“If each individual Minister can receive commands from his Sovereign without previous arrangement with his colleagues, a coherent policy, for which some one is to be responsible, is an impossibility.  It would be impossible for any of the Ministers, and especially for the Minister President, to bear the constitutional responsibility for the Cabinet as a whole.  Such a provision as that contained in the Order of 1852 could be dispensed with under the absolute monarchy and could also be dispensed with to-day if we returned to absolutism without ministerial responsibility.  But according to the constitutional arrangements now legally in force the control of the Cabinet by a President under the Order of 1852 is indispensable.”

The Emperor replied to Prince Bismarck’s resignation in a communication which the reader, according to his disposition, will regard as an effusion of the heart, immensely creditable to its composer, a model of an official reply as demanded by circumstances, a striking example of the art of throwing dust in the public eye, or an equally striking contribution to the literature of excusable hypocrisy.  It was as follows:—­

“MY DEAR PRINCE,—­With deep emotion I learn from your request of the 18th instant that you have decided to retire from the offices which you have filled for long years with incomparable success.  I had hoped not to have been compelled to entertain the thought of separation during our lives.  While, however, in full consciousness of the important consequences of your retirement, I am forced to accustom myself to the thought.  I do so, it is true, with a heavy heart, but in the strong confidence that the grant of your request will contribute as much as possible to the protection and preservation for as long as possible of a life and strength of unreplaceable value to the Fatherland.

“The grounds you offer for your resignation convince me that any further attempt to induce you to reconsider your determination would have no prospect of success.  I acquiesce, therefore, in your wish by hereby graciously releasing you from your offices as Imperial Chancellor, President of my State Ministry, and Minister of Foreign Affairs, and trust that your counsels and energy, your loyalty and devotion, will not be wanting to me and the country in the future also.

“I have considered it as one of the most valued privileges in my life that at the commencement of my reign I had you at my side as my first counsellor.  What you have done and achieved for Prussia and Germany, what you have done for my House, my ancestors, and me, will remain to me and the German people in grateful and imperishable memory.  But also in foreign countries your wise and energetic peace policy, which I, too, in the future also, as a result of sincere conviction, decide to take as the guiding line of my conduct, will be always gloriously recognized.  It is not in my power to requite your services