Not only has Prussian history been the centre of all Treitschke’s activities; it also supplies him with the sole standard of all political values, the sole test of the truth of all political theories. With superb logic he deduces all his political system from the vicissitudes of the Brandenburg State. His sympathies and antipathies, his affinities and repulsions, are Prussian. Prussia and the German Empire have monopolized all human virtues. His only enemies are the enemies of the Prussian State (see paragraphs VIII. and IX. of this Essay). Prussia is a national State, exclusive, self-sufficient, self-contained. Therefore, the national State is the supreme and final political reality (see paragraph XI.). All the theories which challenge or threaten this conception of the national State are dismissed by Treitschke as damnable heresies: the heresy of individualism (see paragraph XII.), the heresy of internationalism (see paragraph XIII.), and the heresy of imperialism (paragraph XIV.). The one aim of the Prussian State has been the extension of Prussian power. Therefore the will to power must be the fundamental dogma of the State (paragraph XV.). Prussia has always subordinated political ethics to national aggrandizement; therefore Treitschke holds with Machiavelli that in politics the end justifies the means (paragraph XVI.). Prussia has only expanded through war. War has been the national industry of the Prussian people. Therefore war is considered by Treitschke as the vital principle of national life (paragraph XVII.). Prussia has been the family estate of the Hohenzollern dynasty; therefore the monarchy must be considered as the ideal form of government (paragraph XVIII.). The Prussian military aristocracy of Junkers have been the mainstay of the Prussian State; therefore an aristocratic government is a corollary of the monarchic form of government, and the French democratic theory of government is the arch-heresy (paragraphs XIX. and XX.). Prussia has been the leading Protestant State; therefore Roman Catholicism must be held to be inconsistent with the prosperity of any modern polity (paragraph XXI.). Prussia, from a small straggling territory, has grown to be one of the leading Powers of Europe by the gradual absorption of all the surrounding small States; therefore only great Powers have a right to exist (paragraph XXII.); therefore small States are a monstrosity (paragraph XXIII.). VIII.—TREITSCHKE’S POLITICAL PAGANISM.