Book Description

Excerpt from The Soul of Germany: A Twelve Years Study of the People From Within, 1902-14 A Great deal of interesting literature has appeared during the last decade treating of Modern Germany. The writer has studied a great many of these works, and has the feeling that none of them express what he felt and saw during twelve years spent in Germany. There is nothing of a derogatory nature implied in this remark, for the present author could name several works on German organization which deserve serious study. Most writers have, however, restricted themselves to some special features of German life, and in the most cases were objective observers. That is to say, they were Englishmen or Americans who did not know the language well enough to judge and feel from the German point of view, or were not in the least capable of "feeling German." The result has been that their writings provide for the most part valuable descriptions of the outward and visible life of the nation, but they give no subjective reasons for these phenomena - they do not describe the life-blood pulsating beneath it all. Germans are very fond of asking foreigners the question, "Nun, haben Sie sich gut eingelebt?" ("Have you got accustomed to the life?" or "Have you entered into the spirit of your surroundings?"). In reality it means a great deal more: "Have you lived yourself into your surroundings, and become a part of them?" About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.