tional monarchy under which we
live is the co-operation of the monarchical will and the convictions
of the people." But what, one is tempted to ask, if will and
convictions differ?

In recent times, Dr. Paul Liman, in an excellent character sketch of
the Emperor, devotes his first chapter to the subject, thus
recognizing the important place it occupies in the Emperor's
mentality. Dr. Liman, like all German writers who have dealt with the
topic, animadverts on the Hohenzollern obsession by the theory and
attributes it chiefly to the romantic side of the Emperor's nature
which was strongly influenced in youth by the "wonderful events" of
1870, by the national outburst of thanks to God at the time, and by
the return from victorious war of his father, his grandfather, and
other heroes, as they must have appeared to him, like Bismarck,
Moltke, and Roon.

It is worth noting that Prince von Buelow, during the ten years of his
Chancellorship, made no parliamentary or other specific and public
allusion to the doctrine.

Before, however, attempting to offer a somewhat different explanation
of the Emperor's attitude in the matter from those just cited, let us
see what statements he has himself made publicly about it and how the
doctrine has been interpreted by his contemporaries. He made no
reference to it in his declarations to the army, the navy, and the
people when he ascended the throne. His first allusion to it was in
March, 1890, at the annual meeting of the Brandenburg provincial Diet
at the Kaiserhof Hotel in Berlin, and then the allusion was not
explicit. "I see," said the Emperor,

"in the folk and land which have descended to me a talent
entrusted to me by God, which it is my task to increase, and
I intend with all my power so to administer this talent that
I hope to be able to add much to it. Those who are willing
to help me I heartily welcome whoever they may be: those who
oppose me in this task I will crush."

His next allusion, at Bremen in April of the same year, when he was
laying the foundation-stone of a statue to his grandfather, King
William, a few months subsequent to Bismarck's retirement, was more
explicit, yet not completely so.

"It is a tradition of our House," so ran his speech,

"that we, the Hohenzollerns, regard ourselves as appointed
by God to govern and to lead the people, whom it is given us
to rule, for their well-being and the advancement of