Chapter V: Philosophy and
Organization
The People's State, which I have tried to sketch in general outline,
will not become a reality in virtue of the simple fact that we know the
indispensable conditions of its existence. It does not suffice to know what
aspect such a State would present. The problem of its foundation is far more
important. The parties which exist at present and which draw their profits from
the State as it now is cannot be expected to bring about a radical change in
the regime or to change their attitude on their own initiative. This is
rendered all the more impossible because the forces which now have the
direction of affairs in their hands are Jews here and Jews there and Jews
everywhere. The trend of development which we are now experiencing would, if
allowed to go on unhampered, lead to the realization of the Pan-Jewish prophecy
that the Jews will one day devour the other nations and become lords of the
earth.
In contrast to the millions of 'bourgeois' and 'proletarian'
Germans, who are stumbling to their ruin, mostly through timidity, indolence
and stupidity, the Jew pursues his way persistently and keeps his eye always
fixed on his future goal. Any party that is led by him can fight for no other
interests than his, and his interests certainly have nothing in common with
those of the Aryan nations.
If we would transform our ideal picture of the People's
State into a reality we shall have to keep independent of the forces that now
control public life and seek for new forces that will be ready and capable of
taking up the fight for such an ideal. For a fight it will have to be, since
the first objective will not be to build up the idea of the People's State but
rather to wipe out the Jewish State which is now in existence. As so often
happens in the course of history, the main difficulty is not to establish a new
order of things but to clear the ground for its establishment. Prejudices and
egotistic interests join together in forming a common front against the new
idea and in trying by every means to prevent its triumph, because it is
disagreeable to them or threatens their existence.
That is why the protagonist of the new idea is
unfortunately, in spite of his desire for constructive work, compelled to wage
a destructive battle first, in order to abolish the existing state of affairs.
A doctrine whose principles are radically new and of essential
importance must adopt the sharp probe of criticism as its weapon, though this
may show itself disagreeable to the individual followers.
It is evidence of a very superficial insight into
historical developments if the so-called folkists emphasize again and again
that they will adopt the use of negative criticism under no circumstances but
will engage only in constructive work. That is nothing but puerile chatter and
is typical of the whole lot of folkists. It is another proof that the history
of our own times has made no impression on these minds. Marxism too has had its
aims to pursue and it also recognizes constructive work, though by this it
understands only the establishment of despotic rule in the hands of
international Jewish finance. Nevertheless for seventy years its principal work
still remains in the field of criticism. And what disruptive and destructive
criticism it has been! Criticism repeated again and again, until the corrosive
acid ate into the old State so thoroughly that it finally crumbled to pieces.
Only then did the so-called 'constructive' critical work of Marxism begin. And
that was natural, right and logical. An existing order of things is not
abolished by merely proclaiming and insisting on a new one. It must not be
hoped that those who are the partisans of the existing order and have their
interests bound up with it will be converted and won over to the new movement
simply by being shown that something new is necessary. On the contrary, what
may easily happen is that two different situations will exist side by side and
that the-called philosophy is transformed into a party, above which
level it will not be able to raise itself afterwards. For the philosophy is
intolerant and cannot permit another to exist side by side with it. It
imperiously demands its own recognition as unique and exclusive and a complete
transformation in accordance with its views throughout all the branches of
public life. It can never allow the previous state of affairs to continue in
existence by its side.
And the same holds true of religions.
Christianity was
not content with erecting an altar of its own. It had first to destroy the
pagan altars. It was only in virtue of this passionate intolerance that an
apodictic faith could grow up. And intolerance is an indispensable condition
for the growth of such a faith.
It may be objected here that in these phenomena which we
find throughout the history of the world we have to recognize mostly a
specifically Jewish mode of thought and that such fanaticism and intolerance
are typical symptoms of Jewish mentality. That may be a thousandfold true; and
it is a fact deeply to be regretted. The appearance of intolerance and
fanaticism in the history of mankind may be deeply regrettable, and it may be
looked upon as foreign to human nature, but the fact does not change conditions
as they exist today. The men who wish to liberate our German nation from the
conditions in which it now exists cannot cudgel their brains with thinking how
excellent it would be if this or that had never arisen. They must strive to
find ways and means of abolishing what actually exists. A philosophy of life
which is inspired by an infernal spirit of intolerance can only be set aside by
a doctrine that is advanced in an equally ardent spirit and fought for with as
determined a will and which is itself a new idea, pure and absolutely true.
Each one of us today may regret the fact that the advent of
Christianity was the first occasion on which spiritual terror was introduced
into the much freer ancient world, but the fact cannot be denied that ever
since then the world is pervaded and dominated by this kind of coercion and
that violence is broken only by violence and terror by terror. Only then can a
new regime be created by means of constructive work. Political parties are
prone to enter compromises; but a philosophy never does this. A political party
is inclined to adjust its teachings with a view to meeting those of its
opponents, but a philosophy proclaims its own infallibility.
In the beginning, political parties have also and nearly
always the intention of securing an exclusive and despotic domination for
themselves. They always show a slight tendency to become philosophical. But the
limited nature of their programme is in itself enough to rob them of that
heroic spirit which a philosophy demands. The spirit of conciliation which
animates their will attracts those petty and chicken-hearted people who are not
fit to be protagonists in any crusade. That is the reason why they mostly
become struck in their miserable pettiness very early on the march. They give
up fighting for their ideology and, by way of what they call 'positive
collaboration,' they try as quickly as possible to wedge themselves into some
tiny place at the trough of the existent regime and to stick there as long as
possible. Their whole effort ends at that. And if they should get shouldered
away from the common manger by a competition of more brutal manners then their
only idea is to force themselves in again, by force or chicanery, among the
herd of all the others who have similar appetites, in order to get back into
the front row, and finally – even at the expense of their most sacred
convictions – participate anew in that beloved spot where they find their
fodder. They are the jackals of politics.
But a general philosophy of life will never share its
place with something else. Therefore it can never agree to collaborate in any
order of things that it condemns. On the contrary it feels obliged to employ
every means in fighting against the old order and the whole world of ideas
belonging to that order and prepare the way for its destruction.
These purely destructive tactics, the danger of which is
so readily perceived by the enemy that he forms a united front against them for
his common defence, and also the constructive tactics, which must be aggressive
in order to carry the new world of ideas to success – both these phases of the
struggle call for a body of resolute fighters. Any new philosophy of life will
bring its ideas to victory only if the most courageous and active elements of
its epoch and its people are enrolled under its standards and grouped firmly
together in a powerful fighting organization. To achieve this purpose it is
absolutely necessary to select from the general system of doctrine a certain
number of ideas which will appeal to such individuals and which, once they are
expressed in a precise and clear-cut form, will serve as articles of faith for
a new association of men. While the programme of the ordinary political party
is nothing but the recipe for cooking up favourable results out of the next
general elections, the programme of a philosophy represents a declaration of
war against an existing order of things, against present conditions, in short,
against the established view of life in general.
It is not necessary, however, that every individual
fighter for such a new doctrine need have a full grasp of the ultimate ideas
and plans of those who are the leaders of the movement. It is only necessary
that each should have a clear notion of the fundamental ideas and that he
should thoroughly assimilate a few of the most fundamental principles, so that
he will be convinced of the necessity of carrying the movement and its
doctrines to success. The individual soldier is not initiated in the knowledge
of high strategical plans. But he is trained to submit to a rigid discipline,
to be passionately convinced of the justice and inner worth of his cause and
that he must devote himself to it without reserve. So, too, the individual
follower of a movement must be made acquainted with its far-reaching purpose,
how it is inspired by a powerful will and has a great future before it.
Supposing that each soldier in an army were a general, and had the
training and capacity for generalship, that army would not be an efficient
fighting instrument. Similarly a political movement would not be very efficient
in fighting for a philosophy if it were made up exclusively of intellectuals.
No, we need the simple soldier also. Without him no discipline can be
established.
By its very nature, an organization can exist only if
leaders of high intellectual ability are served by a large mass of men who are
emotionally devoted to the cause. To maintain discipline in a company of two
hundred men who are equally intelligent and capable would turn out more
difficult in the long run than in a company of one hundred and ninety less
gifted men and ten who have had a higher education.
The Social-Democrats have profited very much by
recognizing this truth. They took the broad masses of our people who had just
completed military service and learned to submit to discipline, and they
subjected this mass of men to the discipline of the Social-Democratic
organization, which was no less rigid than the discipline through which the
young men had passed in their military training. The Social-Democratic
organization consisted of an army divided into officers and men. The German
worker who had passed through his military service became the private soldier
in that army, and the Jewish intellectual was the officer. The German trade
union functionaries may be compared to the non-commissioned officers. The fact,
which was always looked upon with indifference by our middle-classes, that only
the so-called uneducated classes joined Marxism was the very ground on which
this party achieved its success. For while the bourgeois parties, because they
mostly consisted of intellectuals, were only a feckless band of undisciplined
individuals, out of much less intelligent human material the Marxist leaders
formed an army of party combatants who obey their Jewish masters just as
blindly as they formerly obeyed their German officers. The German
middle-classes, who never; bothered their heads about psychological problems
because they felt themselves superior to such matters, did not think it
necessary to reflect on the profound significance of this fact and the secret
danger involved in it. Indeed they believed. that a political movement which
draws its followers exclusively from intellectual circles must, for that very
reason, be of greater importance and have better grounds. for its chances of
success, and even a greater probability of taking over the government of the
country than a party made up of the ignorant masses. They completely failed to
realize the fact that the strength of a political party never consists in the
intelligence and independent spirit of the rank-and-file of its members but
rather in the spirit of willing obedience with which they follow their
intellectual leaders. What is of decisive importance is the leadership itself.
When two bodies of troops are arrayed in mutual combat victory will not fall to
that side in which every soldier has an expert knowledge of the rules of
strategy, but rather to that side which has the best leaders and at the same
time the best disciplined, most blindly obedient and best drilled troops.
That is a fundamental piece of knowledge which we must always bear in
mind when we examine the possibility of transforming a philosophy into a
practical reality.
If we agree that in order to carry a philosophy into
practical effect it must be incorporated in a fighting movement, then the
logical consequence is that the programme of such a movement must take account
of the human material at its disposal. Just as the ultimate aims and
fundamental principles must be absolutely definite and unmistakable, so the
propagandist programme must be well drawn up and must be inspired by a keen
sense of its psychological appeals to the minds of those without whose help the
noblest ideas will be doomed to remain in the eternal, realm of ideas.
If
the idea of the People's State, which is at present an obscure wish, is one day
to attain a clear and definite success, from its vague and vast mass of thought
it will have to put forward certain definite principles which of their very
nature and content are calculated to attract a broad mass of adherents; in
other words, such a group of people as can guarantee that these principles will
be fought for. That group of people are the German workers.
That is why the programme of the new movement was
condensed into a few fundamental postulates, twenty-five in all. They are meant
first of all to give the ordinary man a rough sketch of what the movement is
aiming at. They are, so to say, a profession of faith which on the one hand is
meant to win adherents to the movement and, on the other, they are meant to
unite such adherents together in a covenant to which all have subscribed.
In these matters we must never lose sight of the following: What we
call the programme of the movement is absolutely right as far as its ultimate
aims are concerned, but as regards the manner in which that programme is
formulated certain psychologica1 considerations had to be taken into account.
Hence, in the course of time, the opinion may well arise that certain
principles should be expressed differently and might be better formulated. But
any attempt at a different formulation has a fatal effect in most cases. For
something that ought to be fixed and unshakable thereby becomes the subject of
discussion. As soon as one point alone is removed from the sphere of dogmatic
certainty, the discussion will not simply result in a new and better
formulation which will have greater consistency but may easily lead to endless
debates and general confusion. In such cases the question must always be
carefully considered as to whether a new and more adequate formulation is to be
preferred, though it may cause a controversy within the movement, or whether it
may not be better to retain the old formula which, though probably not the
best, represents an organism enclosed in itself, solid and internally
homogeneous. All experience shows that the second of these alternatives is
preferable. For since in these changes one is dealing only with external forms
such corrections will always appear desirable and possible. But in the last
analysis the generality of people think superficially and therefore the great
danger is that in what is merely an external formulation of the programme
people will see an essential aim of the movement. In that way the will and the
combative force at the service of the ideas are weakened and the energies that
ought to be directed towards the outer world are dissipated in programmatic
discussions within the ranks of the movement.
