by the
interference of the armed power. The classes in question would have
preferred a less forcible mode of performing that operation, but they
had not had a chance; the thing was done, and they had to make the
best of it, a resolution which they at once took and carried out most
heroically. In the smaller States, where things had been going on
comparatively smoothly, the middle classes had long since been thrown
back into that showy, but resultless, because powerless, parliamentary
agitation, which was most congenial to themselves. The different
States of Germany, as regarded each of them separately, appeared thus
to have attained that new and definite form which was supposed to
enable them to enter henceforth the path of peaceful constitutional
development. There only remained one open question, that of the new
political organization of the German Confederacy. And this question,
the only one which still appeared fraught with danger, it was
considered a necessity to resolve at once. Hence the pressure exerted
upon the Frankfort Assembly by the middle classes, in order to induce
it to get the Constitution ready as soon as possible; hence the
resolution among the higher and lower bourgeoisie to accept and
support this Constitution, whatever it might be, in order to create a
settled state of things without delay. Thus from the very beginning
the agitation for the Imperial Constitution arose out of a reactionary
feeling, and sprang up among these classes which were long since tired
of the Revolution.

But there was another feature in it. The first and fundamental
principles of the future German Constitution had been voted during the
first months of spring and summer, 1848, a time when popular agitation
was still rife. The resolutions then passed, though completely
reactionary _then_, now, after the arbitrary acts of the Austrian and
Prussian Governments, appeared exceedingly Liberal, and even
Democratic. The standard of comparison had changed. The Frankfort
Assembly could not, without moral suicide, strike out these once-voted
provisions, and model the Imperial Constitution upon those which the
Austrian and Prussian Governments had dictated, sword in hand.
Besides, as we have seen, the majority in that Assembly had changed
sides, and the Liberal and Democratic party were rising in influence.
Thus the Imperial Constitution not only was distinguished by its
apparently exclusive popular origin, but at the same time, full of