"
My thoughts were much engaged on my sick-bed by reflections upon the
future of Denmark. The following entry is dated March 8, 1871:
What do we mean by _our national future_, which we talk so much
about? We do not purpose to extend our borders, to make conquests, or
play any part in politics. For that, as is well comprehensible, we know
we are too weak. I will leave alone the question as to whether it is
possible to live without, in one way or another, growing, and ask: What
do we want? _To continue to exist_. How exist? We want to get
Slesvig back again, for as it is we are not _existing_; we are
sickening, or else we are living like those lower animals who even when
they are cut in pieces, are quite nimble; but it is a miserable life. We
are in a false position with regard to Germany. The centripetal force
that draws the individual members of one nationality together, and which
we in Denmark call Danishness, that which, further, draws nationalities
of the same family together, and which in Denmark is called
_Scandinavianism_, must logically lead to a sympathy for the
merging of the entire race, a kind of _Gothogermanism_. If we seek
support from France, we shall be behaving like the Poles, turning for
help to a foreign race against a nation of our own.
Pages:
548
549
550
551
552
553
554
555
556
557
558
559
560
561
562
563
564
565
566
567
568
569
570
571
572