For a doctrine that is actually right in its main
features it is less dangerous to retain a formulation which may no longer be
quite adequate instead of trying to improve it and thereby allowing a
fundamental principle of the movement, which had hitherto been considered as
solid as granite, to become the subject of a general discussion which may have
unfortunate consequences. This is particularly to be avoided as long as a
movement is still fighting for victory. For would it be possible to inspire
people with blind faith in the truth of a doctrine if doubt and uncertainty are
encouraged by continual alterations in its external formulation?
The essentials of a teaching must never be looked for in
its external formulas, but always in its inner meaning. And this meaning is
unchangeable. And in its interest one can only wish that a movement should
exclude everything that tends towards disintegration and uncertainty in order
to preserve the unified force that is necessary for its triumph.
Here again the Catholic Church has a lesson to teach us.
Though sometimes, and often quite unnecessarily, its dogmatic system is in
conflict with the exact sciences and with scientific discoveries, it is not
disposed to sacrifice a syllable of its teachings. It has rightly recognized
that its powers of resistance would be weakened by introducing greater or less
doctrinal adaptations to meet the temporary conclusions of science, which in
reality are always vacillating. And thus it holds fast to its fixed and
established dogmas which alone can give to the whole system the character of a
faith. And that is the reason why it stands firmer today than ever before. We
may prophesy that, as a fixed pole amid fleeting phenomena, it will continue to
attract increasing numbers of people who will be blindly attached to it the
more rapid the rhythm of changing phenomena around it.
Therefore whoever really and seriously desires that the
idea of the People's State should triumph must realize that this triumph can be
assured only through a militant movement and that this movement must ground its
strength only on the granite firmness of an impregnable and firmly coherent
programme. In regard to its formulas it must never make concessions to the
spirit of the time but must maintain the form that has once and for all been
decided upon as the right one; in any case until victory has crowned its
efforts. Before this goal has been reached any attempt to open a discussion on
the opportuneness of this or that point in the programme might tend to
disintegrate the solidity and fighting strength of the movement, according to
the measures in which its followers might take part in such an internal
dispute. Some 'improvements' introduced today might be subjected to a critical
examination to-morrow, in order to substitute it with something better the day
after. Once the barrier has been taken down the road is opened and we know only
the beginning, but we do not know to what shoreless sea it may lead.
This important principle had to be acknowledged in practice by the
members of the National Socialist Movement at its very beginning. In its
programme of twenty-five points the National Socialist German Labour Party has
been furnished with a basis that must remain unshakable. The members of the
movement, both present and future, must never feel themselves called upon to
undertake a critical revision of these leading postulates, but rather feel
themselves obliged to put them into practice as they stand. Otherwise the next
generation would, in its turn and with equal right, expend its energy in such
purely formal work within the party, instead of winning new adherents to the
movement and thus adding to its power. For the majority of our followers the
essence of the movement will consist not so much in the letter of our theses
but in the meaning that we attribute to them.
The new movement owes its name to these considerations,
and later on its programme was drawn up in conformity with them. They are the
basis of our propaganda. In order to carry the idea of the People's State to
victory, a popular party had to be founded, a party that did not consist of
intellectual leaders only but also of manual labourers. Any attempt to carry
these theories into effect without the aid of a militant organization would be
doomed to failure today, as it has failed in the past and must fail in the
future. That is why the movement is not only justified but it is also obliged
to consider itself as the champion and representative of these ideas. Just as
the fundamental principles of the National Socialist Movement are based on the
folk idea, folk ideas are National Socialist. If National Socialism would
triumph it will have to hold firm to this fact unreservedly, and here again it
has not only the right but also the duty to emphasize most rigidly that any
attempt to represent the folk idea outside of the National Socialist German
Labour Party is futile and in most cases fraudulent.
If the reproach should be launched against our movement
that it has 'monopolized' the folk idea, there is only one answer to give.
Not only have we monopolized the folk idea but, to all practical
intents and purposes, we have created it.
For what hitherto existed under this name was not in the
least capable of influencing the destiny of our people, since all those ideas
lacked a political and coherent formulation. In most cases they are nothing but
isolated and incoherent notions which are more or less right. Quite frequently
these were in open contradiction to one another and in no case was there any
internal cohesion among them. And even if this internal cohesion existed it
would have been much too weak to form the basis of any movement.
Only the National Socialist Movement proved capable of
fulfilling this task.
All kinds of associations and groups, big as well as
little, now claim the title völkisch. This is one result of the work which
National Socialism has done. Without this work, not one of all these parties
would have thought of adopting the word völkisch at all. That expression would
have meant nothing to them and especially their directors would never have had
anything to do with such an idea. Not until the work of the German National
Socialist Labour Party had given this idea a pregnant meaning did it appear in
the mouths of all kinds of people. Our party above all, by the success of its
propaganda, has shown the force of the folk idea; so much so that the others,
in an effort to gain proselytes, find themselves forced to copy our example, at
least in words.
Just as heretofore they exploited everything to serve
their petty electoral purposes, today they use the word völkisch only as an
external and hollow-sounding phrase for the purpose of counteracting the force
of the impression which the National Socialist Party makes on the members of
those other parties. Only the desire to maintain their existence and the fear
that our movement may prevail, because it is based on a philosophy that is of
universal importance, and because they feel that the exclusive character of our
movement betokens danger for them – only for these reasons do they use words
which they repudiated eight years ago, derided seven years ago, branded as
stupid six years ago, combated five years ago, hated four years ago, and
finally, two years ago, annexed and incorporated them in their present
political vocabulary, employing them as war slogans in their struggle.
And so it is necessary even now not to cease calling attention to the
fact that not one of those parties has the slightest idea of what the German
nation needs. The most striking proof of this is represented by the superficial
way in which they use the word völkisch.
Not less dangerous are those who run about as
semi-folkists formulating fantastic schemes which are mostly based on nothing
else than a fixed idea which in itself might be right but which, because it is
an isolated notion, is of no use whatsoever for the formation of a great
homogeneous fighting association and could by no means serve as the basis of
its organization. Those people who concoct a programme which consists partly of
their own ideas and partly of ideas taken from others, about which they have
read somewhere, are often more dangerous than the outspoken enemies of the
völkisch idea. At best they are sterile theorists but more frequently they are
mischievous agitators of the public mind. They believe that they can mask their
intellectual vanity, the futility of their efforts, and their lack of
stability, by sporting flowing beards and indulging in ancient German gestures.
In face of all those futile attempts, it is therefore worth while to
recall the time when the new National Socialist Movement began its fight.
Organization
The People's State, which I have tried to sketch in general outline,
will not become a reality in virtue of the simple fact that we know the
indispensable conditions of its existence. It does not suffice to know what
aspect such a State would present. The problem of its foundation is far more
important. The parties which exist at present and which draw their profits from
the State as it now is cannot be expected to bring about a radical change in
the regime or to change their attitude on their own initiative. This is
rendered all the more impossible because the forces which now have the
direction of affairs in their hands are Jews here and Jews there and Jews
everywhere. The trend of development which we are now experiencing would, if
allowed to go on unhampered, lead to the realization of the Pan-Jewish prophecy
that the Jews will one day devour the other nations and become lords of the
earth.
In contrast to the millions of 'bourgeois' and 'proletarian'
Germans, who are stumbling to their ruin, mostly through timidity, indolence
and stupidity, the Jew pursues his way persistently and keeps his eye always
fixed on his future goal. Any party that is led by him can fight for no other
interests than his, and his interests certainly have nothing in common with
those of the Aryan nations.
If we would transform our ideal picture of the People's
State into a reality we shall have to keep independent of the forces that now
control public life and seek for new forces that will be ready and capable of
taking up the fight for such an ideal. For a fight it will have to be, since
the first objective will not be to build up the idea of the People's State but
rather to wipe out the Jewish State which is now in existence. As so often
happens in the course of history, the main difficulty is not to establish a new
order of things but to clear the ground for its establishment. Prejudices and
egotistic interests join together in forming a common front against the new
idea and in trying by every means to prevent its triumph, because it is
disagreeable to them or threatens their existence.
That is why the protagonist of the new idea is
unfortunately, in spite of his desire for constructive work, compelled to wage
a destructive battle first, in order to abolish the existing state of affairs.
A doctrine whose principles are radically new and of essential
importance must adopt the sharp probe of criticism as its weapon, though this
may show itself disagreeable to the individual followers.
It is evidence of a very superficial insight into
historical developments if the so-called folkists emphasize again and again
that they will adopt the use of negative criticism under no circumstances but
will engage only in constructive work. That is nothing but puerile chatter and
is typical of the whole lot of folkists. It is another proof that the history
of our own times has made no impression on these minds. Marxism too has had its
aims to pursue and it also recognizes constructive work, though by this it
understands only the establishment of despotic rule in the hands of
international Jewish finance. Nevertheless for seventy years its principal work
still remains in the field of criticism. And what disruptive and destructive
criticism it has been! Criticism repeated again and again, until the corrosive
acid ate into the old State so thoroughly that it finally crumbled to pieces.
Only then did the so-called 'constructive' critical work of Marxism begin. And
that was natural, right and logical. An existing order of things is not
abolished by merely proclaiming and insisting on a new one. It must not be
hoped that those who are the partisans of the existing order and have their
interests bound up with it will be converted and won over to the new movement
simply by being shown that something new is necessary. On the contrary, what
may easily happen is that two different situations will exist side by side and
that the-called philosophy is transformed into a party, above which
level it will not be able to raise itself afterwards. For the philosophy is
intolerant and cannot permit another to exist side by side with it. It
imperiously demands its own recognition as unique and exclusive and a complete
transformation in accordance with its views throughout all the branches of
public life. It can never allow the previous state of affairs to continue in
existence by its side.
And the same holds true of religions.
Christianity was
not content with erecting an altar of its own. It had first to destroy the
pagan altars. It was only in virtue of this passionate intolerance that an
apodictic faith could grow up. And intolerance is an indispensable condition
for the growth of such a faith.
It may be objected here that in these phenomena which we
find throughout the history of the world we have to recognize mostly a
specifically Jewish mode of thought and that such fanaticism and intolerance
are typical symptoms of Jewish mentality. That may be a thousandfold true; and
it is a fact deeply to be regretted. The appearance of intolerance and
fanaticism in the history of mankind may be deeply regrettable, and it may be
looked upon as foreign to human nature, but the fact does not change conditions
as they exist today. The men who wish to liberate our German nation from the
conditions in which it now exists cannot cudgel their brains with thinking how
excellent it would be if this or that had never arisen. They must strive to
find ways and means of abolishing what actually exists. A philosophy of life
which is inspired by an infernal spirit of intolerance can only be set aside by
a doctrine that is advanced in an equally ardent spirit and fought for with as
determined a will and which is itself a new idea, pure and absolutely true.
Each one of us today may regret the fact that the advent of
Christianity was the first occasion on which spiritual terror was introduced
into the much freer ancient world, but the fact cannot be denied that ever
since then the world is pervaded and dominated by this kind of coercion and
that violence is broken only by violence and terror by terror. Only then can a
new regime be created by means of constructive work. Political parties are
prone to enter compromises; but a philosophy never does this. A political party
is inclined to adjust its teachings with a view to meeting those of its
opponents, but a philosophy proclaims its own infallibility.
