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i9i4] GROWTH OF GERMAN INFLUENCE 255
perseverance was inaugurating her new policy : that of
substituting herself for the former Germanic Empire and
of raising to heights as yet undreamt of the name, the
might and the wealth of the German race.
Pan-Germanism was born just then, issuing ready armed from the
brain of Wotan. The University of Berlin was seized
with an ardent love for Scandinavian, Flemish, even
Anglo-Saxon mythology, history, linguistics,
jurisprudence. Literature followed science. Pan-Germanism
became ultra-faithful and loyal with the Prussian squires,
liberal even to vehemence with the men of 1848, pious
and unctuous with the Protestant pastors while waiting
to win even the Catholic padres ; but it chiefly flattered
the " sister nations," extolling their virtues, their history,
their customs, their Germanic soul.
For a long time Sweden did not respond. In the first
place Prussia and Berlin were not popular there; there
had been many fights with Brandenburg; many people
still regretted the possession of Pomerania, particularly
the numerous noble families natives of this province
who at the present time felt as if they had been
uprooted ; then Prussia was the intimate friend of Russia,
and Russia was not always in the odour of sanctity
according to Swedish public opinion; Prussia was a
" parvenue" who by her present might wounded the
pride of a kingdom fallen from its high political estate;
finally, Sweden held the traditions of French influence
and sympathies, whereas people in Berlin feigned to
despise the light French mind and to replace its simple
logic by confused and pompous metaphysics.
All the same, gradually the ice between Berlin and
Stockholm began to break. First it was Europe’s
infatuation for the scientific proceedings of erudite
Germany : the less her science was understood the more
it was esteemed. Then persistent flattery had its
natural result. A Swede would take up a German book
on comparative mythology and would find that he was
a direct descendant of the Azes, the gods of the German
Olympus; or he would open a popular history book,
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