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diff --git a/32779.txt b/32779.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..81e87f7 --- /dev/null +++ b/32779.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5685 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Above the Battle, by Romain Rolland + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Above the Battle + +Author: Romain Rolland + +Release Date: June 12, 2010 [EBook #32779] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOVE THE BATTLE *** + + + + +Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team +at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned +images of public domain material from the Google Print +project.) + + + + + + + + + +ABOVE THE BATTLE + + +"The fire smouldering in the forest of Europe was beginning to burst +into flames. In vain did they try to put it out in one place; it only +broke out in another. With gusts of smoke and a shower of sparks it +swept from one point to another, burning the dry brushwood. Already in +the East there were skirmishes as the prelude to the great war of the +nations. All Europe, Europe that only yesterday was sceptical and +apathetic, like a dead wood, was swept by the flames. All men were +possessed by the desire for battle. War was ever on the point of +breaking out. It was stamped out, but it sprang to life again. The world +felt that it was at the mercy of an accident that might let loose the +dogs of war. The world lay in wait. The feeling of inevitability weighed +heavily even upon the most pacifically minded. And ideologues, sheltered +beneath the massive shadows of the cyclops, Proudhon, hymned in war +man's fairest title of nobility...." + +_"This, then, was to be the end of the physical and moral resurrection +of the races of the West! To such butchery they were to be borne along +by the currents of action and passionate faith! Only a Napoleonic genius +could have marked out a chosen, deliberate aim for this blind, onward +rush. But nowhere in Europe was there any genius for action. It was as +though the world had chosen the most mediocre to be its governors. The +force of the human mind was in other things--so there was nothing to be +done but to trust to the declivity down which they were moving. This +both the governing and the governed classes were doing. Europe looked +like a vast armed camp."_ + +_Jean-Christophe_, vol. x (1912). + +[English translation by Gilbert Cannan, vol. iv, p. 504.] + + + + +ABOVE THE BATTLE + +BY +ROMAIN ROLLAND + +TRANSLATED BY +C. K. OGDEN, M. A. +(Editor of _The Cambridge Magazine_) + +CHICAGO + +THE OPEN COURT PUBLISHING COMPANY +1916 + +_Copyright 1916_ + +_The Open Court Pub. Co., Chicago._ + +_First published in 1916._ + +(_All rights reserved._) + + + INTRODUCTION + CONTENTS + PREFACE + NOTES + FOOTNOTES + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + + _"Over the carnage rose prophetic a voice, + Be not dishearten'd, affection shall solve the problem of + freedom yet._ + + * * * * * + + _(Were you looking to be held together by lawyers? + Or by an agreement on a paper? or by arms? + Nay, nor the world, nor any living thing, will so cohere.)"_ + +These lines of Walt Whitman will be recalled by many who read the +following pages: for not only does Rolland himself refer to Whitman in +his brief Introduction, but, were it not for a certain _bizarrerie_ +apart from their context, the words "Over the Carnage" might perhaps +have stood on the cover of this volume as a striking variant on +_Au-dessus de la Melee_. + +Yet though the voice comes to us over the carnage, its message is not +marred by the passions of the moment. After eighteen months of war we +are learning to look about us more calmly, and to distinguish amid the +ruins those of Europe's intellectual leaders who have not been swept off +their feet by the fury of the tempest. Almost alone Romain Rolland has +stood the test. The two main characteristics which strike us in all that +he writes are lucidity and common sense--the qualities most needed by +every one in thought upon the war. But there is another feature of +Rolland's work which contributes to its universal appeal. He describes +our feelings and sensations in the presence of a given situation, not +what actually passes before our eyes: he describes the effects and +causes of things, but not the things themselves. Through his work for +the _Agence internationale des prisonniers de guerre_, to which one of +the articles now collected is largely devoted, he is, moreover, in a +position to observe every phase of the great battle between ideals and +between nations which fills him with such anguish and indignation. And +with his matchless insight and sympathy he gives permanent form to our +vague feelings in these noble and inspiring essays. + +It will not, however, surprise the vast public who have read +_Jean-Christophe_ to find that while so many have capitulated to the +madness of the terrible year through which we have passed, Rolland has +remained firm, and has surpassed himself. He was prepared. As the +extract placed at the beginning of this volume shows, he was one of the +few who realized only too well the horror he was powerless to prevent. +Yet he made every effort to open the eyes of Europe and especially of +the young, so many of whom had learned to look up to him as a leader. To +these young men, one of the finest essays in the present collection is +primarily addressed--_O jeunesse heroique du monde_.... + +Eighteen months have passed and they still endure the terrible ordeal, +the young men of Germany and France, whom he had striven so hard to +bring together; on whose aspirations and failings _Jean-Christophe_ is a +critical commentary. The movements and tendencies of society were there +given a dramatic embodiment, permeated for Rolland by the Life +Force--that struggle between Good and Bad, Love and Hatred, which makes +life worth living. All is set down with the clear analysis of feeling +natural to a musical critic. But in spite of his burning words on the +destruction of Rheims, Rolland, as is clear from his other critical and +biographical writings, is more interested in men than in their +achievements. And the men of today interest him most passionately. +"Young men," he has said, "do not bother about the old people. Make a +stepping-stone of our bodies and go forward." + +And above all it is the permanent things in life with which he is +concerned. As Mr. Lowes Dickinson puts it, "M. Rolland is one of the +many who believe, though their voice for the moment may be silenced, +that the spiritual forces that are important and ought to prevail are +the international ones; that co-operation, not war, is the right destiny +of nations; and that all that is valuable in each people may be +maintained in and by friendly intercourse with the others. The war +between these two ideals is the greater war that lies behind the present +conflict. Hundreds and thousands of generous youths have gone to battle +in the belief that they are going to a 'war that will end war,' that +they are fighting against militarism in the cause of peace. Whether, +indeed, it is for that they will have risked or lost their lives, only +the event can show." + +The forces against such ideals are powerful, but Rolland is not +dismayed. "Come, friends! let us make a stand! Can we not resist this +contagion, whatever its nature and virulence be--whether moral epidemic +or cosmic force." And he appeals not only in the name of humanity but in +the name of that France which he loves so dearly--"la vraie France" of +which Jaures wrote (in the untranslatable words which Rolland has +quoted), "qui n'est pas resumee dans une epoque et dans un jour, ni dans +le jour d'il y a des siecles, ni dans le jour d'hier, mais la France +tout entiere, dans la succession de ses jours, de ses nuits, de ses +aurores, de ses crepuscules, de ses montees, de ses chutes, et qui, a +travers toutes ces ombres melees, toutes ces lumieres incompletes et +toutes ces vicissitudes, s'en va vers une pleine clarte qu'elle n'a pas +encore atteinte, mais dont le pressentiment est dans sa pensee!" + +But though his love for France inspires every word that Rolland has +written, the significance of the present volume is not less apparent to +English readers. Some of the articles and letters now collected have +already appeared in English, for the most part in the pages of _The +Cambridge Magazine_, from which they have been widely quoted in the +press. For help in rendering the translations as adequately as possible +I may also take this opportunity of acknowledging my special +indebtedness to Mr. Roger Fry,[1] who has just issued through the Omega +Workshops a striking translation of some of the most recent French +poetry inspired by the war; to Mr. James Wood, who has himself done part +of the translation, particularly "pro Aris"; and to Mr. E. K. Bennett, +of Caius College, whose version of "Above the Battle" has already been +quoted by the Archbishop of Canterbury and others. For the most part, +the articles here collected have not appeared in English before; and +they have been almost inaccessible even in French, as their author +explains in his Preface. + +C. K. OGDEN. + +MAGDALENE COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE, _January, 1916_. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +INTRODUCTION BY THE TRANSLATOR 7 + +PREFACE 15 + +I. AN OPEN LETTER TO GERHART HAUPTMANN 19 + +II. PRO ARIS 23 + +III. ABOVE THE BATTLE 37 + +IV. THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS: PANGERMANISM, +PANSLAVISM 56 + +V. INTER ARMA CARITAS 76 + +VI. TO THE PEOPLE THAT IS SUFFERING FOR JUSTICE 93 + +VII. LETTER TO MY CRITICS 97 + +VIII. THE IDOLS 107 + +IX. FOR EUROPE: MANIFESTO OF THE WRITERS AND +THINKERS OF CATALONIA 122 + +X. FOR EUROPE: AN APPEAL FROM HOLLAND TO THE +INTELLECTUALS OF ALL NATIONS 127 + +XI. LETTER TO FREDERIK VAN EEDEN 136 + +XII. OUR NEIGHBOR THE ENEMY 142 + +XIII. A LETTER TO SVENSKA DAGBLADET OF STOCKHOLM 151 + +XIV. WAR LITERATURE 153 + +XV. THE MURDER OF THE ELITE 168 + +XVI. JAURES 181 + +NOTES 193 + +INDEX 195 + +FOOTNOTES + +NOTES OF ETEXT TRANSCRIBER + + +It is my pleasant duty to thank the brave friends who have defended me +during the past year, in the Parisian press:--at the end of October +1914, Amedee Dunois in _l'Humanite_, and Henri Guilbeaux, in the +_Bataille syndicaliste_; in the same paper, _Fernand Depres_; Georges +Pioch in the _Hommes du Jour_; J. M. Renaitour, in the _Bonnet Rouge_; +Rouanet, in _l'Humanite_; Jacques Mesnil, in the _Mercure de France_, +and Gaston Thiesson, in the _Guerre Sociale_. To these faithful comrades +in the struggle I express my affectionate gratitude. + +R. R. + +_October, 1915._ + + + + +PREFACE + + +A great nation assailed by war has not only its frontiers to protect: it +must also protect its good sense. It must protect itself from the +hallucinations, injustices, and follies which the plague lets loose. To +each his part: to the armies the protection of the soil of their native +land; to the thinkers the defense of its thought. If they subordinate +that thought to the passions of their people they may well be useful +instruments of passion; but they are in danger of betraying the spirit, +which is not the least part of a people's patrimony. One day History +will pass judgment on each of the nations at war; she will weigh their +measure of errors, lies, and heinous follies. Let us try and make ours +light before her! + +Children are taught the Gospel of Jesus and the Christian ideal. +Everything in the education they receive at school is designed to +stimulate in them intellectual understanding of the great human family. +Classical education makes them see, beyond the differences of race, the +roots and the common trunk of our civilization. Art makes them love the +profound sources of the genius of a people. Science makes them believe +in the unity of reason. The great social movement which renews the +world, reveals the organized effort of the working classes all round +them to unite their forces in the hopes and struggles which break the +barriers of nations. The brightest geniuses of the earth, like Walt +Whitman and Tolstoi, chant universal brotherhood in joy and suffering, +or else like our Latin spirits, pierce with their criticism the +prejudices of hatred and ignorance which separate individuals and +peoples. + +Like all the men of my time, I have been brought up on these thoughts; I +have tried in my turn to share the bread of life with my younger or less +fortunate brothers. When the war came I did not think it my duty to deny +these thoughts because the hour had come to put them to the test. + +I have been insulted. I knew that I should be and I went forward. But I +did not know that I should be insulted without even a hearing. + +For several months no one in France could know my writings except +through scraps of phrases arbitrarily extracted and mutilated by my +enemies. It is a shameful record. For nearly a year this has gone on. +Certain socialist or syndicalist papers may have succeeded here and +there in getting some fragments through,[2] but it was only in the month +of June 1915 that for the first time my chief article, the one which was +the object of the most violent criticism, "Above the Battle," dating +from September 1914, could be published in full (almost in full), thanks +to the malevolent zeal of a maladroit pamphleteer, to whom I am indebted +for bringing my words before the French public for the first time. + +A Frenchman does not judge his adversary unheard. Whoever does so judges +and condemns himself: for he shows that he fears the light. I place +before the world the texts they have slandered.[3] I shall not defend +them. Let them defend themselves! + +One single word will I add. For a year I have been rich in enemies. Let +me say this to them: they can hate me, but they will not teach me to +hate. I have no concern with them. My business is to say what I believe +to be fair and humane. Whether this pleases or irritates is not my +business. I know that words once uttered make their way of themselves. +Hopefully I sow them in the bloody soil. The harvest will come. + +ROMAIN ROLLAND. + +_September, 1915._ + + + + +I. AN OPEN LETTER TO GERHART HAUPTMANN + + +_Saturday, August 29, 1914._[4] + +I am not, Gerhart Hauptmann, one of those Frenchmen who regard Germany +as a nation of barbarians. I know the intellectual and moral greatness +of your mighty race. I know all that I owe to the thinkers of old +Germany; and even now, at this hour, I recall the example and the words +of _our_ Goethe--for he belongs to the whole of humanity--repudiating +all national hatreds and preserving the calmness of his soul on those +heights "_where we feel the happiness and the misfortunes of other +peoples as our own_." I myself have labored all my life to bring +together the minds of our two nations; and the atrocities of this +impious war in which, to the ruin of European civilization, they are +involved, will never lead me to soil my spirit with hatred. + +Whatever pain, then, your Germany may give me, whatever reasons I may +have to stigmatize as criminal German policy and the means it employs, I +do not attach responsibility for it to the people which is burdened with +it and is used as its blind instrument. It is not that I regard, as you +do, war as a fatality. A Frenchman does not believe in fatality. +Fatality is the excuse of souls without a will. War springs from the +weakness and stupidity of nations. One cannot feel resentment against +them for it; one can only pity them. I do not reproach you with our +miseries; for yours will be no less. If France is ruined, Germany will +be ruined too. I did not even raise my voice when I saw your armies +violating the neutrality of noble Belgium. This flagrant breach of +honor, which incurs the contempt of every upright conscience, is quite +in the political tradition of your Prussian kings; it did not surprise +me. + +But when I see the fury with which you are treating that magnanimous +nation whose only crime has been to defend its independence and the +cause of justice to the last, as you Germans yourselves did in 1813 ... +that is too much! The world is revolted by it. Keep these savageries for +us Frenchmen, your true enemies! But to wreak them against your +victims, against this small, unhappy, innocent Belgian people ... how +shameful is this! + +And not content to fling yourselves on living Belgium, you wage war on +the dead, on the glories of past ages. You bombard Malines, you burn +Rubens, and Louvain is now no more than a heap of ashes--Louvain with +its treasures of art and of science, the sacred town! What are you, +then, Hauptmann, and by what name do you want us to call you now, since +you repudiate the title of barbarians? Are you the grandsons of Goethe +or of Attila? Are you making war on enemies or on the human spirit? Kill +men if you like, but respect masterpieces. They are the patrimony of the +human race. You, like all the rest of us, are its depositories; in +pillaging it, as you do, you show yourselves unworthy of our great +heritage, unworthy to take your place in that little European army which +is civilization's guard of honor. + +It is not to the opinion of the rest of the world that I address myself +in challenging you, Hauptmann. In the name of our Europe, of which you +have hitherto been one of the most illustrious champions, in the name of +that civilization for which the greatest of men have striven all down +the ages, in the name of the very honor of your Germanic race, Gerhart +Hauptmann, I abjure you, I challenge you, you and the intellectuals of +Germany, amongst whom I reckon so many friends, to protest with all your +energy against this crime which is recoiling upon you. + +If you fail to do this, you will prove one of two things: either that +you approve what has been done--and in that case may the opinion of +mankind crush you--or else that you are powerless to raise a protest +against the Huns who command you. If this be so, by what title can you +still claim, as you have claimed, that you fight for the cause of +liberty and human progress? You are giving the world a proof that, +incapable of defending the liberty of the world, you are even incapable +of defending your own, and that the best of Germany is helpless beneath +a vile despotism which mutilates masterpieces and murders the spirit of +man. + +I am expecting an answer from you, Hauptmann, an answer that may be an +act. The opinion of Europe awaits it as I do. Think about it: at such a +time silence itself is an act. + +_Journal de Geneve_, Wednesday, Sept. 2, 1914. + + + + +II. PRO ARIS[5] + + +Among the many crimes of this infamous war which are all odious to us, +why have we chosen for protest the crimes against things and not against +men, the destruction of works and not of lives? + +Many are surprised by this, and have even reproached us for it--as if we +have not as much pity as they for the bodies and hearts of the thousands +of victims who are crucified! Yet over the armies which fall, there +flies the vision of their love, and of _la Patrie_, to which they +sacrifice themselves--over these lives which are passing away passes the +holy Ark of the art and thought of centuries, borne on their shoulders. +The bearers can change. May the Ark be saved! To the elite of the world +falls the task of guarding it. And since the common treasure is +threatened, may they rise to protect it! + +I am glad to think that in the Latin countries this sacred duty has +always been regarded as paramount. Our France which bleeds with so many +other wounds, has suffered nothing more cruel than the attack against +her Parthenon, the Cathedral of Rheims, "Our Lady of France." Letters +which I have received from sorely tried families, and from soldiers who +for two months have borne every hardship, show me (and I am proud of it +for them and for my people) that there was no burden heavier for them to +bear. It is because we put spirit above flesh. Very different is the +case of the German intellectuals, who, to my reproaches for the +sacrilegious acts of their devastating armies, have all replied with one +voice, "Perish every _chef-d'oeuvre_ rather than one German soldier!" + +A piece of architecture like Rheims is much more than one life; it is a +people--whose centuries vibrate like a symphony in this organ of stone. +It is their memories of joy, of glory, and of grief; their meditations, +ironies, dreams. It is the tree of the race, whose roots plunge to the +profoundest depths of its soil, and whose branches stretch with a +sublime _elan_ towards the sky. It is still more: its beauty which soars +above the struggles of nations is the harmonious response made by the +human race to the riddle of the world--this light of the spirit more +necessary to souls than that of the sun. + +Whoever destroys this work, murders more than a man; he murders the +purest soul of a race. His crime is inexpiable, and Dante would have it +punished with an eternal agony, eternally renewed. We who repudiate the +vindictive spirit of so cruel a genius, do not hold a people responsible +for the crimes of a few. The drama which unfolds itself before our eyes, +and whose almost certain _denouement_ will be the crushing of the German +hegemony, is enough for us. + +What brings it home to us most nearly is that not one of those who +constitute the moral and intellectual elite of Germany--that hundred +noble spirits, and those thousands of brave hearts of which no great +nation was ever destitute--not one really suspects the crimes of his +Government; the atrocities committed in Flanders, in the north and in +the east of France during the two or three first weeks of the war; or +(one can safely wager) the voluntary devastations of the towns of +Belgium and the ruin of Rheims. If they came to look at the reality, I +know that many of them would weep with grief and shame; and of all the +shortcomings of Prussian Imperialism, the worst and the vilest is to +have concealed its crimes from its people. For by depriving them of the +means of protesting against those crimes, it has involved them for ever +in the responsibility; it has abused their magnificent devotion. The +intellectuals, however, are also guilty. For if one admits that the +brave men, who in every country tamely feed upon the news which their +papers and their leaders give them for nourishment, allow themselves to +be duped, one cannot pardon those whose duty it is to seek truth in the +midst of error, and to know the value of interested witnesses and +passionate hallucinations. Before bursting into the midst of this +furious debate upon which was staked the destruction of nations and of +the treasures of the spirit, their first duty (a duty of loyalty as much +as of common sense) should have been to consider the problems from both +sides. By blind loyalty and culpable trustfulness they have rushed head +foremost into the net which their Imperialism had spread. They believed +that their first duty was, with their eyes closed, to defend the honor +of their State against all accusation. They did not see that the noblest +means of defending it was to disavow its faults and to cleanse their +country of them.... + +I have awaited this virile disavowal from the proudest spirits of +Germany, a disavowal which would have been ennobling instead of +humiliating. The letter which I wrote to one of them, the day after the +brutal voice of Wolff's Agency pompously proclaimed that there remained +of Louvain no more than a heap of ashes, was received by the entire +elite of Germany in a spirit of enmity. They did not understand that I +offered them the chance of releasing Germany from the fetters of those +crimes which its Empire was forging in its name. What did I ask of them? +What did I ask of you all, finer spirits of Germany?--to express at +least a courageous regret for the excesses committed, and to dare to +remind unbridled power that even the Fatherland cannot save itself +through crime, and that above its rights are those of the human spirit. +I only asked for _one_ voice--a _single_ free voice.... None spoke. I +heard only the clamor of herds, the pack of intellectuals giving tongue +on the track whereon the hunter loosed them, and that insolent +Manifesto, in which, without the slightest effort to justify its crimes, +you have unanimously declared that they do not exist. And your +theologians, your pastors, your court-preachers, have stated further +that you are very just and that you thank God for having made you +thus.... Race of Pharisees, what chastisement from on high shall scourge +your sacrilegious pride!... Do you not suspect the evil which you have +done to your own people? The megalomania, a menace to the world, of an +Ostwald or an H. S. Chamberlain,[6] the criminal determination of +ninety-three intellectuals not to wish to see the truth, will have cost +Germany more than ten defeats. + +How clumsy you are! I believe that of all your faults _maladresse_ is +the worst. You have not said one word since the beginning of this war +which has not been more fatal for you than all the speeches of your +adversaries. It is you who have light-heartedly furnished the proof or +the argument of the worst accusations that have been brought against +you; just as your official agencies, under the stupid illusion of +terrorizing us, have been the first to launch emphatic recitals of your +most sinister devastations. It is you, who when the most impartial of +your adversaries were obliged, in fairness, to limit the responsibility +of these acts to a few of your leaders and armies, have angrily claimed +your share. It is you who the day after the destruction of Rheims, +which, in your inmost hearts, should have dismayed the best amongst you, +have boasted of it in imbecile pride, instead of trying to clear +yourselves.