In the beginning, political parties have also and nearly
always the intention of securing an exclusive and despotic domination for
themselves. They always show a slight tendency to become philosophical. But the
limited nature of their programme is in itself enough to rob them of that
heroic spirit which a philosophy demands. The spirit of conciliation which
animates their will attracts those petty and chicken-hearted people who are not
fit to be protagonists in any crusade. That is the reason why they mostly
become struck in their miserable pettiness very early on the march. They give
up fighting for their ideology and, by way of what they call 'positive
collaboration,' they try as quickly as possible to wedge themselves into some
tiny place at the trough of the existent regime and to stick there as long as
possible. Their whole effort ends at that. And if they should get shouldered
away from the common manger by a competition of more brutal manners then their
only idea is to force themselves in again, by force or chicanery, among the
herd of all the others who have similar appetites, in order to get back into
the front row, and finally – even at the expense of their most sacred
convictions – participate anew in that beloved spot where they find their
fodder. They are the jackals of politics.
But a general philosophy of life will never share its
place with something else. Therefore it can never agree to collaborate in any
order of things that it condemns. On the contrary it feels obliged to employ
every means in fighting against the old order and the whole world of ideas
belonging to that order and prepare the way for its destruction.
These purely destructive tactics, the danger of which is
so readily perceived by the enemy that he forms a united front against them for
his common defence, and also the constructive tactics, which must be aggressive
in order to carry the new world of ideas to success – both these phases of the
struggle call for a body of resolute fighters. Any new philosophy of life will
bring its ideas to victory only if the most courageous and active elements of
its epoch and its people are enrolled under its standards and grouped firmly
together in a powerful fighting organization. To achieve this purpose it is
absolutely necessary to select from the general system of doctrine a certain
number of ideas which will appeal to such individuals and which, once they are
expressed in a precise and clear-cut form, will serve as articles of faith for
a new association of men. While the programme of the ordinary political party
is nothing but the recipe for cooking up favourable results out of the next
general elections, the programme of a philosophy represents a declaration of
war against an existing order of things, against present conditions, in short,
against the established view of life in general.
It is not necessary, however, that every individual
fighter for such a new doctrine need have a full grasp of the ultimate ideas
and plans of those who are the leaders of the movement. It is only necessary
that each should have a clear notion of the fundamental ideas and that he
should thoroughly assimilate a few of the most fundamental principles, so that
he will be convinced of the necessity of carrying the movement and its
doctrines to success. The individual soldier is not initiated in the knowledge
of high strategical plans. But he is trained to submit to a rigid discipline,
to be passionately convinced of the justice and inner worth of his cause and
that he must devote himself to it without reserve. So, too, the individual
follower of a movement must be made acquainted with its far-reaching purpose,
how it is inspired by a powerful will and has a great future before it.
Supposing that each soldier in an army were a general, and had the
training and capacity for generalship, that army would not be an efficient
fighting instrument. Similarly a political movement would not be very efficient
in fighting for a philosophy if it were made up exclusively of intellectuals.
No, we need the simple soldier also. Without him no discipline can be
established.
By its very nature, an organization can exist only if
leaders of high intellectual ability are served by a large mass of men who are
emotionally devoted to the cause. To maintain discipline in a company of two
hundred men who are equally intelligent and capable would turn out more
difficult in the long run than in a company of one hundred and ninety less
gifted men and ten who have had a higher education.
The Social-Democrats have profited very much by
recognizing this truth. They took the broad masses of our people who had just
completed military service and learned to submit to discipline, and they
subjected this mass of men to the discipline of the Social-Democratic
organization, which was no less rigid than the discipline through which the
young men had passed in their military training. The Social-Democratic
organization consisted of an army divided into officers and men. The German
worker who had passed through his military service became the private soldier
in that army, and the Jewish intellectual was the officer. The German trade
union functionaries may be compared to the non-commissioned officers. The fact,
which was always looked upon with indifference by our middle-classes, that only
the so-called uneducated classes joined Marxism was the very ground on which
this party achieved its success. For while the bourgeois parties, because they
mostly consisted of intellectuals, were only a feckless band of undisciplined
individuals, out of much less intelligent human material the Marxist leaders
formed an army of party combatants who obey their Jewish masters just as
blindly as they formerly obeyed their German officers. The German
middle-classes, who never; bothered their heads about psychological problems
because they felt themselves superior to such matters, did not think it
necessary to reflect on the profound significance of this fact and the secret
danger involved in it. Indeed they believed. that a political movement which
draws its followers exclusively from intellectual circles must, for that very
reason, be of greater importance and have better grounds. for its chances of
success, and even a greater probability of taking over the government of the
country than a party made up of the ignorant masses. They completely failed to
realize the fact that the strength of a political party never consists in the
intelligence and independent spirit of the rank-and-file of its members but
rather in the spirit of willing obedience with which they follow their
intellectual leaders. What is of decisive importance is the leadership itself.
When two bodies of troops are arrayed in mutual combat victory will not fall to
that side in which every soldier has an expert knowledge of the rules of
strategy, but rather to that side which has the best leaders and at the same
time the best disciplined, most blindly obedient and best drilled troops.
That is a fundamental piece of knowledge which we must always bear in
mind when we examine the possibility of transforming a philosophy into a
practical reality.
If we agree that in order to carry a philosophy into
practical effect it must be incorporated in a fighting movement, then the
logical consequence is that the programme of such a movement must take account
of the human material at its disposal. Just as the ultimate aims and
fundamental principles must be absolutely definite and unmistakable, so the
propagandist programme must be well drawn up and must be inspired by a keen
sense of its psychological appeals to the minds of those without whose help the
noblest ideas will be doomed to remain in the eternal, realm of ideas.
If
the idea of the People's State, which is at present an obscure wish, is one day
to attain a clear and definite success, from its vague and vast mass of thought
it will have to put forward certain definite principles which of their very
nature and content are calculated to attract a broad mass of adherents; in
other words, such a group of people as can guarantee that these principles will
be fought for. That group of people are the German workers.
That is why the programme of the new movement was
condensed into a few fundamental postulates, twenty-five in all. They are meant
first of all to give the ordinary man a rough sketch of what the movement is
aiming at. They are, so to say, a profession of faith which on the one hand is
meant to win adherents to the movement and, on the other, they are meant to
unite such adherents together in a covenant to which all have subscribed.
In these matters we must never lose sight of the following: What we
call the programme of the movement is absolutely right as far as its ultimate
aims are concerned, but as regards the manner in which that programme is
formulated certain psychologica1 considerations had to be taken into account.
Hence, in the course of time, the opinion may well arise that certain
principles should be expressed differently and might be better formulated. But
any attempt at a different formulation has a fatal effect in most cases. For
something that ought to be fixed and unshakable thereby becomes the subject of
discussion. As soon as one point alone is removed from the sphere of dogmatic
certainty, the discussion will not simply result in a new and better
formulation which will have greater consistency but may easily lead to endless
debates and general confusion. In such cases the question must always be
carefully considered as to whether a new and more adequate formulation is to be
preferred, though it may cause a controversy within the movement, or whether it
may not be better to retain the old formula which, though probably not the
best, represents an organism enclosed in itself, solid and internally
homogeneous. All experience shows that the second of these alternatives is
preferable. For since in these changes one is dealing only with external forms
such corrections will always appear desirable and possible. But in the last
analysis the generality of people think superficially and therefore the great
danger is that in what is merely an external formulation of the programme
people will see an essential aim of the movement. In that way the will and the
combative force at the service of the ideas are weakened and the energies that
ought to be directed towards the outer world are dissipated in programmatic
discussions within the ranks of the movement.
For a doctrine that is actually right in its main
features it is less dangerous to retain a formulation which may no longer be
quite adequate instead of trying to improve it and thereby allowing a
fundamental principle of the movement, which had hitherto been considered as
solid as granite, to become the subject of a general discussion which may have
unfortunate consequences. This is particularly to be avoided as long as a
movement is still fighting for victory. For would it be possible to inspire
people with blind faith in the truth of a doctrine if doubt and uncertainty are
encouraged by continual alterations in its external formulation?
The essentials of a teaching must never be looked for in
its external formulas, but always in its inner meaning. And this meaning is
unchangeable. And in its interest one can only wish that a movement should
exclude everything that tends towards disintegration and uncertainty in order
to preserve the unified force that is necessary for its triumph.
Here again the Catholic Church has a lesson to teach us.
Though sometimes, and often quite unnecessarily, its dogmatic system is in
conflict with the exact sciences and with scientific discoveries, it is not
disposed to sacrifice a syllable of its teachings. It has rightly recognized
that its powers of resistance would be weakened by introducing greater or less
doctrinal adaptations to meet the temporary conclusions of science, which in
reality are always vacillating. And thus it holds fast to its fixed and
established dogmas which alone can give to the whole system the character of a
faith. And that is the reason why it stands firmer today than ever before. We
may prophesy that, as a fixed pole amid fleeting phenomena, it will continue to
attract increasing numbers of people who will be blindly attached to it the
more rapid the rhythm of changing phenomena around it.
Therefore whoever really and seriously desires that the
idea of the People's State should triumph must realize that this triumph can be
assured only through a militant movement and that this movement must ground its
strength only on the granite firmness of an impregnable and firmly coherent
programme. In regard to its formulas it must never make concessions to the
spirit of the time but must maintain the form that has once and for all been
decided upon as the right one; in any case until victory has crowned its
efforts. Before this goal has been reached any attempt to open a discussion on
the opportuneness of this or that point in the programme might tend to
disintegrate the solidity and fighting strength of the movement, according to
the measures in which its followers might take part in such an internal
dispute. Some 'improvements' introduced today might be subjected to a critical
examination to-morrow, in order to substitute it with something better the day
after. Once the barrier has been taken down the road is opened and we know only
the beginning, but we do not know to what shoreless sea it may lead.
This important principle had to be acknowledged in practice by the
members of the National Socialist Movement at its very beginning. In its
programme of twenty-five points the National Socialist German Labour Party has
been furnished with a basis that must remain unshakable. The members of the
movement, both present and future, must never feel themselves called upon to
undertake a critical revision of these leading postulates, but rather feel
themselves obliged to put them into practice as they stand. Otherwise the next
generation would, in its turn and with equal right, expend its energy in such
purely formal work within the party, instead of winning new adherents to the
movement and thus adding to its power. For the majority of our followers the
essence of the movement will consist not so much in the letter of our theses
but in the meaning that we attribute to them.
The new movement owes its name to these considerations,
and later on its programme was drawn up in conformity with them. They are the
basis of our propaganda. In order to carry the idea of the People's State to
victory, a popular party had to be founded, a party that did not consist of
intellectual leaders only but also of manual labourers. Any attempt to carry
these theories into effect without the aid of a militant organization would be
doomed to failure today, as it has failed in the past and must fail in the
future. That is why the movement is not only justified but it is also obliged
to consider itself as the champion and representative of these ideas. Just as
the fundamental principles of the National Socialist Movement are based on the
folk idea, folk ideas are National Socialist. If National Socialism would
triumph it will have to hold firm to this fact unreservedly, and here again it
has not only the right but also the duty to emphasize most rigidly that any
attempt to represent the folk idea outside of the National Socialist German
Labour Party is futile and in most cases fraudulent.
If the reproach should be launched against our movement
that it has 'monopolized' the folk idea, there is only one answer to give.
Not only have we monopolized the folk idea but, to all practical
intents and purposes, we have created it.
For what hitherto existed under this name was not in the
least capable of influencing the destiny of our people, since all those ideas
lacked a political and coherent formulation. In most cases they are nothing but
isolated and incoherent notions which are more or less right. Quite frequently
these were in open contradiction to one another and in no case was there any
internal cohesion among them. And even if this internal cohesion existed it
would have been much too weak to form the basis of any movement.
Only the National Socialist Movement proved capable of
fulfilling this task.
