Page:The Czechoslovak Review, vol4, 1920.pdf/211

It has been pointed out on several occasions, that the Czechs are the only non-German race in Central Europe which can effectively compete with the Germans for the control of the Polish and the Russian markets, and that, in geenral, the Czechs are the only Slavonic race which has shown itself a successful rival of the Germans in the economic sphere. Economic prosperity, however, is not necessarily a proof of advanced culture, though it enables culture to develop successfully. The fact that the Czechs who some hundred and thirty years ago had undertaken the difficult task of re-establishing their own language for literary purposes succeeded during these struggles in holding their own against the Germans, is a far better proof of their high moral and intellectual qualities.

In the nineteenth century Czech culture was based upon a solid foundation of linguistic and historical knowledge. It thus follows that the most prominent of the Czech patriots were scholars. Dobrovský, the founder of Slavonic studies, had an admirable knowledge of Slavonic philology and a fine feeling for the spirit of Slavonic languages. A significant tribute was paid to his remarkable attainments by prof. Delbruck, the distinguished German scholar, who did not hesitate to say as late as 1893 that nobody after Dobrovský (who died in 1829) had succeeded in penetrating the whole of Slavonic syntax. But Dobrovský knew far more than that; he penetrated the spirit of the Slavs as well as their languages; he expressed the opinion in his private letters that the Slavs had something which the Germans, in spite of their great learning, could not achieve-the natural wisdom of the Slavonic soul. This of course must not be exaggerated, neither must it be interpreted as meaning that he regarded German learning as ballast which could be dispensed with; what he meant was, that if learning were combined with this natural wisdom, it would result in a new intellectual product of great importance. Dobrovský’s successors were naturally influenced by German Romanticism, a movement which, having originated on foreign soil and being actuated by a non-Slavonic spirit, did not even remotely realise the hopes of the Czech patriots. But this movement had one good effect, it increased the enthusiasm for the native languages, and it led the Czech patriots to appreciate the national poetry of the Czech peasants. Though there was much that was inspiring in this national poetry, it could not express all the needs of national life in the nineteenth century, and the enthusiasm for Czech and the Slav history sometimes led the scholars to excercise much less criticism than the circumstances really demanded.

These conditions were improved first in literature. The Czech authors began to see how important it was to learn from foreign literatures, and so within about sixty years Czech literature succeeded in absorbing all the important literary movements of modern Europe. The average Czech intellecttual is now familiar with all modern literary schools of eastern and western Europe. His knowledge in this respect is at least equal to that possessed by those of similar attainments in Western Europe.

Czech scholarship was re-organized by Masaryk and his friends. This movement was especially fortunate because the Czechs succeeded in re-establishing the Czech University. It had been Germanized by the Habsburgs who even after the re-establishment of the Czech University did not abolish the German one. The demand for Czech university professors proved that Czech scholars were by no means inferior to their German colleagues. Some of them are known abroad even better than in their own country. Such were conditions in Bohemia before the war; there was a high standard of intellectual attainments, and among the Czech poets there were some such as Sova, Březina, Bezruč, whose works will reflect great credit on the Czechs when they have become better known abroad. The only task left to the Czechs was to establish a tradition for Czech public life in such a way as to justify Dobrovský’s prophecy about the lSavs. This was naturally impossible for the Czechs so long as they were under Austrian rule and were unable to decide their own destnies, for only a free nation can create its individual life.