vernment so
repugnant to natural human reason. "If I were not a Christian, I would
be a Republican," he said many years later; in Christianity he found the
only support against revolution and socialism. He was not the man to be
beguiled by romantic sentiment; he was not a courtier to be blinded by
the pomp and ceremony of royalty; he was too stubborn and independent to
acquiesce in the arbitrary rule of a single man. He could only obey the
king if the king himself held his authority as the representative of a
higher power. Bismarck was accustomed to follow out his thought to its
conclusions. To whom did the king owe his power? There was only one
alternative: to the people or to God. If to the people, then it was a
mere question of convenience whether the monarchy were continued in
form; there was little to choose between a constitutional monarchy where
the king was appointed by the people and controlled by Parliament, and
an avowed republic. This was the principle held by nearly all his
contemporaries. He deliberately rejected it. He did not hold that the
voice of the people was the voice of God. This belief did not satisfy
his moral sense; it seemed in public life to leave all to interest and
ambition and nothing to duty. It did not satisfy his critical intellect;
the word "people" was to him a vague idea. The service of the People or
of the King by the Grace of God, this was the struggle which was soon to
be fought out.

Bismarck's connection with his neighbours was cemented by his marriage.
At the beginning of 1847, he was engaged to a Fraeulein von Puttkammer,
whom he had first met at the Blankenburgs' house; she belonged to a
quiet and religious family, and it is said that her mother was at first
filled with dismay when she heard that Johanna proposed to marry the mad
Bismarck. He announced the engagement to his sister in a letter
containing the two words, "All right," written in English. Before the
wedding could take place, a new impulse in his life was to begin. As
representative of the lower nobility he had to attend the meeting of the
Estates General which had been summoned in Berlin. From this time the
story of his life is interwoven with the history of his country.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER III.

THE REVOLUTION.

1847-1852.

Bismarck was a subject of the King of Prussia, but Prussia was after all
only one part of a larger unit; it was a part of Germany. At this time,
however, Germany was little