There are two directions in which the party can hope to gain new recruits--the small farmer and the small tradesman. The small farmer is peculiarly hard to reach. He is well guarded--the Church on the one side, the landlord and _junker_ on the other. To step in and steal his heart is a very difficult task. The work is pushed steadily, with tenacity, but results are slow in coming. Among the tradespeople and business men, there is more rapid progress, especially in southern Germany. In Munich a great many tradespeople vote for Von Vollmar.[44] Primarily it will always be a workingman's party. Its soul is the labor movement. Its political aim is democracy, and its hope is the power of sheer preponderance of numbers. What it will do when it has that power is a speculation that does not lure the prosaic Teutonic mind. "We will find plenty to do," one of them said, "when we have the government. We have plenty to do now, that we haven't the government." This is wisdom learned of France. This means that the party have given up their "splendid isolation"--what Von Vollmar called their "policy of sterility and despair"[45]--a policy which they acknowledged by words long after they had abandoned it in fact. They abandoned it the moment they championed labor legislation, and sought the sanitation of cities and the opening of parks, in their municipal councils. The pressure of things as they are has been too powerful for even the German Social Democracy, with its dogmatic temper and strength of millions. Revolution has, even here, been replaced by a slow and orderly development. The rapidity with which the medieval empire will be democratized will depend upon the formation of a genuine liberal party that will enlist those citizens who are inclined toward modernism but cannot be enticed into the Social Democratic or Radical parties. When such a party is formed, and an alliance made with the Social Democrats, then the transformations will be rapid.[46] Among the most significant accessions to the Social Democracy are many professional men: lawyers, physicians, engineers, etc. This augurs a change in party spirit and method. Dr. Frank of Mannheim told me that he considered the extent to which the party could lure the intellectual element the measure of the party greatness and power. VI A word should be added upon the attitude of the Social Democrats toward militarism. The standing army and the increasing navy of Germany are a heavy tax upon the people. The Germans for centuries have been military in ambition, soldiers by instinct. The Social Democrats, in common with all Socialists, are opposed to war. But the German is a patriot. In the International Congress at Stuttgart, the French and Russian delegations imposed an extreme anti-military resolution upon the Socialists, against the protest of the Germans. Bebel called their anti-patriotic utterances "silly word-juggling."[47]