As the education of a prince, and the surroundings in which he is brought up, are usually different from the education and surroundings of his subjects, it is not surprising if, at least during some portion of his reign, and until he has graduated in the university of life, misunderstandings, if nothing worse, should occur between them: indeed the wonder is that princes and people succeed in living harmoniously together. They are separated by great gulfs both of sentiment and circumstance. Bismarck is quoted by one of his successors, Prince Hohenlohe, as remarking that every King of Prussia, with whatever popularity he began his reign, was invariably hated at the close of it.
The prince that would rule well has to study the science of government, itself a difficult and incompletely explored subject, and the art of administration; he has to know history, and above all the history of his own country; not that history is a safe or certain guide, but that it informs him of traditions he will be expected to continue in his own country and respect in that of others; he must understand the political system under which his people choose to live, and the play of political, religious, economic, and social forces which are ever at work in a community; he must learn to speak and understand (not always quite the same thing) other languages besides his own; and concurrently with these studies he must endeavour to develop in himself the personal qualities demanded by his high office--health and activity of body, quick comprehension and decision, a tenacious memory for names and faces, capacity for public speaking, patience, and that command over the passions and prejudices, natural or acquired, which is necessary for his moral influence as a ruler. On what percentage of his subjects is such a curriculum imposed, and what allowances should not be made if a full measure of success is not achieved?
But even when the prince has done all this, there is still a study, the most comprehensive and most important of all, in which he should be learned--the study of humanity, and in especial that part of it with the care of whose interests and happiness he is to be charged. A few people seem to have this knowledge instinctively, others acquire something of it in the school of sad experience. It is not the fault of the Emperor, if, in his youth, his knowledge of humanity was not profound. There was always a strong vein of idealism and romance among Hohenzollerns, the vein of a Lohengrin, a Tancred, or some mediæval knight. The Emperor, of course, never lived among the common people; never had to work for a living in competition with a thousand others more fortunate than he, or better endowed by nature with the qualities and gifts that make for worldly success; never, so far as is known to a watchful and exceptionally curious public, endured domestic sorrow of a deep or lasting kind; never suffered materially or in his proper person from ingratitude, carelessness, or neglect; never knew the "penalty of Adam, the seasons' difference"; never, in short, felt those pains one or more of which almost all the rest of mankind have at one time or other to bear as best they may.