[7] It is you, wretched creatures, you, representatives of +the spirit, who have not ceased to extol force and to despise the weak, +as if you did not know that the wheel of fortune turns, that this force +one day will weigh afresh upon you, as in past ages, when your great +men, at least, retained the consolation of not having yielded to it the +sovereignty of the spirit and the sacred rights of Right!... What +reproaches, what remorse are you heaping up for the future, O blind +guides--you who are leading into the ditch your nation, which follows +you like the stumbling blind men of Brueghel! + +What poor arguments you have opposed to us for two months! + +1. _War is war_, say you, that is to say without common measure with the +rest of things, above morals and reason and all the limits of ordinary +life, a kind of supernatural state before which one can only bow without +discussion; + +2. _Germany is Germany_, that is to say without common measure with the +rest of nations. The laws which apply to others do not apply to her, and +the rights which she arrogates to herself to violate Right appertain to +her alone. Thus she can, without crime, tear up written promises, betray +sworn oaths, violate the neutrality of peoples which she has pledged +herself to defend. But she claims in return the right to find, in the +nations which she outrages, "chivalrous adversaries," and that they +should not be so, that they should dare to defend themselves by all the +means and the arms that remain to them, she proclaims a crime!... + +One recognizes there indeed the interested teaching of your Prussian +masters! Great minds of Germany, I do not doubt your sincerity, but you +are no longer capable of seeing the truth. Prussian Imperialism has +crushed down over your eyes and conscience, its spiked helmet. + +"_Necessity knows no law._" ... Here is the eleventh commandment, the +message that you bring to the universe today, sons of Kant!... We have +heard it more than once in history: it is the famous doctrine of Public +Safety, mother of heroisms and crimes. Every nation has recourse to it +in the hour of danger, but the greatest are those who defend against it +their immortal soul. Fifteen years have passed since the famous trial +which saw a single innocent man opposed to the force of the State. +Fifteen years have passed since we French affronted and shattered the +idol of public safety, when it threatened, as our Peguy says, "the +eternal safety of France." + +Listen to him, whom you have killed; listen to a hero of the French +conscience, writers who have the keeping of the conscience of Germany. + +"_Our enemies of that time_," wrote Charles Peguy, "_spoke the language +of the_ raison d'Etat, _of the temporal safety of the people and the +race. But we, by a profound Christian movement, by a revolutionary +effort, at unity with traditional Christianity, aimed at no less than +attaining the heights of sacrifice, in our anxiety for the eternal +salvation of this people. We did not wish to place France in the +position of having committed the unpardonable sin._" + +You do not trouble yourselves about that, thinkers of Germany. You +bravely give your blood to save the mortal life, but do not bother about +the life eternal. It is a terrible moment, I grant. Your fatherland as +ours struggles for its life, and I understand and admire the ecstasy of +sacrifice which impels your youth, as ours, to make of its body a +rampart against death. "To be or not to be," do you say? No, that is not +enough. To be the great Germany, to be the great France, worthy of their +past, and respecting one another even while fighting, that is what I +wish. I should blush for victory if my France bought it at the price for +which you will pay for your temporary success. Even while the battles +are being fought upon the plains of Belgium and amongst the chalky +slopes of Champagne, another war is taking place upon the field of the +spirit, and often victory below means defeat above. The conquest of +Belgium, Malines, Louvain and Rheims, the carillons of Flanders, will +sound a sadder knell in your history than the bells of Jena; and the +conquered Belgians have robbed you of your glory. You know it. You are +enraged because you know it. What is the good of vainly trying to +deceive yourselves? Truth will be clear to you in the end. You have done +your best to silence her--one day she will speak; she will speak by the +mouth of one of your own in whom will be awakened the conscience of your +race.... Oh, that he may soon appear and that we may hear his voice--the +pure and noble voice of the redeemer who shall set you free! He who has +lived in the intimacy of your old Germany, who has clasped her hand in +the twisted streets of her heroic and sordid past, who has caught the +breath of her centuries of trials and shames, remembers and waits: for +he knows that even if she has never proved strong enough to bear victory +without wavering, it is in her hours of trouble that she reforms +herself, and her greatest geniuses are sons of sorrow. + +_September 1914._ + + * * * * * + +Since these lines were written I have watched the birth of the anxiety +which little by little is making its way into the consciences of the +good people of Germany. First a secret doubt, kept under by a stubborn +effort to believe the bad arguments collected by their Government to +oppose it--documents fabricated to prove that Belgium had renounced her +neutrality herself, false allegations (in vain repudiated four times by +the French Government, by the Commander-in-Chief, by the Cardinal and +the Archbishop, and by the Mayor of Rheims)--accusing the French of +using the Cathedral of Rheims for military purposes. Lacking arguments, +their system of defense is at times disconcerting in its naivete. + +"Is it possible," they say, "that we should be accused of wishing to +destroy artistic monuments, we, the people above all others who venerate +art, in whom is instilled this respect from infancy, who have the +greatest number of text books and historical collections of art and the +longest list of lectures on aesthetics? Is it possible to accuse of the +most barbarous actions the most humane, the most affectionate, and the +most homely of peoples?" + +The idea never strikes them that Germany is not constituted by a single +race of men, and that besides the obedient masses who are born to obey, +to respect the law--all the laws--there is the race which commands, +which believes itself above all laws, and which makes and unmakes them +in the name of force and necessity (_Not_....) It is this evil marriage +of idealism and German force which leads to these disasters. The +idealism proves to be a woman; a woman captive, who like so many worthy +German wives, worships her lord and master, and refuses even to think +that he could ever be wrong. + +It is, however, necessary for the salvation of Germany that she should +one day countenance the thought of divorce, or that the wife should have +the courage to make her voice heard in the household. I already know +several who are beginning to champion the rights of the spirit against +force. Many a German voice has reached us lately in letters protesting +against war and deploring with us the injustices which we deplore. I +will not give their names in order not to compromise them. Not very +long ago I told the "Fair"[8] which obstructed Paris that it was not +France. I say today to the German Fair, "You are not the true Germany." +There exists another Germany juster and more humane, whose ambition is +not to dominate the world by force and guile, but to absorb in peace +everything great in the thought of other races, and in return to reflect +the harmony. With that Germany there is no dispute; we are not her +enemies, we are the enemies of those who have almost succeeded in making +the world forget that she still lives. + +_October 1914._ + +Edition des _Cahiers Vaudois_ 10 cahier, 1914 (Lausanne, C. Tarin). + + + + +III. ABOVE THE BATTLE + + +O young men that shed your blood with so generous a joy for the starving +earth! O heroism of the world! What a harvest for destruction to reap +under this splendid summer sun! Young men of all nations, brought into +conflict by a common ideal, making enemies of those who should be +brothers; all of you, marching to your death, are dear to me.[9] Slavs, +hastening to the aid of your race; Englishmen fighting for honor and +right; intrepid Belgians who dared to oppose the Teutonic colossus, and +defend against him the Thermopylae of the West; Germans fighting to +defend the philosophy and the birthplace of Kant against the Cossack +avalanche; and you, above all, my young compatriots, in whom the +generation of heroes of the Revolution lives again; you, who for years +have confided your dreams to me, and now, on the verge of battle, bid +me a sublime farewell. + +Those years of scepticism and gay frivolity in which we in France grew +up are avenged in you; your faith, which is ours, you protect from their +poisonous influence; and with you that faith triumphs on the +battlefield. "A war of revenge" is the cry. Yea! revenge indeed; but in +no spirit of Chauvinism. The revenge of faith against all the egotisms +of the senses and of the spirit--the surrender of self to eternal ideas. + +One of the most powerful of the young French novelists--Corporal +X.--writes to me:-- + + "What are our lives, our books, compared with the magnitude of the + aim? The war of the Revolution against feudalism is beginning anew. + The armies of the Republic will secure the triumph of democracy in + Europe and complete the work of the Convention. We are fighting for + more than our hearths and homes, for the awakening of liberty." + Another of these young people, of noble spirit and pure heart, who + will be, if he lives, the first art critic of our time--Lieutenant + X.:-- + + "My friend, could you see our Army as I do, you would be thrilled + with admiration for our people, for this noble race. An enthusiasm, + like an outburst of the Marseillaise, thrills them; heroic, + earnest, and even religious. I have seen the three divisions of my + army corps set out; the men of active service first, young men of + twenty marching with firm and rapid steps, without a cry, without a + gesture, like the ephebi of old calmly going to sacrifice. After + them come the reserve, men of twenty-five to thirty years, more + stalwart and more determined, who will reinforce the younger men + and make them irresistible. We, the old men of forty, the fathers + of families, are the base of the choir; and we too, I assure you, + set out confidently, resolute and unwavering. I have no wish to + die, but I can die now without regret; for I have lived through a + fortnight, which would be cheap at the price of death, a fortnight + which I had not dared to ask of fate. History will tell of us, for + we are opening a new era in the world. We are dispelling the + nightmare of the materialism of a mailed Germany and of armed + peace. It will fade like a phantom before us; the world seems to + breathe again. Reassure your Viennese friend,[10] France is not + about to die; it is her resurrection which we see. For throughout + history--Bouvines, the Crusades, Cathedrals, the Revolution--we + remain the same, the knights-errant of the world, the paladins of + God. I have lived long enough to see it fulfilled; and we who + prophesied it twenty years ago to unbelieving ears may rejoice + today." + +O my friends, may nothing mar your joy! Whatever fate has in store, you +have risen to the pinnacle of earthly life, and borne your country with +you. And you will be victorious. Your self-sacrifice, your courage, your +whole-hearted faith in your sacred cause, and the unshaken certainty +that, in defending your invaded country, you are defending the liberty +of the world--all this assures me of your victory, young armies of the +Marne and Meuse, whose names are graven henceforth in history by the +side of your elders of the Great Republic. Yet even had misfortune +decreed that you should be vanquished, and with you France itself, no +people could have aspired to a more noble death. It would have crowned +the life of that great people of the Crusades--it would have been their +supreme victory. Conquerors or conquered, living or dead, rejoice! As +one of you said to me, embracing me on the terrible threshold: "A +splendid thing it is to fight with clean hands and a pure heart, and to +dispense divine justice with one's life." + +You are doing your duty, but have others done theirs? Let us be bold and +proclaim the truth to the elders of these young men, to their moral +guides, to their religious and secular leaders, to the Churches, the +great thinkers, the leaders of socialism; these living riches, these +treasures of heroism you held in your hands; for what are you +squandering them? What ideal have you held up to the devotion of these +youths so eager to sacrifice themselves? Their mutual slaughter! A +European war! A sacrilegious conflict which shows a maddened Europe +ascending its funeral pyre, and, like Hercules, destroying itself with +its own hands! + +And thus the three greatest nations of the West, the guardians of +civilization, rush headlong to their ruin, calling in to their aid +Cossacks, Turks, Japanese, Cingalese, Soudanese, Senegalese, Moroccans, +Egyptians, Sikhs and Sepoys--barbarians from the poles and those from +the equator, souls and bodies of all colors.[11] It is as if the four +quarters of the Roman Empire at the time of the Tetrarchy had called +upon the barbarians of the whole universe to devour each other. + +Is our civilization so solid that you do not fear to shake the pillars +on which it rests? Can you not see that all falls in upon you if one +column be shattered? Could you not have learned if not to love one +another, at least to tolerate the great virtues and the great vices of +each other? Was it not your duty to attempt--you have never attempted it +in sincerity--to settle amicably the questions which divided you, the +problem of peoples annexed against their will, the equitable division of +productive labor and the riches of the world? Must the stronger forever +darken the others with the shadow of his pride, and the others forever +unite to dissipate it? Is there no end to this bloody and puerile sport, +in which the partners change about from century to century--no end, +until the whole of humanity is exhausted thereby? + +The rulers who are the criminal authors of these wars dare not accept +the responsibility for them. Each one by underhand means seeks to lay +the blame at the door of his adversary. The peoples who obey them +submissively resign themselves with the thought that a power higher than +mankind has ordered it thus. Again the venerable refrain is heard: "The +fatality of war is stronger than our wills." The old refrain of the herd +that makes a god of its feebleness and bows down before him. Man has +invented fate, that he may make it responsible for the disorders of the +universe, those disorders which it was his duty to regulate. There is no +fatality! The only fatality is what we desire; and more often, too, what +we do not desire enough. Let each now repeat his _mea culpa_. The +leaders of thought, the Church, the Labor Parties did not desire war ... +That may be.... What then did they do to prevent it? What are they doing +to put an end to it? They are stirring up the bonfire, each one bringing +his faggot. + +The most striking feature in this monstrous epic, the fact without +precedent, is the unanimity for war in each of the nations engaged. An +epidemic of homicidal fury, which started in Tokio ten years ago, has +spread like a wave and overflowed the whole world. None has resisted it; +no high thought has succeeded in keeping out of the reach of this +scourge. A sort of demoniacal irony broods over this conflict of the +nations, from which, whatever its result, only a mutilated Europe can +emerge. For it is not racial passion alone which is hurling millions of +men blindly one against another, so that not even neutral countries +remain free of the dangerous thrill, but all the forces of the spirit, +of reason, of faith, of poetry, and of science, all have placed +themselves at the disposal of the armies in every state. There is not +one amongst the leaders of thought in each country who does not proclaim +with conviction that the cause of his people is the cause of God, the +cause of liberty and of human progress. And I, too, proclaim it. + +Strange combats are being waged between metaphysicians, poets, +historians--Eucken against Bergson; Hauptmann against Maeterlinck; +Rolland against Hauptmann; Wells against Bernard Shaw. Kipling and +D'Annunzio, Dehmel and de Regnier sing war hymns, Barres and Maeterlinck +chant paeans of hatred. Between a fugue of Bach and the organ which +thunders _Deutschland ueber Alles_, Wundt, the aged philosopher of +eighty-two, calls with his quavering voice, the students of Leipzig to +the holy war. And each nation hurls at the other the name "Barbarians." + +The academy of moral science, in the person of its president, Bergson, +declares the struggle undertaken against Germany to be "_the struggle of +civilization itself against barbarism_." German history replies with the +voice of Karl Lamprecht that "_this is a war between Germanism and +barbarism and the present conflict is the logical successor of those +against the Huns and Turks in which Germany has been engaged throughout +the ages._" Science, following history into the lists, proclaims through +E. Perrier, director of the Museum, member of the Academy of Sciences, +that the Prussians do not belong to the Aryan race, but are descended in +direct line from the men of the Stone Age called Allophyles, and adds, +"_the modern skull, resembling by its base, the best index of the +strength of the appetites, the skull of the fossilized man in the +Chapelle-aux-Saints most nearly, is none other than that of Prince +Bismarck!_" + +But the two moral forces whose weakness this contagious war shows up +most clearly are Christianity and Socialism. These rival apostles of +religious and secular internationalism have suddenly developed into the +most ardent of nationalists. Herve is eager to die for the standard of +Austerlitz. The German socialists, pure trustees of the pure doctrine, +support this bill of credit for the war in the Reichstag. They place +themselves at the disposal of the Prussian minister, who uses their +journals to spread abroad his lies, even into the barracks, and sends +them as secret agents to attempt to pervert Italy. It was believed for +the honor of their cause for a moment that two or three of them had been +shot rather than take arms against their brothers. Indignant, they +protest; they are all marching under arms! Liebknecht, forsooth, did not +die for the cause of socialism;[12] but Frank, the principal champion of +the Franco-German union, fell under French fire, fighting in the cause +of militarism. These men have courage to die for the faith of others; +they have no courage to die for their own. + +As for the representatives of the Prince of Peace--priests, pastors, +bishops--they go into battle in their thousands, to carry out, musket in +hand, the Divine commands: _Thou shalt not kill_, and _Love one +another_. Each bulletin of victory, whether it be German, Austrian, or +Russian, gives thanks to the great captain God--_unser alter Gott, notre +Dieu_--as William II or M. Arthur Meyer says. For each has his own God, +and each God, whether old or young, has his Levites to defend him and +destroy the God of the others. + +Twenty thousand French priests are marching with the colors; Jesuits +offer their services to the German armies; cardinals issue warlike +mandates; and the Serb bishops of Hungary incite their faithful flocks +to fight against their brothers in Greater Serbia. The newspapers +report, with no expressions of astonishment, the paradoxical scene at +the railway station at Pisa, where the Italian socialists cheered the +young ordinands who were rejoining their regiments, all singing the +Marseillaise together. So strong the cyclone that sweeps them all before +it; so feeble the men it encounters on its career--and I am amongst +them.... + +Come, friends! Let us make a stand! Can we not resist this contagion, +whatever its nature and virulence be--whether moral epidemic or cosmic +force? Do we not fight against the plague, and strive even to repair the +disaster caused by an earthquake? Or must we bow ourselves before it, +agreeing with Luzzatti in his famous article[13] that "_In the universal +disaster, the nations triumph_"? Shall we say with him that it is good +and reasonable that "the demon of international war, which mows down +thousands of beings, should be let loose," so that the great and simple +truth, "love of our country," be understood? It would seem, then, that +love of our country can flourish only through the hatred of other +countries and the massacre of those who sacrifice themselves in the +defense of them. There is in this theory a ferocious absurdity, a +Neronian dilettantism which repels me to the very depths of my being. +No! Love of my country does not demand that I shall hate and slay those +noble and faithful souls who also love theirs, but rather that I should +honor them and seek to unite with them for our common good. + +You Christians will say--and in this you seek consolation for having +betrayed your Master's orders--that war exalts the virtue of sacrifice. +And it is true that war has the privilege of bringing out the genius of +the race in the most commonplace of hearts. It purges away, in its bath +of blood, all dross and impurity; it tempers the metal of the soul of a +niggardly peasant, of a timorous citizen; it can make a hero of Valmy. +But is there no better employment for the devotion of one people than +the devastation of another? Can we not sacrifice ourselves without +sacrificing our neighbors also? I know well, poor souls, that many of +you are more willing to offer your blood than to spill that of +others.... But what a fundamental weakness! Confess, then, that you who +are undismayed by bullets and shrapnel yet tremble before the dictates +of racial frenzy--that Moloch that stands higher than the Church of +Christ--the jealous pride of race. You Christians of today would not +have refused to sacrifice to the gods of Imperial Rome; you are not +capable of such courage! Your Pope Pius X died of grief to see the +outbreak of this war--so it is said. And not without reason. The Jupiter +of the Vatican who hurled thunderbolts upon those inoffensive priests +who believed in the noble chimera of modernism--what did he do against +those princes and those criminal rulers whose measureless ambition has +given the world over to misery and death? May God inspire the new +Pontiff who has just ascended the throne of St. Peter, with words and +deeds which will cleanse the Church from the stain of this silence. + +As for you socialists who on both sides claim to be defending liberty +against tyranny--French liberty against the Kaiser, German liberty +against the Czar, is it a question of defending one despotism against +another? Unite and attack both. + +There was no reason for war between the Western nations; French, +English, and German, we are all brothers and do not hate one another. +The war-preaching press is envenomed by a minority, a minority vitally +interested in maintaining these hatreds; but our peoples, I know, ask +for peace and liberty and that alone. The real tragedy, to one situated +in the midst of the conflict and able to look down from the high +plateaus of Switzerland into all the hostile camps, is the patent fact +that actually each of the nations is being menaced in its dearest +possessions--in its honor, its independence, its life. Who has brought +these plagues upon them? Brought them to the desperate alternative of +overwhelming their adversary or dying? None other than their +governments, and above all, in my opinion, the three great culprits, the +three rapacious eagles, the three empires, the tortuous policy of the +house of Austria, the ravenous greed of Czarism, the brutality of +Prussia. The worst enemy of each nation is not without, but within its +frontiers, and none has the courage to fight against it. It is the +monster of a hundred heads, the monster named Imperialism, the will to +pride and domination, which seeks to absorb all, or subdue all, or break +all, and will suffer no greatness except itself. For the Western nations +Prussian imperialism is the most dangerous. Its hand uplifted in menace +against Europe has forced us to join in arms against this outcome of a +military and feudal caste, which is the curse not only of the rest of +the world but also of Germany itself, whose thought it has subtly +poisoned. We must destroy this first: but not this alone; the Russian +autocracy too will have its turn. Every nation to a greater or less +extent has an imperialism of its own, and whether it be military, +financial, feudal, republican, social, or intellectual, it is always the +octopus sucking the best blood of Europe. Let the free men of all the +countries of Europe when this war is over take up again the motto of +Voltaire: "_Ecrasons l'infame!_" + +When the war is over! The evil is done now, the torrent let loose and we +cannot force it back into its channel unaided. Moreover crimes have been +committed against right, attacks on the liberties of peoples and on the +sacred treasuries of thought, which must and will be expiated. Europe +cannot pass over unheeded the violence done to the noble Belgian people, +the devastation of Malines and Louvain, sacked by modern Tillys.... But +in the name of heaven let not these crimes be expiated by similar +crimes! Let not the hideous words "vengeance" and "retaliation" be +heard; for a great nation does not revenge itself, it re-establishes +justice. But let those in whose hands lies the execution of justice show +themselves worthy of her to the end. + +It is our duty to keep this before them; nor will we be passive and wait +for the fury of this conflict to spend itself. Such conduct would be +unworthy of us who have such a task before us. + +Our first duty, then, all over the world, is to insist on the formation +of a moral High Court, a tribunal of consciences, to watch and pass +impartial judgment on any violations of the laws of nations. And since +committees of inquiry formed by belligerents themselves would be always +suspect, the neutral countries of the old and new world must take the +initiative, and form a tribunal such as was suggested by Mr. +Prenant,[14] professor of medicine at Paris, and taken up +enthusiastically by M. Paul Seippel in the _Journal de Geneve_.