Chapter 25 Germany pursues Germany

Only Berlin, faintly reverberates with a strange momentum that makes people dare not get too close. What I mean is not a street, not a building, but a kind of ethereal floating or stillness hiding behind everything; invisible, intangible, but a kind of pervasiveness or aggregation that is enough to surround the senses; indescribable, Tao It is unknown, but it has aroused a thousand words or indifference from politicians in various countries Rome also has grandeur, which is a poetic display of old age; Paris also has grandeur, which is a warm and elegant cultural gathering; London also has grandeur, which is a busy and orderly urban style.Berlin is completely different from them. It is not old. It was only a small distribution center for goods merchants in the middle of the thirteenth century. The city was built more than 600 years later, but it seems more sophisticated and subtle than anyone else, and it is quietly unpredictable.

It was only in the 1870s that it became the capital of the German Empire, but in just a few decades, by the end of the Second World War in the 1940s, it was almost razed to the ground.Even so, Adenauer, the newly elected German leader at the time, still wanted to avoid the ruins. He said: Once Berlin becomes the capital again, the mistrust abroad will not be eliminated.Whoever makes Berlin the new capital mentally creates a new Prussia. So, what is spiritual Prussia, or the Prussian spirit?There are even more opinions.The most famous is Winston Churchill's statement: Prussia is the root of all evil.This was the voice of justice during World War II. After the war, the Allies officially announced the permanent dissolution of Prussia, and there was no international objection.But fifty years after the reunification of the two Germanys, the referendum still decided to elect Dublin, and it did not shy away from the revival of the Prussian spirit.Of course, it is not the kind of thing that brews wars and disasters that Churchill hated, but no one can say what it is.Unexplainable yet existing, this is the mystery, sophistication and power of Berlin.

As our convoy slowly drove into Berlin, I thought that questions about the Prussian spirit could be put aside for a while.Now that this has become the capital of unified Germany again, we have to use our own feet and eyes to ask some difficult questions about Germany.For example, mankind has encountered two world wars in total, both of which were instigated by it, and both of which were disastrous defeats. So, how does it view the world and human beings? Before the instigation of the world war, the art and culture were already brilliant, and after the fiasco, the economy recovered by leaps and bounds. What kind of power can make it retain a quiet and powerful nobility behind the hustle and bustle?

Historically, its ideological enlightenment movement was far slower, more tortuous, and more hidden than that of France, but why did such spiritual giants as Lessing, Kant, Hegel, and Feuerbach emerge quietly in this backward state and dominate Europe?Some people say that all western philosophy is written in German, why can it catch up and take the lead in such an abstract field? The evil behavior of a nation will inevitably lead to a substantial depreciation of the way of thinking of this nation in front of the world. Why is it only this land that the world demands the dignity of life from on the one hand, and on the other hand respectfully asks for the freedom of thinking from it? dignity?Why can its cultural value be suspended above the disaster without pollution?

Goethe once said that the Germans are very rational individually, but as a whole they often get lost.This has been repeatedly proved by history. The question is, what power can make a rational individual get lost so neatly?After getting lost, don't you completely lose your sanity? Kissinger said that for nearly three hundred years, the stability of Europe depended on Germany.What kind of fulcrum does a group that often loses its way rely on to control the whole of Europe frequently, even losing to it in the mighty Napoleonic War? Russian President Vladimir Putin did intelligence work in Germany during the Cold War. After being elected president, he announced that the economy would follow the path of Germany. The world said that he did a good job in intelligence.Then, why can a social market economy with the goal of social justice and humanity be successfully implemented in Germany, which has a poor humanitarian record?

There will be some specific answers to these questions, but I think all the answers will be related to the faint momentum and spirit in the dark. The real big questions in the world are incomprehensible, and overly clear answers are only a logical comfort.I would rather accept a poetic statement like Mr. Zhao Xinshan's: In the character of the German nation, there seems to be a kind of forest temperament: deep, introverted, steady and quiet. Taylor said that the Germans had unprecedented freedom and unprecedented autocracy, but never had moderation or moderation.This is very much like a forest, not like flat grass and willow banks in spring.There are soaring trees that melancholy ask the sky, and there are thorns and vines spreading everywhere. There are gods and demons.As for getting lost, it is only in the forest that you can get lost and turn upside down.

Now, the auspicious energy is rising in this forest, and the auspicious clouds are hovering, but the forest is a forest after all, not joyful, not bright, and quietly flourishing.