Six years were enough to fulfill the dreams of centuries. A year to bring our people into the enjoyment of that unity that was the futile aspiration of many generations. As I see you today gathered around me as representatives of our German people from all parts of the empire and know among you the newly elected men of the Ostmark and the Sudetenland, I again relishes the tremendous impressions of the events of a year in which centuries were realized. How much blood flowed around this destination in vain! How many millions of German men, consciously or unconsciously in the service of this purpose, have gone the bitter road of rapid or painful death for more than a thousand years! How many others were condemned to end life behind fortress and dungeon walls, that they wanted to give to Greater Germany! How many hundreds of thousands have flowed into the wide world as an endless stream of German emigration, driven by distress and anxiety! For decades thinking of the unfortunate homeland, after generations forgetting it. And now, in one year, the realization of this dream has succeeded. Not without a fight, as thoughtless citizens may believe it.