One evil effect of the Monarchical system was that it increasingly persuaded a very large section of the nation that, as a matter of course, government was from above, and that the individual had no need to trouble himself about it. As long as government was really good, or at least meant well, matters went satisfactorily. But, alas ! supposing a well-meaning old government was replaced by a fresh and less conscientious one ! Then passive obedience and childlike faith were the worst evil imaginable.
But against these and other weaknesses there were points of undoubted value.
First of all, stability in the State leadership secured by the monarchical form of State, and withdrawal of all places under the State from the turmoil of speculation by greedy politicians ; also the intrinsic dignity of the institution and the authority which this engendered ; elevation of the officials as a body and of the Army far above the obligations of Party politics. Then the advantages due to the personal embodiment of the headship of the State in the person of the Monarch, and the example of responsibility, which is laid upon the Monarch more heavily than on the chance of a parlia¬ mentary majority—the proverbial purity of German administration was ascribable to this first and foremost.
The Army taught certain ideals and self-sacrifice for the Fatherland and its greatness, whilst in other callings greed and materialism had taken fast hold. It taught national unity as against division into classes, and perhaps its only failing was the institution of one-year volunteers. This was a failing because it broke through the principle of absolute equality and separated the better educated from the general military community ; whereas the opposite would have been an advantage.