[15] + +"They should produce men of some worldly authority, and of proved civic +morality to act as a commission of inquiry, and to follow the armies at +a little distance. Such an organization would complete and solidify the +Hague Court, and prepare indisputable documents for the necessary work +of justice...." + +The neutral countries are too much effaced. Confronted by unbridled +force they are inclined to believe that opinion is defeated in advance, +and the majority of thinkers in all countries share their pessimism. +There is a lack of courage here as well as of clear thinking. For just +at this time the power of opinion is immense. The most despotic of +governments, even though marching to victory, trembles before public +opinion and seeks to court it. Nothing shows this more clearly than the +efforts of both parties engaged in war, of their ministers, chancellors, +sovereigns, of the Kaiser himself turned journalist, to justify their +own crimes, and denounce the crimes of their adversary at the invisible +tribunal of humanity. Let this invisible tribunal be seen at last, let +us venture to constitute it. Ye know not your moral power, O ye of +little faith! If there be a risk, will you not take it for the honor of +humanity? What is the value of life when you have saved it at the price +of all that is worth living for?... + +_Et propter vitam, vivendi perdere causas_.... + +But for us, the artists and poets, priests and thinkers of all +countries, remains another task. Even in time of war it remains a crime +for finer spirits to compromise the integrity of their thought; it is +shameful to see it serving the passion of a puerile, monstrous policy of +race, a policy scientifically absurd--since no country possesses a race +wholly pure. Such a policy, as Renan points out in his beautiful letter +to Strauss,[16] "_can only lead to zoological wars, wars of +extermination, similar to those in which various species of rodents and +carnivorous beasts fight for their existence. This would be the end of +that fertile admixture called humanity, composed as it is of such +various necessary elements._" Humanity is a symphony of great collective +souls; and he who understands and loves it only by destroying a part of +those elements, proves himself a barbarian and shows his idea of harmony +to be no better than the idea of order another held in Warsaw. + +For the finer spirits of Europe there are two dwelling-places: our +earthly fatherland, and that other City of God. Of the one we are the +guests, of the other the builders. To the one let us give our lives and +our faithful hearts; but neither family, friend, nor fatherland, nor +aught that we love has power over the spirit. The spirit is the light. +It is our duty to lift it above tempests, and thrust aside the clouds +which threaten to obscure it; to build higher and stronger, dominating +the injustice and hatred of nations, the walls of that city wherein the +souls of the whole world may assemble. + +I feel here how the generous heart of Switzerland is thrilled, divided +between sympathies for the various nations, and lamenting that it cannot +choose freely between them, nor even express them. I understand its +torment; but I know that this is salutary. I hope it will rise thence to +that superior joy of a harmony of races, which may be a noble example +for the rest of Europe. It is the duty of Switzerland now to stand in +the midst of the tempest, like an island of justice and of peace, where, +as in the great monasteries of the early Middle Ages, the spirit may +find a refuge from unbridled force; where the fainting swimmers of all +nations, those who are weary of hatred, may persist, in spite of all the +wrongs they have seen and suffered, in loving all men as their brothers. + +I know that such thoughts have little chance of being heard today. Young +Europe, burning with the fever of battle, will smile with disdain and +show its fangs like a young wolf. But when the access of fever has spent +itself, wounded and less proud of its voracious heroism, it will come to +itself again. + +Moreover I do not speak to convince it. I speak but to solace my +conscience ... and I know that at the same time I shall solace the +hearts of thousands of others who, in all countries, cannot or dare not +speak themselves. + +_Journal de Geneve_, September 15, 1914. + + + + +IV. THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS: PANGERMANISM, PANSLAVISM + + +I do not hold the doctrine expounded by a certain saintly king, that it +is useless to enter into discussion with heretics--and we regard all +those who do not agree with our opinions as heretics nowadays--but that +it is sufficient to brain them. I feel the need of understanding my +enemy's reasons. I am unwilling to believe in unfairness. Doubtless my +enemy is as passionately sincere as I am. Why, then, should we not +attempt to understand each other? For such an understanding, though it +will not suppress the conflict, may perhaps suppress our hatred; and it +is hatred more than anything else that I regard as my enemy. + +However much I may feel that the motives actuating the various +combatants are not equally worthy, I have yet come to the conviction, +after reading the papers and letters which, during the last two months, +have arrived in Geneva from every country, that the ardor of patriotic +faith is everywhere the same, and that each of the nations engaged in +this mighty struggle believes itself to be the champion of liberty +against barbarism. But liberty and barbarism do not mean the same thing +to both sides. + +Barbarous despotism, the worst enemy to liberty, is exemplified for us +Frenchmen, Englishmen, men of the West, in Prussian Imperialism; and I +venture to think that the register of its methods is plainly set forth +in the devastated route from Liege to Senlis, passing by way of Louvain, +Malines, and Rheims. For Germany, the monster ("_Ungeheuer_," as the +aged Wundt calls it), which threatens civilization is Russia, and the +bitterest reproach which the Germans hurl against France is our alliance +with the Empire of the Czar. I have received many letters reproaching us +with this. In the Munich review, _Das Forum_, I read only yesterday an +article by Wilhelm Herzog challenging me to explain my position with +regard to Russia. Let us consider the question, then. I ask nothing +better. By this means we shall be able to weigh the German danger and +the Russian danger in the balance, and thus show which of the two seems +the more threatening to us. Of the actual events of the present war +between Germany and Russia I will say nothing. All the information we +have comes from Russian or German sources, equally unreliable. To judge +by them it would appear that the same ferocity exists in both camps. The +Germans in Kalish were worthy companions of the Cossacks in Grodtken and +Zorothowo.--It is of the German spirit and of the Russian spirit that I +wish to speak here, for this is the important thing and of this we have +more definite knowledge. + +You, my German friends--for those of you who were my friends in the past +remain my friends in spite of fanatical demands from both sides that we +should break off all relations--know how much I love the Germany of the +past, and all that I owe to it. Not less than you, yourselves, I am the +son of Beethoven, of Leibnitz, and of Goethe. But what do I owe to the +Germany of today, or what does Europe owe to it? What art have you +produced since the monumental work of Wagner, which marks the end of an +epoch and belongs to the past? What new and original thought can you +boast of since the death of Nietzsche, whose magnificent madness has +left its traces upon you though we are unscathed by it? Where have we +sought our spiritual food for the last forty years, when our own fertile +soil no longer yielded sufficient for our needs? Who but the Russian +writers have been our guides? What German writer can you set up against +Tolstoi and Dostoievsky, those giants of poetic genius and moral +grandeur? These are the men who have moulded my soul, and in defending +the nation from which they sprang, I am but paying a debt which I owe to +that nation as well as to themselves. Even if the contempt for Prussian +Imperialism were not innate in me as a Latin, I should have learned it +from them. Twenty years ago Tolstoi expressed his contempt for your +Kaiser. In music, Germany, so proud of its ancient glory, has only the +successors of Wagner, neurotic jugglers with orchestral effects, like +Richard Strauss, but not a single sober and virile work of the quality +of _Boris Godunov_. No German musician has opened up new roads. A single +page of Moussorgsky or Strawinsky shows more originality, more potential +greatness than the complete scores of Mahler and Reger. In our +Universities, in our hospitals and Pasteur Institutes, Russian students +and scholars work side by side with our own, and Russian +revolutionaries who have taken refuge in Paris mingle their aspirations +with those of our socialists. + +The crimes of Czarism are continually on your lips. We, too, denounce +these crimes; for Czarism is our enemy, and what I wrote but recently, I +repeat now. But it is likewise the enemy of the intellectual elite of +Russia itself. This cannot be said of your intellectuals, who are so +slavishly obedient to the commands of your rulers. A few days ago I +received that amazing "Address to the Civilized Nations" with which the +Imperial army-corps of German intellectuals bombarded Europe; meanwhile +the army-corps of German Commerce (_Bureau des Deutschen Handelstages_) +shelled the markets of the world with circulars ornamented by the figure +of Mercury, the god of lies. This mobilization of the forces of the pen +and of the caduceus, with which in good truth no other country could +compete, has given us additional reason to fear the Empire's powers of +organization, no reason to respect it more. "Civilized Nations" read, +not without amazement, that Address, the truth of which was vouched for +by the names of the most distinguished scientists, thinkers, and artists +in Germany--by Behring, Ostwald, Roentgen, Eucken, Haeckel, Wundt, +Dehmel, Hauptmann, Sudermann, Hildebrand, Klinger, Liebermann, +Humperdinck, Weingartner, etc.--by painters and philosophers, musicians, +theologians, chemists, economists, poets, and the professors of twenty +universities. They learned, not without surprise, that "it is not true +that Germany provoked the war,--it is not true that Germany criminally +violated the neutrality of Belgium,--it is not true that Germany used +violence against the life or the belongings of a single Belgian citizen +without being forced to do so,--it is not true that Germany destroyed +Louvain" (destroyed it? no indeed, she saved it!),--"it is not true that +Germany----" It is not true that day is day and night is night! I +confess that I could not read to the end without that feeling of +embarrassment which I felt as a child, when I heard an elderly man whom +I respected make false statements. I turned aside my eyes and blushed +for him. Thank God! the crimes of Czarism never found a defender amongst +the great artists, scholars, and thinkers of Russia. Are not Kropotkin, +Tolstoi, Dostoievsky, and Gorki, the greatest names in its literature, +the very ones who denounced its crimes! + +Russian domination has often been cruelly heavy for the smaller +nationalities which it has swallowed up. But how comes it then, Germans, +that the Poles prefer it to yours? Do you imagine that Europe is +ignorant of the monstrous way in which you are exterminating the Polish +race? Do you think that we do not receive the confidences of those +Baltic nations who, having to choose between two conquerors, prefer the +Russian because he is the more humane? Read the following letter which I +received but lately from a Lett, who, though he has suffered severely at +the hands of the Russians, yet sides ardently with them against you. My +German friends, you are either strangely ignorant of the state of mind +of the nations which surround you, or you think us extremely simple and +ill-informed. Your imperialism, beneath its veneer of civilization, +seems to me no less ferocious than Czarism towards everything that +ventures to oppose its avaricious desire for universal dominion. But +whereas immense and mysterious Russia, overflowing with young and +revolutionary forces, gives us hope of a coming renewal, your Germany +bases its systematic harshness on a culture too antiquated and +scholastic to allow of any hope of amendment. If I had any such +hope--and I once had it, my friends--you have taken great pains to rob +me of it, you, artists and scholars, who drew up that address in which +you pride yourself on your complete unity with Prussian Imperialism. +Know once for all that there is nothing more overwhelming for us Latins, +nothing more difficult to endure, than your militarization of the +intellect. If, by some awful fate, this spirit were triumphant, I should +leave Europe for ever. To live here would be intolerable to me. + +Here, then, are some extracts from the interesting letter which I have +received from a representative of those little nationalities which are +being disputed between Russia and Germany. They desire to maintain their +independence, but find themselves obliged to choose between these two +nations, and choose Russia. It is good to hear them speak. We are too +much inclined to listen only to the Great Powers who are now at war. Let +us think of those little barques which the great vessels draw in their +wake. Let us share for a moment the agony with which these little +nationalities, forgotten by the egotism of Europe, await the final issue +of a struggle which will decide their fate. Let England and France heed +those beseeching eyes which are turned towards them; let young Russia, +herself so eager for liberty, help generously to shed its benefits +abroad. + +_October 10, 1914._ + + * * * * * + +LETTER TO ROMAIN ROLLAND + +_30th September, 1914._ + +SIR:--I desire to thank you for your article, "Above the Battle."... +Although by my education I am more akin to the civilizations of Germany +and Russia than to the civilization of France, yet I respect the French +spirit more, for I am convinced, more than ever today, that it will +furnish the greatly needed solution of the problems of national rights +and liberty. + +In your article you quote the words of one of your friends, a soldier +and a writer, who says that the French are fighting not only to defend +their own country but to save the _liberty of the world_. You can hardly +imagine how such words re-echo in the hearts of oppressed nations, what +streams of sympathy are today converging from all corners of Europe upon +France, what hopes depend upon your victory. + +And yet many doubts have been expressed with regard to these French and +English assertions because both nations have allied themselves with +Russia, whose policy is contrary to the ideas of right and liberty; and +Germany herself maintains that it is precisely those ideas for which she +is fighting against Russia. + +It would be interesting to discover what German writers and professors +really mean when they speak of a Holy War against Russia. Do they wish +to assist Russian revolutionaries to dethrone the Czar?--Every +revolutionary party would refuse indignantly to accept assistance from +Prussian militarism. Do they wish to set free the neighboring countries, +such as Poland, which are oppressed by Russia, by incorporating them +with the German Empire?--It is well known that the Poles who are German +subjects have suffered much more ignoble treatment than the Russian +Poles, though even they have every reason to complain. + +The Baltic provinces of Russia alone remain, and here the Germans have +for centuries had their pioneers among the large landowners and the +merchants in the bigger towns. These, no doubt, Russian subjects but of +German nationality, would welcome the German armies with enthusiasm. But +they form only a caste of nobles and of the wealthy middle-classes, +numbering at most a few thousands, whereas the bulk of the population, +the Lettish and Esthonian nations, would regard the absorption of these +provinces into Germany as the worst of calamities. We know well what +German domination means. I am a Lett and can speak with authority, for I +know the deepest feelings and hopes of my own countrymen. + +The Letts are akin to the Lithuanians. They inhabit Courland, Livonia, +and a part of the province of Vitebsk. Their intellectual center is +Riga. There are colonies of them in all the principal towns of Russia. +Last year the _Annales des Nationalites_ of Paris devoted two numbers to +these two sister nations. Owing to the geographical situation of their +country, which is only too desirable, they had the misfortune to be +under the yoke of the Germans, before they were under the yoke of the +Russians. To understand how much they suffered under the former it will +be sufficient to say that, in comparison with the Germans, we think of +the Russians as our liberators. By sheer force the Germans kept us for +centuries in a state equivalent to slavery. Only fifty years ago the +Russian Government set us free from this bondage; but, at the same +time, it committed the grave injustice of leaving all our land in the +hands of German proprietors. Nevertheless, within the last twenty or +thirty years, we have succeeded in reclaiming from the Germans a part at +least of our land, and in reaching a considerable level of culture, +thanks to which, we are considered, together with the Esthonians and the +Finns, as the most advanced people in the Russian Empire. + +German papers often accuse us of ingratitude, and reproach us with our +lack of appreciation of the advantages of the culture which they boast +of having brought us. We listen to such accusations with a bitter smile, +and in writing the word _Kulturtraeger_ (bearer of civilization) add an +exclamation mark afterwards, for the behavior of the Germans has brought +the expression into contempt. We have acquired our culture in spite of +their opposition, and against their will. _Even today it is the German +representatives in the Russian Duma who veto the occasional suggestions +on the part of the Government to make reforms in the Baltic provinces._ +These provinces are administered in a manner that differs, and differs +for the worse, from that adopted in the other provinces of Russia. We +still submit to laws and regulations which no longer exist in other +parts of Europe--laws which were made in the feudal ages and have been +rigorously maintained amongst us, thanks to the exertions of the big +German landowners, who are always sure of a hearing at the Imperial +Court of St. Petersburg. + +Formerly, when we were striving in vain to reconcile our sympathy and +admiration for German thought and art with the narrow, haughty, and +cruel spirit of its representatives amongst us, we explained it all by +saying that the Germans in our provinces were of a peculiar type, and +had little in common with other Germans. But the crimes of which they +have been guilty in Belgium and in France show us our mistake. Germans +are the same everywhere in the work of conquest and domination--wholly +without humanitarian scruples. In Germany, as in Russia, there are two +distinct tendencies--the one, provoked by the ideas of Pangermanism and +Panslavism, is to seek national glory on the field of battle and in the +oppression of the personalities of other nations; the other is to +achieve the same end in the peaceful realms of thought and artistic +creation. Just as the culture of which Goethe was typical has nothing +in common with Prussian militarism, so Tolstoi may be considered as the +representative of that other Russia which is so different from the one +represented by the Russian Government of today. Certainly the gulf +between these two tendencies is less deep in Germany than in Russia, and +this is due to the immense size of Russia, which contains vast numbers +of poor and ignorant human beings whom the Russian Government oppresses +with the utmost brutality. _But it is entirely unjust always to allude +to the Russians as barbarians; and the Germans who invariably make use +of this word when they speak of Russia have less right than any one to +do so._ No one who knows the intellectual world of Germany and Russia +will venture to say that the former is much superior to the latter--they +are simply different. _And I would add that the one fact which makes us +feel more drawn to the intellectual world of Russia than to that of the +Germany of today, is that it would never be capable of justifying and +approving the brutal conduct of its Government, as the German +intellectuals are doing now. It has often been constrained to keep +silence, but it has never raised its voice in defense of a guilty +Government._ + +Let not my testimony in favor of the Russians lead any one to believe +that I am idealizing them, or that my people, the Letts, have enjoyed +any special privileges under their government. On the contrary! I have +suffered more at their hands than at the hands of the Germans, and my +nation knows only too well how heavy is the hand of the Russian +Government, and how suffocating the atmosphere of Panslavism. In 1906 it +was the Lett peasant and intellectual classes who enjoyed most +frequently the privilege of being flogged; it was amongst these classes +that the greatest number of unfortunates were shot, hanged, or +imprisoned for life. And since that dreadful year there are to be found +in all the principal towns of Western Europe colonies of Letts, formed +of refugees who succeeded in escaping from the atrocities of the +punitive expedition sent by the Russian Government against my country. +But this fact is significant: _at the head of the majority of the +military bands commissioned to punish the country were German officers +who had asked for this employment, and showed so great a zeal in +shooting down men and setting fire to houses, that they went even beyond +the intentions of the Russian Government. In those days the places +might count themselves fortunate which were visited by dragoons +commanded by officers of Russian nationality; for where Russian officers +would have ordered the knout, German officers habitually inflicted a +sentence of death._ + +If my nation had ever to choose between a German and a Russian +government it would choose the latter as the lesser of two evils. I see +in the Lett newspapers that the reservists of my country left for the +war with enthusiasm. I do not imagine that this enthusiasm is due to the +thought that they are fighting for the glory of a nation which, by every +means in its power, seeks to hinder our national development, by +forbidding instruction in our native tongue in primary schools, by +attempting to colonize our land with Russian peasants, by compelling our +own people to emigrate to Siberia and America, by excluding all Letts +from any share in Government employment, etc. This enthusiasm +nevertheless exists, and it is because the war is being waged against +Germany, and because the Letts know that the Germans have long been +aiming at the possession of the Baltic provinces. To prevent this we are +prepared to make any sacrifice. We, who love our national civilization +and know well what Panslavism and Pangermanism mean, are of opinion +that, of the two, Panslavism is less fatal to the civilizations of small +nations. This is really due to the character of the two races. + +_German oppression is always systematic, hence always efficacious. In +addition to this, their arrogant contempt for everything that is not +themselves, the calm and calculated method in which they carry out their +system of persecution wherever they dominate, all this makes them +intolerable._ + +_Russians are less logical by nature; their minds are not so regulated +and they are more inclined to obey the dictates of their hearts; for +this reason they are less to be feared as oppressors. The blows which +they strike are often extremely cruel and painful, but they can repent +from time to time. Their manners are rougher and more brutal_ (I speak +here more especially of civil and military officials), _but on the whole +they are more humane than the Germans, who often conceal feelings of +fierce savagery under the mask of perfect courtesy. In the year 1906, +when there were executions in Russia on a large scale, there were many +cases of suicide amongst Russian officers who could not reconcile their +profession of soldiers with that of a hangman. The officers of German +nationality, on the other hand, carried out their orders with +enjoyment._ + +Nevertheless Russian domination, though preferable to German, is still +very oppressive. I hear the news of Russian victories with mingled +feelings, rejoicing in so far as they are victories for the Allies, yet +dreading the triumph of Russia. After the defeats of the Russo-Japanese +War, when the Russian Government was weakened, it conceded certain +liberal measures and then revoked them almost entirely as its strength +returned. What have we to expect from a victory for Czarism, especially +we who are not Russians, but a savage revival of the crushing ideals of +Panslavism? + +This is the agonized question which the nations subject to Russia are +asking now. I read in your article that the turn of Czarism will come +after that of Prussianism. In what sense is this to be understood? Is it +your opinion that another war will presently break out against Czarism, +or will it be struck down by the blows of an internal revolution? Is it +even possible that France and England obtained the promise of a reform +in the internal politics of Russia before allying themselves with her? +And is the proclamation to the Poles evidence of this? Will it have any +real effect after the war? And those other nations oppressed by +Russia--the Finns, the Letts, the Lithuanians, the Esthonians, the +Armenians, the Jews...--will they too have justice done them? + +These questions are probably devoid of any political significance. Yet +without perceiving in what manner France and England can set us free, we +do direct our hopes towards them. We believe that in some way or other +they will take care in future that their Russian ally shall show herself +worthy of them and of the ideas for which they are fighting, lest the +blood of those who have died in the cause of freedom go to feed the +strength of the oppressors. + +Thus, sir, I have ventured uninvited to set forth rather fully to you +the hopes and fears of a nation which has developed itself on a narrow +strip of land between the two abysses of Pangermanism and Panslavism. +Whilst ardently desiring the destruction of the former, we have +everything to fear from the latter. Yet we do not aspire to political +independence. We seek only the possibility of developing freely our +intellectual, artistic, and economic powers, without the perpetual +menace of being absorbed by Russia or Germany. We believe that, in +virtue of the civilization we have acquired in the face of obstacles, we +are worthy of the liberties and rights of man; we are convinced that as +a nation we have qualities which will fit us to play a valuable part in +the great symphony of civilized peoples. + +_Journal de Geneve_, October 10, 1914. + + + + +V. INTER ARMA CARITAS + + +Once more I address myself to our friends the enemy. But this time I +shall attempt no discussion, for discussion is impossible with those who +avow that they do not seek for but possess the truth. For the moment +there is no spiritual force that can pierce the thick wall of certitude +by which Germany is barricaded against the light of day--the terrible +certitude, the pharisaical satisfaction which pervades the monstrous +letter of a Court preacher who glorifies God for having made him +impeccable, irreproachable, and pure, himself, his emperor, his +ministers, his army, and his race; and who rejoices beforehand in his +"holy wrath" at the destruction of all who do not think as he +thinks.[17] + +True, I am very far from thinking that this monument of anti-Christian +pride represents the spirit of the better part of Germany. I know how +many noble hearts, moderate, affectionate, incapable of doing evil and +almost of conceiving it, go to make up her moral strength; amongst them +are friends that I shall never cease to esteem. I know how many intrepid +minds work ceaselessly in German science for the conquest of the truth. +But I see on the one hand these good people so over-confident, so +tractable, with their eyes shut, ignorant of the facts and unwilling to +recognize anything but what it is the pleasure of their Government that +they shall know; and on the other, the clearest minds of Germany, +historians and savants, trained for the criticism of texts, basing their +conviction on documents which all emanate from one alone of the parties +concerned, and by way of peremptory proof referring us to the _ex-parte_ +affirmations of their Emperor, and of their Chancellor, like +well-behaved scholars, whose only argument is _Magister dixit_. What +hope remains of convincing such people that there exists a truth beyond +that master, and that in addition to his White Book we have in our hands +books of every kind and of every color, whose testimony demands the +attention of an impartial judge? But do they so much as know of their +existence, and does the master allow his class to handle the manuals of +his enemies? Our disagreement is not only as regards the facts of the +case; it is due to difference in mind itself. Between the spirit of +Germany today and that of the rest of Europe there is no longer a point +of contact. We speak to them of _Humanity_; they reply with +_Uebermensch_, _Uebervolk_, and it goes without saying that they +themselves are the Uebervolk. Germany seems to be overcome by a morbid +exaltation, a collective madness, for which there is no remedy but time. +According to the view of medical experts in analogous cases such forms +of madness develop rapidly, and are suddenly followed by profound +depression. We can then but wait, and in the meantime defend ourselves +to the best of our ability from the madness of Ajax. + +Certainly Ajax has given us plenty of work to do. Look at the ruins +around us! We may bring aid to the victims--yet how little can we +achieve? In the eternal struggle between good and evil the scales are +not evenly balanced. We need a century to re-create what one day can +destroy. The fury of madness, on the other hand, endures only for a day; +patient labor is our lot throughout the years. It knows no pause, even +in those hours when the world seems at an end. The vine-growers of +Champagne gather in their vintage though the bombs of the rival armies +explode around them--and we, too, can do our share! There is work for +all who find themselves outside the battle. Especially for those who +still can write, it seems to me that there should be something better to +do than to brandish a pen dipped in blood and seated at their tables to +cry "Kill! Kill!" I hate the war, but even more do I hate those who +glorify it without taking part. What would we say of officers who +marched behind their men? The noblest role of those who follow in the +rear is to pick up their friends who fall, and to bear in mind even +during the battle those fair words so often forgotten--_Inter arma +caritas_. + + * * * * * + +Amidst all the misery which every man of feeling can do his share to +relieve, let us recall the fate of the prisoner of war. But knowing that +Germany today blushes at her former sentimentality, I carefully refrain +from appealing to her pity by whinings, as they call them, about the +destruction of Louvain and Rheims. "War is war." Granted!