Slote's Rant in Winds of War

Leslie Slote was a state department employee in Herman Wouk's novel The Winds of War.  There is a point in the novel where he insists that German philosophy did influence the course of events that led to Hitler.  On page 515 (ISBN 0316955000) Slote says, "German  Romanticism is a terribly important and powerful critique of the way the West lives."  The historical novel depicts Europe and America from Hitler's rise to power to the very beginning of America's entry into the war.  It's sequel, War and Remembrance, continues the story.

Leslie Slote goes on with an emphatic rant that is supposed to be a quote from the German poet Heinrich Heine.  Wikipedia says about Heine, "His radical political views led to many of his works being banned by German authorities."  Here is the rant (page 516).  I think Herman Wouk was right to bring these words to our attention, and we need to take heed.  The violence of the thoughts and the references to revolution alarmed me. 

The German Revolution will not prove any milder or gentler because it was preceded by the Critique of Kant, by the Transcendental Idealism of Fichte.  These doctrines served to develop revolutionary forces  that only await their time to break forth.  Christianity subdued the brutal warrior passion of the Germans, but it could not quench it. When the Cross, that restraining talisman, falls to pieces, then  will break forth again the frantic Berserker rage.  The old stone gods will then arise from the forgotten ruins and wipe from their eyes the dust of centuries.  Thor with his giant hammer will arise again, and he will shatter the Gothic cathedrals.  

Smile not at the dreamer who warns you against Kantians, Fichteans, and the other philosophers.  Smile not at the fantasy of one who foresees in the region of reality the same outburst of revolution that has taken place in the region of intellect.  The thought precedes the deed as the lightening the thunder.  German thunder is of true German character.  It is not very nimble but rumbles along somewhat slowly.  But come it will. And when you hear a crashing such as never before has been heard in the world's history, then know that at last the German thunderbolt has fallen.

The Leslie Slote character then says Heinrich Heine wrote these words 106 years before Hitler. This article does confirm that these are the concluding words of Heine's 1834 book, Religion and Philosophy in Germany.

What really caught my eye was this sentence: "The thought precedes the deed as the lightening the thunder. "

So many people I know pay no attention to philosophy, but in my opinion Karl Marx (Das Kapital) was more a philosopher than an economist. I have heard the death count from his Marxist Communism has exceeded 100 million dead.  I would say the philosophy of Marx has brought thunder and lightening to this world.

We certainly need to spot a bad philosophy when we see one!

Robert