All kinds of associations and groups, big as well as
little, now claim the title völkisch. This is one result of the work which
National Socialism has done. Without this work, not one of all these parties
would have thought of adopting the word völkisch at all. That expression would
have meant nothing to them and especially their directors would never have had
anything to do with such an idea. Not until the work of the German National
Socialist Labour Party had given this idea a pregnant meaning did it appear in
the mouths of all kinds of people. Our party above all, by the success of its
propaganda, has shown the force of the folk idea; so much so that the others,
in an effort to gain proselytes, find themselves forced to copy our example, at
least in words.
Just as heretofore they exploited everything to serve
their petty electoral purposes, today they use the word völkisch only as an
external and hollow-sounding phrase for the purpose of counteracting the force
of the impression which the National Socialist Party makes on the members of
those other parties. Only the desire to maintain their existence and the fear
that our movement may prevail, because it is based on a philosophy that is of
universal importance, and because they feel that the exclusive character of our
movement betokens danger for them – only for these reasons do they use words
which they repudiated eight years ago, derided seven years ago, branded as
stupid six years ago, combated five years ago, hated four years ago, and
finally, two years ago, annexed and incorporated them in their present
political vocabulary, employing them as war slogans in their struggle.
And so it is necessary even now not to cease calling attention to the
fact that not one of those parties has the slightest idea of what the German
nation needs. The most striking proof of this is represented by the superficial
way in which they use the word völkisch.
Not less dangerous are those who run about as
semi-folkists formulating fantastic schemes which are mostly based on nothing
else than a fixed idea which in itself might be right but which, because it is
an isolated notion, is of no use whatsoever for the formation of a great
homogeneous fighting association and could by no means serve as the basis of
its organization. Those people who concoct a programme which consists partly of
their own ideas and partly of ideas taken from others, about which they have
read somewhere, are often more dangerous than the outspoken enemies of the
völkisch idea. At best they are sterile theorists but more frequently they are
mischievous agitators of the public mind. They believe that they can mask their
intellectual vanity, the futility of their efforts, and their lack of
stability, by sporting flowing beards and indulging in ancient German gestures.
In face of all those futile attempts, it is therefore worth while to
recall the time when the new National Socialist Movement began its fight.
Chapter VI: The Struggle of the
Early Period -- The Significance of the Spoken Word
The echoes of our first great meeting, in the banquet hall of the
Hofbräuhaus on February 24th, 1920, had not yet died away when we began
preparations for our next meeting. Up to that time we had to consider carefully
the venture of holding a small meeting every month or at most every fortnight
in a city like Munich; but now it was decided that we should hold a mass
meeting every week. I need not say that we anxiously asked ourselves on each
occasion again and again: Will the people come and will they listen? Personally
I was firmly convinced that if once they came they would remain and listen.
During that period the hall of the Hofbrau Haus in Munich acquired
for us, National Socialists, a sort of mystic significance. Every week there
was a meeting, almost always in that hall, and each time the hall was better
filled than on the former occasion, and our public more attentive.
Starting with the theme, 'Responsibility for the War,' which nobody
at that time cared about, and passing on to the discussion of the peace
treaties, we dealt with almost everything that served to stimulate the minds of
our audience and make them interested in our ideas. We drew attention to the
peace treaties. What the new movement prophesied again and again before those
great masses of people has been fulfilled almost in every detail. To-day it is
easy to talk and write about these things. But in those days a public mass
meeting which was attended not by the small bourgeoisie but by proletarians who
had been aroused by agitators, to criticize the Peace Treaty of Versailles
meant an attack on the Republic and an evidence of reaction, if not of
monarchist tendencies. The moment one uttered the first criticism of the
Versailles Treaty one could expect an immediate reply, which became almost
stereotyped: 'And Brest-Litowsk?' 'Brest-Litowsk!' And then the crowd would
murmur and the murmur would gradually swell into a roar, until the speaker
would have to give up his attempt to persuade them. It would be like knocking
one's head against a wall, so desperate were these people. They would not
listen nor understand that Versailles was a scandal and a disgrace and that the
dictate signified an act of highway robbery against our people. The disruptive
work done by the Marxists and the poisonous propaganda of the external enemy
had robbed these people of their reason. And one had no right to complain. For
the guilt on this side was enormous. What had the German bourgeoisie done to
call a halt to this terrible campaign of disintegration, to oppose it and open
a way to a recognition of the truth by giving a better and more thorough
explanation of the situation than that of the Marxists? Nothing, nothing. At
that time I never saw those who are now the great apostles of the people.
Perhaps they spoke to select groups, at tea parties of their own little
coteries; but there where they should have been, where the wolves were at work,
they never risked their appearance, unless it gave them the opportunity of
yelling in concert with the wolves.
As for myself, I then saw clearly that for the small
group which first composed our movement the question of war guilt had to be
cleared up, and cleared up in the light of historical truth. A preliminary
condition for the future success of our movement was that it should bring
knowledge of the meaning of the peace treaties to the minds of the popular
masses. In the opinion of the masses, the peace treaties then signified a
democratic success. Therefore, it was necessary to take the opposite side and
dig ourselves into the minds of the people as the enemies of the peace
treaties; so that later on, when the naked truth of this despicable swindle
would be disclosed in all its hideousness, the people would recall the position
which we then took and would give us their confidence.
Already at that time I took up my stand on those
important fundamental questions where public opinion had gone wrong as a whole.
I opposed these wrong notions without regard either for popularity or for
hatred, and I was ready to face the fight. The National Socialist German Labour
Party ought not to be the beadle but rather the master of public opinion. It
must not serve the masses but rather dominate them.
In the case of every movement, especially during its
struggling stages, there is naturally a temptation to conform to the tactics of
an opponent and use the same battle-cries, when his tactics have succeeded in
leading the people to crazy conclusions or to adopt mistaken attitudes towards
the questions at issue. This temptation is particularly strong when motives can
be found, though they are entirely illusory, that seem to point towards the
same ends which the young movement is aiming at. Human poltroonery will then
all the more readily adopt those arguments which give it a semblance of
justification, 'from its own point of view,' in participating in the criminal
policy which the adversary is following.
On several occasions I have experienced such cases, in
which the greatest energy had to be employed to prevent the ship of our
movement from being drawn into a general current which had been started
artificially, and indeed from sailing with it. The last occasion was when our
German Press, the Hecuba of the existence of the German nation, succeeded in
bringing the question of South Tyrol into a position of importance which was
seriously damaging to the interests of the German people. Without considering
what interests they were serving, several so-called 'national' men, parties and
leagues, joined in the general cry, simply for fear of public opinion which had
been excited by the Jews, and foolishly contributed to help in the struggle
against a system which we Germans ought, particularly in those days, to
consider as the one ray of light in this distracted world. While the
international World-Jew is slowly but surely strangling us, our so-called
patriots vociferate against a man and his system which have had the courage to
liberate themselves from the shackles of Jewish Freemasonry at least in one
quarter of the globe and to set the forces of national resistance against the
international world-poison. But weak characters were tempted to set their sails
according to the direction of the wind and capitulate before the shout of
public opinion. For it was veritably a capitulation. They are so much in the
habit of lying and so morally base that men may not admit this even to
themselves, but the truth remains that only cowardice and fear of the public
feeling aroused by the Jews induced certain people to join in the hue and cry.
All the other reasons put forward were only miserable excuses of paltry
culprits who were conscious of their own crime.
There it was necessary to grasp the rudder with an iron
hand and turn the movement about, so as to save it from a course that would
have led it on the rocks. Certainly to attempt such a change of course was not
a popular manoeuvre at that time, because all the leading forces of public
opinion had been active and a great flame of public feeling illuminated only
one direction. Such a decision almost always brings disfavour on those who dare
to take it. In the course of history not a few men have been stoned for an act
for which posterity has afterwards thanked them on its knees.
But a movement must count on posterity and not on the
plaudits of the movement. It may well be that at such moments certain
individuals have to endure hours of anguish; but they should not forget that
the moment of liberation will come and that a movement which purposes to
reshape the world must serve the future and not the passing hour.
On this point it may be asserted that the greatest and
most enduring successes in history are mostly those which were least understood
at the beginning, because they were in strong contrast to public opinion and
the views and wishes of the time.
We had experience of this when we made our own first
public appearance. In all truth it can be said that we did not court public
favour but made an onslaught on the follies of our people. In those days the
following happened almost always: I presented myself before an assembly of men
who believed the opposite of what I wished to say and who wanted the opposite
of what I believed in. Then I had to spend a couple of hours in persuading two
or three thousand people to give up the opinions they had first held, in
destroying the foundations of their views with one blow after another and
finally in leading them over to take their stand on the grounds of our own
convictions and our philosophy of life.
I learned something that was important at that time,
namely, to snatch from the hands of the enemy the weapons which he was using in
his reply. I soon noticed that our adversaries, especially in the persons of
those who led the discussion against us, were furnished with a definite
repertoire of arguments out of which they took points against our claims which
were being constantly repeated. The uniform character of this mode of procedure
pointed to a systematic and unified training. And so we were able to recognize
the incredible way in which the enemy's propagandists had been disciplined, and
I am proud today that I discovered a means not only of making this propaganda
ineffective but of beating the artificers of it at their own work. Two years
later I was master of that art.
In every speech which I made it was important to get a
clear idea beforehand of the probable form and matter of the counter-arguments
we had to expect in the discussion, so that in the course of my own speech
these could be dealt with and refuted. To this end it was necessary to mention
all the possible objections and show their inconsistency; it was all the easier
to win over an honest listener by expunging from his memory the arguments which
had been impressed upon it, so that we anticipated our replies. What he had
learned was refuted without having been mentioned by him and that made him all
the more attentive to what I had to say.
That was the reason why, after my first lecture on the
'Peace Treaty of Versailles,' which I delivered to the troops while I was still
a political instructor in my regiment, I made an alteration in the title and
subject and henceforth spoke on 'The Treaties of Brest-Litowsk and Versailles.'
For after the discussion which followed my first lecture I quickly ascertained
that in reality people knew nothing about the Treaty of Brest-Litowsk and that
able party propaganda had succeeded in presenting that Treaty as one of the
most scandalous acts of violence in the history of the world.
As a result of the persistency with which this falsehood
was repeated again and again before the masses of the people, millions of
Germans saw in the Treaty of Versailles a just castigation for the crime we had
committed at Brest-Litowsk. Thus they considered all opposition to Versailles
as unjust and in many cases there was an honest moral dislike to such a
proceeding. And this was also the reason why the shameless and monstrous word
'Reparations' came into common use in Germany. This hypocritical falsehood
appeared to millions of our exasperated fellow countrymen as the fulfilment of
a higher justice. It is a terrible thought, but the fact was so. The best proof
of this was the propaganda which I initiated against Versailles by explaining
the Treaty of Brest-Litowsk. I compared the two treaties with one another,
point by point, and showed how in truth the one treaty was immensely humane, in
contradistinction to the inhuman barbarity of the other. The effect was very
striking. Then I spoke on this theme before an assembly of two thousand
persons, during which I often saw three thousand six hundred hostile eyes fixed
on me. And three hours later I had in front of me a swaying mass of righteous
indignation and fury. A great lie had been uprooted from the hearts and brains
of a crowd composed of thousands of individuals and a truth had been implanted
in its place.
The two lectures – that 'On the Causes of the World War'
and 'On the Peace Treaties of Brest-Litowsk and Versailles' respectively – I
then considered as the most important of all. Therefore I repeated them dozens
of times, always giving them a new intonation; until at least on those points a
definitely clear and unanimous opinion reigned among those from whom our
movement recruited its first members.
Furthermore, these gatherings brought me the advantage
that I slowly became a platform orator at mass meetings, and gave me practice
in the pathos and gesture required in large halls that held thousands of
people.
