirmation of mass power. He notes that these "human tides" marching across the countryside seem to find great delight in it. Frenchmen who have participated confess to feeling an inarticulate but powerful sensation of liberation, affected by the pantheistic enthusiasm generated. Sigfried believes that originally, elementary nature surrounds these beings, less developed than the French, both physically and morally, hence their fondness for calling themselves "barbarians".
Such an inadequate, incomplete, constantly changing, and never definitive form of self-expression is inconceivable for the French spirit. Under its rigid outward shell, Germany gives an impression of insecurity.
While French disorder is outward and superficial, in Germany, the chaos is internal, and discipline must come from the outside. Sigfried feels uncomfortable at the proximity of this people that can never finally make up its mind, a congenital indeterminateness.
He recalls that the more attractive but "woolly and inefficient" Germany admired by 1848 idealists adopted the rigid administrative and military framework of Prussia with delight, resembling a class with masters, a factory with foremen, and a barracks with non-commissioned officers.
Efficiency and obedience were paramount. Similarly, Germany hurled itself into Hitler's arms after the unloved Weimar regime, finding again "method in the service of passion," a turbid mixture of mystical paroxysm with technical efficiency. But all these experiments ended in catastrophe, requiring a fresh start.
The German soul is expressed in many profound words untranslatable to the French, all corresponding to something collective, as German thought arises from medieval realism rather than nominalism. The ordinary Frenchman sees only the individual as real, the group a mere conception.
The opposite is true in Germany, with a direct sense of communion with things, leading to the idea that feeling is superior to reason. Sigfried evokes the essence of this vocabulary, including words like Urgrund, Sturm und Drang, Verdichtung, Schwärmerei, Gemütlichkeit, Tüchtigkeit, Fleiss, Ernst, Gründlichkeit, Wirtschaft, Sachlichkeit, Sachheit, Geist, Seele, Stimmung, Gemeinschaft, Volk, resources astonishingly rich. A highly efficient technique exists alongside deep soulfulness, creating a general impression of life. The German contribution to European civilisation is outstanding, accumulating vast information and producing music, poetry, and philosophy. They were pioneers of industrial rationalisation.
Yet, Sigfried sees this as a compilation, a thesaurus, never fully given form. Here, the barbarian, proud of being so, lacking the classic contact from Greece, cannot be regarded as completely western. He has not achieved a synthesis of his contradictions like adult civilisations. The German is sentimental but also brutal, cruel, vicious, sadistic, and Neronian, enjoying catastrophe and weeping at a conflagration he himself started, his very obedience applied equally to good and evil.
To bring order to this chaos would have needed the wit of a Voltaire. While Goethe desired synthesis, other spirits lacking measure but deemed more "national," like Wagner and Nietzsche, were preferred. Ultimately, Germany is destructive of resources, human life, and empires.
In attempting this analysis, Sigfried has looked to the past. Even in this country of saviours, there is once again a new birth amidst the ruins. Germany, he remarks, is hardly astonished at disasters and perhaps suffers less from them due to a singular capacity to start again at zero. He questions whether it will develop well or ill, unable to answer. Trampled, scarred, suffering a fantastic mixture of populations and divided into east and west, present-day (Western) Germany seems more Catholic than before, as Prussian Lutheran Protestantism was defeated in the war.
The North German, Prussian, and Protestant aesthetic took delight in renunciation; Catholicism, less national but less strict and more human, now holds more sway. The country retains its respect for objectivity (Wirtschaft) and Gründlichkeit. Perhaps in the ruins, Germany will lose some traditional rigidity, but its vitality remains. Apart from Russia, it is still the most populous cultured country.
Sigfried concludes on a note of perturbation: outwardly, order, efficiency, and achievement are visible, but inwardly, a swamp, a chaos. Germany believes truth is obscure and found by plunging into the night, while the French believe truth is light and clarity.
While some countries have an original simplicity like a transparent wave, with Germany, we are on the edge of a dark, seemingly bottomless sea, which is its glory, but leaning over its surface feels like being suspended over an abyss.