In attempting to estimate the actual phenomena of the German mind at the present time, we must remember that our sources of knowledge are subject to a rigid selection. Those of us who are unable to give time to the regular reading of German publications must depend on extracts which owe their appearance in our papers to some striking characteristic which may be supposed to be pleasing to the prejudices or hopes of the English reader. The main facts, however, are clear enough to yield {176} valuable conclusions, if such are made on broad lines without undue insistence on minor points. An intense but often ingenuous and even childish national arrogance is a character that strikes one at once. It seems to be a serious and often a solemn emotion impregnably armoured against the comic sense, and expressed with a childlike confidence in its justness. It is usually associated with a language of metaphor, which is almost always florid and banal, and usually grandiose and strident. This fondness for metaphor and inability to refer to common things by plain names affects all classes, from Emperor to journalist, and gives an impression of peculiar childishness. It reminds one of the primitive belief in the transcendental reality and value of names. The national arrogance of the German is at the same time peculiarly sensitive and peculiarly obtuse. It is readily moved by praise or blame, though that be the most perfunctory and this the most mild, but it has no sense of a public opinion outside the pack. It is easily aroused to rage by external criticism, and when it finds its paroxysms make it ridiculous to the spectator it cannot profit by the information but becomes, if possible, more angry. It is quite unable to understand that to be moved to rage by an enemy is as much a proof of slavish automatism as to be moved to fear by him. The really extraordinary hatred for England is, quite apart from the obvious association of its emotional basis with fear, a most interesting phenomenon. The fact that it was possible to organize so unanimous a howl shows very clearly how fully the psychological mechanisms of the wolf were in action. It is most instructive to find eminent men of science and philosophers bristling and baring their teeth with the rest, and would be another proof, if such were needed, of the infinite insecurity of the hold of {177} reason in the most carefully cultivated minds when it is opposed by strong herd feeling.[Q]