Outside of the small circles which I have mentioned, at that time I
found no party engaged in explaining things to the people in this way. Not one
of these parties was then active which talk today as if it was they who had
brought about the change in public opinion. If a political leader, calling
himself a nationalist, pronounced a discourse somewhere or other on this theme
it was only before circles which for the most part were already of his own
conviction and among whom the most that was done was to confirm them in their
opinions. But that was not what was needed then. What was needed was to win
over through propaganda and explanation those whose opinions and mental
attitudes held them bound to the enemy's camp.
The one-page circular was also adopted by us to help in
this propaganda. While still a soldier I had written a circular in which I
contrasted the Treaty of Brest-Litowsk with that of Versailles. That circular
was printed and distributed in large numbers. Later on I used it for the party,
and also with good success. Our first meetings were distinguished by the fact
that there were tables covered with leaflets, papers, and pamphlets of every
kind. But we relied principally on the spoken word. And, in fact, this is the
only means capable of producing really great revolutions, which can be
explained on general psychological grounds.
In the first volume I have already stated that all the
formidable events which have changed the aspect of the world were carried
through, not by the written but by the spoken word. On that point there was a
long discussion in a certain section of the Press during the course of which
our shrewd bourgeois people strongly opposed my thesis. But the reason for this
attitude confounded the sceptics. The bourgeois intellectuals protested against
my attitude simply because they themselves did not have the force or ability to
influence the masses through the spoken word; for they always relied
exclusively on the help of writers and did not enter the arena themselves as
orators for the purpose of arousing the people. The development of events
necessarily led to that condition of affairs which is characteristic of the
bourgeoisie today, namely, the loss of the psychological instinct to act upon
and influence the masses.
An orator receives continuous guidance from the people
before whom he speaks. This helps him to correct the direction of his speech;
for he can always gauge, by the faces of his hearers, how far they follow and
understand him, and whether his words are producing the desired effect. But the
writer does not know his reader at all. Therefore, from the outset he does not
address himself to a definite human group of persons which he has before his
eyes but must write in a general way. Hence, up to a certain extent he must
fail in psychological finesse and flexibility. Therefore, in general it may be
said that a brilliant orator writes better than a brilliant writer can speak,
unless the latter has continual practice in public speaking. One must also
remember that of itself the multitude is mentally inert, that it remains
attached to its old habits and that it is not naturally prone to read something
which does not conform with its own pre-established beliefs when such writing
does not contain what the multitude hopes to find there. Therefore, some piece
of writing which has a particular tendency is for the most part read only by
those who are in sympathy with it. Only a leaflet or a placard, on account of
its brevity, can hope to arouse a momentary interest in those whose opinions
differ from it. The picture, in all its forms, including the film, has better
prospects. Here there is less need of elaborating the appeal to the
intelligence. It is sufficient if one be careful to have quite short texts,
because many people are more ready to accept a pictorial presentation than to
read a long written description. In a much shorter time, at one stroke I might
say, people will understand a pictorial presentation of something which it
would take them a long and laborious effort of reading to understand.
The most important consideration, however, is that one never knows
into what hands a piece of written material comes and yet the form in which its
subject is presented must remain the same. In general the effect is greater
when the form of treatment corresponds to the mental level of the reader and
suits his nature. Therefore, a book which is meant for the broad masses of the
people must try from the very start to gain its effects through a style and
level of ideas which would be quite different from a book intended to be read
by the higher intellectual classes.
Only through his capacity for adaptability does the force
of the written word approach that of oral speech. The orator may deal with the
same subject as a book deals with; but if he has the genius of a great and
popular orator he will scarcely ever repeat the same argument or the same
material in the same form on two consecutive occasions. He will always follow
the lead of the great mass in such a way that from the living emotion of his
hearers the apt word which he needs will be suggested to him and in its turn
this will go straight to the hearts of his hearers. Should he make even a
slight mistake he has the living correction before him. As I have already said,
he can read the play of expression on the faces of his hearers, first to see if
they understand what he says, secondly to see if they take in the whole of his
argument, and, thirdly, in how far they are convinced of the justice of what
has been placed before them. Should he observe, first, that his hearers do not
understand him he will make his explanation so elementary and clear that they
will be able to grasp it, even to the last individual. Secondly, if he feels
that they are not capable of following him he will make one idea follow another
carefully and slowly until the most slow-witted hearer no longer lags behind.
Thirdly, as soon as he has the feeling that they do not seem convinced that he
is right in the way he has put things to them he will repeat his argument over
and over again, always giving fresh illustrations, and he himself will state
their unspoken objection. He will repeat these objections, dissecting them and
refuting them, until the last group of the opposition show him by their
behaviour and play of expression that they have capitulated before his
exposition of the case.
Not infrequently it is a case of overcoming ingrained
prejudices which are mostly unconscious and are supported by sentiment rather
than reason. It is a thousand times more difficult to overcome this barrier of
instinctive aversion, emotional hatred and preventive dissent than to correct
opinions which are founded on defective or erroneous knowledge. False ideas and
ignorance may be set aside by means of instruction, but emotional resistance
never can. Nothing but an appeal to these hidden forces will be effective here.
And that appeal can be made by scarcely any writer. Only the orator can hope to
make it.
A very striking proof of this is found in the fact that, though we
had a bourgeois Press which in many cases was well written and produced and had
a circulation of millions among the people, it could not prevent the broad
masses from becoming the implacable enemies of the bourgeois class. The deluge
of papers and books published by the intellectual circles year after year
passed over the millions of the lower social strata like water over glazed
leather. This proves that one of two things must be true: either that the
matter offered in the bourgeois Press was worthless or that it is impossible to
reach the hearts of the broad masses by means of the written word alone. Of
course, the latter would be specially true where the written material shows
such little psychological insight as has hitherto been the case.
It is useless to object here, as certain big Berlin papers
of German-National tendencies have attempted to do, that this statement is
refuted by the fact that the Marxists have exercised their greatest influence
through their writings, and especially through their principal book, published
by Karl Marx. Seldom has a more superficial argument been based on a false
assumption. What gave Marxism its amazing influence over the broad masses was
not that formal printed work which sets forth the Jewish system of ideas, but
the tremendous oral propaganda carried on for years among the masses. Out of
one hundred thousand German workers scarcely one hundred know of Marx's book.
It has been studied much more in intellectual circles and especially by the
Jews than by the genuine followers of the movement who come from the lower
classes. That work was not written for the masses, but exclusively for the
intellectual leaders of the Jewish machine for conquering the world. The engine
was heated with quite different stuff: namely, the journalistic Press. What
differentiates the bourgeois Press from the Marxist Press is that the latter is
written by agitators, whereas the bourgeois Press would like to carry on
agitation by means of professional writers. The Social-Democrat sub-editor, who
almost always came directly from the meeting to the editorial offices of his
paper, felt his job on his finger-tips. But the bourgeois writer who left his
desk to appear before the masses already felt ill when he smelled the very
odour of the crowd and found that what he had written was useless to him.
What won over millions of workpeople to the Marxist cause was not the
ex cathedra style of the Marxist writers but the formidable propagandist work
done by tens of thousands of indefatigable agitators, commencing with the
leading fiery agitator down to the smallest official in the syndicate, the
trusted delegate and the platform orator. Furthermore, there were the hundreds
of thousands of meetings where these orators, standing on tables in smoky
taverns, hammered their ideas into the heads of the masses, thus acquiring an
admirable psychological knowledge of the human material they had to deal with.
And in this way they were enabled to select the best weapons for their assault
on the citadel of public opinion. In addition to all this there were the
gigantic mass-demonstrations with processions in which a hundred thousand men
took part. All this was calculated to impress on the petty-hearted individual
the proud conviction that, though a small worm, he was at the same time a cell
of the great dragon before whose devastating breath the hated bourgeois world
would one day be consumed in fire and flame, and the dictatorship of the
proletariat would celebrate its conclusive victory.
This kind of propaganda influenced men in such a way as to
give them a taste for reading the Social Democratic Press and prepare their
minds for its teaching. That Press, in its turn, was a vehicle of the spoken
word rather than of the written word. Whereas in the bourgeois camp professors
and learned writers, theorists and authors of all kinds, made attempts at
talking, in the Marxist camp real speakers often made attempts at writing. And
it was precisely the Jew who was most prominent here. In general and because of
his shrewd dialectical skill and his knack of twisting the truth to suit his
own purposes, he was an effective writer but in reality his métier was that of
a revolutionary orator rather than a writer.
For this reason the journalistic bourgeois world, setting
aside the fact that here also the Jew held the whip hand and that therefore
this press did not really interest itself in the instructtion of the broad
masses, was not able to exercise even the least influence over the opinions
held by the great masses of our people.
It is difficult to remove emotional prejudices,
psychological bias, feelings, etc., and to put others in their place. Success
depends here on imponderable conditions and influences. Only the orator who is
gifted with the most sensitive insight can estimate all this. Even the time of
day at which the speech is delivered has a decisive influence on its results.
The same speech, made by the same orator and on the same theme, will have very
different results according as it is delivered at ten o'clock in the forenoon,
at three in the afternoon, or in the evening. When I first engaged in public
speaking I arranged for meetings to take place in the forenoon and I remember
particularly a demonstration that we held in the Munich Kindl Keller 'Against
the Oppression of German Districts.' That was the biggest hall then in Munich
and the audacity of our undertaking was great. In order to make the hour of the
meeting attractive for all the members of our movement and the other people who
might come, I fixed it for ten o'clock on a Sunday morning. The result was
depressing. But it was very instructive. The hall was filled. The impression
was profound, but the general feeling was cold as ice. Nobody got warmed up,
and I myself, as the speaker of the occasion, felt profoundly unhappy at the
thought that I could not establish the slightest contact with my audience. I do
not think I spoke worse than before, but the effect seemed absolutely negative.
I left the hall very discontented, but also feeling that I had gained a new
experience. Later on I tried the same kind of experiment, but always with the
same results.
That was nothing to be wondered at. If one goes to a
theatre to see a matinée performance and then attends an evening performance of
the same play one is astounded at the difference in the impressions created. A
sensitive person recognizes for himself the fact that these two states of mind
caused by the matinee and the evening performance respectively are quite
different in themselves. The same is true of cinema productions. This latter
point is important; for one may say of the theatre that perhaps in the
afternoon the actor does not make the same effort as in the evening. But surely
it cannot be said that the cinema is different in the afternoon from what it is
at nine o'clock in the evening. No, here the time exercises a distinct
influence, just as a room exercises a distinct influence on a person. There are
rooms which leave one cold, for reasons which are difficult to explain. There
are rooms which refuse steadfastly to allow any favourable atmosphere to be
created in them. Moreover, certain memories and traditions which are present as
pictures in the human mind may have a determining influence on the impression
produced. Thus, a representation of Parsifal at Bayreuth will have an effect
quite different from that which the same opera produces in any other part of
the world. The mysterious charm of the House on the 'Festival Heights' in the
old city of The Margrave cannot be equalled or substituted anywhere else.
In all these cases one deals with the problem of influencing the
freedom of the human will. And that is true especially of meetings where there
are men whose wills are opposed to the speaker and who must be brought around
to a new way of thinking. In the morning and during the day it seems that the
power of the human will rebels with its strongest energy against any attempt to
impose upon it the will or opinion of another. On the other hand, in the
evening it easily succumbs to the domination of a stronger will. Because really
in such assemblies there is a contest between two opposite forces. The superior
oratorical art of a man who has the compelling character of an apostle will
succeed better in bringing around to a new way of thinking those who have
naturally been subjected to a weakening of their forces of resistance rather
than in converting those who are in full possession of their volitional and
intellectual energies.
The mysterious artificial dimness of the Catholic
churches also serves this purpose, the burning candles, the incense, the
thurible, etc.
In this struggle between the orator and the opponent whom
he must convert to his cause this marvellous sensibility towards the
psychological influences of propaganda can hardly ever be availed of by an
author. Generally speaking, the effect of the writer's work helps rather to
conserve, reinforce and deepen the foundations of a mentality already existing.
