Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler

out to deprive him of the sleep he needed; they were satisfied if in other things, as a man and
character, he was an honor to the name of his house and to the nation, and if he fulfilled his
duties as a ruler. Telling fairy tales helped little, but did all the more harm.
This and many similar things were mere trifles, however. What had a worse effect on sections
of the nation, that were unfortunately very large, was the mounting conviction that people
were ruled from the top no matter what happened, and that, therefore, the individual had no
need to bother about anything. As long as the government was really good, or at least had
the best intentions, this was bearable. But woe betide if the old government whose intentions
were after all good were replaced by a new one which was not so decent; then spineless
compliance and childlike faith were the gravest calamity that could be conceived of.
But along with these and many other weaknesses, there were unquestionable assets.
For one thing, the stability of the entire state leadership, brought about by the monarchic
form of state and the removal of the highest state posts from the welter of speculation by
ambitious politicians. Furthermore, the dignity of the institution as such and the authority
which this alone created: likewise the raising of the civil service and particularly the army
above the level of party obligations. One more advantage was the personal embodiment of the
state's summit in the monarch as a person, and the example of responsibility which is bound
to be stronger in a monarch than in the accidental rabble of a parliamentary majority-the
proverbial incorruptibility of the German administration could primarily be attributed to this.
Finally, the cultural value of the monarchy for the German people was high and could very
well compensate for other drawbacks. The German court cities were still the refuge of an
artistic state of mind, which is increasingly threatening to die out in our materialistic times.
What the German princes did for art and science, particularly in the nineteenth century, was
exemplary. The present period in any case cannot be compared with it.
As the greatest credit factor, however, in this period of incipient and slowly spreading
decomposition of our nation, we must note the army. It was the mightiest school of the
German nation, and not for nothing was the hatred of all our enemies directed against this
buttress of national freedom and independence. No more glorious monument can be
dedicated to this unique institution than a statement of the truth that it was slandered,
hated, combated, and also feared by all inferior peoples. The fact that the rage of the
international exploiters of our people in Versailles was directed primarily against the old
German army permits us to recognize it as the bastion of our national freedom against the
power of the stock exchange. Without this warning power, the intentions of Versailles would
long since have been carried out against our people. What the German people owes to the
army can be briefly summed up in a single word, to wit: everything.
The army trained men for unconditional responsibility at a time when this quality had grown
rare and evasion of it was becoming more and more the order of the day, starting with the
model prototype of all irresponsibility, the parliament; it trained men in personal courage in
an age when cowardice threatened to become a raging disease and the spirit of sacrifice, the
willingness to give oneself for the general welfare, was looked on almost as stupidity, and the
only man regarded as intelligent was the one who best knew how to indulge and advance his
own ego. it was the school that still taught the individual German not to seek the salvation of
the nation in lying phrases about an international brotherhood between Negroes, Germans,
Chinese, French, etc., but in the force and solidarity of our own nation.
The army trained men in resolution while elsewhere in life indecision and doubt were
beginning to determine the actions of men. In an age when everywhere the know-it-alls were
setting the tone, it meant something to uphold the principle that some command is always
better than none. In this sole principle there was still an unspoiled robust health which