[5] "There is no leisure class among the Junkers. They are all workers, patriotic, honest and devoted to the Emperor and the Fatherland. If it is possible that government by one class is to be suffered, then the Prussian Junkers have proved themselves more fit for rule than any class in history. Their virtues are Spartan, their minds narrow but incorruptible, and their bravery and patriotism undoubted. One can but admire them and their stern, virtues." James W. Gerard, _My Four Years in Germany_, p. 123.
This uncompromising devotion to duty had its roots in old Prussian history. Frederick William I, father of Frederick the Great, threatened his son with death if he were found derelict in what the stern old man regarded as the duty of a future ruler.
The whole rule of Frederick the Great was marked by a rigid sense of duty. He termed himself "the first servant of the state," and no servant worked harder or allowed himself less leisure or fewer bodily comforts. It was this monarch who, told of a brave act of sacrifice by one of his officers, refused to consider it as anything calling for special recognition. _Er hat nur seine verdammte Pflicht und Schuldigkeit getan_ (he did only his accursed duty), said the King. This saying became the formula that characterized the attitude of the Prussian-German _Beamten_ in their relations to the state. Whatever was (or was represented as) their "accursed duty" must be done, regardless of personal considerations or rewards.
In the catalogue of virtues enumerated we have one important group of prerequisites to efficient government. There remain two things: intelligence and education. The first can be dismissed briefly. The average of intelligence in all civilized countries is probably much the same. There would not be much difference in native capacity and ability between the best thousand of a million Germans or of a million men of any other race. In respect of education and training, however, German officials as a whole were at least the equal of any body of government servants anywhere in the world and the superior of most. In the first place, educational qualifications were definitely laid down for every category of officials. Nor were these qualifications determined, as in the American civil-service, by an examination. The candidate must have attended school and taken the prescribed course for a term of years, varying with the importance of the government career to which he aspired.