All really great historical revolutions were not produced by the written word.
At most, they were accompanied by it.
It is out of the question to think that the French
Revolution could have been carried into effect by philosophizing theories if
they had not found an army of agitators led by demagogues of the grand style.
These demagogues inflamed popular passion that had been already aroused, until
that volcanic eruption finally broke out and convulsed the whole of Europe. And
the same happened in the case of the gigantic Bolshevik revolution which
recently took place in Russia. It was not due to the writers on Lenin's side
but to the oratorical activities of those who preached the doctrine of hatred
and that of the innumerable small and great orators who took part in the
agitation.
The masses of illiterate Russians were not fired to
Communist revolutionary enthusiasm by reading the theories of Karl Marx but by
the promises of paradise made to the people by thousands of agitators in the
service of an idea.
It was always so, and it will always be so.
It is just typical of our pig-headed intellectuals, who
live apart from the practical world, to think that a writer must of necessity
be superior to an orator in intelligence. This point of view was once
exquisitely illustrated by a critique, published in a certain National paper
which I have already mentioned, where it was stated that one is often
disillusioned by reading the speech of an acknowledged great orator in print.
That reminded me of another article which came into my hands during the War. It
dealt with the speeches of Lloyd George, who was then Minister of Munitions,
and examined them in a painstaking way under the microscope of criticism. The
writer made the brilliant statement that these speeches showed inferior
intelligence and learning and that, moreover, they were banal and commonplace
productions. I myself procured some of these speeches, published in pamphlet
form, and had to laugh at the fact that a normal German quill-driver did not in
the least understand these psychological masterpieces in the art of influencing
the masses. This man criticized these speeches exclusively according to the
impression they made on his own blasé mind, whereas the great British Demagogue
had produced an immense effect on his audience through them, and in the widest
sense on the whole of the British populace. Looked at from this point of view,
that Englishman's speeches were most wonderful achievements, precisely because
they showed an astounding knowledge of the soul of the broad masses of the
people. For that reason their effect was really penetrating. Compare with them
the futile stammerings of a Bethmann-Hollweg. On the surface his speeches were
undoubtedly more intellectual, but they just proved this man's inability to
speak to the people, which he really could not do. Nevertheless, to the average
stupid brain of the German writer, who is, of course, endowed with a lot of
scientific learning, it came quite natural to judge the speeches of the English
Minister – which were made for the purpose of influencing the masses – by the
impression which they made on his own mind, fossilized in its abstract
learning. And it was more natural for him to compare them in the light of that
impression with the brilliant but futile talk of the German statesman, which of
course appealed to the writer's mind much more favourably. That the genius of
Lloyd George was not only equal but a thousandfold superior to that of a
Bethmann-Hollweg is proved by the fact that he found for his speeches that form
and expression which opened the hearts of his people to him and made these
people carry out his will absolutely. The primitive quality itself of those
speeches, the originality of his expressions, his choice of clear and simple
illustration, are examples which prove the superior political capacity of this
Englishman. For one must never judge the speech of a statesman to his people by
the impression which it leaves on the mind of a university professor but by the
effect it produces on the people. And this is the sole criterion of the
orator's genius.
The astonishing development of our movement, which was
created from nothing a few years ago and is today singled out for persecution
by all the internal and external enemies of our nation, must be attributed to
the constant recognition and practical application of those principles.
Written matter also played an important part in our movement; but at
the stage of which I am writing it served to give an equal and uniform
education to the directors of the movement, in the upper as well as in the
lower grades, rather than to convert the masses of our adversaries. It was only
in very rare cases that a convinced and devoted Social Democrat or Communist
was induced to acquire an understanding of our conception of life or to study a
criticism of his own by procuring and reading one of our pamphlets or even one
of our books. Even a newspaper is rarely read if it does not bear the stamp of
a party affiliation. Moreover, the reading of newspapers helps little; because
the general picture given by a single number of a newspaper is so confused and
produces such a fragmentary impression that it really does not influence the
occasional reader. And where a man has to count his pennies it cannot be
assumed that, exclusively for the purpose of being objectively informed, he
will become a regular reader or subscriber to a paper which opposes his views.
Only one who has already joined a movement will regularly read the party organ
of that movement, and especially for the purpose of keeping himself informed of
what is happening in the movement.
It is quite different with the 'spoken' leaflet.
Especially if it be distributed gratis it will be taken up by one person or
another, all the more willingly if its display title refers to a question about
which everybody is talking at the moment. Perhaps the reader, after having read
through such a leaflet more or less thoughtfully, will have new viewpoints and
mental attitudes and may give his attention to a new movement. But with these,
even in the best of cases, only a small impulse will be given, but no definite
conviction will be created; because the leaflet can do nothing more than draw
attention to something and can become effective only by bringing the reader
subsequently into a situation where he is more fundamentally informed and
instructed. Such instruction must always be given at the mass assembly.
Mass assemblies are also necessary for the reason that, in attending
them, the individual who felt himself formerly only on the point of joining the
new movement, now begins to feel isolated and in fear of being left alone as he
acquires for the first time the picture of a great community which has a
strengthening and encouraging effect on most people. Brigaded in a company or
battalion, surrounded by his companions, he will march with a lighter heart to
the attack than if he had to march alone. In the crowd he feels himself in some
way thus sheltered, though in reality there are a thousand arguments against
such a feeling.
Mass demonstrations on the grand scale not only reinforce
the will of the individual but they draw him still closer to the movement and
help to create an esprit de corps. The man who appears first as the
representative of a new doctrine in his place of business or in his factory is
bound to feel himself embarrassed and has need of that reinforcement which
comes from the consciousness that he is a member of a great community. And only
a mass demonstration can impress upon him the greatness of this community. If,
on leaving the shop or mammoth factory, in which he feels very small indeed, he
should enter a vast assembly for the first time and see around him thousands
and thousands of men who hold the same opinions; if, while still seeking his
way, he is gripped by the force of mass-suggestion which comes from the
excitement and enthusiasm of three or four thousand other men in whose midst he
finds himself; if the manifest success and the concensus of thousands confirm
the truth and justice of the new teaching and for the first time raise doubt in
his mind as to the truth of the opinions held by himself up to now – then he
submits himself to the fascination of what we call mass-suggestion. The will,
the yearning and indeed the strength of thousands of people are in each
individual. A man who enters such a meeting in doubt and hesitation leaves it
inwardly fortified; he has become a member of a community.
The National Socialist Movement should never forget this,
and it should never allow itself to be influenced by these bourgeois duffers
who think they know everything but who have foolishly gambled away a great
State, together with their own existence and the supremacy of their own class.
They are overflowing with ability; they can do everything, and they know
everything. But there is one thing they have not known how to do, and that is
how to save the German people from falling into the arms of Marxism. In that
they have shown themselves most pitiably and miserably impotent. So that the
present opinion they have of themselves is only equal to their conceit. Their
pride and stupidity are fruits of the same tree.
If these people try to disparage the importance of the
spoken word today, they do it only because they realize – God be praised and
thanked – how futile all their own speechifying has been.
Early Period -- The Significance of the Spoken Word
The echoes of our first great meeting, in the banquet hall of the
Hofbräuhaus on February 24th, 1920, had not yet died away when we began
preparations for our next meeting. Up to that time we had to consider carefully
the venture of holding a small meeting every month or at most every fortnight
in a city like Munich; but now it was decided that we should hold a mass
meeting every week. I need not say that we anxiously asked ourselves on each
occasion again and again: Will the people come and will they listen? Personally
I was firmly convinced that if once they came they would remain and listen.
During that period the hall of the Hofbrau Haus in Munich acquired
for us, National Socialists, a sort of mystic significance. Every week there
was a meeting, almost always in that hall, and each time the hall was better
filled than on the former occasion, and our public more attentive.
Starting with the theme, 'Responsibility for the War,' which nobody
at that time cared about, and passing on to the discussion of the peace
treaties, we dealt with almost everything that served to stimulate the minds of
our audience and make them interested in our ideas. We drew attention to the
peace treaties. What the new movement prophesied again and again before those
great masses of people has been fulfilled almost in every detail. To-day it is
easy to talk and write about these things. But in those days a public mass
meeting which was attended not by the small bourgeoisie but by proletarians who
had been aroused by agitators, to criticize the Peace Treaty of Versailles
meant an attack on the Republic and an evidence of reaction, if not of
monarchist tendencies. The moment one uttered the first criticism of the
Versailles Treaty one could expect an immediate reply, which became almost
stereotyped: 'And Brest-Litowsk?' 'Brest-Litowsk!' And then the crowd would
murmur and the murmur would gradually swell into a roar, until the speaker
would have to give up his attempt to persuade them. It would be like knocking
one's head against a wall, so desperate were these people. They would not
listen nor understand that Versailles was a scandal and a disgrace and that the
dictate signified an act of highway robbery against our people. The disruptive
work done by the Marxists and the poisonous propaganda of the external enemy
had robbed these people of their reason. And one had no right to complain. For
the guilt on this side was enormous. What had the German bourgeoisie done to
call a halt to this terrible campaign of disintegration, to oppose it and open
a way to a recognition of the truth by giving a better and more thorough
explanation of the situation than that of the Marxists? Nothing, nothing. At
that time I never saw those who are now the great apostles of the people.
Perhaps they spoke to select groups, at tea parties of their own little
coteries; but there where they should have been, where the wolves were at work,
they never risked their appearance, unless it gave them the opportunity of
yelling in concert with the wolves.
As for myself, I then saw clearly that for the small
group which first composed our movement the question of war guilt had to be
cleared up, and cleared up in the light of historical truth. A preliminary
condition for the future success of our movement was that it should bring
knowledge of the meaning of the peace treaties to the minds of the popular
masses. In the opinion of the masses, the peace treaties then signified a
democratic success. Therefore, it was necessary to take the opposite side and
dig ourselves into the minds of the people as the enemies of the peace
treaties; so that later on, when the naked truth of this despicable swindle
would be disclosed in all its hideousness, the people would recall the position
which we then took and would give us their confidence.
Already at that time I took up my stand on those
important fundamental questions where public opinion had gone wrong as a whole.
I opposed these wrong notions without regard either for popularity or for
hatred, and I was ready to face the fight. The National Socialist German Labour
Party ought not to be the beadle but rather the master of public opinion. It
must not serve the masses but rather dominate them.
In the case of every movement, especially during its
struggling stages, there is naturally a temptation to conform to the tactics of
an opponent and use the same battle-cries, when his tactics have succeeded in
leading the people to crazy conclusions or to adopt mistaken attitudes towards
the questions at issue. This temptation is particularly strong when motives can
be found, though they are entirely illusory, that seem to point towards the
same ends which the young movement is aiming at. Human poltroonery will then
all the more readily adopt those arguments which give it a semblance of
justification, 'from its own point of view,' in participating in the criminal
policy which the adversary is following.
On several occasions I have experienced such cases, in
which the greatest energy had to be employed to prevent the ship of our
movement from being drawn into a general current which had been started
artificially, and indeed from sailing with it. The last occasion was when our
German Press, the Hecuba of the existence of the German nation, succeeded in
bringing the question of South Tyrol into a position of importance which was
seriously damaging to the interests of the German people. Without considering
what interests they were serving, several so-called 'national' men, parties and
leagues, joined in the general cry, simply for fear of public opinion which had
been excited by the Jews, and foolishly contributed to help in the struggle
against a system which we Germans ought, particularly in those days, to
consider as the one ray of light in this distracted world. While the
international World-Jew is slowly but surely strangling us, our so-called
patriots vociferate against a man and his system which have had the courage to
liberate themselves from the shackles of Jewish Freemasonry at least in one
quarter of the globe and to set the forces of national resistance against the
international world-poison. But weak characters were tempted to set their sails
according to the direction of the wind and capitulate before the shout of
public opinion. For it was veritably a capitulation. They are so much in the
habit of lying and so morally base that men may not admit this even to
themselves, but the truth remains that only cowardice and fear of the public
feeling aroused by the Jews induced certain people to join in the hue and cry.
