culture--and this is the culture that is supposed to have conquered
France?

The contention appears to be altogether too preposterous. It was
solely to the more extensive knowledge of German officers, to the
superior training of their soldiers, and to their more scientific
military strategy, that all impartial Judges, and even the French
nation, in the end, ascribed the victory. Hence, if it be intended to
regard German erudition as a thing apart, in what sense can German
culture be said to have conquered? In none whatsoever; for the moral
qualities of severe discipline, of more placid obedience, have nothing
in common with culture: these were characteristic of the Macedonian
army, for instance, despite the fact that the Greek soldiers were
infinitely more cultivated. To speak of German scholarship and culture
as having conquered, therefore, can only be the outcome of a
misapprehension, probably resulting from the circumstance that every
precise notion of culture has now vanished from Germany.

Culture is, before all things, the unity of artistic style, in every
expression of the life of a people. Abundant knowledge and learning,
however, are not essential to it, nor are they a sign of its
existence; and, at a pinch, they might coexist much more harmoniously
with the very opposite of culture--with barbarity: that is to say,
with a complete lack of style, or with a riotous jumble of all styles.
But it is precisely amid this riotous jumble that the German of to-day
subsists; and the serious problem to be solved is: how, with all his
learning, he can possibly avoid noticing it; how, into the bargain, he
can rejoice with all his heart in his present "culture"? For
everything conduces to open his eyes for him--every glance he casts at
his clothes, his room, his house; every walk he takes through the