work)[160] grew up out of the contempt of the prince of _historical_ tragedy for the pragmatic aspect of history. For this is the aspect of it that has always dominated “the world,” and has encouraged ambitious little men to interfere in it. It was because their eyes were set on _this_, and its rationalistic structure, that Rousseau and Marx could persuade themselves that they could alter the “course of the world” by a theory. And even the social or economic interpretation of political developments, to which present-day historical work is trying to rise as to a peak-ideal (though its biological cast constantly leads us to suspect foundations of the causal kind), is still exceedingly shallow and trivial. Napoleon had in his graver moments a strong feeling for the deep logic of world-becoming, and in such moments could divine to what extent he _was_, and to what extent he _had_, a destiny. “I feel myself driven towards an end that I do not know. As soon as I shall have reached it, as soon as I shall become unnecessary, an atom will suffice to shatter me. Till then, not all the forces of mankind can do anything against me,” he said at the beginning of the Russian campaign. Here, certainly, is not the thought of a pragmatist. In this moment he divined how little the logic of Destiny needs particular instances, better men or situations. Supposing that he himself, as “empirical person,” had fallen at Marengo—then that which he _signified_ would have been actualized in some other form. A melody, in the hands of a great musician, is capable of a wealth of variations; it can be entirely transformed so far as the simple listener is concerned without altering itself—which is quite another matter—fundamentally. The epoch of German national union accomplished itself through the person of Bismarck, that of the Wars of Freedom through broad and almost nameless events; but either theme, to use the language of music, could have been “worked out” in other ways. Bismarck might have been dismissed early, the battle of Leipzig might have been lost, and for the group of wars 1864—1866—1870 there might have been substituted (as “modulations”) diplomatic, dynastic, revolutionary or economic facts—though it must not be forgotten that _Western history, under the pressure of its own physiognomic abundance_ (as distinct from physiognomic style, for even Indian history has that) _demands, so to say, contrapuntally strong accents—wars or big personalities—at the decisive points_. Bismarck himself points out in his reminiscences that in the spring of 1848 national unity could have been achieved on a broader base than in 1870 but for the policy (more accurately, the personal taste) of the King of Prussia;[161] and yet, again, according to Bismarck, this would have been so tame a working-out that a coda of one sort or another (_da capo e poi la coda_) would have been imperatively necessary. Withal, the Theme—the meaning of the epoch—