It was significant of the unhealthy character of nationalism’s “practical” politics that it tried in every possible way to deck itself out with a tinsel imitation of idealism. The struggle for power became one for right and civilization; the alliances for the promotion of their selfish interests which various nations made with one another against all the rest were made to appear to be friendships and spiritual affinities. As such they were dated back into the past, even though history had a great deal more to say about hereditary quarrels than about spiritual relationships. * * * * * [pg 053] Finally, nationalism was not content with putting aside, in the sphere of politics generally, all attempts to bring into existence a really civilized humanity; it distorted the very idea of civilization itself and talked of national civilization. Once there was what was known just simply as civilization, and every civilized nation strove to possess it in its purest and most fully developed form. In this respect nationality had in the idea of civilization at that time something much more original and less spoilt than it has in the same idea to-day. If, in spite of this, there was no impulse among the nations to separate the spiritual life of each from that of its neighbours, we have a proof that nationality is not in itself the strong element in the people that demanded this. Such a claim as is made to-day to have a _national civilization_ is an unhealthy phenomenon. It presupposes that the civilized peoples of to-day have lost their healthy nature, and no longer follow instincts, but theories. They percuss and sound their souls to such an extent that these are no longer capable of any natural action. They analyse and describe them so continuously that in thinking of what they ought to be they forget what they actually are. Questions of spiritual differences between races are discussed so subtly, and with such obstinacy and dogmatism, that the talk works like an obsession, and the [pg 054] peculiarities that are said to exist make their appearance like imaginary diseases. In every department of life more and more effort is devoted to making clearly visible in the results which follow from them the emotions, the ideas, and the reasonings of the mass of the people. Any peculiarity preserved and fostered in this way shows that its natural counterpart has perished. The individual element in the personality of a people no longer, as something unconscious or half conscious, plays with varying lights on the totality of the nation’s spiritual life. It becomes an artifice, a fashion, a self-advertisement, a mania. There is bred in the nation a mass of thought, the serious results of which in every department become more evident year by year. The spiritual life of some of the leading civilized nations has already, in comparison with earlier days, taken on a monotonous tone such as makes an observer feel anxious.