Der Fuehrer - Hitler's Rise to Power (1944) - Heiden

260 DER FUEHRERagainst this division and blood-poisoning must have good, unspoiledblood; by becoming a National Socialist he proved it. He proved —even if he were ten times a dwarf with a squashed face like Max Amannor a bald, grinning faun like Julius Streicher — that he belonged to thehigher type, which, according to Houston Stewart Chamberlain, was toarise only in the future. 'Everything beautiful,' Hitler went on, 'which wesee around us today is only the creation of the Aryan, his spirit andindustry; only the bad things are the heritage of the Hebrew.'Aryans of all nations, unite! Into what immeasurable distance this aimhad been removed! For the moment Hitler could be glad that the Aryansunited in the Burgerbrau Keller. The squabbling must end, he cried.Anyone who didn't like this could stay away — most had stayed away,anyway — and no one should try to impose any conditions on him,Hitler. By 'conditions' he meant the demand of his more respectable oldfriends that he drop the unsavory Hermann Esser or the repulsivefellow, Julius Streicher: 'I lead the movement, and no one gives me anyconditions.' But if anyone should do so, here was the answer: 'Friend,just wait and see what conditions I'll give you.' He wasn't going to takeany orders as long as he personally bore the responsibility — 'and I bearall the responsibility for everything that happens in this movement.' Atthe end of a year he would give the party an accounting; if by then hehad done his work badly, 'I'll give my office back into your hands.'(Cries of Never!) Well, he himself didn't think so. He believed in theSwastika banner; he himself had designed it, he himself had been first tocarry it, and only wished 'that some day, when Father Time strikes medown, it may be my winding sheet. . . . Either the enemy will pass overour corpses or we over his.'Four thousand were happy, exalted, consoled; again they felt a forcethat drove them on, a stream that bore them. The despised band againfelt something like pride; this was the secret of this unusual speechcoming after a year of silence. Up front, right under the platform, sat illtemperedsub-leaders, resolved not to give Esser and Streicher theirhand, doubting whether Hitler still had his old power; some, afterpersonal experiences, were convinced that he had suffered a mentalcollapse in Landsberg. But now Hitler had