--then it is +natural that it drags in its train thousands of prisoners, officers and +men. + +For the moment I shall say only a word about these, in order to comfort +as far as possible the families who are searching for them, and are so +anxious about their fate. On both sides hateful rumors circulate only +too easily, rumors given currency by an unscrupulous press, rumors which +would have us believe that the most elementary laws of humanity are +trampled under foot by the enemy. Only the other day an Austrian friend +wrote to me, maddened by the lies of some paper or other, to beg me to +help the German wounded in France, who are left without any aid. And +have I not heard or read the same unworthy fears expressed by Frenchmen +as regards their wounded, who are said to be maltreated in Germany? But +it is all a lie--on both sides; and those of us whose task it is to +receive the true information from either camp must affirm the contrary. +Speaking generally (for in so many thousands of cases one cannot, of +course, be sure that there will not here and there be individual +exceptions) this war, whose actual conduct has provoked a degree of +harshness which our knowledge of previous wars in the West would not +have allowed us to expect, is by contrast less cruel to all +those--prisoners and wounded--who are put out of the battle line. + +The letters that we receive and documents already published--especially +an interesting account which appeared in the _Neue Zuercher Zeitung_ of +October 18th, written by Dr. Schneeli, who had just been visiting the +hospitals and prisoners' camps in Germany--show that in that country +efforts are being made to reconcile the ideals of humanity with the +exigencies of war. They make it clear that there is no difference +between the care bestowed by the Germans on their own wounded and those +of the enemy, and that friendly relations exist between the prisoners +and their guards, who all share the same food. + +I could wish that a similar inquiry might be made and published on the +camps where German prisoners are concentrated in France. In the meantime +accounts which reach me from individuals disclose a similar +situation,[18] and there is plenty of reliable evidence that in Germany +and France alike the wounded of both countries are living in terms of +friendship. There are even soldiers who refuse to have their wounds +dressed or receive their rations before their comrades the enemy have +received similar attention. And who knows if it is not perhaps in the +ranks of the contending armies that the feelings of national hatred are +least violent? For there one learns to appreciate the courage of one's +adversaries, since the same sufferings are common to all, and since +where all energy is directed towards action there is none left for +personal animosity. It is amongst those who are not actively engaged +that there is developed the harsh and implacable brand of hatred, of +which certain intellectuals provide terrible examples. + +The moral situation of the military prisoner is therefore not so +overwhelming as might be imagined, and his lot, sad as it is, is less to +be pitied than that of another class of prisoners of whom I shall speak +later. The feeling of duty accomplished, the memory of the struggle, +glorifies his misfortune in his own eyes, and even in those of the +enemy. He is not totally abandoned to the foe; international conventions +protect him; the Red Cross watches over him, and it is possible to +discover where he is and to come to his assistance. + +In this work the admirable _Agence internationale des prisonniers de +guerre_, most providentially established some two months after the +commencement of the war, has caused the name of Geneva to be known and +blessed in the most remote corners of France and Germany. It only needs, +like Providence itself, to gain the co-operation of those over whose +interests it watches, that is to say, of the States concerned which have +been somewhat slow in supplying the lists we need. Under the aegis of the +International Committee of the Red Cross, with M. Gustave Ador as +president and M. Max Dollfus as director, some 300 voluntary workers, +drawn from all classes of society, are assisting in its charitable work. +More than 15,000 letters a day pass through its hands. It daily +transmits about 7,000 letters between prisoners and their families, and +is responsible for the safe dispatch of some 4,000 francs on an average. +The precise information which it is able to communicate was very meager +at the start, but soon increased, until a thousand cases could be dealt +with in the course of a single day; and this number rapidly increased +with the arrival of more complete lists from the Governments concerned. + +This renewal of intercourse between a prisoner and his family is not the +only beneficial result of our organization. Its peaceful work, its +impartial knowledge of the actual facts in the belligerent countries, +contribute to modify the hatred which wild stories have exasperated, and +to reveal what remains of humanity in the most envenomed enemy. It can +also draw the attention of the different Governments, or at least of the +general public, to cases where a speedy understanding would be in the +interest of both parties--as, for instance, in the exchange of men who +are so seriously wounded that they will be quite unable to take further +part in the war, and whom it is useless and inhuman to keep languishing +far from their friends. Finally, it can effectively direct public +generosity, which often hesitates for want of guidance. It can, for +instance, point out to neutral countries, who are so ungrudging in their +anxiety to aid the sufferings of the combatants, where help is most +urgently needed--for the wounded prisoners, convalescents leaving the +hospital without linen or boots, and with no claims on the enemy for +further support.[19] + +Instead of showering gifts (which, no doubt, are never superfluous) on +the armies who can and should be supported by the peoples for whom they +are fighting, neutrals might well reserve the greater part of their +generosity for those who are most destitute, those whose need is the +greatest, for they are feeble, broken, and alone. + + * * * * * + +But there is another class of prisoners on whom I would like interest to +be specially concentrated, for their situation is far more precarious, +unprotected as they are by any international convention. These are the +civil prisoners. They are one of the innovations of this unbridled war, +which seems to have set itself to violate all the rights of humanity. In +former wars it was only a question of a few hostages arrested here and +there as a guarantee of good faith for the pledge of some conquered +town. Never until now had one heard of populations taken bodily into +captivity on the model of ancient conquests--a custom actively revived +since the beginning of this war. Such a contingency not having been +foreseen, no conventions existed to regulate the situation in the laws +of war, if the words have any meaning. And as it would have been awkward +to formulate fresh laws in the midst of the struggle, it seemed more +simple to overlook them. It has been as though these unfortunates did +not exist. + +But they do exist, and in thousands. Their number seems about equal on +both sides. Which of the belligerents took the initiative in these +captures? At present certainty is impossible. It seems clear that in the +second half of July Germany ordered the arrest of a number of Alsatian +civilians. To this France replied the day after her mobilization by +declaring prisoners Germans and Austrians then to be found on her +territory. The casting of this vast net was followed by similar action +in Germany and Austria, though, perhaps, with less result. The conquest +of Belgium and the invasion of the North of France brought about a +redoubling of these measures aggravated by violence. The Germans, on +retiring after their defeat on the Marne, methodically made a clean +sweep in the towns and villages of Picardy and Flanders of all persons +capable of bearing arms--500 men at Douai, at Amiens 1,800 summoned +before the citadel on some apparently harmless pretext, and carried off +without even the possibility of returning for a change of clothes. + +In many cases the captures had not even the excuse of military utility. +In the village of Sompuis (Marne) on September 10th, the Saxons seized a +helpless village priest of seventy-three, scarcely able to walk, and +five old men of ages from sixty to seventy, one of whom was lame, and +took them away on foot. Elsewhere women and children are taken, happy if +they can remain together. Here a husband, mad with grief, searches for +his wife and son aged three, who have disappeared since the Germans +passed through Quievrechain (Nord). There it is a mother and her +children taken by the French near Guebwiller; the children were sent +back, but not the mother. A French captain, wounded by the bursting of a +shell, saw his wife also wounded by German bullets at Nomeny +(Meurthe-et-Moselle); since when she has disappeared, taken he does not +know where. An old peasant woman of sixty-three is taken away from her +husband near Villers-aux-Vents (Meuse) by a company of Germans. A child +of sixteen is seized at its mother's house at Mulhouse. + +Such action shows an utter lack of human feeling, and is almost more +absurd than cruel. It really appears as though people had been +deliberately separated from all who were dearest to them; and of those +who have so disappeared no trace remains by which they can at present be +found. I am not speaking of Belgium; there the silence is as of the +grave. Of what is taking place there nothing has been heard in the +outer world for three months. Are the villages and towns still in +existence? I have before me letters from parents (in some cases +belonging to neutral nations) begging for news of their children of +twelve or eight years of age, detained in Belgium since hostilities +broke out. I have even found in the lists of these vanished +children--doubtless prisoners of war--youthful citizens of four or two +years of age. Are we to understand that they too could have been +mobilized? + +We see the anguish of the survivors. Imagine the distress of those who +have disappeared, deprived of money or the means of obtaining any from +their families. What misery is revealed in the first letters received +from such families interned in France or Germany! A mother whose little +boy is ill, although rich, cannot procure any money. Another, with two +children, requests us to warn her family that if after the war, nothing +more is heard of her, it will mean that she has died of hunger. These +cries of misery seemed in the noise of battle to fall on deaf ears for +the first two months. The Red Cross itself, absorbed in its immense +task, reserved all its help for the military prisoners, and the +Governments seemed to show a superb disdain for their unfortunate +citizens. Of what use are such as cannot serve! Yet these are the most +innocent victims of this war. They have not taken part in it, and +nothing had prepared them for such calamities. + +Fortunately a man of generous sympathies (he will not forgive me for +publishing his name), Dr. Ferriere, was touched by the misfortunes of +these outcasts of the war. With a tenacity as patient as it was +passionate, he set himself to construct in the swarming hive of Red +Cross workers a special department to deal with their distress. Refusing +to be discouraged by the innumerable difficulties and the remote chances +of success, he persevered, limiting himself at first to drawing up lists +of the missing, and trying to inspire confidence in their anxious +friends. He then attempted by every means in his power to discover the +place of internment, and to re-establish communications between +relations and friends. What joy when one can announce to a family that +the son or the father has been found! Every one of us at our table--for +I, too, had the honor of sharing in the work--rejoices as though he were +a member of that family. And as luck would have it the first letter of +this kind which I had to write was to comfort some good people in my own +little town in the Nivernais. + +Great progress has already been made. The most pressing needs have +obtained a hearing. The Governments have agreed to liberate women, +children under seventeen, and men over sixty. Repatriation began on +October 23rd through the Bureau of Berne, created by the Federal +Council. It remains, if not to deliver the others (we cannot count on +this before the end of the war), at any rate to put them in +communication with their families. In such cases, as in many others, +more can be expected from the charitable efforts of private individuals +than from Governments. The friends with whom we communicated in Germany +or Austria as in France have replied with enthusiasm, all showing a +generous desire to take part in our work. It is such questions +transcending national pride which reveal the underlying fellowship of +the nations which are tearing each other to pieces, and the sacrilegious +folly of war. How friends and enemies are drawn together in the face of +common suffering which the efforts of all humanity would hardly suffice +to alleviate! + +When after three months of fratricidal struggle one has felt the calming +influence of this wide human sympathy, and turns once more to the field +of strife, the rasping cries of hate in the press inspire only horror +and pity. What object have they in view? They wish to punish crimes and +are a crime in themselves; for murderous words are the seeds of future +murder. In the diseased organism of a fevered Europe everything vibrates +and reverberates without end. Every word, every action, arouses +reprisals. Him who fans hatred, hatred flares up to consume. Heroes of +officialdom! bullies of the press! the blows which you deal very often +reach your own people, little though you think it--your soldiers, your +prisoners, delivered into the hands of the enemy. They answer for the +harm which you have done, and you escape the danger. + +We cannot stop the war, but we can make it less bitter. There are +medicines for the body. We need medicines for the soul, to dress the +wounds of hatred and vengeance by which the world is being poisoned. We +who write--let that be our task. And as the Red Cross pursues its work +of mercy in the midst of the combat, like the bees of Holy Writ that +made their honey in the jaws of the lion, let us try to support its +efforts. Let our thoughts follow the ambulances that gather up the +wounded on the field of battle. May _Notre-Dame la Misere_ lay on the +brow of raging Europe her stern but succoring hand. May she open the +eyes of these peoples, blinded by pride, and show them that they are +but poor human flocks, equal in the face of suffering; suffering at all +times so great that there is no reason to add to the burden. + +_Journal de Geneve_, October 30, 1914. + + + + +VI. TO THE PEOPLE THAT IS SUFFERING FOR JUSTICE + +(For _King Albert's Book_.[20]) + + +Belgium has just written an Epic, whose echoes will resound throughout +the ages. Like the three hundred Spartans, the little Belgian army +confronts for three months the German Colossus; Leman-Leonides; the +Thermopylae of Liege; Louvain, like Troy, burnt; the deeds of King Albert +surrounded by his valiant men: with what legendary grandeur are these +figures already invested, and history has not yet completed their story! +The heroism of this people, who, without a murmur, sacrificed everything +for honor, has burst like a thunderclap upon us at a time when the +spirit of victorious Germany was enthroning in the world a conception of +political realism, resting stolidly on force and self-interest. It was +a liberation of the oppressed idealism of the West. And that the signal +should have been given by this little nation seemed a miracle. + +Men call the sudden appearance of a hidden reality a miracle. It is the +shock of danger which makes us best understand the character of +individuals and of nations. What discoveries this war has caused us to +make in those around us, even among those nearest and dearest to us! +What heroic hearts and savage beasts! The inner soul, not a new soul, +reveals itself. + +In this fearful hour Belgium has seen the hidden genius of her race +emerge. The sterling qualities that she has displayed during the last +three months evoke admiration; it should not surprise any one who, in +the pages of history, has felt, coursing through the ages, the vigorous +sap of her people. Small in numbers and in territory, but one of the +greatest in Europe in virtue of her overflowing vitality. The Belgians +of today are the sons of the Flemings of Courtrai. The men of this land +never feared to oppose their powerful neighbors, the kings of France or +Spain--now heroes, now victims, Artevelde and Egmont. Their soil, +watered by the blood of millions of warriors, is the most fertile in +Europe in the harvests of the spirit. From it arose the art of modern +painting, spread throughout the world by the school of the van Eycks at +the time of the Renaissance. From it arose the art of modern music, of +that polyphony which thrilled through France, Germany, and Italy for +nearly two centuries. From it, too, came the superb poetic efflorescence +of our times; and the two writers who most brilliantly represent French +literature in the world, Maeterlinck and Verhaeren, are Belgian. They +are the people who have suffered most and have borne their sufferings +most bravely and cheerfully; the martyr-people of Philip II and of +Kaiser Wilhelm; and they are the people of Rubens, the people of +Kermesses and of Till Ulenspiegel. + +He who knows the amazing epic re-told by Charles de Coster: _The heroic, +joyous, and glorious adventures of Ulenspiegel and Lamme Goedjak_, those +two Flemish worthies who might take their places side by side with the +immortal Don Quixote and his Sancho Panza--he who has seen that +dauntless spirit at work, rough and facetious, rebellious by nature, +always offending the established powers, running the gauntlet of all +trials and hardships, and emerging from them always gay and +smiling--realizes also the destinies of the nation that gave birth to +Ulenspiegel, and even in the darkest hour fearlessly looks towards the +approaching dawn of rich and happy days. Belgium may be invaded. The +Belgian people will never be conquered nor crushed. The Belgian people +cannot die. + +At the end of the story of _Till Ulenspiegel_, when they think he is +dead, and are going to bury him, he wakes up: + + _"Are they," he asks, "going to bury Ulenspiegel the soul, Nele the + heart of mother Flanders? Sleep, perhaps, but die, no! Come, + Nele."_ + + _And he departed, singing his sixth song. But no one knows where he + sang his last._ + + + + +VII. LETTER TO MY CRITICS[21] + + +_November 17, 1914._ + +There has reached me, after much delay, at Geneva, where I am engaged on +the International work of Prisoners of War, the echo of attacks against +me in certain newspapers, roused by the articles that I have published +in the _Journal de Geneve_, or rather by two or three passages +arbitrarily chosen from those articles (for they themselves are scarcely +known to anybody in France). My best reply will be to collect what I +have written and publish it in Paris. I would not add a word of +explanation, for there is not a line that I did not think it my right +and my duty to set down. Moreover, I think that there is better work to +do at this moment than to defend oneself; there are others to defend, +the thousands of victims who are fighting in France. Time devoted to +polemics is like a theft from these unfortunates, from these prisoners +and families, whose hands seeking each other across space we are trying +to unite at Geneva. + +But not content with attacking me personally, they have attacked ideas +and a cause which I believe to be that of the true France; and since my +friends expect me to defend these thoughts which are also theirs, I +profit by the hospitality which is offered me to reply distinctly and +frankly in good French. + +I have published four articles: a letter to Gerhart Hauptmann, written +the day after the devastation of Louvain, "Above the Battle," "The +Lesser of Two Evils," and "Inter Arma Caritas." In these four articles I +have stated that of all the imperialisms which are the scourge of the +world, Prussian Military Imperialism is the worst. I have declared that +it is the enemy of European liberty, the enemy of Western civilization, +the enemy of Germany herself, and that it must be destroyed. On this +point I imagine we are agreed. + +To what do my critics take exception? Without entering into the +discussion of certain points of detail, such as the appeal made by the +Allies to the forces of Asia and Africa of which I disapprove, and +still disapprove because I see in it a near and grave danger for Europe +and for the Allies themselves, and because this danger is already +materializing in threats of disturbance in the world of Islam--exception +is taken essentially on two grounds: + +1. My refusal to include the German people and its military and +intellectual rulers in the same denunciation. + +2. The esteem and friendship which I have for the individuals in the +country with which we are at war. + +I will reply first of all without ambiguity to this second reproach. +Yes, I have German friends as I have French, Italian, and English +friends, and friends of every race. They are my wealth: I am proud of it +and keep it. When one has had the good fortune to meet in this world +loyal souls with whom one shares one's most intimate thoughts, and with +whom one has formed bonds of brotherly union, such bonds are sacred, and +not to be broken asunder in the hour of trial. He would be a coward who +timidly ceased to own them, in order to obey the insolent summons of a +public opinion which has no right over the heart. Does the love of +country demand this unkindness of thought which is associated with the +name Cornelienne? Corneille himself has given the answer: + + --_Albe vous a nomme, je ne vous connais plus._ + --_Je vous connais encore, et c'est ce qui me tue._ + +Certain letters, which I shall reproduce later, will show the grief, +sometimes almost tragic, that such friendships mean in these moments. +Thanks to them, we have at least been able to defend ourselves against a +hatred which is more murderous than war, since it is an infection +produced by its wounds; and it does as much harm to those whom it +possesses as to those against whom it is directed. + +This poison I see with apprehension spreading at the present moment. +Amongst the victim populations, the cruelties and ravages committed by +the German armies have brought to birth a desire for reprisals. This, +when once in existence, is not for the press to exasperate, for such a +desire runs the risk of leading to dangerous injustice--dangerous not +only for the conquered but above all for the conquerors. France has, in +this war, the chance of playing the nobler part, the rarest chance that +the world has even seen. A German wrote to me a few weeks ago: "France +has won in this war a prodigious moral triumph. The sympathies of the +whole world are drawn towards her; and, most extraordinary of all, +Germany herself has a secret leaning towards her enemy." All should wish +that this moral triumph may be hers to the end, and that she may remain +to the end just, straightforward, and humane. I could never distinguish +the cause of France from that of humanity. It is just because I am +French that I leave to our Prussian enemies the motto: "_Oderint, dum +metuant._" I wish France to be loved, I wish her to be victorious not +only by force, not only by right (that would be difficult enough), but +by that large and generous heart which is pre-eminently hers. I wish her +to be strong enough to fight without hatred and to regard even those +against whom she is forced to fight as misguided brothers who must be +pitied when they have been rendered harmless. + +Our soldiers know it well, and I say nothing here of letters from the +front which tell us of compassion and kindness between the combatants. +But the civilians who are outside the combat, who do not fight, but +talk, who write and embroil themselves in a factitious and lunatic +agitation and are never exhausted; these are delivered over to the winds +of feverish violence. And there is the danger. For they form opinion, +the only opinion that can be expressed (all others are forbidden). It +is for these that I write, not for those who are fighting (they have no +need of us!). + +And when I hear the publicists trying to rouse the energies of the +nation by all the stimulants at their disposal for this one object, the +total crushing of the enemy nation, I think it my duty to rise in +opposition to what I believe to be at once a moral and a political +error. You make war against a State, not against a people. It would be +monstrous to hold sixty-five million men responsible for the acts of +some thousands--perhaps some hundreds. Here in French Switzerland, so +passionately in sympathy with France, so eager both in its sympathies +and in the duty of restraining them, I have been able for three months, +by reading German letters and pamphlets, to examine closely the +conscience of the German nation. And I have been able thus to take +account of a good many facts which escape the greater part of the French +people. The first, the most striking, the most ignored, is that there is +not in Germany as a whole any real hatred of France (all the hatred is +turned against England). The especial pathos of the situation lies in +the fact that the French spirit only really began to exercise an +attraction upon Germany some two or three years ago. Germany was +beginning to discover the true France, the France of work and of faith. +The new generations, the young classes that they have just led to the +abattoir of Ypres and Dixmude, numbered the purest souls, the greatest +idealists, those most possessed by the dream of universal brotherhood. +If I say that for many among them the war has been a laceration, "a +horror, a failure, a renunciation of every ideal, an abdication of the +spirit," as one of them wrote on the eve of his death--if I say that the +death of Peguy has been mourned by many young Germans, no one would +believe me. But belief will be a necessity the day I publish the +documents which I have collected. + +It is somewhat better understood in France how this German nation, +enveloped in the network of lies woven by its Government, and abandoning +herself thereto with a blind and obstinate loyalty, is profoundly +convinced that she was attacked, hemmed in by the jealousy of the world; +and that she must defend herself at all costs or die. It is among the +chivalrous traditions of France to render homage to the courage of an +adversary. One owes it to that adversary to recognize that in default of +other virtues the spirit of sacrifice is, in the present instance, +almost boundless. It would be a great mistake to force it to extremes. +Instead of driving this blind people to a magnificent and desperate +defense, let us try to open their eyes. It is not impossible. An +Alsatian patriot, to whom one could not impute indulgence for Germany, +Dr. Bucher of Strasbourg, told me not long since, that even though the +German is full of haughty prejudices carefully fostered by his teachers, +he is at any rate always amenable to discussion and his docile spirit is +accessible to arguments. As an example, I would instance the secret +evolution that I see in progress in the thought of certain Germans. +Numbers of German letters that I have read this month begin to utter +agonized questionings as to the legitimacy of the proceedings of Germany +in Belgium. I have seen this anxiety growing, little by little, in +consciences which at first reposed in the conviction of their right. +Truth is slowly dawning. What will happen if its light conquers and +spreads? Carry truth in your hands! Let it be our strongest weapon! Let +us, like the soldiers of the Revolution, whose hearts live again in our +troops, fight not against our enemies, but for them. In saving the +world, let us save them too. France does not break old chains in order +to rivet new. + +Your thoughts are fixed on victory. I think of the peace which will +follow. For however insistently the most militarist among you may talk, +venturing as did an article to hold out the delightful promise of a +perpetual war--"a war which will last after this war, indefinitely...."