Spengler’s Prussianism Explained
Oswald Spengler's 'The Hour of Decision' Series - Part 15
The fate of the West is uncertain as we stand in the hour of decision. Spengler emphasizes the forces of terror that threaten high Western culture. Leftist, Bolshevism, and vulgarity threaten the aristocratic spirit that raised the West to its high point. It is not enough, though, to simply point out problems. One must also try to propose a solution to be taken seriously. Spengler discusses Caesarism as an answer to the civilizational maladies of our time. However, it is unclear how Caesarism would affect the day-to-day lives of the people. Caesarism is a parachute that will save civilization, but it does not directly pertain to the cultivation of nobility among the citizens. If the workers’ advocacy movements are to be disregarded, as we have discussed in our previous analyses, then there must be an alternative. Spengler puts forth Prussianism as an alternative to socialism.
Spengler explored the idea of Prussianism in an earlier work, Prussianism and Socialism, and hearkens back to these ideas in The Hour of Decision. Prussianism, Spengler says, is an idea in the same sense that we discussed in my essay on the nation as an ideal versus as an idea. The idea is primordial, not theoretical, discovered, not created, explained after the fact, and not constructed through reason. Prussianism is the embrace of one "being "in form" for a task," that one is taken up within his work, that it is right for him, and that it becomes a part of his soul. This is different than the socialist attitude. The socialist attitude is born from rationalism and resentment.
The German people must embrace Prussianism to pass through the hour of decision, Spengler says. Prussianism seems similar to socialism at first. It dignifies the worker, but not in the crude way that the political movements of Spengler's day did. The dignity of the worker under Prussianism is not aimed at vulgar emancipation sought after by the Bolsheviks but rather for the sake of a spiritual duty to the worker's country. Spengler distinguishes Socialism as a moral attitude from economic socialism or program socialism. Moralistic socialism aims to permit base instincts, vulgar thought, and materialistic ends. "It is the contrary of Prussian feeling,” Spengler says, “which has livingly experienced through exemplary leaders the necessity of disciplined devotion and possesses accordingly the inward freedom that comes with the fulfillment of duty, the ordering of oneself, command of oneself, for the sake of a great aim" (page 100).
Labor socialism and what we today call Capitalism are both expressions of Free Trade Manchesterism, both sharing the common root of economics detached from the soul and emphasis on materialism. Spengler writes, "this ‘white’ Bolshevism is capitalism from below, wage-capitalism, just as speculative finance-capital in respect of its method is Socialism from above, from the stock exchange. Both grew out of the same intellectual root: thinking in money, trading in money on the pavements of the world's capitals, whether as wage-levels or profits on exchange rates makes no odds. There is no contradiction between economic Liberalism and Socialism" (page 100). From Spengler's perspective, which is to view history through the lens of rising and declining organic cultures, both Capitalism and Socialism are the same. They are the same because they place emphasis on money first, while all aspects of culture, those that concern the human soul, are pushed aside and replaced if they stand in the way.
Prussianism demands that Germany place policy over economics, as we discussed in my essay on the domination of economics over political thinking. The economic life should be disciplined by the state because the economy should be oriented towards cultural enrichment. This is distinct from what we would today call economic interventionism, the mere regulations that libertarians correctly decry. We have not seen the kind of discipline of the economy in the manner that Spengler describes in likely over a century. Spengler describes this discipline:
"‘Disciplining’ is the training of a racehorse by an experienced rider and not the forcing of the living economic body into the strait-jacket of an economic plan or its transformation into a press-the-button machine. "Prussian" is also the aristocratic ordering of life according to the grade of achievement. Prussian is, above all, the undisputed precedence of foreign policy, the successful steering of the State in a world of states, over internal policy, which exists solely to keep the nation in form for this task and becomes mischievous and criminal as soon as it begins to follow independently its own ideological aims... the future belongs to the great fact-men, now that the world-improvers, who have preened themselves on the stage of world history since Rousseau, have vanished and left no trace" (page 101).
Unfortunately, the “world-improvers” are still operating in 2024.
To serve the state requires aristocratic virtue. One needs a soul that is willing to either serve or achieve greatness through the state. The bureaucrats in government today are there only to serve their base instincts, or to pursue a deranged ideological aim. They are not aristocratic in the slightest.Serving
The restoration of Prussianism is the key to passing through the hour of decision, according to Spengler. He adds that one does not need to be born in Prussia to be Prussian. Prussianism is not nationalism in the modernist sense, which is only loyalty to the nation as an ideal, but it is an allegiance to the nation as an idea. Spengler further elaborates on Prussianism:
"The Prussian idea is opposed to finance-Liberalism as well as to Labour-Socialism. Every description of mass and majority, everything that is "Left," it regards as suspect. Above all, it is opposed to any weakening of the State and to the desecrating misuse of it for economic interests. It is conservative and "Right," and it grows out of whatever fundamental life- forces still exist in Nordic peoples: instinct for power and possessions; for possessions as power; for inheritance, fecundity, and family, which three belong together; for distinctions of rank and social gradation, whose mortal enemy was (or is) Rationalism from 1750 to 1950" (page 102).
