The division established between the outer realm, in which of course acts fall, and the inner realm of consciousness explains what is otherwise so paradoxical to a foreigner in German writings: The constant assertion that Germany brought to the world the conscious recognition of the principle of freedom coupled with the assertion of the relative incompetency of the German folk _en masse_ for political self-direction. To one saturated by the English tradition which identifies freedom with power to act upon one's ideas, to make one's purposes effective in regulation of public affairs, the combination seems self-contradictory. To the German it is natural. Readers who have been led by newspaper quotations to regard Bernhardi as preaching simply a gospel of superior force will find in his writings a continual assertion that _the_ German spirit is the spirit of freedom, of complete intellectual self-determination; that the Germans have "always been the standard bearers of free thought." We find him supporting his teachings not by appeal to Nietzsche, but by the Kantian distinction between the "empirical and rational ego."
"Two great movements were born from the German intellectual life, on which, henceforth, _all the intellectual and moral progress of mankind must rest_:--The Reformation and the critical philosophy. The Reformation that broke the intellectual yoke imposed by the Church, which checked all free progress; and the Critique of Pure Reason which put a stop to the caprice of philosophic speculation by defining for the human mind the limitations of its capacities for knowledge, and at the same time pointed out the way in which knowledge is really possible. On this substructure was developed the intellectual life of our time, whose deepest significance consists in the attempt to reconcile the result of free inquiry with the religious needs of the heart, and thus to lay a foundation for the harmonious organization of mankind. . . . The German nation not only laid the foundations of this great struggle for a harmonious development of humanity but took the lead in it. We are thus incurring an obligation for the future from which we cannot shrink. We must be prepared to be the leader in this campaign which is being fought for the highest stake that has been offered to human efforts. . . . To no nation except the German has it been given to enjoy in its inner self 'that which is given to mankind as a whole.' . . . It is this quality which especially fits us for leadership in the intellectual domain and _imposes upon us the obligation to maintain that position_."[35:A]