[22] +(it will come to an end, nevertheless--for lack of combatants!) ... +there must come a day when you will stretch out the hand of friendship, +you and your neighbors across the Rhine, if it were only to come to an +agreement, for the sake of your own business. You will have to +re-establish supportable and humane relations: so set to work in such a +manner as not to make them impossible! Do not break down all the +bridges, since it will ever be necessary to cross the river. Do not +destroy the future. A good open, clean wound will heal; but do not +poison it. Let us be on our guard against hatred. If we prepare for war +in peace according to the wisdom of nations, we should also prepare for +peace in war. It is a task which seems to me not unworthy of those among +us who find themselves outside the struggle, and who through the life of +the spirit have wider relations with the universe--a little lay church +which, today more than the other, preserves its faith in the unity of +human thought and believes that all men are sons of the same Father. In +any case, if such a faith merits insult, the insults constitute an honor +that we will claim as ours before the tribunal of posterity. + + + + +VIII. THE IDOLS + + +For more than forty centuries it has been the effort of great minds who +have attained liberty to extend this blessing to others; to liberate +humanity and to teach men to see reality without fear or error, to look +themselves in the face without false pride or false humility and to +recognize their weakness and their strength, that they may know their +true position in the universe. They have illumined the path with the +brightness of their lives and their example, like the star of the magi, +that mankind may have light. + +Their efforts have failed. For more than forty centuries humanity has +remained in bondage--I do not say to masters (for such are of the order +of the flesh, of which I am not speaking here; and their chains break +sooner or later), but to the phantoms of their own minds. Such servitude +comes from within. We grow faint in the endeavor to cut the bonds which +bind mankind, who straightway tie them again to be more firmly +enthralled. Of every liberator men make a master. Every ideal which +ought to liberate is transformed into a clumsy idol. The history of +humanity is the history of Idols and of their successive reigns; and as +humanity grows older the power of the Idol seems to wax greater and more +destructive. + +At first the divinities were of wood, of stone, or of metal. Those at +any rate were not proof against the axe or against fire. Others followed +that no material force could reach, for they were graven in the +invisible mind. Yet all aspired to material dominion, and to secure for +them that dominion the peoples of the world have poured out their best +blood: Idols of religions and of nationality: the Idol of liberty whose +reign was established in Europe by the armies of the _sans-culotte_ at +the point of the bayonet. The masters have changed, the slaves are still +the same. Our century has made the acquaintance of two new species. The +Idol of Race, at first the outcome of noble ideas, became in the +laboratories of spectacled savants the Moloch which Germany herself +hurled against France in 1870 and which her enemies now wish to use +against the Germany of today. The latest on the scene is that authentic +product of German science, fraternally allied to the labors of industry, +of commerce, and of the firm of Krupp--the Idol of Kultur surrounded by +its Levites, the thinkers of Germany. + + * * * * * + +The common feature of the cult of all Idols is the adaptation of an +ideal to the evil instincts of mankind. Man cultivates the vices which +are profitable to him, but feels the necessity of legitimizing them; +being unwilling to sacrifice them, he must idealize them. That is why +the problem at which he has never ceased to labor throughout the +centuries has been to harmonize his ideals with his own mediocrity. He +has always succeeded. The crowd has no difficulty here. It sets side by +side its virtues and its vices, its heroism and its meanness. The force +of its passions and the rapid course of the days which carry it along +cause it to forget its lack of logic. + +But the intelligent few cannot satisfy themselves with so little effort. +Not that they are, as is often said, less readily swayed by passion. +This is a grave error; the richer a life becomes the more does it offer +for passion to devour, and history sufficiently shows the terrifying +paroxysms to which the lives of religious leaders and revolutionaries +have attained. But these toilers in the spirit love careful work, and +are repelled by popular modes of thought which perpetually break through +the meshes of reasoning. They have to make a more closely woven net in +which instinct and idea, cost what it may, combine to form a stouter +tissue. They thus achieve monstrous _chefs-d'oeuvre_. Give an +intellectual any ideal and any evil passion and he will always succeed +in harmonizing the twain. The love of God and the love of mankind have +been invoked in order to burn, kill, and pillage. The fraternity of 1793 +was sister to the Holy Guillotine. We have in our time seen Churchmen +seeking and finding in the Gospels the justification of Banking and of +War. Since the outbreak of the war a clergyman of Wuertemberg established +the fact that _neither Christ nor John the Baptist nor the apostles +desired to suppress militarism_.[23] A clever intellectual is a conjuror +in ideas. "_Nothing in my hands--nothing up my sleeves._" The great +trick is to extract from any given idea its precise contrary--war from +the Sermon on the Mount, or, like Professor Ostwald, the military +dictatorship of the Kaiser from the dream of an intellectual +internationalism. For such conjurors these things are but child's play. + +Let us expose them, by examining the words of this Dr. Ostwald, who has +appeared during the last few months as the Baptist of the Gospel of the +spiked helmet. + +Here is the Idol to begin with--_Kultur (made in Germany), with a +capital K "rectiligne et de quatre pointes, comme un chevel de frise,"_ +as Miguel de Unamuno wrote to me. All around are little gods, the +children of its loins: _Kulturstaat_, _Kulturbund_, _Kulturimperium_.... + +_"I am now" (it is the voice of Ostwald[24]) "going to explain to you +the great secret of Germany. We, or rather the Germanic race, have +discovered the factor of Organization. Other peoples still live under +the regime of individualism while we are under that of Organization. The +stage of Organization is a more advanced stage of civilization."_ + +It is surely clear that, like those missionaries who, in order to carry +the Christian faith to heathen peoples, secure the co-operation of a +squadron and a landing party which straightway establish in the +idolatrous country commercial stores protected by a ring of cannon, +German intelligence cannot without selfishness keep her treasures to +herself. She is obliged to share them. + +"_Germany wishes to organize Europe, for Europe has hitherto not been +organized. With us everything tends to elicit from each individual the +maximal output in the direction most favorable for society. That for us +is liberty in its highest form._" + +We may well pause to marvel at this way of talking about human "culture" +as though it were a question of asparagus and artichokes. Of this +happiness, and these advantages, this maximal output, this market-garden +culture, this liberty of artichokes subjected to a judicious forcing +process, Professor Ostwald does not wish to deprive the other peoples of +Europe. As they are so unenlightened as not to acquiesce with +enthusiasm: + +"_War will make them participate in the form of this organization in our +higher civilization._" + +Thereupon the chemist-philosopher, who is also in his leisure hours a +politician and a strategist, sketches in bold outline the picture of the +victories of Germany and a remodeled Europe--a United States of Europe +under the paternal sceptre of his mailed Kaiser: England crushed, France +disarmed, and Russia dismembered. His colleague Haeckel completes this +joyous _expose_ by dividing Belgium, the British Empire, and the North +of France--like Perrette of the fable before her pitcher broke. +Unfortunately neither Haeckel nor Ostwald tells us if their plan for the +establishment of this higher civilization included the destruction of +the Halle of Ypres, of the Library at Louvain, of the Cathedral at +Rheims. After all these conquests, divisions, and devastations, let us +not overlook this wonderful sentence of which Ostwald certainly did not +realize the sinister buffoonery, worthy of a Moliere: "You know that I +am a pacifist." + +However far the high priests of a cult may allow their emotion to carry +them, their profession of faith still retains a certain diplomatic +reserve which does not hamper their followers. Thus the +_Kulturmenschen_. But the zeal of their Levites must frequently disturb +the serenity of Moses and Aaron--Haeckel and Ostwald--by its intemperate +frankness. I do not know what they think of the article of Thomas Mann +which appeared in the November number of the _Neue Rundschau_: "Gedanken +im Kriege." But I do know what certain French intellectuals will think +of it. Germany could not offer them a more terrible weapon against +herself. + +In an access of delirious pride and exasperated fanaticism Mann employs +his envenomed pen to justify the worst accusations that have been made +against Germany. While an Ostwald endeavors to identify the cause of +_Kultur_ with that of civilization, Mann proclaims: "They have nothing +in common. The present war is that of _Kultur_ (i. e., of Germany) +against civilization." And pushing this outrageous boast of pride to the +point of madness, he defines civilization as Reason (_Vernunft, +Aufklaerung_), Gentleness (_Sittigung, Saenftigung_), Spirit (_Geist, +Aufloesung_), and Kultur as "a spiritual _organization_ of the world" +which does not exclude "bloody savagery." Kultur is "the sublimation of +the demoniacal" (_die Sublimierung des Daemonischen_). It is "above +morality, above reason, and above science." While Ostwald and Haeckel +see in militarism merely an arm or instrument of which Kultur makes use +to secure victory, Thomas Mann affirms that Kultur and Militarism are +brothers--their ideal is the same, their aim the same, their principle +the same. Their enemy is peace, is spirit ("_Ja, der Geist ist zivil, +ist buergerlich_"). He finally dares to inscribe on his own and his +country's banner the words, "Law is the friend of the weak; it would +reduce the world to a level. War brings out strength." + + _Das Gesetz ist der Freund des Schwachen,_ + _Moechte gern die Welt verflachen_ + _Aber der Krieg laesst die Kraft erscheinen...._ + +In this criminal glorification of violence, Thomas Mann himself has been +surpassed. Ostwald preached the victory of Kultur, if necessary by +Force; Mann proved that Kultur is Force. Some one was needed to cast +aside the last veil of reserve and say "Force alone. All else be +silent." We have read extracts from the cynical article in which +Maximilian Harden, treating the desperate efforts of his Government to +excuse the violation of Belgian neutrality as feeble lies, dared to +write: + +"_Why on earth all this fuss? Might creates our Right. Did a powerful +man ever submit himself to the crazy pretensions or to the judgment of a +band of weaklings?_" + +What a testimony to the madness into which German intelligence has been +precipitated by pride and struggle, and to the moral anarchy of this +Empire, whose _organization_ is imposing only to the eyes of those who +do not see farther than the facade! Who cannot see the weakness of a +Government which gags its socialist press and yet tolerates such an +insulting contradiction as this? Who does not see that such words +defame Germany before the whole world for centuries to come? These +miserable intellectuals imagine that with their display of infuriated +Nietzcheism and Bismarckism they are acting heroically and impressing +the world. They merely disgust it. They wish to be believed. People are +only too ready to believe them. The whole of Germany will be made +responsible for the delirium of a few writers. Germany will one day +realize she has had no more deadly enemy than her own intellectuals. + + * * * * * + +I write here without prejudice, for I am certainly not proud of our +French intellectuals. The Idol of Race, or of Civilization, or of +Latinity, which they so greatly abuse, does not satisfy me. I do not +like any idol--not even that of Humanity. But at any rate those to which +my country bows down are less dangerous. They are not aggressive, and, +moreover, there remains even in the most fanatical of our intellectuals +a basis of native common sense, of which the Germans of whom I have just +spoken seem to have lost all trace. But it must be admitted that on +neither side have they brought honor to the cause of reason, which they +have not been able to protect against the winds of violence and folly. +There is a saying of Emerson's which is applicable to their failure: + +"_Nothing is more rare in any man than an act of his own._" + +Their acts and their writings have come to them from others, from +outside, from public opinion, blind and menacing. I do not wish to +condemn those who have been obliged to remain silent either because they +are in the armies, or because the censorship which rules in countries +involved in war has imposed silence upon them. But the unheard-of +weakness with which the leaders of thought have everywhere abdicated to +the collective madness has certainly proved their lack of _character_. + +Certain somewhat paradoxical passages in my own writings have caused me +at times to be styled an anti-intellectual; an absurd charge to bring +against one who has given his life to the worship of thought. But it is +true that Intellectualism has often appeared to me as a mere caricature +of Thought--Thought mutilated, deformed, and petrified, powerless, not +only to dominate the drama of life, but even to understand it. And the +events of to-day have proved me more in the right than I wished to be. +The intellectual lives too much in the realm of shadows, of ideas. +Ideas have no existence in themselves, but only through the hopes or +experiences which can fill them. They are either summaries, or +hypotheses; frames for what has been or will be; convenient or necessary +formulae. One cannot live and act without them, but the evil is that +people make them into oppressive realities. No one contributes more to +this than the intellectual, whose trade it is to handle them, who, +biased by his profession, is always tempted to subordinate reality to +them. Let there supervene a collective passion which completes his +blindness, and it will be cast in the form of the idea which can best +serve its purpose: it transfers its life-blood to that idea, and the +idea magnifies and glorifies it in turn. Nothing is more long-lived in a +man than a phantom which his own mind has created, a phantom in which +are combined the madness of his heart and the madness of his head. Hence +the intellectuals in the present crisis have not been overcome by the +warlike contagion less than others, but they have themselves contributed +to spreading it. I would add (for it is their punishment) that they are +victims of the contagion for a longer period: for whilst simple folk +constantly submit to the test of every-day action and of experience, and +modify their ideas without conscious regret, the intellectual finds +himself bound in the net of his own creation and every word that he +writes draws the bonds tighter. Hence while we see that in the soldiers +of all armies the fire of hate is rapidly dying down and that they +already fraternize from trench to trench, the writers redouble their +furious arguments. We can easily prophesy that when the remembrance of +this senseless war has passed away among the people its bitterness will +still be smouldering in the hearts of the intellectuals.... + +Who shall break the idols? Who shall open the eyes of their fanatical +followers? Who shall make them understand that no god of their minds, +religious or secular, has the right to force himself on other human +beings--even he who seems the most worthy--or to despise them? Admitting +that your _Kultur_ on German soil produces the sturdiest and most +abundant human crop, who has entrusted to you the mission of cultivating +other lands? Cultivate your own garden. We will cultivate ours. There is +a sacred flower for which I would give all the products of your +artificial culture. It is the wild violet of Liberty. You do not care +about it. You tread it under foot. But it will not die. It will live +longer than your masterpieces of barrack and hot-house. It is not +afraid of the wind. It has braved other tempests than that of today. It +grows under brambles and under dead leaves. Intellectuals of Germany, +intellectuals of France, labor and sow on the fields of your own minds: +respect those of others. Before _organizing_ the world you have enough +to do to _organize_ your own private world. Try for a moment to forget +your ideas and behold yourselves. And above all, look at us. Champions +of _Kultur_ and of Civilization, of the Germanic races and of Latinity, +enemies, friends, let us look one another in the eyes. My brother, do +you not see there a heart similar to your own, with the same hopes, the +same egoism, and the same heroism and power of dream which forever +refashions its gossamer web? _Vois-tu pas que tu es moi_? said the old +Hugo to one of his enemies.... + +The true man of culture is not he who makes of himself and his ideal the +center of the universe, but who looking around him sees, as in the sky +the stream of the Milky Way, thousands of little flames which flow with +his own; and who seeks neither to absorb them nor to impose upon them +his own course, but to give himself the religious persuasion of their +value and of the common source of the fire by which all alike are fed. +Intelligence of the mind is nothing without that of the heart. It is +nothing also without good sense and humor--good sense which shows to +every people and to every being their place in the universe--and humor +which is the critic of misguided reason, the soldier who, following the +chariot to the Capitol, reminds Caesar in his hour of triumph that he is +bald. + +_Journal de Geneve_, December 4, 1914. + + + + +IX. FOR EUROPE: MANIFESTO OF THE WRITERS AND THINKERS OF CATALONIA + + +National passions are triumphant. For five months they have rent our +Europe. They think they will soon have compassed its destruction and +effaced its image in the hearts of the last of these who remain faithful +to it. But they are mistaken. They have renewed the faith that we had in +it. They have made us recognize its value and our love. And from one +country to another we have discovered our unknown brothers, sons of the +same mother, who in the hour when she is denied, consecrate themselves +to her defence. + +Today, it is from Spain that the voice reaches us, from the thinkers of +Catalonia. Let us pass on their appeal which comes to us from the shores +of the Mediterranean, like the sound of a Christmas bell. Another day +the bells of Northern Europe will be heard in their turn. And soon all +will ring together in unison. The test is good. Let us be thankful. +Those who desired to separate us have joined our hands. + +R. R. + +_December 31, 1914._ + + +MANIFESTO OF THE _FRIENDS OF THE MORAL UNITY OF EUROPE_ + +A number of literary and scientific men at Barcelona, as far removed +from amorphous internationalism on the one hand as from mere +parochialism on the other, have banded themselves together _to affirm +their unchangeable belief in the moral unity of Europe_, and to further +this belief as far as the suffocating conditions resulting from the +present tragic circumstances permit. + +We set out from the principle that the terrible war which today is +rending the heart of this Europe of ours is, by implication, a _Civil +War_. + +A civil war does not exactly mean an unjust war; still, it can only be +justified by a conflict between great ideals, and if we desire the +triumph of one or the other of these ideals, it must be for the sake of +the entire European Commonwealth and its general well-being. None of the +belligerents, therefore, can be allowed to aim at the complete +destruction of its opponents; and it is even less legitimate to start +out from the criminal hypothesis that one or another of the parties is +_de facto_ already excluded from this superior commonwealth. + +Yet we have seen with pain assertions such as these approved and +deliriously spread abroad; and not always amongst common people, or by +the voices of those who speak not with authority. For three months it +seemed as if our ideal Europe were ship-wrecked, but a reaction is +making its appearance already. A thousand indications assure us that, in +the world of intellect at any rate, the winds are quieting down, and +that in the best minds the eternal values will soon spring up once more. + +It is our purpose to assist in this reaction, to contribute to making it +known, and, as far as we are able, to ensure its triumph. We are not +alone. We have with us in every quarter of the world the ardent +aspirations of far-sighted minds, and the unvoiced wishes of thousands +of men of good will, who, beyond their sympathies and personal +preferences, are determined to remain faithful to the cause of this +moral unity. + +And above all we have, in the far distant future, the appreciation of +the men who tomorrow will applaud this modest work to which we are +devoting ourselves today. + +We will begin by giving the greatest possible publicity to those +actions, declarations, and manifestations--whether they emanate from +belligerent or neutral nations--in which the effort of reviving the +feeling of a higher unity and a generous altruism may become apparent. +Later we shall be able to extend our activities and place them at the +service of new enterprises. We demand nothing more of our friends, of +our press, and of our fellow citizens than a little attention for these +quickenings of reality, a little respect for the interests of a higher +humanity, and a little love for the great traditions and the rich +possibilities of a _unified Europe_. + +BARCELONA, _November 27, 1914_. + + +EUGENIO D'ORS, Member of the Institute; MANUEL DE MONTOLIU, Author; +AURELIO RAS, Director of the Review _Estudio_; AUGUSTIN MURUA, +University Professor; TELESFORO DE ARANZADI, University Professor; +MIGUEL S. OLIVER; JUAN PALAU, publicist; PABLO VILA, Director of _Mont +d'Or_ College; ENRIQUE JARDI, Barrister; E. MESSEGUER, publicist; CARMEN +KARR, Director of the _Residencia de Estudiantes El Hogar_; ESTEBAN +TERRADES, Member of the Institute; JOSE ZULUETA, Member of Parliament; +R. JORI, Author; EUDALDO DURAN REYNALS, Librarian of the _Biblioteca de +Cataluna_; RAFAEL CAMPALANS, Engineer; J. M. LOPEZ-PICO, Author; R. +RUCABADO, Author; E. CUELLO CALOU, University Professor; MANUEL +REVENLOS, Professor of the _Escuela de Funcionarios_; J. FARRAN MAYORAL, +Author; JAIME MASSO TORRENTS, Member of the Institute; JORGE RUBIO +BALAGUER, Director of the _Biblioteca de Cataluna_. + +_Translated from the Spanish by R. R._ + +_Journal de Geneve_, January 9, 1915. + + + + +X. FOR EUROPE: AN APPEAL FROM HOLLAND TO THE INTELLECTUALS OF ALL +NATIONS + + +In the preceding chapter, in which I put before my readers the fine +manifesto of the Catalonian intellectuals "For the Moral Unity of +Europe," I stated that after this appeal from the Mediterranean South I +would make known those of the North. Amongst the latter here is the +voice of Holland:-- + +The _Nederlandsche Anti-Oorlog Road_ (Dutch Anti-War Council) is perhaps +the most important attempt that these last months has seen to unify +pacifist thought. Whilst recognizing the value of what has been done for +some years past in favor of peace, the N. A. O. R. is convinced that +"all this work could have been much more effective, and could even have +prevented the present catastrophe, if it had been better taken in hand." +There has been lack of co-operation, wastage of energy, lack of +penetration to the mass of the people. The problem is to discover if +this internal defect cannot be remedied. "Will the world-wide tragedy of +rivalry continue even inside the pacifist movement, or will this war +teach those who are fighting against it the necessity of an energetic +organization and preparation?" + +To this task the N.A.O.R. is devoting itself. Founded on October 8, +1914, it had succeeded by January 15th in securing the adhesion of 350 +Dutch societies (official, political, of all parties, religious, +intellectual, labor), and its manifestoes brought together the +signatures of more than a hundred of the most illustrious names of the +Netherlands--statesmen, prelates, officers, writers, professors, +artists, business men, etc. It therefore represents a considerable moral +force. + +Let it be said at once that the N.A.O.R. does not look for an immediate +end of the war by a peace at any price. On the one hand it declares +itself "it has formed no presumptuous idea of its strength; it has no +naive confidence in vague peace formulae, nor even in well-defined mutual +obligations. The universal war of today has, alas! taught it much in +this respect also." And, moreover, it is quite aware that a peace at +any price, under present conditions, would only be a consecration of +injustice. The great public meetings which it has organized on December +15th in the chief towns of the Netherlands have unanimously declared +that such a peace seemed neither possible nor even desirable. I will add +that certain of the articles of the N.A.O.R. suggest, with all the +reserve necessitated by its attitude of neutrality and its profound +desire for impartiality, the direction of its suppressed sympathies. +Especially the following:-- + +"To repair the harm done by this war to the prestige of law in +international relations. To bow before the law, whether customary or +codified in treaties is a duty, even where sanction is wanting. Reform +will be in vain: if there is not respect for law, and nations refuse to +keep their word, a durable peace is out of the question." + +The object of the N.A.O.R. is especially to study the conditions in +which we can realize a just, humane, and durable peace, which will +secure for Europe a long future of fruitful tranquility and of common +work, and to interest the public opinion of all nations in securing such +a peace. I cannot analyze here, owing to lack of space, the various +public manifestoes, the _Appeal to the People of Holland_ (October, +1914), or the _Appeal for Co-operation and the Preparation of Peace_, a +kind of attempt to mobilize the pacifist armies (November). The latter +of these contains ideas which agree in many cases with those of the +_Union of Democratic Control_ (the abolition of secret diplomacy, and a +larger control of foreign affairs by Parliaments; the prohibition of +special armament industries; the establishment of the elementary +principle of international law, that no country shall be annexed without +the consent, freely expressed, of the population). I will content myself +here with publishing the manifesto addressed to the thinkers, writers, +artists, and scientists of all nations. In this manifesto we shall find +support for the tasks which we ourselves have undertaken in working to +keep the thought of Europe sheltered from the ravages of the war, and in +continually recalling it to the recognition of its highest duty, which +is, even in the worst storms of passion, to safeguard the spiritual +unity bf civilized humanity. + +R. R. + +_February 7, 1915._ + + +NEDERLANDSCHE ANTI-OORLOG RAAD + +Immediately after the European war had broken out, several groups of +intellectuals belonging to the warring nations have advocated the +justice of their country's cause in manifestoes and pamphlets, which +they have scattered in great numbers throughout the neutral states.