Spengler saw the nationalism and monarchism of his day as a transition towards the inevitable Caesarism. This necessary historical destiny has not concluded. “All great leaders in history go "Right," however low the depths from which they have climbed. It is the mark of the born master and ruler” (page 102). Defeating the enemy, overcoming the World Revolution, and passing through the hour of decision is not a matter of careful refutation and discourse. It does not come through a consensus being reached in the marketplace of ideas. Caesarism comes about through action and power. Spengler suggests that the inherent dynamism and intoxicating force of true statesmanship would crush the opposition by making it boring. We saw a microcosm of this process in Trump's 2016 rise to the Presidency, which has had a considerable effect on the feelings of our country.
Socialism, liberal forms, parties, and programs are antiquated, and they have been for a long time. Spengler says that the contrasts pointed out by the Bolsheviks, the division between the classes, will no longer be a political issue but rather be recognized as the natural fact of rank after the rise of Caesar and the restoration of aristocracy.
After World War I, Spengler observed that the fantasy of endless progress had been shattered and spiritual chaos was the result. America, though, is intoxicated with this same fantasy today, but decline seems to be creeping around every corner. A possible explanation is that American was birthed as a colony of Faustian Culture, and is therefore playing out the historical destiny with roughly a century of delay. Perhaps the outcome will be different for America than it was for Europe, perhaps the cultural destiny will play out in full and Spengler's heralding of the coming Caesarism will be fulfilled. We must wait and see.
Spengler speaks of the importance of the youth in sparking political change. It is not enough to simply be young, though. The youth must also be energetic and strong. "Is there, in that which in all white countries that took part in the War calls itself (vaguely enough) "Youth" and the "front-generation," anything like a weight-carrying foundation for such men and for the tasks of the future?" Spengler asks (page 103). In the age of demographic decline across all developed countries, we are inclined to answer no.
"All revolutions are humourless - and this causes their fall. Petty obstinacy and lack of humour: that is the definition of fanaticism" (page 104). The youth of Spengler's day fell prey to Bolshevism. The youth of our day fall prey to progressivism. The overly stern hand-wringing over constant existential threats to the right to practice public sodomy in Uganda. These are not serious people, because they are too serious. There is joviality and lightness to truth, a joy to goodness, and it is no wonder that those motivated by resentment are incapable of this joy.
The foot soldiers of the Bolshevik revolution were Slavs who felt inferior and resented the nobility of high Russian culture. Because of their inability to rise to a high standard of cultural living, they instead grew in resentment and banded together under Bolshevism. The only strength of this movement was how large it was. There was no strength to the individuals in the movement, and bitterness was a driving force. Not only bitterness but also "The urge to be released from one's own will, to be submerged in the lazy majority, to know the happiness of a lackey's soul, to be spared the master's anxieties - all this is here disguised under big words. The Romanticism of the insignificant! The apotheosis of the herd-feeling! The last final way to idealize one's own dread of responsibility!" (page 105) This is the opposite of the strength necessary to pursue the "I", or the ego, to pursue oneself and lift oneself up to the heights, a capability that Spengler points out is more German than anything else. "The strong, unbending "I" was their destiny. Every attempt to overstep its boundary merely showed that it had none" (page 105). Weak men turn into socialists because they are incapable of rising to greatness. They cannot take responsibility for themselves, so they spread their responsibility among the rest of the masses. They complain together and grow more resentful, and then they begin killing. This is the mode of the Left, and we should not expect it to change. The weak ones who comprise the left adopt a herd mentality because it removes the mental anguish of their personal failures.
The Celtic Germans have the strongest will, and the greatest capability to be "I". This is what gives rise to Faustian Culture, to the limitless achievements of the West. But this capability brings with it solitude and loneliness that the noble soul must cope with. "Will and loneliness are in the last resort the same thing" (page 105). This is the Faustian Spirit: "If there is such a thing as individualism in the world, it is this of an individual defying the whole universe, his knowledge of his own unbending will, his delight in ultimate decisions and love of destiny itself even at the moment when it is breaking him. And being "Prussian" consists in bending of one's own free will." (page 106). One must be in control of oneself to be loyal, and to contribute to a cause greater than himself. The Socialist ideal is to give up, to be a coward, and to hide from oneself by blending into the masses. The Prussian and Faustian Spirit is to grow oneself, to take responsibility for oneself, and to give willingly to a noble cause, not because you want to hide away from your inabilities, but because you want to extend your domain out into the world and contribute to something greater. "If a man has no "I" to offer up, he should not talk of loyalty. He merely runs along behind someone on to whom he has shifted the responsibility" (page 106).
Truly Prussian loyalty is what is needed to pass through the hour of decision, not party politics and movements. The Caesar must use and despise the masses. "He fights his most difficult battles, not against the enemy, but against the swarm of his all-too-devoted friends" (page 106). He must have an army, not a party, behind him. He must have martial duty backing him up, not simply the voters at the ballot box. Prussianism provides the sense of duty Caesar needs to take over and rule effectively. Embracing this is important. If the West does not embrace Caesar and shed the vulgarity and worker worship, it will be swallowed into the non-Western world.