ABSTRACT
All over Europe the romantic movement of the eighteenth century was a very conflicting phenomenon sociologically. On the one hand, it represented the continuation and the climax of that emancipation of the middle class which began with the enlightenment; it was the expression of plebeian emotionalism and, there92 fore, the opposite of the fastidious and unobtrusive intellectualism of the higher levels of society. On the other hand, however, it represented the reaction of these same higher levels against the undermining influences of the rationalism and the reformative tendencies of the enlightenment. It developed, to begin with, in the broad middle sections of the bourgeoisie which had been only superficially influenced by the enlightenment, and amongst that section which regarded the enlightenment as still all too closely allied with the old classical culture; gradually, however, it became the property of those classes which were using the emotional tendencies of the age for the attainment of their own anti-rational, socially and politically reactionary ends. But whilst the middle class in France and England remained fully conscious of its own position in society and never entirely abandoned the achievements of the enlightenment, the German middle class came under the sway of romantic irrationalism before it had passed through the school of rationalism. That is not to say that rationalism as a doctrine was without its protagonists in Germany; as a matter of fact, it was probably championed more vigorously in the German universities than anywhere else, but, characteristically, it remained a doctrine and the speciality of professional scholars and academic poets. Rationalism in Germany had never completely penetrated public life, the social and political thinking of the broad masses or the attitude to life of the middle classes. Germany could certainly
boast the possession of several quite outstanding representatives of the enlightenment, such as Lessing, to name the greatest of them all and perhaps the most genuine and the most attractive personality in the whole movement, but the honest, clear-sighted and steadfast supporters of the ideas of the enlightenment were here always exceptions even among the intellectuals. The majority of the middle class and the intelligentsia were incapable of grasping the significance of the enlightenment in relation to their own class interests; it was easy to present a distorted picture of the nature of the movement to them and to caricature the limitations and inadequacies of rationalism. We must not, of course, think of the process as a kind of conspiracy, in which writers were acting as the hirelings and accomplices of the politicians in office. Probably not even the 93 real controllers of public opinion admitted to themselves that an ideological falsification of the facts was taking place; at any rate, the intellectual leaders of the middle classes were far from any awareness that they were perpetrating a fraud, nor in fact were they even remotely aware of anything fraudulent or treasonable in the whole proceeding.