All the other reasons put forward were only miserable excuses of paltry
culprits who were conscious of their own crime.
There it was necessary to grasp the rudder with an iron
hand and turn the movement about, so as to save it from a course that would
have led it on the rocks. Certainly to attempt such a change of course was not
a popular manoeuvre at that time, because all the leading forces of public
opinion had been active and a great flame of public feeling illuminated only
one direction. Such a decision almost always brings disfavour on those who dare
to take it. In the course of history not a few men have been stoned for an act
for which posterity has afterwards thanked them on its knees.
But a movement must count on posterity and not on the
plaudits of the movement. It may well be that at such moments certain
individuals have to endure hours of anguish; but they should not forget that
the moment of liberation will come and that a movement which purposes to
reshape the world must serve the future and not the passing hour.
On this point it may be asserted that the greatest and
most enduring successes in history are mostly those which were least understood
at the beginning, because they were in strong contrast to public opinion and
the views and wishes of the time.
We had experience of this when we made our own first
public appearance. In all truth it can be said that we did not court public
favour but made an onslaught on the follies of our people. In those days the
following happened almost always: I presented myself before an assembly of men
who believed the opposite of what I wished to say and who wanted the opposite
of what I believed in. Then I had to spend a couple of hours in persuading two
or three thousand people to give up the opinions they had first held, in
destroying the foundations of their views with one blow after another and
finally in leading them over to take their stand on the grounds of our own
convictions and our philosophy of life.
I learned something that was important at that time,
namely, to snatch from the hands of the enemy the weapons which he was using in
his reply. I soon noticed that our adversaries, especially in the persons of
those who led the discussion against us, were furnished with a definite
repertoire of arguments out of which they took points against our claims which
were being constantly repeated. The uniform character of this mode of procedure
pointed to a systematic and unified training. And so we were able to recognize
the incredible way in which the enemy's propagandists had been disciplined, and
I am proud today that I discovered a means not only of making this propaganda
ineffective but of beating the artificers of it at their own work. Two years
later I was master of that art.
In every speech which I made it was important to get a
clear idea beforehand of the probable form and matter of the counter-arguments
we had to expect in the discussion, so that in the course of my own speech
these could be dealt with and refuted. To this end it was necessary to mention
all the possible objections and show their inconsistency; it was all the easier
to win over an honest listener by expunging from his memory the arguments which
had been impressed upon it, so that we anticipated our replies. What he had
learned was refuted without having been mentioned by him and that made him all
the more attentive to what I had to say.
That was the reason why, after my first lecture on the
'Peace Treaty of Versailles,' which I delivered to the troops while I was still
a political instructor in my regiment, I made an alteration in the title and
subject and henceforth spoke on 'The Treaties of Brest-Litowsk and Versailles.'
For after the discussion which followed my first lecture I quickly ascertained
that in reality people knew nothing about the Treaty of Brest-Litowsk and that
able party propaganda had succeeded in presenting that Treaty as one of the
most scandalous acts of violence in the history of the world.
As a result of the persistency with which this falsehood
was repeated again and again before the masses of the people, millions of
Germans saw in the Treaty of Versailles a just castigation for the crime we had
committed at Brest-Litowsk. Thus they considered all opposition to Versailles
as unjust and in many cases there was an honest moral dislike to such a
proceeding. And this was also the reason why the shameless and monstrous word
'Reparations' came into common use in Germany. This hypocritical falsehood
appeared to millions of our exasperated fellow countrymen as the fulfilment of
a higher justice. It is a terrible thought, but the fact was so. The best proof
of this was the propaganda which I initiated against Versailles by explaining
the Treaty of Brest-Litowsk. I compared the two treaties with one another,
point by point, and showed how in truth the one treaty was immensely humane, in
contradistinction to the inhuman barbarity of the other. The effect was very
striking. Then I spoke on this theme before an assembly of two thousand
persons, during which I often saw three thousand six hundred hostile eyes fixed
on me. And three hours later I had in front of me a swaying mass of righteous
indignation and fury. A great lie had been uprooted from the hearts and brains
of a crowd composed of thousands of individuals and a truth had been implanted
in its place.
The two lectures – that 'On the Causes of the World War'
and 'On the Peace Treaties of Brest-Litowsk and Versailles' respectively – I
then considered as the most important of all. Therefore I repeated them dozens
of times, always giving them a new intonation; until at least on those points a
definitely clear and unanimous opinion reigned among those from whom our
movement recruited its first members.
Furthermore, these gatherings brought me the advantage
that I slowly became a platform orator at mass meetings, and gave me practice
in the pathos and gesture required in large halls that held thousands of
people.
Outside of the small circles which I have mentioned, at that time I
found no party engaged in explaining things to the people in this way. Not one
of these parties was then active which talk today as if it was they who had
brought about the change in public opinion. If a political leader, calling
himself a nationalist, pronounced a discourse somewhere or other on this theme
it was only before circles which for the most part were already of his own
conviction and among whom the most that was done was to confirm them in their
opinions. But that was not what was needed then. What was needed was to win
over through propaganda and explanation those whose opinions and mental
attitudes held them bound to the enemy's camp.
The one-page circular was also adopted by us to help in
this propaganda. While still a soldier I had written a circular in which I
contrasted the Treaty of Brest-Litowsk with that of Versailles. That circular
was printed and distributed in large numbers. Later on I used it for the party,
and also with good success. Our first meetings were distinguished by the fact
that there were tables covered with leaflets, papers, and pamphlets of every
kind. But we relied principally on the spoken word. And, in fact, this is the
only means capable of producing really great revolutions, which can be
explained on general psychological grounds.
In the first volume I have already stated that all the
formidable events which have changed the aspect of the world were carried
through, not by the written but by the spoken word. On that point there was a
long discussion in a certain section of the Press during the course of which
our shrewd bourgeois people strongly opposed my thesis. But the reason for this
attitude confounded the sceptics. The bourgeois intellectuals protested against
my attitude simply because they themselves did not have the force or ability to
influence the masses through the spoken word; for they always relied
exclusively on the help of writers and did not enter the arena themselves as
orators for the purpose of arousing the people. The development of events
necessarily led to that condition of affairs which is characteristic of the
bourgeoisie today, namely, the loss of the psychological instinct to act upon
and influence the masses.
An orator receives continuous guidance from the people
before whom he speaks. This helps him to correct the direction of his speech;
for he can always gauge, by the faces of his hearers, how far they follow and
understand him, and whether his words are producing the desired effect. But the
writer does not know his reader at all. Therefore, from the outset he does not
address himself to a definite human group of persons which he has before his
eyes but must write in a general way. Hence, up to a certain extent he must
fail in psychological finesse and flexibility. Therefore, in general it may be
said that a brilliant orator writes better than a brilliant writer can speak,
unless the latter has continual practice in public speaking. One must also
remember that of itself the multitude is mentally inert, that it remains
attached to its old habits and that it is not naturally prone to read something
which does not conform with its own pre-established beliefs when such writing
does not contain what the multitude hopes to find there. Therefore, some piece
of writing which has a particular tendency is for the most part read only by
those who are in sympathy with it. Only a leaflet or a placard, on account of
its brevity, can hope to arouse a momentary interest in those whose opinions
differ from it. The picture, in all its forms, including the film, has better
prospects. Here there is less need of elaborating the appeal to the
intelligence. It is sufficient if one be careful to have quite short texts,
because many people are more ready to accept a pictorial presentation than to
read a long written description. In a much shorter time, at one stroke I might
say, people will understand a pictorial presentation of something which it
would take them a long and laborious effort of reading to understand.
The most important consideration, however, is that one never knows
into what hands a piece of written material comes and yet the form in which its
subject is presented must remain the same. In general the effect is greater
when the form of treatment corresponds to the mental level of the reader and
suits his nature. Therefore, a book which is meant for the broad masses of the
people must try from the very start to gain its effects through a style and
level of ideas which would be quite different from a book intended to be read
by the higher intellectual classes.
Only through his capacity for adaptability does the force
of the written word approach that of oral speech. The orator may deal with the
same subject as a book deals with; but if he has the genius of a great and
popular orator he will scarcely ever repeat the same argument or the same
material in the same form on two consecutive occasions. He will always follow
the lead of the great mass in such a way that from the living emotion of his
hearers the apt word which he needs will be suggested to him and in its turn
this will go straight to the hearts of his hearers. Should he make even a
slight mistake he has the living correction before him. As I have already said,
he can read the play of expression on the faces of his hearers, first to see if
they understand what he says, secondly to see if they take in the whole of his
argument, and, thirdly, in how far they are convinced of the justice of what
has been placed before them. Should he observe, first, that his hearers do not
understand him he will make his explanation so elementary and clear that they
will be able to grasp it, even to the last individual. Secondly, if he feels
that they are not capable of following him he will make one idea follow another
carefully and slowly until the most slow-witted hearer no longer lags behind.
Thirdly, as soon as he has the feeling that they do not seem convinced that he
is right in the way he has put things to them he will repeat his argument over
and over again, always giving fresh illustrations, and he himself will state
their unspoken objection. He will repeat these objections, dissecting them and
refuting them, until the last group of the opposition show him by their
behaviour and play of expression that they have capitulated before his
exposition of the case.
Not infrequently it is a case of overcoming ingrained
prejudices which are mostly unconscious and are supported by sentiment rather
than reason. It is a thousand times more difficult to overcome this barrier of
instinctive aversion, emotional hatred and preventive dissent than to correct
opinions which are founded on defective or erroneous knowledge. False ideas and
ignorance may be set aside by means of instruction, but emotional resistance
never can. Nothing but an appeal to these hidden forces will be effective here.
And that appeal can be made by scarcely any writer. Only the orator can hope to
make it.
A very striking proof of this is found in the fact that, though we
had a bourgeois Press which in many cases was well written and produced and had
a circulation of millions among the people, it could not prevent the broad
masses from becoming the implacable enemies of the bourgeois class. The deluge
of papers and books published by the intellectual circles year after year
passed over the millions of the lower social strata like water over glazed
leather. This proves that one of two things must be true: either that the
matter offered in the bourgeois Press was worthless or that it is impossible to
reach the hearts of the broad masses by means of the written word alone. Of
course, the latter would be specially true where the written material shows
such little psychological insight as has hitherto been the case.
It is useless to object here, as certain big Berlin papers
of German-National tendencies have attempted to do, that this statement is
refuted by the fact that the Marxists have exercised their greatest influence
through their writings, and especially through their principal book, published
by Karl Marx. Seldom has a more superficial argument been based on a false
assumption. What gave Marxism its amazing influence over the broad masses was
not that formal printed work which sets forth the Jewish system of ideas, but
the tremendous oral propaganda carried on for years among the masses. Out of
one hundred thousand German workers scarcely one hundred know of Marx's book.
It has been studied much more in intellectual circles and especially by the
Jews than by the genuine followers of the movement who come from the lower
classes. That work was not written for the masses, but exclusively for the
intellectual leaders of the Jewish machine for conquering the world. The engine
was heated with quite different stuff: namely, the journalistic Press. What
differentiates the bourgeois Press from the Marxist Press is that the latter is
written by agitators, whereas the bourgeois Press would like to carry on
agitation by means of professional writers. The Social-Democrat sub-editor, who
almost always came directly from the meeting to the editorial offices of his
paper, felt his job on his finger-tips. But the bourgeois writer who left his
desk to appear before the masses already felt ill when he smelled the very
odour of the crowd and found that what he had written was useless to him.
What won over millions of workpeople to the Marxist cause was not the
ex cathedra style of the Marxist writers but the formidable propagandist work
done by tens of thousands of indefatigable agitators, commencing with the
leading fiery agitator down to the smallest official in the syndicate, the
trusted delegate and the platform orator. Furthermore, there were the hundreds
of thousands of meetings where these orators, standing on tables in smoky
taverns, hammered their ideas into the heads of the masses, thus acquiring an
admirable psychological knowledge of the human material they had to deal with.