[25] +And this still goes on; side by side with the war of the sword a no less +vehement war is carried on with the pen. + +Those writings have also reached us, the undersigned, all subjects of a +neutral state. We have read them with the greatest interest, as they +enable us to form a clear opinion not only of the frame of mind brought +about by the outbreak of the war among the intellectuals of the warring +nations, but also of the opinions they hold about the causes and the +nature of the present war. + +It has not surprised us neutrals to see that the spokesmen of the +opposing nations are equally convinced of the justice of their cause. +Neither has it surprised us that those spokesmen evince such a strong +inclination to advocate their rights before the neutral states. Indeed, +in such a terrible struggle it is a psychologic necessity for all the +nations concerned that they should believe implicitly in the justice of +their cause; they must ardently desire to testify to their faith before +others. Only an unshakable confidence in the absolute justice of their +cause can keep them from wavering or despairing during the gigantic +struggle. + +But we have perceived with great sorrow that the greater part of those +writings are absolutely lacking in the slightest effort to be just +towards opponents; that the meanest and most malicious motives are +ascribed to them. + +We respect the conviction of every one of the warring nations that they +are fighting for a just cause. Even if we should have formed an opinion +about the origin of the war, we should yet not think the present a fit +moment to oppose different opinions or arguments to each other. This +should be the work of the future, when scientific research will be able +to consider all the facts quietly, when national passions will have +subsided and the nations will listen with more composure to the verdict +of history. + +Yet we think it our duty and we consider it a privilege given to us as +neutrals to utter a serious warning against the systematic rousing of a +lasting bitterness between the now warring parties. + +Though fully aware that the late events have irritated the feeling of +nationality to the utmost, yet we believe that patriotism should not +prevent any one from doing justice to the character of one's enemy; +that faith in the virtues of one's own nation need not be coupled with +the idea that all vices are inherent in the opposing nation; that +confidence in the justice of one's own cause should not make one forget +that the other side cherishes that conviction with the same energy. + +Besides, no one should forget that the question: "What nations will be +enemies?" depends on political relations, which vary according to +unexpected circumstances. Today's enemy may be tomorrow's friend. + +The tone, in which of late not only the papers to which we have referred +above, but also the newspaper press of the warring nations has written +about the enemy, threatens to arouse and to perpetuate the bitterest +hatred. + +To the evils directly resulting from the war, will be added the +regrettable consequence that co-operation between the belligerent +nations in art, science, and all other labors of peace will be delayed +for some time, nay, even made quite impossible. Yet the time will come +after this war, when the nations will have to resume some form of +intercourse, social as well as spiritual. + +The fewer fierce accusations have been breathed on either side, the less +one nation has attacked the character of the other: in short, the less +lasting bitterness has been roused, so much the easier will it be +afterwards to take up again the broken threads of international +intercourse. + +This rousing of hatred and bitterness is also an impediment in the way +that leads our thoughts towards peace. + +Every one who in word or writing rails at the enemy or excites national +passions is responsible for the longer duration of this horrible war. + +Therefore, we the undersigned, appeal to all those of the same mind, +especially among those belonging to the warring nations, to co-operate +for this purpose: that in word and writing everything be avoided that +may rouse lasting animosity. + +We especially address this appeal to those who influence public opinion +in their own country, to men of science and to artists, to those who +long ago have realized that in all civilized countries there are men and +women with the same notions of justice and morality as they have +themselves. + +May the representatives of all countries--according to the saying of a +Dutch statesmen--remember what unites them and not only what separates +them! + +_Signed_:--H.-C. DRESSELHUYS, Secretary-General of the Ministry of +Justice, _President_ of the N.A.O.R. J.-H. SCHAPER, member of the +Second Chamber, _Vice-President_. Madame M. ASSER-THORBEKE, secretary of +the Dutch League for Women's Suffrage. Professor Dr. D. VAN EMBDEN, +Professor of law at Amsterdam. Dr. KOOLEN, member of the Second Chamber. +V.-H. RUTGERS, member of the Second Chamber. Baron de JONG VAN BEEK EN +DONK, _Secretary_ of the N.A.O.R. (and also subscribed to by 130 +politicians, intellectuals, and artists, including FREDERIK VAN EEDEN, +WILLEM MENGELBERG, etc.). Office: Theresiastraat, 51, The Hague. + +_Journal de Geneve_, February 15, 1915. + + + + +XI. LETTER TO FREDERIK VAN EEDEN + + +_January 12, 1915._ + +MY DEAR FRIEND: + +You offer me the hospitality of your paper _De Amsterdammer_. I thank +you and accept. It is good to take one's stand with those free souls who +resist the unrestrained fury of national passions. In this hideous +struggle, with which the conflicting peoples are rending Europe, let us +at least preserve our flag, and rally round that. We must re-create +European opinion. That is our first duty. Among these millions who are +only conscious of being Germans, Austrians, Frenchmen, Russians, +English, etc., let us strive to be _men_, who, rising above the selfish +aims of short-lived nations, do not lose sight of the interests of +civilization as a whole--that civilization which each race mistakenly +identifies with its own, to destroy that of the others. I wish your +noble country,[26] which has always preserved its political and moral +independence among the great surrounding states, could become the hearth +of this ideal Europe we believe in--the hearth round which shall gather +all those who seek to rebuild her. + +Everywhere there are men who think thus though they are unknown one to +another. Let us get to know them. Let us bring together each and all. +Here I would introduce to you two important groups, one from the North +and one from the South--the Catalonian thinkers who have formed the +society of _Amis de l'Unite Morale de l'Europe_ at Barcelona--I send you +their fine appeal: and the _Union of Democratic Control_ founded in +London and inspired by indignation against this European war, and by the +firm determination to render it impossible for the diplomatists and +militarists to inaugurate another. I am having the programmes and the +first publications sent to you. This Union, whose general Council +contains members of Parliament, and authors like Norman Angell, Israel +Zangwill, and Vernon Lee, has already formed twenty branches in towns in +Great Britain. + +Let us try and unite permanently all such organizations, though each has +its racial characteristics and peculiarities, for all aim at +re-establishing the peace of Europe as best they may. With them let us +take stock of our united resources. Then we can act. + + * * * * * + +What shall we do? Try to put an end to the struggle? It is no use +thinking of that now. The brute is loose; and the Governments have +succeeded so well in spreading hatred and violence abroad that even if +they wished they could not bring it back again into control. The damage +is irreparable. It is possible that the neutral countries of Europe and +the United States of America may decide one day to interfere, and +endeavor to put an end to a war which, if it continued indefinitely, +would threaten to ruin them as well as the belligerents. But I do not +know what one must expect from this too tardy intervention. + +In any case I see another outlet for our activity. Let the war be what +it may--we can no longer intervene; but at least we must try to make the +scourge productive of as little evil and as much good as possible. And +in order to do this we must get public opinion all the world over to see +to it that the peace of the future shall be just, that the greed of the +conqueror (whoever that may be) and the intrigues of diplomacy, do not +make it the seed of a new war of revenge; and that the moral crimes +committed in the past are not repeated or allowed to stain yet darker +the record of humanity. That is why I hold the first article of the +Union of Democratic Control as a sacred principle: "No Province shall be +transferred from one Government to another without the consent by +plebiscite of the population of such province." We must oppose those +odious maxims which have weighed too long on the populations they +enslave and which quite recently Professor Lasson dared to repeat as a +threat for the future, in his cynical Catechism of Force (_Das +Kulturideal und der Krieg_).[27] + +And this principle must be proposed and adopted at once without any +delay. If we waited to announce it until--the war being over--the +congress of the Powers were assembled, we should be suspected of wishing +to make justice serve the interest of the conquered. It is now, when the +forces of the two sides are equal, that we must establish this +primordial right which soars over all the armies. + +From this principle we can deduce an immediate application. Since the +whole of Europe is disorganized let us profit by it to set in order +this untidy house! For a long time injustices have been accumulating. +The moment of settling the general account will be an opportunity of +rectifying them. The duty of all of us who feel for the brotherhood of +mankind is to stand for the rights of the small nations. There are some +in both camps: Schleswig, Alsace, Lorraine, Poland, the Baltic nations, +Armenia, the Jewish people. At the beginning of the war Russia made some +generous promises. We have registered them in our minds; let her not +forget them! We are as determined about Poland, torn by the claws of +three imperial eagles, as we are about Belgium crucified. We remember +all. It is because our fathers, obsessed by their narrow realism and by +selfish fears, let the rights of the people of Eastern Europe be +violated, that today the West is shattered, and the sword hangs over the +small nations, over you, my friends, as over the country which is +befriending me, Switzerland. Whoever harms one of us harms all the +others. Let us unite! Above all race questions, which are for the most +part a mask behind which pride crouches and the interests of the +financial or aristocratic classes dissemble, there is a law of humanity, +eternal and universal, of which we are all the servants and guardians; +it is that of the right of a people to rule themselves. And he who +violates shall be the enemy of all. + +R. R. + +_De Amsterdammer Weekblad voor Nederland_, January +24, 1915. + + + + +XII. OUR NEIGHBOR THE ENEMY + + +_March 15, 1915._ + +While the war tempest rages, uprooting the strongest souls and dragging +them along in its furious cyclone, I continue my humble pilgrimage, +trying to discover beneath the ruins the rare hearts who have remained +faithful to the old ideal of human fraternity. What a sad joy I have in +collecting and helping them! + +I know that each of their efforts--like mine--that each of their words +of love, rouses and turns against them the hostility of the two hostile +camps. The combatants, pitted against each other, agree in hating those +who refuse to hate. Europe is like a besieged town. Fever is raging. +Whoever will not rave like the rest is suspected. And in these hurried +times when justice cannot wait to study evidence, every suspect is a +traitor. Whoever insists, in the midst of war, on defending peace among +men knows that he risks his own peace, his reputation, his friends, for +his belief. But of what value is a belief for which no risks are run? + +Certainly it is put to the test in these days, when every day brings the +echo of violence, injustice, and new cruelties. But was it not still +more tried when it was entrusted to the fishermen of Judea by him whom +humanity pretends to honor still--with its lips more than with its +heart? The rivers of blood, the burnt towns, all the atrocities of +thought and action, will never efface in our tortured souls the luminous +track of the Galilean barque, nor the deep vibrations of the great +voices which from across the centuries proclaim reason as man's true +home. You choose to forget them, and to say (like many writers of today) +that this war will begin a new era in the history of mankind, a reversal +of former values, and that from it alone will future progress be dated. +That is always the language of passion. Passion passes away. Reason +remains--reason and love. Let us continue to search for their young +shoots amidst the bloody ruins. + +I feel the same joy when I find the fragile and valiant flowers of human +pity piercing the icy crust of hatred that covers Europe, as we feel in +these chilly March days when we see the first flowers appear above the +soil. They show that the warmth of life persists below the surface of +the earth, that fraternal love persists below the surface of the +nations, and that soon nothing will prevent it rising again. + +I have on several occasions shown how the neutral countries have become +the refuge of this European spirit, which seems driven from the +belligerent countries by the armies of the pen, more savage than the +others because they risk nothing. The efforts made in Holland or in +Spain to save the moral unity of Europe, the burning charity and +untiring help that Switzerland lavishes on prisoners, on wounded, on +victims of both sides, are a great comfort to oppressed souls, who in +every country are suffocating in the atmosphere of hatred forced on +them, and who look for purer air. But I find still more beautiful and +touching the signs of fraternal aid between friends and enemies in +belligerent countries, however rare and feeble they may be. + +If there are two countries between which the present war seems specially +to have created an abyss of hatred and misunderstanding, they are +England and Germany. The writers and publicists of Germany, whose orders +are to profess for France rather sympathy and compassion than +animosity, and who are even constrained to distinguish between the +people and the Government of Russia, have vowed eternal hatred against +England. _Hasse England_ has become their _Delenda Carthago_. The most +moderate declare that the struggle cannot be ended except by the +destruction of the _Seeherrschaft_ (naval supremacy) of Britain. And +Great Britain is not less determined to continue the conflict until +German militarism has been totally eradicated. Yet it is precisely +between these two nations that the noblest bonds of mutual assistance +for the misfortunes of the enemy have been formed and maintained. + +Two days after the declaration of war there was founded in London by the +Archbishop of Canterbury and by well known persons, such as J. +Allen-Baker, M.P., the Right-Hon. W. H. Dickinson, M.P., Lord and Lady +Courtney of Penwith, the _Emergency Committee for the Assistance of +Germans, Austrians, and Hungarians in Distress_. This work, which +affects a large part of England, consists in paying the repatriation +expenses of destitute civilians, of accompanying German women and girls +on their return journey, of securing hospitality in families for poor +Germans and finding work for them. By the end of December almost L10,000 +had been spent in this way. Several sub-committees visit Prisoners' +Camps, facilitate correspondence between the belligerent nations, or +undertake, for Christmas, to convey to interned alien enemies more than +20,000 parcels and 200 Christmas trees. Another English society, already +in existence before the war, the _Society of Friends of Foreigners in +Distress_, regularly looks after 1,800 German and Austrian families. +Finally, the Central Bureau (London) of the International Union of Women +Suffrage Societies has rendered great service to foreigners, paying for +the return journey of between seven and eight thousand women. + +In Germany there has been founded at Berlin a similar Bureau for giving +information and assistance to Germans abroad, and to foreigners in +Germany (_Auskunfts-und Hilfsstelle fuer Deutsche im Ausland und +Auslaender in Deutschland_). Amongst its members may be noted +aristocratic names, and persons well known in the religious and academic +world: Frau Marie von Buelow-Moerlins, Helene Graefin Harrach, Nora +Freiin von Schleinitz, Professors W. Foerster, D. Baumgarten, Paul +Natorp, Martin Rade, Siegmund-Schultze, etc. At its head is a lady of +deep religious feeling, Dr. Elisabeth Rotten. As will be readily +imagined, an undertaking of this kind has not failed to evoke suspicion +and opposition in nationalist quarters. But it has emerged successful, +and persists; and here are the terms in which it justifies its high +mission against the ravings of German Chauvinism: + +"Since the beginning of the war we have recognized the obligation to +interest ourselves in the welfare of foreigners stranded in Germany. +Efforts such as ours are as unpopular in our country as in other +countries. At a time when the whole German people is engaged in +resisting the enemy, it seems superfluous to render to those who belong +to foreign countries more than minimum services to which they are +legally entitled. But it is not only the thought of our kinsmen abroad +which urges us to this work, it is our own desire to render friendly +service (_Freundendienste_) to those who, through no fault of their own, +are in difficulties because of the war. Even in war time, our neighbor +is he who is in need of our help; and love for one's enemy +(_Feindesliebe_) remains a sign whereby those who retain their faith in +the Lord may recognize one another.... + +"We have been able to reassure German families as to the lot of their +members in enemy countries, and in return to vouch to foreigners for the +fact that their friends in our country will be able to rely on us for +assistance if they need it. We have been able to help as neighbors +(_Naechstendienste_) innocent enemies, in whom we see human brothers and +sisters. Above and beyond this practical aid, we find consolation and +comfort in being able freely to hearken, even in such times as these, to +the voice of humanity, and to the command 'love thy neighbor.' The +tragedy which bursts over the earth on every side, which fills all our +being with a religious respect for human suffering, but also stirs our +love and self-sacrifice, enlarges our hearts and leaves no room except +for feelings of affirmation and benevolent action. + +"Our desire to help and to alleviate suffering knows no frontiers. This +need is all the more urgent when we find in the sufferings of others the +traits of what we ourselves also suffer. What unites men goes deeper +into our being than what separates them. That we can tend the wounds +that we are constrained to deal, and that the same is the case in the +enemy's country, gives promise of the brighter days which will come. In +the midst of the tempest which destroys all around us so many things +which we consider worthy of eternal existence, the possibility of such +action strengthens our courage and gives us hope that new bridges will +be rebuilt, on which the men who now find themselves separated, will +once more be closely united in a common effort." + +I dedicate these noble words to my friends amongst the people of France, +who have so often, by letter or by message, declared to me their +sympathy for such thoughts and their unchanging faith in humanity. I +dedicate them to all in France who, even in these days, by their justice +and goodness contribute to make their country loved, as much as she +makes herself admired by her arms--to those who assure her of the name +which I read with emotion on a postcard written yesterday, on his way to +Geneva, by a badly wounded German who had been repatriated: the name of +_gutes Frankreich_, "good France," or, as our tender-hearted old writers +used to say, "_Douce_ France." + +R. R. + +I take this opportunity of recommending to my French readers the +publication of Mme. Arthur Spitzer (Geneva): _Le Paquet du prisonnier de +guerre_. It has contributors in Paris, and was founded in November "to +bring comfort in their misery to such French, Belgians, and English +prisoners as cannot be assisted by their families." It begs all who wish +to send a parcel to a relation or friend who has been taken prisoner, to +send with it, when possible, a similar consignment for some other +prisoner--one of their fellow countrymen without relations, friends, or +resources. May this noble thought of solidarity be extended later, in +more humane times, so that whoever helps a prisoner belonging to his own +country may be willing at the same time to help an enemy prisoner! + +R. R. + +_Journal de Geneve_, March 15, 1915. + + + + +XIII. A LETTER TO SVENSKA DAGBLADET OF STOCKHOLM[28] + + +The European thought of tomorrow is with the armies. The furious +intellectuals in one camp and the other who insult one another do not +represent it at all. The voice of the peoples who will return from the +war, after having experienced the terrible reality, will send back into +the silence of obscurity these men who have revealed themselves as +unworthy to be spiritual guides of the human race. Amongst those who +thus retire more than one St. Peter will then hear the cock crow, and +will weep saying, "Lord, I have denied thee!" + +The destinies of humanity will rise superior to those of all the +nations. Nothing will be able to prevent the reforming of the bonds +between the thought of the hostile nations. Whatever nation should stand +aside would commit suicide. For by means of these bonds the tide of life +is kept in motion. + +But they have never been completely broken, even at the height of the +war. The war has even had the sad advantage of grouping together +throughout the universe the minds who reject national hatred. It has +tempered their strength, it has welded their wills into a solid block. +Those are mistaken who think that the ideals of a free human fraternity +are at present stifled! They are but silent under the gag of military +(and civil) dictation which reigns throughout Europe. But the gag will +fall, and they will burst forth with explosive force. I am agonized by +the sufferings of millions of innocent victims, sacrificed today on the +field of battle, but I have no anxiety for the future unity of European +society. It will be realized anew. The war of today is its baptism of +blood. + +R. R. + +_April 10, 1915._ + + + + +XIV. WAR LITERATURE + + +The intellectuals on both sides have been much in evidence since the +beginning of the war; they have, indeed, brought so much violence and +passion to bear upon it, that it might almost be called their war! + +It seems to me, however, that attention has not been sufficiently drawn +to the fact that, with a few exceptions, it is only the voice of the +older generation that has been heard--the voice of Academicians, and +Professoren, of distinguished members of the press and the universities, +of poets of established reputations, and the doyens of literature, art, +and science. + +As far as France is concerned, the explanation of this is simple: nearly +all those up to the age of forty-eight who are able to bear arms are now +acting instead of talking. In Germany the situation is rather different, +since for various reasons, which I shall not attempt to elucidate, much +of the literary youth of the nation has remained at home, and continues +to publish books. Even those who are at the front contrive to send +articles and poems to the Reviews (for the passion for writing dies hard +in Germany). + +It seems to me to be of importance to ascertain what spiritual currents +are influencing the young intellectuals of Germany.[29] + + * * * * * + +It has been pointed out that in all countries the extremest views have +been expressed by writers who have already passed _el mezzo del +cammino_. We shall attempt to find the reason for this at some later +date. At present we are content again to verify this fact in the case of +German writers. Almost all the celebrated and acknowledged poets, all +those who were rich in years and in honor, were swept off their feet at +the beginning of the war. And this fact is all the more curious because +some of them had been up to that time the apostles of peace, of pity, +and of humanitarianism. Dehmel, the enemy of war, the friend of all men, +who said that he did not know to which of the ten nationalities he owed +his intellect, is now writing Battle Songs (_Schlachtenlieder_), and +Songs of the Flag (_Fahnenlieder_), apostrophizing the enemy, praising +and dealing death. (At the age of fifty-one he is learning to bear arms, +and has enlisted against the Russians.) Gerhart Hauptmann, whom Fritz +von Unruh calls "the poet of brotherly love," has shaken off his +neurasthenia, and bids men "mow down the grass which drips with blood." +Franz Wedekind is pouring out invectives against Czarism, Lissauer +against England. Arno Holz is raving deliriously. Petzold desires to be +in every bullet that enters an enemy's heart; whilst Richard Nordhausen +has written an Ode to a Howitzer.