There are nations in Europe at this moment presenting such a mass of anomalies as to render it extremely difficult to decide whether they are bent on improving their laws and institutions, or on making them worse. Much, for example, that has happened in Germany has been pronounced as a decided forward movement. The German army has displayed physical and mental qualities which bear witness to healthy development rather than degeneration. The unification of the German States into one Empire had for some time before the last war been the goal towards which the nation aspired. When it was reached, patriotic Germans expected it to be made the starting-point of a new departure for further progress. But the very accomplishment of national unification involved features which clearly pointed to retrogression. The mediæval principle of conquest was revised. The future peace and good-will among the nations was destroyed by the annexation of the two provinces conquered from France. Standing armies for Germany became more than ever necessary, and the nation was called upon to make enormous sacrifices in order to ward off the consequences of retrogression in foreign politics. The heaviest burdens were laid upon the working class, and their struggle for existence became desperate. They have shown many signs of discontent, and these have led to the consolidation of repressive measures. Thus Germany now presents the spectacle of a curious amalgam of mediæval and modern features. At the head of this great empire we find a young Emperor who, though not a despot in the widest sense of the word, possesses, as an indispensable feature of the system, sufficient power to plunge not only the whole of Germany, but all Europe, into unspeakable misery. The individuals of the nation sink into insignificance before him. They plainly feel that their destiny is in his hands as much as that of their ancestors was in the hands of their mediæval emperors. And yet the people are highly civilized, well educated, and show, in their different walks of life, intelligence, strength of character, moral worth. Here, then, is a people which, judged collectively by our standard, would stand at a low point of development, because their laws and institutions are not based on personal liberty. If we consider the direction in which they are moving, the verdict becomes as unfavourable. The country is torn by two divergent tendencies, neither of them aiming onwards. The one represented by the Emperor, the official bodies, the plutocrats, and men who think as Nordau, who wish to keep a keener watch on the destitute classes; the other represented by the Socialists, who clamour for the destruction of the present system, not for the purpose of securing personal liberty, but of wresting what little is left of it from the people, and of establishing complete State tyranny.