THE PRUSSIAN PARTITION 85lion Poles formed a very small minority in a German Empire of 56 million
people.^1
The forum of Polish political activities shifted accordingly. Before 1848, the
Diet and provincial institutions of the Grand Duchy of Posen formed a natural
meeting-point. For a time, it looked as though the Grand Duchy might play a
coordinating role for Poles from all three Partitions. Then, with the suppression
of the Grand Duchy, attention moved to the 'Polish Circle' of the Prussian
Landtag in Berlin, and after 1872, to the imperial Reichstag.
In German terminology, modern Prussia was an Obrigkeitsstaat, an 'author-
itarian state'. Although it failed to develop the mystical ideology of Autocracy
or the streamlined machinery of Absolutism, it operated on the principle that
the will of the ruler and of his government was supreme. Its system was typified
less by rigid ideas or institutions than by that imprecise but ominous phrase, the
Prussian Spirit. In the words of one of its least critical admirers, 'Prussianism
was a life-style, an instinct, a compulsion ... where the people desire and act as
a super-personal whole ... it is not a herd instinct, but something immensely
strong and free which no one who does not belong can understand.'^2 It was a
tradition created by the ceaseless struggle over three centuries to forge a king-
dom from the scattered Hohenzollern possessions, and by the constant danger
and insecurity which that struggle involved. For practical purposes, it reduced
civil liberties to a minimum, and prevented democratic institutions, when they
appeared, from being fully accountable to the people. In Prussia, as in Russia,
the monarch was wont to command, and the people to obey.
In several important ways, therefore, Prussian authorita-rianism closely
matched Russian Autocracy. The Army, for example, occupied pride of place,
and from the time of Frederick-William I and his lange kerls, or 'tall grenadiers',
had acted as the principal instrument of Prussia's success. Its establishment was
enormous, and its prowess, from Fehrbellin to Sedan, legendary. No one can
deny that Prussian militarism was rather special. Whilst the Russian army prac-
tised methods of crude coercion against the civilian population and against its
own ranks alike, the Prussians nurtured a genuine enthusiasm for the people-in-
arms. Under the influence of Napoleonic France, Scharnhorst and Gneisenau
abolished the press-ganging and brutal discipline of former times. In the nine-
teenth century, the Prussian soldier was not only the best drilled in Europe; he
was the best led, the best fed, and the best armed; and he marched to the best
military music in the world.
The bureaucracy, too, resembled its autocratic counterparts. The Prussian
Inspector, with his pince-nez and rubber stamp, was no less a figure of fun and
fear, than elsewhere. Unfortunately, he gained the reputation not only of petty-
mindedness, but also of incorruptibility.
The Prussian Police mirrored the thoroughness of the bureaucracy as a whole.
The Minister of the Interior combined his police duties with political functions,
and till 1822 enjoyed the title of 'State-Chancellor' or premier. Wide-ranging
powers of censorship and summary arrest were used against political opponents