to develop its power it must embrace at the same time the most varied phases of evolution.  A nation over-refined by culture and satiated with prosperity is a dead nation, for whom nothing remains but, like Sardanapalus, to burn itself up together with all its magnificence.  The blase city man, the fat farmer of the rich corn-land, may be the men of the present; but the poverty-stricken peasant of the moors, the rough, hardy peasant of the forests, the lonely, self-reliant Alpine shepherd, full of legends and songs—­these are the men of the future.  Civil society is founded on the doctrine of the natural inequality of mankind.  Indeed, in this inequality of talents and of callings is rooted the highest glory of society, for it is the source of its inexhaustible vital energy.  As the sea preserves the vigor of the people of the coast-lands by keeping them in a hardy natural state, so does the forest produce a similar effect on the people of the interior.  Therefore since Germany has such a large expanse of interior country, it needs just that much more forest-land than does England.  The genuine woodland villagers, the foresters, wood-cutters, and forest laborers are the strong, rude seamen among us landlubbers.  Uproot the forests, level the mountains, and shut out the sea, if you want to equalize society in a closet-civilization where all will have the same polish and all be of the same color.  We have seen that entire flourishing lands which have been robbed of the protecting forests have fallen prey to the devastating floods of the mountain streams and the scorching breath of the storms.  A large part of Italy, the paradise of Europe, is a land which has, ceased to live, because its soil no longer bears any forests under the protection of which it might become rejuvenated.  And not only is the land exhausted, but the people are, likewise.  A nation must die off when it can no longer have recourse to the back-woodsmen in order to gather from them the fresh strength of a natural, hardy, national life.  A nation without considerable forest-property is worthy of the same consideration as a nation without requisite sea-coast.  We must preserve our forests not only so that our stoves shall not be cold in winter, but also that the pulse of the nation’s life shall continue to throb on warmly and cheerfully—­in short, so that Germany shall remain German.

The inhabitants of the German woodland villages have almost always a far fresher, more individual, mental stamp than the inhabitants of the villages of the plain.  In the latter we find more sleek prosperity side by side with greater degeneracy of morals, than in the former.  The inhabitant of the woodland villages is often very poor, but the discontented proletarian dwells far more frequently in the villages of the plain.  The latter is more important in an economic sense, the former in a social-political one.  The forest peasant is rougher, more quarrelsome, but also merrier than the peasant of the field; the