And in this way they were enabled to select the best weapons for their assault
on the citadel of public opinion. In addition to all this there were the
gigantic mass-demonstrations with processions in which a hundred thousand men
took part. All this was calculated to impress on the petty-hearted individual
the proud conviction that, though a small worm, he was at the same time a cell
of the great dragon before whose devastating breath the hated bourgeois world
would one day be consumed in fire and flame, and the dictatorship of the
proletariat would celebrate its conclusive victory.
This kind of propaganda influenced men in such a way as to
give them a taste for reading the Social Democratic Press and prepare their
minds for its teaching. That Press, in its turn, was a vehicle of the spoken
word rather than of the written word. Whereas in the bourgeois camp professors
and learned writers, theorists and authors of all kinds, made attempts at
talking, in the Marxist camp real speakers often made attempts at writing. And
it was precisely the Jew who was most prominent here. In general and because of
his shrewd dialectical skill and his knack of twisting the truth to suit his
own purposes, he was an effective writer but in reality his métier was that of
a revolutionary orator rather than a writer.
For this reason the journalistic bourgeois world, setting
aside the fact that here also the Jew held the whip hand and that therefore
this press did not really interest itself in the instructtion of the broad
masses, was not able to exercise even the least influence over the opinions
held by the great masses of our people.
It is difficult to remove emotional prejudices,
psychological bias, feelings, etc., and to put others in their place. Success
depends here on imponderable conditions and influences. Only the orator who is
gifted with the most sensitive insight can estimate all this. Even the time of
day at which the speech is delivered has a decisive influence on its results.
The same speech, made by the same orator and on the same theme, will have very
different results according as it is delivered at ten o'clock in the forenoon,
at three in the afternoon, or in the evening. When I first engaged in public
speaking I arranged for meetings to take place in the forenoon and I remember
particularly a demonstration that we held in the Munich Kindl Keller 'Against
the Oppression of German Districts.' That was the biggest hall then in Munich
and the audacity of our undertaking was great. In order to make the hour of the
meeting attractive for all the members of our movement and the other people who
might come, I fixed it for ten o'clock on a Sunday morning. The result was
depressing. But it was very instructive. The hall was filled. The impression
was profound, but the general feeling was cold as ice. Nobody got warmed up,
and I myself, as the speaker of the occasion, felt profoundly unhappy at the
thought that I could not establish the slightest contact with my audience. I do
not think I spoke worse than before, but the effect seemed absolutely negative.
I left the hall very discontented, but also feeling that I had gained a new
experience. Later on I tried the same kind of experiment, but always with the
same results.
That was nothing to be wondered at. If one goes to a
theatre to see a matinée performance and then attends an evening performance of
the same play one is astounded at the difference in the impressions created. A
sensitive person recognizes for himself the fact that these two states of mind
caused by the matinee and the evening performance respectively are quite
different in themselves. The same is true of cinema productions. This latter
point is important; for one may say of the theatre that perhaps in the
afternoon the actor does not make the same effort as in the evening. But surely
it cannot be said that the cinema is different in the afternoon from what it is
at nine o'clock in the evening. No, here the time exercises a distinct
influence, just as a room exercises a distinct influence on a person. There are
rooms which leave one cold, for reasons which are difficult to explain. There
are rooms which refuse steadfastly to allow any favourable atmosphere to be
created in them. Moreover, certain memories and traditions which are present as
pictures in the human mind may have a determining influence on the impression
produced. Thus, a representation of Parsifal at Bayreuth will have an effect
quite different from that which the same opera produces in any other part of
the world. The mysterious charm of the House on the 'Festival Heights' in the
old city of The Margrave cannot be equalled or substituted anywhere else.
In all these cases one deals with the problem of influencing the
freedom of the human will. And that is true especially of meetings where there
are men whose wills are opposed to the speaker and who must be brought around
to a new way of thinking. In the morning and during the day it seems that the
power of the human will rebels with its strongest energy against any attempt to
impose upon it the will or opinion of another. On the other hand, in the
evening it easily succumbs to the domination of a stronger will. Because really
in such assemblies there is a contest between two opposite forces. The superior
oratorical art of a man who has the compelling character of an apostle will
succeed better in bringing around to a new way of thinking those who have
naturally been subjected to a weakening of their forces of resistance rather
than in converting those who are in full possession of their volitional and
intellectual energies.
The mysterious artificial dimness of the Catholic
churches also serves this purpose, the burning candles, the incense, the
thurible, etc.
In this struggle between the orator and the opponent whom
he must convert to his cause this marvellous sensibility towards the
psychological influences of propaganda can hardly ever be availed of by an
author. Generally speaking, the effect of the writer's work helps rather to
conserve, reinforce and deepen the foundations of a mentality already existing.
All really great historical revolutions were not produced by the written word.
At most, they were accompanied by it.
It is out of the question to think that the French
Revolution could have been carried into effect by philosophizing theories if
they had not found an army of agitators led by demagogues of the grand style.
These demagogues inflamed popular passion that had been already aroused, until
that volcanic eruption finally broke out and convulsed the whole of Europe. And
the same happened in the case of the gigantic Bolshevik revolution which
recently took place in Russia. It was not due to the writers on Lenin's side
but to the oratorical activities of those who preached the doctrine of hatred
and that of the innumerable small and great orators who took part in the
agitation.
The masses of illiterate Russians were not fired to
Communist revolutionary enthusiasm by reading the theories of Karl Marx but by
the promises of paradise made to the people by thousands of agitators in the
service of an idea.
It was always so, and it will always be so.
It is just typical of our pig-headed intellectuals, who
live apart from the practical world, to think that a writer must of necessity
be superior to an orator in intelligence. This point of view was once
exquisitely illustrated by a critique, published in a certain National paper
which I have already mentioned, where it was stated that one is often
disillusioned by reading the speech of an acknowledged great orator in print.
That reminded me of another article which came into my hands during the War. It
dealt with the speeches of Lloyd George, who was then Minister of Munitions,
and examined them in a painstaking way under the microscope of criticism. The
writer made the brilliant statement that these speeches showed inferior
intelligence and learning and that, moreover, they were banal and commonplace
productions. I myself procured some of these speeches, published in pamphlet
form, and had to laugh at the fact that a normal German quill-driver did not in
the least understand these psychological masterpieces in the art of influencing
the masses. This man criticized these speeches exclusively according to the
impression they made on his own blasé mind, whereas the great British Demagogue
had produced an immense effect on his audience through them, and in the widest
sense on the whole of the British populace. Looked at from this point of view,
that Englishman's speeches were most wonderful achievements, precisely because
they showed an astounding knowledge of the soul of the broad masses of the
people. For that reason their effect was really penetrating. Compare with them
the futile stammerings of a Bethmann-Hollweg. On the surface his speeches were
undoubtedly more intellectual, but they just proved this man's inability to
speak to the people, which he really could not do. Nevertheless, to the average
stupid brain of the German writer, who is, of course, endowed with a lot of
scientific learning, it came quite natural to judge the speeches of the English
Minister – which were made for the purpose of influencing the masses – by the
impression which they made on his own mind, fossilized in its abstract
learning. And it was more natural for him to compare them in the light of that
impression with the brilliant but futile talk of the German statesman, which of
course appealed to the writer's mind much more favourably. That the genius of
Lloyd George was not only equal but a thousandfold superior to that of a
Bethmann-Hollweg is proved by the fact that he found for his speeches that form
and expression which opened the hearts of his people to him and made these
people carry out his will absolutely. The primitive quality itself of those
speeches, the originality of his expressions, his choice of clear and simple
illustration, are examples which prove the superior political capacity of this
Englishman. For one must never judge the speech of a statesman to his people by
the impression which it leaves on the mind of a university professor but by the
effect it produces on the people. And this is the sole criterion of the
orator's genius.
The astonishing development of our movement, which was
created from nothing a few years ago and is today singled out for persecution
by all the internal and external enemies of our nation, must be attributed to
the constant recognition and practical application of those principles.
Written matter also played an important part in our movement; but at
the stage of which I am writing it served to give an equal and uniform
education to the directors of the movement, in the upper as well as in the
lower grades, rather than to convert the masses of our adversaries. It was only
in very rare cases that a convinced and devoted Social Democrat or Communist
was induced to acquire an understanding of our conception of life or to study a
criticism of his own by procuring and reading one of our pamphlets or even one
of our books. Even a newspaper is rarely read if it does not bear the stamp of
a party affiliation. Moreover, the reading of newspapers helps little; because
the general picture given by a single number of a newspaper is so confused and
produces such a fragmentary impression that it really does not influence the
occasional reader. And where a man has to count his pennies it cannot be
assumed that, exclusively for the purpose of being objectively informed, he
will become a regular reader or subscriber to a paper which opposes his views.
Only one who has already joined a movement will regularly read the party organ
of that movement, and especially for the purpose of keeping himself informed of
what is happening in the movement.
It is quite different with the 'spoken' leaflet.
Especially if it be distributed gratis it will be taken up by one person or
another, all the more willingly if its display title refers to a question about
which everybody is talking at the moment. Perhaps the reader, after having read
through such a leaflet more or less thoughtfully, will have new viewpoints and
mental attitudes and may give his attention to a new movement. But with these,
even in the best of cases, only a small impulse will be given, but no definite
conviction will be created; because the leaflet can do nothing more than draw
attention to something and can become effective only by bringing the reader
subsequently into a situation where he is more fundamentally informed and
instructed. Such instruction must always be given at the mass assembly.
Mass assemblies are also necessary for the reason that, in attending
them, the individual who felt himself formerly only on the point of joining the
new movement, now begins to feel isolated and in fear of being left alone as he
acquires for the first time the picture of a great community which has a
strengthening and encouraging effect on most people. Brigaded in a company or
battalion, surrounded by his companions, he will march with a lighter heart to
the attack than if he had to march alone. In the crowd he feels himself in some
way thus sheltered, though in reality there are a thousand arguments against
such a feeling.
Mass demonstrations on the grand scale not only reinforce
the will of the individual but they draw him still closer to the movement and
help to create an esprit de corps. The man who appears first as the
representative of a new doctrine in his place of business or in his factory is
bound to feel himself embarrassed and has need of that reinforcement which
comes from the consciousness that he is a member of a great community. And only
a mass demonstration can impress upon him the greatness of this community. If,
on leaving the shop or mammoth factory, in which he feels very small indeed, he
should enter a vast assembly for the first time and see around him thousands
and thousands of men who hold the same opinions; if, while still seeking his
way, he is gripped by the force of mass-suggestion which comes from the
excitement and enthusiasm of three or four thousand other men in whose midst he
finds himself; if the manifest success and the concensus of thousands confirm
the truth and justice of the new teaching and for the first time raise doubt in
his mind as to the truth of the opinions held by himself up to now – then he
submits himself to the fascination of what we call mass-suggestion. The will,
the yearning and indeed the strength of thousands of people are in each
individual. A man who enters such a meeting in doubt and hesitation leaves it
inwardly fortified; he has become a member of a community.
The National Socialist Movement should never forget this,
and it should never allow itself to be influenced by these bourgeois duffers
who think they know everything but who have foolishly gambled away a great
State, together with their own existence and the supremacy of their own class.
They are overflowing with ability; they can do everything, and they know
everything. But there is one thing they have not known how to do, and that is
how to save the German people from falling into the arms of Marxism. In that
they have shown themselves most pitiably and miserably impotent. So that the
present opinion they have of themselves is only equal to their conceit. Their
pride and stupidity are fruits of the same tree.
If these people try to disparage the importance of the
spoken word today, they do it only because they realize – God be praised and
thanked – how futile all their own speechifying has been.