[30] + +At first the younger writers as well were possessed with the same +madness for war; but, in contact with the sufferings they endured and +inflicted, it quickly disappeared. Fritz von Unruh enlisted as a Uhlan, +and left for the front, crying "Paris, Paris is our goal!" Since the +Battle of the Aisne, in September, he has written "Der Lamm": "_Lamb of +God, I have seen thy look of suffering. Give us peace and rest; lead us +back to the heaven of love, and give us back our dead_." Rudolf +Leonhard sang of war at the beginning, and is still fighting; on +re-reading his poems shortly afterwards, he wrote on the front page: +"_These were written during the madness of the first weeks. That madness +has spent itself, and only our strength is left. We shall again win +control over ourselves and love one another._" Poets, hitherto unknown, +are revealed by the cry of compassion wrung from their anguished hearts. +To Andrea Fram, who has remained at home, it is a grief that he does not +suffer, whilst thousands of others suffer and die. "_All thy love, and +all thy agony, in spite of thy ardent desire, avail not to soothe the +last hour of a single man who is dying yonder._" Upon Ludwig Marck each +minute weighs like a nightmare:-- + + Menschen in Not.... + Brueder dir tot.... + Krieg ist im Land.... + +The poet who writes under the pseudonym of Dr. Owlglass proposed a new +ideal for Germany, on the seventieth anniversary of the birth of +Nietzsche (October 15th): not the superman, but at least--man. And Franz +Werfel realizes this ideal in poems thrilling with a mournful humanity, +which takes part in the sacrament of misery and death: + +"_We are bound together not only by our common words and deeds, but +still more by the dying glance, the last hours, the mortal anguish of +the breaking heart. And whether you bow down before the tyrant, or gaze +trembling into the beloved's countenance, or mark down your enemy with +pitiless glance, think of the eye that will grow dim, of the failing +breath, the parched lips and clenched hands, the final solitude, and the +brow that grows moist in the last agony.... Be kind.... Tenderness is +wisdom, kindness is reason[31].... We are strangers all upon this +earth, and die but to be reunited._"[32] + +But the one German poet who has written the serenest and loftiest words, +and preserved in the midst of this demoniacal war an attitude worthy of +Goethe, is Hermann Hesse. He continues to live at Berne, and, sheltered +there from the moral contagion, he has deliberately kept aloof from the +combat. All will remember his noble article in the _Neue Zuercher +Zeitung_ of November 3rd, "_O Freunde, nicht diese Toene!_" in which he +implored the artists and thinkers of Europe "to save what little peace" +might yet be saved, and not to join with their pens in destroying the +future of Europe. Since then he has written some beautiful poems, one +of which, an Invocation to Peace, is inspired with deep feeling and +classical simplicity, and will find its way to many an oppressed heart. + + Jeder hat's gehabt + Keiner hat's geschaetzt. + Jeden hat der suesse Quell gelabt. + O wie klingt der Name Friede jetzt! + + Klingt so fern und zag, + Klingt so traenenschwer, + Keiner weiss und kennt den Tag, + Jeder sehnt ihn vol Verlangen her.... + +("Each one possessed it, but no one prized it. Like a cool spring it +refreshed us all. What a sound the word Peace has for us now! + +"Distant it sounds, and fearful, and heavy with tears. No one knows or +can name the day for which all sigh with such longing.") + + * * * * * + +The attitude of the younger reviews is curious: for whereas the older, +traditional reviews (those which correspond to our _Revue des Deux +Mondes_ or our _Revue de Paris_) are more or less affected by military +fervor--thus, for instance, the _Neue Rundschau_, which printed Thomas +Mann's notorious vagaries on Culture and Civilization (_Gedanken im +Kriege_)--many of the younger ones affect a haughty detachment from +actual events. + +That impassive publication, _Blaetter fuer die Kunst_, over which broods +the invisible personality of Stefan George, published at the end of 1914 +a volume of poems of 156 pages, which did not contain a single line +referring to the war. A note at the end affirms that the points of view +of the various authors have not changed on account of recent events, and +anticipates the objection that "this is not the time for poetry," by the +saying of Jean Paul: "No period has so much need of poetry, as the one +which thinks it can do without it." + +_Die Aktion_, a vibrating, audacious Berlin review, with an ultra-modern +point of view, totally different from the calm impersonality of _Blaetter +fuer die Kunst_, stated in its issue of August 15, 1914, that it would +not concern itself with politics, but would contain only literature and +art. And if it finds room in its literary columns for the war poems sent +from the field of battle by the military doctors, Wilhelm Klemm and Hans +Kock, it is in consideration of their value as art, and not for the +vivacity of their patriotic sentiments; for it scoffs mercilessly at +the ridiculous bards of German Chauvinism, at Heinrich Vierordt, the +author of _Deutschland, hasse_, at the criminal poets who stir up hatred +with their false stories, and at Professor Haeckel. The dilettantism of +this review is extreme. Its weekly issues contain translations from the +French of Andre Gide, Peguy, and Leon Bloy, and reproductions of the +works of Daumier, Delacroix, Cezanne, Matisse, and R. de la Fresnaye: +(cubism flourishes in this Berlin review). The issue of October 24th is +devoted to Peguy, and contains, as frontispiece, Egon Schiele's portrait +of the man, who is honored by Franz Pfemfert, the editor, as "the purest +and most vigorous moral force in French literature of today." Let us +hasten to add, however, that, as is often the case on the other side of +the Rhine, they are carried away by their zeal in deploring his death as +of one of their countrymen, and in proclaiming themselves his heirs. But +the pride which admires is at least superior to the pride which +disparages. + +The most important of these young reviews is _Die Weissen Blaetter_; +important on account of the variety of questions it deals with, and the +value and number of its contributors, as well as for the +broad-mindedness of its editor--Rene Schickele. An Alsatian by birth, +he belongs to those who feel most acutely the bitterness of the present +struggle. After an interval of three months _Die Weissen Blaetter_, which +almost corresponds to our _Nouvelle Revue Francaise_, reappeared in +January last with the following declaration, akin to that of the _Revue +des Nations_, at Berne. "_It seems good to us to begin the work of +reconstruction, in the midst of the war, and to aid in preparing for the +victory of the spirit. The community of Europe is at present apparently +destroyed. Is it not the duty of all of us who are not bearing arms, to +live from today onwards according to the dictates of our conscience, as +it will be the duty of every German when once the war is over?_" + +By the side of these disinterested manifestoes about actual politics, +appear lengthy historical novels (_Tycho Brahe_ by Max Brod) and +satirical comedies by Carl Sternheim, who continues to scourge the upper +classes of German society, and the capitalists, for _Die Weissen +Blaetter_ is open to all questions of the day. But in spite of the actual +differences which must necessarily exist between a German and a French +review, we cannot but point out the frankly hostile attitude of these +writers to all the excesses of Chauvinism. The articles of Max Scheler, +"Europe and the War," show an impartial attitude which is entirely +praiseworthy. The review opens its columns to the loyal Annette Kolb, +who, as the daughter of a German father and of a French mother, suffers +keenly in this conflict between the parts of her nature, and has lately +raised a tempest in Dresden, where in a public lecture she had the +courage to admit her fidelity to both sides, and to express her regret +that Germany should fail to understand France. In the February number, +under the title "Ganz niedrich haengen!" there appeared a violent +repudiation of the _Krieg mit dem Maul_ (the war of tongues); "_If +journalists hope to inspire courage by insulting the enemy, they are +mistaken--we refuse such stimulants. We dare to maintain our opinion, +that the humblest volunteer of the enemy, who from an unreasoned but +exalted sentiment of patriotism, fires upon us from an ambush, knowing +well what he risks, is much superior to those journalists who profit by +the public feeling of the day, and under cover of high-sounding words of +patriotism do not fight the enemy but spit upon him._" + +Of all these young writers who are striving to preserve the integrity of +their minds against the force of national passions, the one whose +personality has been most exalted by this tempest, the most eloquent, +courageous, and decided of all is Wilhelm Herzog. He is the editor of +the _Forum_ at Munich, and like our own Peguy, when he began to publish +his _Cahiers de la Quinzaine_, he fills almost the whole of his review +with his own burning articles. The enthusiastic biographer of H. von +Kleist, he sees and judges the events of his own time with the eyes of +that indomitable spirit. The German censor attempts in vain to silence +him and to forbid the publication of the lectures of Spitteler and of +Annette Kolb; his indignation and cries of vengeful irony spread even to +us. He attacks bitterly the ninety-three intellectuals who "_fancy they +are all Ajaxes because they bray the loudest_," those politicians of the +school of Haeckel, who make a new division of the world, those patriotic +bards who insult other nations; he attacks Thomas Mann mercilessly, +scoffs at his sophistry, and defends France, the French Army,[33] and +French civilization against him; he points out that the great men of +Germany (Gruenwald, Duerer, Bach, and Mozart amongst others) have always +been persecuted, humiliated, and calumniated.[34] In an article entitled +"_Der neue Geist_,"[35] after having scoffed at the banality that has +reappeared in the German theaters, and the literary mediocrity of +patriotic productions, he asked where this "new spirit" may be found, +and this gives him an opportunity to demolish Ostwald and Lasson. + +"_Where is it to be found? In the Hochschulen? Have we not read that +incredibly clumsy_ (unwahrscheinlich plumpen) _appeal of the 99 +professors? Have we not appreciated the statements of that double +centenarian_ (des zweihundertjaehrige Mummelgreises) _mummy Lasson? When +I was studying philosophy as an undergraduate at the University of +Berlin, the theatre in which he lectured was a place of amusement_ +(Lachkabinett) _for us--nothing more. And today people take him +seriously! English, French, and Italian papers print his senile +babblings against Holland, as typical of the_ Stimmung _of the German +intellectuals. The wrong that these privy councillors and professors +have done us with their Aufklaerungsarbeit can hardly be measured. They +have isolated themselves from humanity by their inability to realize the +feelings of others._" + +In opposition to these false representatives of a nation, these cultured +gossips and political adventurers, he extols the silent ones, the great +mass of the people of all nations who suffer in silence; and he joins +with them in "the invisible community of sorrow." + +"_One who is suffering and knows that his sorrow is shared by millions +of other beings, will bear it calmly; he will accept it willingly even, +because he knows that he is enriched thereby, made stronger, more +tender, more humane._"[36] + +And he quotes the words of old Meister Eckehart: "_Suffering is the +fastest steed that will bear you to perfection._" + + * * * * * + +At the close of this summary review of the young writers of the war, a +place must be found for those whom the war has crushed--they counted +amongst the best. Ernst Stadler was an enthusiastic admirer of French +art and of the French spirit. He translated Francis Jammes, and on the +eve of his death, in November, he was writing to Stefan Zweig from the +trenches about the poems of Verlaine, which he was translating. The +unfortunate George Trakl, the poet of melancholy, was made lieutenant of +a sanitary column in Galicia, and the sight of so much suffering drove +him to despair and death. And there are many hidden tragedies, still +unrevealed. When they are made known, humanity will tremble in +contemplating its handiwork. + +I reflected, as doubtless many of my French readers have also done, in +reading through these German writings inspired by the war--writings +through which from time to time there passes a mighty breath of revolt +and sorrow--that our young writers are not writing "literature." Instead +of books they give us deeds, and their letters. And in re-reading some +of their letters I thought that ours had chosen the better part. It is +not for me now to point out the position that this heroic correspondence +will occupy, not only in our history but also in our literature. Into it +the flower of our youth has put all its life, its faith and its genius: +and for some of those letters I would give many of the finest lines of +the noblest poems. Whatever be the result of this war, and the opinion +as to its value later, it will be recognized that France has written on +paper, mud-stained and often blotted with blood, some of its sublimest +pages. Assuredly this war touches us more nearly than it does our +adversaries, for who of us would have the heart to write a play or a +novel whilst his country is in danger and his brothers dying? + +But I will make no comparisons between the two nations. For the present +the essential thing is to show that even in Germany there are certain +finer minds who are fighting against the spirit which we hate--the +spirit of grasping imperialism and inhuman pride, of military caste and +the megalomania of pedants. They are but a minority--we have no +illusions about that--and we ought to redouble our efforts on that +account to vanquish the common enemy. Why then should we trouble to make +these generous but feeble voices heard? Because their merit is the +greater for being so little heeded; because it is the duty of those who +are fighting for justice to render justice in their turn to all those +men, even when they dwell in a country in which the state represents the +violation of right by _Faustrecht_, who are defending with us the spirit +of liberty. + +_Journal de Geneve_, April 19, 1915. + + + + +XV. THE MURDER OF THE ELITE + + +The phrase is not new-coined today;[37] but the fact is. Never in any +period, have we seen humanity throwing into the bloody arena all its +intellectual and moral reserves, its priests, its thinkers, its +scholars, its artists, the whole future of the spirit--wasting its +geniuses as food for cannon. + +A great thing, doubtless, when the struggle is great, when a people +fights for an eternal cause, the fervor of which fires the whole nation, +from the smallest to the greatest; when it fuses all the egoisms, +purifies desire, and out of many souls makes one unanimous soul. But if +the cause be suspect or if it is tainted (as we judge that of our +adversaries to be), what will be the situation of a moral elite which +has preserved the sad and lofty privilege of perceiving at least a part +of the truth, and which must nevertheless fight and die and kill for a +faith which it doubts? + +Those passionate natures that are intoxicated by fighting or are +voluntarily blinded by the necessities of action are not troubled by +these questions. For them the enemy is a single mass; nothing else +exists for them but this, for they have to break it; it is their +function and their duty. And to each his special duty. But if minorities +do not exist for such men, they do exist for us who, since we are not +fighting, have the liberty and the duty to see every aspect of the +case--we who form part of the eternal minority, the minority which has +been, is, and always will be eternally oppressed. It is for us to hear +and to proclaim these moral sufferings! Plenty of others repeat or +invent the jubilant echoes of the struggle. May other voices be raised +to give the tragic accents of the fight and its sacred horror! + +I shall take my examples from the enemy camp, for several reasons: +because the German cause being from the first tainted with injustice, +the sufferings of the few who are just, and the still fewer who have +spiritual perceptions are greater there than elsewhere; because these +evidences appear openly in publications whose boldness the German +censorship has not perceived; because I bow with respect to the heroic +discipline of silence which France in fighting imposes on her +sufferings. (Would to God that this silence were not broken by those +who, trying to deny these sufferings, profane the grandeur of the +sacrifice by the revolting levity of their silly jests in newspapers +which are without either gravity or dignity.) + + * * * * * + +I have shown in the last chapter that a part of the intellectual youth +of Germany was far from sharing the war-madness of its elders. I cited +certain energetic reproofs delivered by these young writers to the +theorists of imperialism. And these writers are not, as one might think +from an article in the _Temps_ (though I gladly pay a tribute to its +honesty), merely a small group as narrow as that of our symbolists. They +count among them writers who appeal to a large public and who do not set +out in any way (except for the group of Stefan George) to write for a +_select few_--they wish to write for all. I stated, too, that the +boldest review of all, Wilhelm Herzog's _Forum_, was read in the German +trenches and received approbation thence. + +But what is more astonishing, this spirit of criticism has possessed +some of the combatants and even made its appearance among German +officers. In the November-December number of the _Friedens-Warte_, +published in Berlin, Vienna, and Leipzig, by Dr. Alfred H. Fried, there +occurs "An appeal to the Germanic peoples," addressed, at the end of +October, by Baron Marschall von Biberstein, Landrat of Prussia and +captain in the 1st Foot Guards reserve. This article was written in a +trench north of Arras, where on the 11th of November, Biberstein was +killed. He expresses unreservedly his horror of the war and his ardent +desire that it may be the last: "_That is the conviction of those at the +front who are witnesses of the unspeakable horrors of modern warfare._" +Even more praiseworthy is Biberstein's frankness when he decides to +begin a confession and a _mea culpa_ for the sins of Germany. "_The war +has opened my eyes_," he says, "_to our terrible unlovableness +(Unbeliebtheit). Everything has its cause; we must have given cause for +this hatred; and even in part have justified it.... Let us hope that it +will not be the least of the advantages of this war that Germany will +turn round on herself, will search out and recognize her faults and +correct them._" Unfortunately even this article is spoiled by Germanic +pride which, desiring a world peace, sets out to impose it on the world. +Herein it recalls in some respects the bellicose pacifism of the too +celebrated Ostwald. + +But another officer (of whom I spoke in my last chapter) the poet Fritz +von Unruh, first Lieutenant of Uhlans on the western front, has written +dramatic scenes in verse and prose. These have appeared recently under +the title _Before the Decision (Vor der Entscheidung)_. It is a dramatic +poem in which the author has noted his own impressions and his moral +transformations. The hero, who like himself, is an officer of Uhlans, +passes through various centers of the war and remains everywhere a +stranger; his soul is detached from murderous passions, he sees the +abominable reality until his sufferings from it amount to agony. The two +scenes reproduced by the _Neue Zuercher Zeitung_ show us a muddy and +bloodstained trench, where German soldiers, like beasts in a +slaughter-house, die or await death with bitter words--and officers +getting drunk on champagne around a 42mm. mortar, laughing and getting +excited till they fall beneath the weight of sleep and fatigue. + +From the first scene I take these terrible words of one of those who +wait in the trenches under fire of the machine guns, a _Dreissigjaehriger_ +(man of thirty). + + In my village they are laughing--they drink to each victory. They + slaughter us like butcher's cattle--and they say "It's war!" When + it is over, they are no fools, they will feast us for three years. + But the first cripple won't be grey headed before they will laugh + at his white hairs. + +And the Uhlan, possessed by horror in the midst of the massacre, falls +on his knees and prays: + + Thou who gavest life and takest it--how shall I recognize Thee? (In + these trenches strewn with mutilated bodies) I find Thee not. Does + the piercing cry of these thousands suffocated in the terrible + embrace of Death reach not up to Thee? Or is it lost in frozen + space? For whom does Thy Springtime blossom? For whom is the + splendor of Thy suns? For whom, O God? I ask it of thee in the name + of all those whose mouths are closed by courage and by fear in face + of the horror of Thy darkness: What heat is left within me? What + light of truth? Can this massacre be Thy will? Is it indeed Thy + will? + +(_He loses consciousness and falls._) + +A pain less lyrical, less ecstatic, more simple, more reflective, and +nearer to ourselves marks the sequence of _Feldpostbriefe_ of Dr. Albert +Klein, teacher in the Oberrealschule at Giessen and Lieutenant of the +Landwehr, killed on the 12th of February in Champagne.[38] Passing over +what are, perhaps, the most striking pages from the point of view of +artistic quality and power of thought, I will only give two extracts +from these letters which are likely to be of special interest to French +readers. + +The first describes for us with an unusual frankness the moral condition +of the German army: + + Brave, without care for his own life! Who is there among us that is + that? We all know too well our own worth and our own possibilities; + we are in the flower of our age: force is in our arms and in our + souls; and as no one willingly dies, no one is brave (_tapfer_) in + the usual sense of the word: or at least such are very rare. It is + just because bravery is so rare in life, it is just for that that + we expend so much religion, poetry, and thought (and this begins + already at school), in celebrating as the highest fate death for + one's fatherland, until it attains its climax in the false heroism + which makes such a sensation about us in newspapers and speeches + and which is so cheap--and also in the true heroism of a small + number who do risk themselves and lead on the others.... We do our + duty, we do what we _ought_; but it is a passive virtue.... When I + read in the papers the scribblings of those who have a bad + conscience because they are safely in the rear--when I read this + talk which makes every soldier into a hero, I feel hurt. Heroism + is a rare growth, and you cannot build on it a citizen army. To + keep such an army together the men must respect their superiors, + and even fear them more than the enemy. And the superiors must be + conscientious, do their duty well, know their business thoroughly, + decide rapidly, and have control of their nerves. When we read the + praises which those behind the line write of us, we blush. Thank + God, old-fashioned, robust shame is not dead in us.... Ah! my dear + friends, those who are here don't speak so complacently of death, + of disease, of sacrifice, and of victory as do those who behind the + line ring the bells, make speeches, and write newspapers. The men + here accustom themselves as best they may to the bitter necessity + of suffering and of death if fate wills; but they know and see that + many noble sacrifices, innumerable, innumerable sacrifices have + already been made, and that already for a long while we shall have + had more than enough of destruction on our side as well as the + other. It is precisely when one has to look suffering in the face + as I have that a tie begins to be formed that unites one to those + over there, on the other side (and one that unites you too with + them, my friends! Yes, surely you feel it too, don't you?) If I + come back from here (which I scarcely hope for any more) my dearest + duty will be to soak myself in the study and the thoughts of those + who have been our enemies. I wish to reconstruct my nature on a + wider basis.... And I believe that it will be easier after this war + than after any other to be a human being. + +The second fragment is the account of a touching encounter with a French +prisoner: + + Yesterday evening I was strangely touched. I happened to see a + convoy of prisoners and I talked to one of them, a colleague of + mine, Professor of classical philology in the college of F----. + Such an open-minded, intelligent man, and with such a fine military + bearing, like all his fellows, although they had just been through + a terrible experience of machine-gun fire.... It was a proof to me + of the senselessness of the war. I thought how much one would have + liked to be the friend of these men, who are so near us in their + education, their mode of life, the circle of their thought and + their interest. We started talking about a book on Rousseau and we + began to dispute like old philologists.... How much we are alike in + force and worth! And how little truth there is in what our papers + tell us of the shaken and exhausted conditions of the French + troops! As true, or rather as untrue, as what the French newspapers + write about us.... My French colleague showed in his remarks such a + balanced mind and such understanding and admiration of German + thought! To think that we were made so clearly to be friends and + that we had to be separated! I was altogether overcome, and sat + down crushed by it. I thought and thought and could not escape my + mood by any sophistry. No end, no end to war, which for nearly six + months now has swallowed in its gulf men, fortunes, and happiness! + And this feeling is the same with us as with the other side. It is + always the same picture: we do the same thing, we suffer the same + thing, we are the same thing. And it is precisely for this reason + that we are so bitterly at enmity.... + +The same accent of troubled anguish, together with a despair which at +moments nearly reaches to madness, and at others breathes a religious +fervor, are seen in the letters of a German soldier to a teacher in +German Switzerland. (We have known of these at the Prisoners' Agency for +three or four months and they were published in _Foi et Vie_ of April +15th.