THE KAISER'S MAD ANCESTORS.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 209, 15 September 1916, Page 4 (Supplement)

THE KAISER'S MAD ANCESTORS.

HOHENZOLLERN IDIOSYNCRASIES. The Japanese Promer n a recent interview expressed the opinion that tho excitement <ol the present war had made the Kaiser insane. "In his insanity," Count Toray added, "he does not see humanity. . , He is just insane to kill and destroy. Others have expressed the same opinion as to the Ka'ser's mental eondiroa in even blunter terms. It is indeed by no means unlikely that the excitement of the war and the many disappointments and disiliusionments it has brought may have entirely overturned a mind which has never ' bee not her than ill-balanced. Ihe family prodsposition to madness, and to "eccentricities" which in the case of other men would almost inevitably have led to their being confined in a lunatic asylum, for their own good and the safety of the community, makes this suppos - ton tho more probable. It would occupy far too much space to attempt to trace the personal peculiarities of the earlier Hohenzollern counts and Margraves and Electors ot Brandenburg. It is sufficient to begin with the Elector Frederick, who, in January. 1701, crowned himself first King of Prussia. Wh;le this monarch cannot be justly described as insane, his nrnd. beyond question, was ill-ba'-nnced. Vain, frivolous, and ostentatious, there was neither honour nor d : gnity in the methods by which he achieved a crown. It was by sordid in. Crigues, accompanied by a good deal . f bribery, that he secured from other European States a recognition of the title ho assumed.

A DANGEROUS COMPOUND. As to th,o mental cond'tion of his m... and successor, Frederick William 1., there, is hardly room for doubt. Mac:iulay has aptly and accurately declared that his so-called "eccentricities" were "such as had never before been seen out of a madhouse." He was really a dangerous compound of fool, imbecile ; and raying maniac. Parsimonious and avaricious, he sold a great part of the beautiful furniture in the palace of Berlin. The Queen and Princesses were often half-starved by the royal lunatic, who refused to allow them a sufficiency of either food or fuel. They could not get decent dresses. He hated h : s eldest son (afterwards Fredcrick tho Great) with peculiar intensity. The Prince's attempt to escape from Prussia, its failure and his father's threats to have Inn executed - threats which would jf.-obably have ben oaried out but for foreign intercession—are w,e!l known. Everybody feared the madman.

Liko his descendant the Kaiser, ho had a mania for military display. Something like five-sevenths of the tjbt.n revenue of Prussian were spent on the army. H's chief pleasure was in reviewing his troops, and the happiest moments of his life those he spent inspecting his famous regiment of giant gretadicrs, to remit winch he ransacked every country, and did not scruple to resort to kidnapping. That h's son, Frederick the Great, was a brave soldier and a d'stinguished general are facts beyond cavil. But withal ho was an extraordinary compound. Abnonnal.y vain, his love of flattery was insatiable, and in many of his dealings he was exceedingly petty Ono of his brothers accused him of having m his " lying Memoirs" suppressed the truth as to the services rendered him in Irs wars by some of his ablest generals. As a matter of fact, Frederick had no conscience, and little if any moral sense. He always spoke o* Christianity in a mocking way, and t is intorest'ng to recall that he'despised the German language and the majority of Germans. At this period French was tho language of the Prussian Court. A despot in family life he fullv nuiintained the Holienzollern trad tions in regard to family amenities. Like the present Ka'ser he regarded himself as qualified to speak and write authoritatively on every subject—musical composition, poetry (he wrote thousands of French verses though he could not spell either French or German properly), architecture etc, etc.

LOXG-SFFFFRIXG PRUSSIA. A competent jury would have some d'rficulty in finding his nephew and successor, Fr'ecbiiek W'iil.'am 11., of sound m : nd and judgmeit. Inclined to myst o sm, he joined the Rosicrueians and dabbled in alchemy. He was a frank polygsuriist. During the eleven years ho occupied the Prussian throne ho brought the country to a condition approaching bankruptcy. But in their relations to their rulers the Prussians have ever been a marvellously long-sut-fering people. To him succeeded the weak and irresolute Frederick \\' ; !!am 111., differing from most of h's predecessors 'n that he was blameless in hLs domestic life but rescmblus arl the Hohenzollerns in tlv tenacity with which he asserted and clung to personal power. Jn firm of vv.'ll and purpose, stubborn only at the wrong tim?. under him Prussia touched tho lowest depths of nat on. al degradation. But he cannot be said to have been mad. It was otherwise, however, with his ••on, Frederick William IV., who succeeded to the Crown in 1840, and who resembled other monib< rs of th,e House of Hohenzollern ■ in his belief in ino manifold number and variety of lis gifts. From the tune he mounted the throne 't was evident that bis mind was ill-bahineed. Eventually lie became hopeles-lv iusune. ft was this madman who declared, u language which h;> might even be suppns 'd to have borrowed —"I nil! never allow to come between Alni'ghty God and th.'s country a blotted parchment to rule us with paragraphs and to replace the ane'ent. snned bond of loyilty." When his mental condition could be no longer concealed !iis brother William, in 1808, was male Regent. Thieo years later W'lliam, w!io was the pip-sent Kaiser's grandfather, becaiiv Kine. The Kaisfr heirs a striving resemblance in *e\oral respects to his mad grand-uncle, and in others to Ivs hardly less mad ancestor, l-'rodorick \\'ilham 1. Ti" b;\-, indeed, many if not most of tho (h:i;a to;--.tics of the various moot l!y-aff!ictei! Holunzollcrns. It is. ft course, a thoroughly-established fact that insan ty may pass over a generati: it. It would almost scorn as if Nature, aftr allowing two generations of Prussian sovereigns to escape, had revenged herself on the next two. For n is difficult to believe that the Crown Prini, 0 any more than his father 's '•Hernial."