GERMANY'S KINGS.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 6, Issue 278, 25 May 1917, Page 2 (Supplement)

GERMANY'S KINGS.

BAVARIA'S Bl D FOR CONTROL. POSSIBLE INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS. apart from tho possibilities of revolt in Germany jis revealed by recently cabled messages, there are good chances of an upheaval along deferent lines. Tho danger from tlie Socialists which at present seems to lie that most to be feared by the Prus siau autocrats is only 0110 of many, 'o a large esten the Socialist menace has been rendered innocuous by a campaign of repression and indeed of extinction that has been waged since the beginning of the war. John Murray in a recent issue of tho London Sunday Times draws attention to a further difficulty facing the Prussian Government. Most people have at one time or another I Relieved that : in' Gorman Kmperor is also Emperor of Germany. Of course iie in not, and ust what that distinction means is told in Mr. Murray's article reproduced herewith.

/COURAGE mes amis, le diable est raort. Or if he isn't lie's dying. Tlie prophets of revolution in Germany have been crying " woll' : ever .since the war started. They prophesied that the Socialists would rise in their wrath, until they discovered, what was already proven up to the hilt, that the German Socialists were as vandalic as their Kaiser; that they were "his Imperial Majesty's faithful Socialists," and would remain faithful so long as he continued to promise them a chance to tyrannise over oilier and non-German Socialists. Vet was a German revolution still held up to the world a-* the one great star of hope 01 the horzizon, until it was suddenly remembered that ay all male German 1 , of a revolutionary av had been carefully shepherded into th" 1 trenciics there eras no one left at home to start a revolt. And all the time everybody was forgetting the subject German king^. It would not be fair to blame tne for gctful prophets, for they are British, and have been unable to rem cm lier that the Kaiser WUhelm is only German Emperor, instead of being an Emperor of Germany. It is truo that the distinction between these two titles has not been very noticeable during the last 45 years, though it has always existed. And there are ominous signs that the Kings of Saxony. Bavaria, and Wurtomburg have always borne it in mind. •THE ONLY WAY OUT." Ever since the fall of Rome, monarch* ies outside Germany have always been hereditary. Even the present German Emperorship has been hereditary, in the House of Hohenzollern, but only sin v 1871. A mushroom heredity, commencing with an election. But it has to be remembered that despite the expressed wish of Wilhelm 1., the Kings of Bavaria, Saxony, etc., insisted that he should only assume tbo rank of German Emperor (i.e., Commander-in-Chief of Germany) instead of the possessive "Emperor of Germany." This was a most important reservation at the time. Ono which may become even more important in the near future. It implied, then, that the minor monarchs might one day remember their old electoral qualfieations and vote v new chief into office, even as they had in the past. They elected a Hohenzollern in 1871, because they bad no other choice and for 40-odd years have soon no reason to regret having done so. But the times are changing, and tho Bavarians at least with them. Note this from a pamphlet entitled "The Only Way Out,'' published at Munich, under the auspices of the "Association of Male Citizens of Southern Germany" :

"Germany cries, 'We will fight till the last man, and when no more men are left wo will enrol tlw women and old men, but the people itself is convinced that no manoeuvre of this sort can avert ultimate defeat, which, desp;ta all efforts and all sacrifices that we. have made and will make, and despite mountainous ruins still increasing day by day is at this moment mathematically certain.'

" "But when Germany Incomes convinced that a sufficient outlay of men and money has l>eon already made, and that national honour has been saved, then will come the time for abrogating the Treaty of Versailles, and for changing the Constitution which granted to the Prussian Crown tho privilege of heredity and the German sceptre. " Even a.s France avoided the terrible per.'o conditions by deposing Napoleon,

so Germany, faced by the vision of final catastrophe, will one day bo driven to decide the deposing of the King ot Prussip. in favour of a Bavarian ruler, 'flic House of Wittelshach iias fulfilled nil its duties to the Emp're, its escutcheon is unstained, ond in this war it lias won its laurels again and again. '

All tho world knows tliat the Bavarian has always hated and l>oen jealous of the Prussian, as all the world knows that the King and Crown Prince nf Bavaria nave almost exhausted the vocabulary in their expression of hatred for England and adoration of the Kaiser. THE WITTELSBACH WAY. Cut that was always the Wittelshach way. Once upon a time there was an Elector of Bavaria who called on all his fathers to witness the sanctity of the onth he swore v.e, a Guarantor of tho Pragmatic Sanction —and as soon as tho breath «as out of the body of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI. immediately la/d claim to the estates of that monarch's daughter. Five_years sufficed to witness the extinction of the last Bavarion hid for the German Imperium for winch Bavaria paid to its ally Prussia''! benefit. One hundred and seventy years have gone, and the omens are certainly more propitious. It is unfortunately true, too truo unfortunately to be hidden, that the Wittelshach record for insanity has beaten even that of tho Hapsburghs, but if tile Hohenzollerns mu»t go—as it seems they must—tho family which makes tlie first bid surely stands tho best cbonce of winning the prize.

Neither Bavarian. Saxon, Wurtem-bit-g. nor Hanovanan territory is threatened with loss. Prussian dominions only must l>e yielded. The hated Quadruple Entente, as even Prussians begin to suspect, look remarkably like potential conquerors. So why not some morn or less ananymous Bavarian sugget thftt Germany proper would l>e better off without Prussia and the Hoheunollerns, while the Wittelsbachs themselves lower all previous records in their protestations of fealty. But, as Herr M*x Stirner explained: 'Justice is a crack-brained idea, invented and foisted on to the world by a phantom. It is of no importance to mo whether an action is just or unju.st. If I am powerful enough to perform any deed whatsoever, then, eo ipso, 1 am justified in doing it. I am empowered bv myself, and require no other arbitration or justification. Power! That am I alone. lam the mighty one, tho possessor of power. Might and force exist only in me—tho strong and mighty one/' riiis elegant extract is taken from Max Stirner's The Individual and His Possessions, published in Leipzig in 1845. Herr Stirner has not achieved much notoriety outside his antivo land, but every German has felt that the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth has never l>een more clearly sot forth. 'Hio German people, whether loyalist or socialist, have been carefully shepherded into tho trendies, where they can talk, if they dare, but can do nothing save starve or get killed —but the German kinglets and princelings have been careful to stay outside the trenches and watch events, also opportunities. For oven kinglets and princelings have been known to mutiny, just as soldiers and policemen have done. If it were not so, -certain institutions would have been perennial instead of having been merely transient.