[39] They have been passed over in silence, so we shall persist in +calling attention to them, for they thoroughly deserve it). In these +letters, which cover from the second fortnight of August to the end of +December, we see from the 25th of August onwards the evidence of a +desire for peace among the German soldiers. + + We all, even those who were hottest for the fight at the beginning, + want nothing now but peace, our officers just as much as + ourselves.... Convinced as we are of the necessity to conquer, + warlike enthusiasm does not exist among us; we fulfil our duty, but + the sacrifice is hard. We suffer in our souls.... I cannot tell you + the sufferings I endure.... + + September 20th. A friend writes to me: "On the 20th to 25th of + August I took part in big battles; since then I suffer morally even + to complete exhaustion, both physical and spiritual. My soul finds + no repose.... This war will show us how much of the beast still + survives in man, and this revelation will cause us to make a great + step out of animalism: if not, it is all up with us!" + + November 28th. (_A splendid passage where one almost hears the + voice of Tolstoi._) What are all the torments of war compared to + the thoughts that obsess us night and day? When I am on some hill + from which my view commands the plain, this is the idea which + ceaselessly tortures me: down there in the valley the war rages; + those brown lines which furrow the landscape are full of men who + are facing one another as enemies. And up there on the hill + opposite you there is, perhaps, a man who, like you, is + contemplating the woods and the blue sky and perhaps ruminating the + same thoughts as you, his enemy! This continual proximity might + make one mad! And one is tempted to envy one's comrades who can + kill time in sleeping and playing cards. + + December 17th. The desire for peace is intense in every one; at + least, in all those who are at the front and who are obliged to + assassinate and be assassinated. The newspapers say that it's + hardly possible to restrain the warlike ardor of the fighters.... + They lie--consciously or unconsciously. Our chaplains in their + sermons dispute the legend that our military ardor is + slackening.... You can hardly believe how such tittle-tattle annoys + us. Let them be silent, and let them not talk about things of which + they can know nothing! Or better still, let them come not as + almoners who keep to the rear, but into the firing-line, rifle in + hand! Perhaps then they will get to know of the inner changes which + take place in so many of us. According to these chaplains, any one + who is without warlike enthusiasm is not a man such as our age + demands. To me it seems that we are greater heroes than the others, + we, who without being upheld by warlike enthusiasm, accomplish + faithfully our duty, while hating war with our whole souls.... They + talk of a holy war ... I know of no holy war. I only know of one + war which is the sum of all that is inhuman, impious, and bestial + in man; it is God's chastisement and a call to repentance for the + people that throws itself into war or lets itself be drawn into it. + God sends men through this hell so that they may learn to love + heaven. For the German people this war seems to me to be a + punishment and a call to repentance,--and most of all for our + German Church. I have friends who suffer at the idea of being + unable to do anything for the fatherland. Let them stay at home + with a calm conscience! All depends on their peaceful work. But let + the war enthusiasts come! Perhaps they will learn to keep silent. + + * * * * * + +"Why publish these pages?" I shall be asked by some people in France. +"What good is it, when once war is let loose, to arouse pity for our +adversaries, at the risk of blunting the ardor of the combatants?"--I +answer, because it is the truth, and because the truth substantiates our +judgment, the judgment of the whole world against the German leaders and +their policy. What their armies have done we know; but that they were +able to do it containing as they did such elements as those whose +confessions we have just heard, incriminates still more deeply their +masters. From the depths of the battlefield, these voices of a +sacrificed minority rise up as a vengeful condemnation of the +oppressors. To the accusations drawn up against predatory Empires and +their inhuman pride, in the name of violated right, of outraged humanity +by the victim peoples and by the combatants, is added the cry of pain of +the nobler souls of their own people whom the bad shepherds who let +loose this war have led and constrained into murder and madness. To +sacrifice one's body is not the worst suffering, but also to sacrifice, +to deny, to kill one's own soul!--You who die at least for a just cause, +and who, full of sap and loaded with faith, fall like ripe fruit, how +sweet is your lot beside this torture! But we shall so act that these +sufferings shall not be vain. + +Let the conscience of humanity hear and accept their complaint! It will +resound in the future above the glory of battles; and whether she wills +or no, History will place it on her register. History will do justice +between the hangmen and their peoples. And the peoples will learn how to +deliver themselves from their hangmen. + +_Journal de Geneve_, June 14, 1915. + + + + +XVI. JAURES + + +Battles are being fought under our eyes in which thousands of men are +dying, yet the sacrifice of their lives does not always influence the +issue of the combat. In other cases the death of a single man may be a +great battle lost for the whole of humanity. The murder of Jaures was +such a disaster. + +Whole centuries were needed to produce such a life; rich civilizations +of North and South, of past and present, spread out on the good soil of +France, matured beneath our Western skies. The mysterious chance which +combines elements and forces will not easily produce a noble spirit like +his a second time. + +Jaures is a type, almost unique in modern times, of the great political +orator who is also a great thinker, and who combines vast culture with +penetrating observation, and moral grandeur with energetic activity. We +must go back to antiquity to find one who, like him, could stir the +crowd and give pleasure to the few; pour out his overflowing genius not +only in his speeches and social treatises, but also in his philosophical +and historical works;[40] and leave on all things the impress of his +personality, the furrow of his robust labor, the seeds of his +progressive mind. I have listened to him often in the Chamber, at +socialist congresses, at meetings held on behalf of oppressed nations; +he even did me the honor of presenting my _Danton_ to the people of +Paris. Again I see his full face, calm and happy like that of a kindly, +bearded ogre; his small eyes, bright and smiling; eyes as quick to +follow the flight of ideas as to observe human nature. I see him pacing +up and down the platform, walking with heavy steps like a bear, his arms +crossed behind his back, and turning sharply to hurl at the crowd, in +his monotonous, metallic voice, words like the call of a trumpet, which +reached the farthest seats in the vast amphitheatre, and went straight +to the heart, making the soul of the whole multitude leap in one united +emotion. What beauty there was in the sight of these proletarian masses +stirred by the visions which Jaures evoked from distant horizons, +imbibing the thought of Greece through the voice of their tribune! + +Of all this man's gifts the most fundamental was to be essentially a +_man_--not the man of a single profession, or class, or party, or +idea--but a complete, harmonious, and free man. His all-comprehensive +nature could be the slave of nothing. The highest manifestations of life +flowed together and met in him. His intelligence demanded unity,[41] his +heart was full of a passion for liberty,[42] and this twofold instinct +protected him alike from party despotism and anarchy. His spirit sought +to encompass all things, not in order to do violence to them, but to +bring them into harmony. Above all, he had the power of seeing the +_human_ element in all things, and this universal sympathy was equally +averse to narrow negation and fanatical affirmation. All intolerance +inspired him with horror.[43] + +He had put himself at the head of a great revolutionary party, but it +was with the desire "of saving the great work of democratic revolution +from the sickening and brutal odor of blood, murder, and hatred which +still clings to the memory of the middle-class Revolution." In his own +name, and in the name of his party, he demanded "with regard to all +doctrines, respect for the human personality and for the spirit which is +manifested in each." The mere feeling of the moral antagonism which +exists between man and man, even when there is no open conflict, the +sense of the invisible barriers which render human brotherhood +impossible, was painful to him. He could not read those words of +Cardinal Newman in which he speaks of the gulf of damnation, which, even +in this life, is fixed between men, without having "a sort of +nightmare.... He saw the abyss ready to gape beneath the feet of fragile +and unhappy human beings who think themselves bound together by a +community of sympathy and suffering"--the sadness of this thought +obsessed him. + +To fill in this abyss of misunderstanding was his life-work. Herein lay +the originality of his standpoint, that although he was the spokesman of +the most advanced parties, he became the continual mediator between +conflicting ideas. He sought to unite them all in the service of +progress and of the common good. In philosophy he united idealism and +realism--in history, the past and the present--in politics, the love of +his own country and a respect for other countries.[44] He refrained from +denouncing that which has been, in the name of that which is to be, as +many so-called free-thinkers have done; and far from condemning, he +upheld the theories of all those who had been fighters in past +centuries, to whatever party they might have belonged. "We reverence the +past," he said. "Not in vain have blazed the hearths of all the +generations of mankind--but it is we who are advancing, who are +fighting for a new ideal, it is we who are the true inheritors of the +hearth of our ancestors. We have taken the flame thereof, you have +preserved only the ashes." (January, 1909.) In his Introduction to +_l'Histoire socialiste de la Revolution_, in which he attempts to +reconcile Plutarch, Michelet, and Karl Marx, he writes: "We hail with +equal respect all men of heroic will. History, even when conceived as a +study of economic forms, will never dispense with individual valor and +nobility. The moral level of society tomorrow will be determined by the +standard of morality of conscience today. So that, to offer the examples +of all the heroic fighters who for the past century have been inspired +by an ideal and held death in sublime contempt, is to do revolutionary +work." In everything he touches he achieves a generous synthesis of +life; he imposes his grand panoramic conception of the universe, the +sense of the manifold and moving unity of all things. This admirable +equilibrium of countless elements presupposes in the man who achieves it +magnificent health of body and of mind, a mastery of his whole being. +And Jaures possessed this mastery, and because of it he was the pilot of +European democracy. + +How clear and far reaching was his foresight! In years to come, when the +record of the war of today is set down, he will appear therein as a +terrible witness. Was there anything he did not foresee? One needs only +to read through his speeches during the last ten years.[45] It is yet +too early, in the midst of the conflict, to quote freely his predictions +concerning the coming retribution. Let us recall only his agonized +presentiment, ever since the year 1905, of the monstrous war which was +imminent;[46] his consciousness "of the antagonism, now muffled, now +acute, but always profound and terrible, between Germany and England" +(November 18, 1909);[47] his denunciation of the secret dealings of +European finance and diplomacy, dealings which are encouraged by the +"torpor of public spirit"; his cry of alarm at "the sensational lies of +the press, actuated by the rotten system of capitalism, sowing panic and +hatred, and playing cynically with the lives of millions of men, through +mere financial considerations or delirious pride"; his contemptuous +words for those whom he calls "the jockeys of his country"; his clear +perception of all responsibilities;[48] his foreknowledge of the +domesticated attitude which would be adopted in case of war by the +Social-democratic party of Germany, to whom he showed, as in a mirror +(at the Amsterdam Congress in 1904) their haughty weakness, their lack +of revolutionary tradition, their want of parliamentary strength, their +"formidable powerlessness";[49] of the attitude which certain leaders of +French Socialism, too, and amongst others Jules Guesde, would maintain +in the conflict between the great States of Europe;[50] and, looking +even beyond the war, his premonition of the consequences, near and +remote, national and international, of this conflict of nations. + +How would he have acted had he lived? The proletariat of Europe looked +to him for guidance, and had faith in him--Camille Huysmans has said so +in the speech delivered at his grave in the name of the Workers' +International.[51] There can be no doubt that when he had fought against +the war until all hope of preventing it was gone, he would have yielded +loyally to the common duty of national defense and taken part in it with +all his might. He had announced this point of view at the Congress in +Stuttgart, in 1907, in full agreement therein with Vandervelde and +Bebel: "If, whatever the circumstances, a nation were to refuse from the +outset to defend itself, it would be entirely at the mercy of the +Governments of violence, barbarism, and reaction.... A unity of mankind +which was the result of the absorption of conquered nations by one +dominating nation would be a unity realized in slavery." On his return +to Paris, in giving an account of the Congress to French Socialists +(September 7, 1907, at the Tivoli Vaux-Hall), he impressed upon them +their double duty--war against war, so long as it is only a menace upon +the horizon, and in the hour of danger war in defense of national +independence. For this great European was also a great Frenchman.[52] +Yet it is certain, too, that the firm accomplishment of his patriotic +duty would not have prevented him from maintaining his human ideals, and +watching with untiring eyes for every opportunity of reconstructing the +shattered unity. Certainly he would not have allowed the vessel of +socialism to drift, as his feeble successors have done. + + * * * * * + +He has passed from us. But the reflection of his luminous genius, his +kindness in the bitter struggle, his indestructible optimism even in the +midst of disaster, shine above the carnage of Europe, over which the +dusk is gathering, like the splendor of the setting sun. + +There is one page which he wrote, which cannot be read without +emotion--an immortal page in which he represents the noble Herakles, +resting after his labors on the maternal earth: + +"There are hours," he says, "when in feeling the earth beneath our feet, +we experience a joy deep and tranquil as the earth herself. How often +on my journey along footpaths and across fields I have realized suddenly +that it was indeed the earth on which I trod, that I belonged to her, as +she belonged to me! Then without thinking I went more slowly, because it +was not worth while to hasten across her surface, because I was +conscious of her and possessed her at each step I took, and my soul was +moving within her depths. How many times at the fall of day, as I lay by +the side of a ditch, my eyes turned towards the faint blue of the +eastern sky, I have suddenly realized that the earth was speeding on her +journey hastening from the fatigues of the day and the limited horizons +which the sun illumines, and rushing with prodigious force towards the +serenity of night and unlimited horizons, and bearing me with her. I +felt in my body as in my soul, and in the earth herself as in my body, +the thrill of this journey, and a strange sweetness in those blue spaces +which opened out before us, without a shock, without a fold, without a +murmur. Oh! how much deeper and more intense is this kinship of our +flesh with the earth, than the vague and wandering kinship of our eyes +with the starry heavens. How much less beautiful the night with its +stars would be to us, did we not feel ourselves at the same time bound +to the earth." + +He has returned to the earth--that earth which belonged to him, that +earth to which he belonged. They have again taken possession of each +other, and his spirit is even now warming and humanizing her. Beneath +the torrents of blood shed upon his tomb the new life and the peace of +tomorrow are already springing. It was a favorite and often repeated +thought of Jaures, as of Heraclitus of old, that nothing can interrupt +the flow of things, that "peace is only a form or aspect of war, war +only a form or aspect of peace, and what is conflict today is the +beginning of the reconciliation of tomorrow." + +R. R. + +_Journal de Geneve_, August 2, 1915. + + + + +NOTES + + +TO PAGE 19 ("LETTER TO GERHART HAUPTMANN") + +The letter to Gerhart Hauptmann, written after the destruction of +Louvain, and in the stress of the emotion aroused by the first news, was +provoked by a high-sounding article of Hauptmann which appeared a few +days previously. In that letter he rebutted the accusation of barbarism +hurled against Germany, and returned it ... against Belgium. The article +ended as follows: + +" ... I assure M. Maeterlinck that no one in Germany thinks of imitating +the act of his 'civilized nation.' We prefer to be and to remain the +German barbarians for whom the women and the children of our enemies are +sacred. I can assure him that we never thoughtlessly massacre and make +martyrs of Belgian women and children. Our witnesses are on our +frontiers; the socialist beside the bourgeois, the peasant beside the +savant, and the prince beside the workman: and all fight with a full +realization of the object, for a noble and rich national treasure, for +internal and external goods which aid the progress and the ascent of +humanity." + + +TO PAGE 41 ("ABOVE THE BATTLE") + +My enemies have not failed to make use of this passage to attribute to +me sentiments of contempt with regard to the peoples of Asia and Africa. +This charge is all the less justified in that I have precious +friendships amongst the intellectuals of Asia, with whom I have remained +in correspondence during this war. These friends have been so little +misled as to my real thought that one of them, a leading Hindu writer, +Ananda Coomaraswamy, has dedicated to me an admirable essay which +appeared in the _New Age_ (December 1914), entitled "A World Policy for +India," but-- + +1. Asiatic troops, recruited amongst races of professional warriors, in +no way represent the thought of Asia, as Coomaraswamy agrees. + +2. The heroism of the troops of Africa and Asia is not under discussion. +There was no need for the hecatombs, which have been made during the +past year, to evoke admiration for their splendid devotion. + +3. As regards barbarism, I am glad to confess that now the "white-skins" +can no longer reproach "skins, black, red, or yellow" in this respect. + +4. It is not the latter but the former whom I blame. I denounce today +once more with as much vigor as fourteen months ago, the short-sighted +policy which has introduced Africa and Asia[53] into the quarrels of +Europe. The future will justify my indictment. + +R. R. + + * * * * * + +PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. + + + + +INDEX + + +Abattoir of Ypres and Dixmude, the, 103. + +Absurdity, a ferocious, 47. + +Academicians and Professoren, the voice of, 153. + +Academy of moral science, the, 44. + +Address to the Civilized Nations, 60. + +Ador, M. Gustave, 83. + +Adversary, A Frenchman does not judge his, unheard, 17, 31. + +_Agence internationale des prisonniers de guerre_, 83. + +Ajax, the madness of, 78. + +Albert, King, 93. + +Allies, the, 73, 98. + +Allophyles, 44. + +Angell, Norman, 137. + +Apostles, rival, 45. + +Architecture like Rheims, a piece of, 24. + +Archbishop of Canterbury, 12, 145. + +Arguments, furious, 119. + +Armies of the Marne and Meuse, 40. + +Art, 16. + +Aryan race, 44. + +Asia and Africa, forces of, 99; + ethnological signification of the terms of, 194. + +Atrocities committed in Flanders, 25; + in Russia, 70. + +Attila, 21. + +_Auskunfts- und Hilfsstelle fuer Deutsche im Ausland und Auslaender + in Deutschland_, 146. + +Austerlitz, 45. + +Austria, 50. + +Authors of these wars, criminal, 42. + + +Babut, C. E., 76. + +Bach, 44, 163. + +Baker, M. P., J. Allen-, 145. + +Banking and war, the justification of, 110. + +Baptism of blood, 152. + +Barbarians from the poles and those from the equator, 41, 44. + +Barres, 44. + +Baumgarten, D., 146. + +Bebel, 189. + +Bees of Holy Writ, the, 91. + +Beethoven, 58. + +Behring, 61. + +Belgium, the neutrality of noble, 20, 87, 93, 94. + +Bennett, E. K., 12. + +Bergson, 43. + +Bishops, 46. + +Bismarck, Prince, 45. + +Blind loyalty, 26. + +Bloody soil, 18. + +Bonfire, stirring up the, 42. + +Books of every kind and of every color, 77. + +Boris Godunov, 59. + +Brotherhood, 16, 101. + +Brueghel, the stumbling blind men of, 30. + +Bucher, Dr., of Strasbourg, 104. + +Bull in the arena, a, 28. + + +Caesar, 121. + +_Cambridge Magazine, The_, 11. + +Cardinals, 46. + +Caste, a military and feudal, 50. + +Catalonia, the thinkers of, 122. + +Catechism of Force, 139. + +Censor, the German, 163. + +Central Bureau, the, 146. + +Chamberlain, H. S., 28. + +Chauvinism, 38, 147, 160. + +Christianity and socialism, 45. + +Christians of today, 48. + +Cingalese, 41. + +City of God, 54. + +Civilization, the common trunk of our, 16, 41. + +Civil war, a, 123. + +Combatants, compassion and kindness between the, 101. + +Combats, strange, 43. + +Comparisons between the two nations, 167. + +Congress in Stuttgart in 1907, the, 189. + +Contagion, can we not resist this, 47. + +Coomaraswamy, Ananda, 194. + +Cornelienne, 100. + +Correvon, Rev. Ch., 110. + +Cosmic force, 11. + +Cossack avalanche, the, 37, 41. + +Coster, Charles de, 95. + +Courtney, Lord and Lady, of Penwith, 145. + +Cubism, 160. + +Cyclone, the, 46. + +Czarism, the ravenous greed of, 50, 60. + + +Danger for Europe, grave, 99. + +D'Annunzio, 44. + +Dante, 25. + +Dehmel, 44, 61, 154. + +"_Der neue Geist_," 163. + +Destiny of nations, 10. + +De Unamuno, Miguel, 29. + +_Deutschland Ueber Alles_, 44. + +Dickinson, Lowes, 10. + +Dickinson, Right-Hon. W. H., 145. + +Dilettantism, neronian, 47. + +Dogs of war, the, 2. + +Dollfus, M. Max., 83. + +Don Quixote, 95. + +Dostoievsky, 59, 61. + +Dryander, Dr. Ernst, 76. + +Dunois, Amedee, 14. + +Duerer, 163. + +Dutch Anti-War Council, 127. + +Duty, to seek truth in the midst of error, 26, 169. + + +Eagles, the three rapacious, 50. + +Eckehart, Meister, 165. + +Egyptians, 41. + +Elite of the World, the, 23. + +Emergency committee for the assistance of Germans, Austrians, 144. + +Emerson's, a saying of, 117. + +Enemies, "for a year I (Rolland) have been rich in," 18. + +England, all the hatred is turned against, 102, 145. + +Enthusiasm, heroic, earnest, and even religious, 38. + +Ephebi of old calmly going to sacrifice, the, 39. + +Epic, this monstrous, 43. + +Epidemic of homicidal fury, an, 43. + +Esthonian nations, 66. + +Eucken, 43. + +Europe, a mutilated, 43, 123. + +Eycks, Van, 95. + + +Faith in the virtues of one's own nation, 133. + +Fatality, 20; of war, 42. + +Father, all men are sons of the same, 106. + +Fatherland, our earthly, 54. + +Finns, the, 67. + +Ferriere, M. Adolphe, 89, 168. + +Flogged, the privilege of being, 70. + +Foerster, Professor W., 146. + +Fram, Andrea, 156. + +France is ruined, if, 20; + the true, 98; + sublime history, 166. + +Frank, 45. + +Fratricidal struggle, 90. + +Fried, Dr. Alfred H., 171. + +Friendly relations exist between the prisoners and their guards, 81. + +Fry, Mr. Roger, 11. + +Funeral pyre, Europe ascending its, 41. + + +Galilean barque, the, 143. + +George, Stefan, 159, 170. + +German prisoners concentrated in France, 81; + my, friends, 99. + +Germany, 19; + intellectual elite of, 25; + Kultur, 28; + great minds of, 30, 31; + and England, 187. + +God, the great captain, 46. + +Goethe, our, 19, 58. + +Gondolf, Friedr., 29. + +Good and evil, the eternal struggle between, 78. + +Gorki, 61. + +Greatness, intellectual and moral, 19. + +Grodtken, 58. + +Gruenwald, 163. + +Guesde, Jules, 188. + +Guilbeaux, Henri, 14. + + +Haeckel, Professor Ernst, 61, 113, 160. + +Hague Court, the, 52. + +Hallucinations, passionate, 26. + +Hangmen, the people will learn how to deliver themselves from their, 180. + +Harden, Maximilian, 115. + +Harmony of races, a, 55. + +Harrach, Helene Graefin, 146. + +Hatred, the wounds of, 91, 100. + +Hauptmann, 19, 43, 61, 98, 155. + +Herakles, 190. + +Hercules, 41. + +Heretics, 56. + +Herve, 45. + +Herzog, Wilhelm, 57, 163, 170. + +Hesse, Hermann, 157. + +High Court, a moral, 51. + +Hildebrand, 61. + +History will pass judgment on each of the nations at war, 15. + +Holy Guillotine, 110. + +Holy War against Russia, a, 65. + +Holz, Arno, 155. + +Honor of their state, to defend the, 26. + +Hugo, Victor, 120. + +Human Mind, the force of, 2. + +Humanity is a symphony of great collective souls, 54. + +Humperdinck, 61. + +Hungarians in distress, 145. + +Huns, the, 22. + +Huysmans, Camille, 188. + + +Idealism and German force, 35. + +Ideas have no existence in themselves, 118. + +Idols, the history of humanity is the history of, 108. + +Imperialism, military, financial, feudal, republican, social + or intellectual, 50, 98. + +Imperial Rome, 48. + +Insulted without even a hearing, 16. + +Intellectual elite of Russia, the, 60. + +Intellectual leaders, Europe's, 8. + +Intellectuals, guilty, 26; + of Germany, 22; + the criminal determination of ninety-three, 28; + provide terrible examples of hatred, 82; + French, 116; + the furious, 151. + +Intelligence of the mind, 120. + +Intelligent few, the, 109. + +Internationalism, intellectual, 111. + +International union of women suffrage societies, 146. + +Invisible tribunal of humanity, 53. + +Ideologues, 2. + +Invocation to Peace, 158. + +Islam, threats of disturbance in the world of, 99. + + +Japanese, 41. + +Jaures, 11; + a favorite thought of, 192; + democracy, 186; + the murder of, 181. + +Jean-Christophe, 8. + +Jena, the bells of, 33. + +Jesuits, 46. + +Jesus, 15. + +Journalists, 162. + +Jupiter of the Vatican, 48. + +Justice to small nations, 74. + + +Kalish, 58. + +Kant, sons of, 31, 37. + +Kill! Kill! I hate the war, 79. + +Kipling, 44. + +Klein, Dr. Albert, 173. + +Klemm, Wilhelm, 159. + +Klinger, 61. + +Knights-errant of the world, the, 39. + +Kock, Hans, 159. + +Kolb, Annette, 162, 163. + +Kropotkin, 61. + +Krupp, 109. + +Kultur, 28. + +Kulturtraeger, 67. + + +Labor parties did not desire war, 42. + +_Lamm, der_, 155. + +Lamprecht, Karl, 44. + +_La Patrie_, 23. + +Lasson, 164. + +Law is the friend of the weak, 28. + +Laws of Nations, the, 52. + +Lawyers, 7. + +Lee, Vernon, 137. + +Legand, Rene, 187. + +Leibnitz, 58. + +Leonhard, Rudolf, 156. + +_Le Paquet du prisonnier de guerre_, 149. + +Letter to Romain Rolland, 64. + +Letts, the, 66. + +Levites, 46. + +Liberator, men make a master of every, 108. + +Liberty against barbarism, 57. + +Liberty, fighting for the awakening of, 38; + of the world, 64; + the wild violet of, 119. + +Liebermann, 61. + +Liebknecht, 45. + +Life Force, the, 9. + +Life, the value of, 53. + +Lissauer, 155. + +Lithuanians, 66. + +Louvain, 21. + +Love of our country, 47. + +Luzzatti, 47. + + +Maeterlinck, 95, 193. + +Mahler, 59. + +Maladresse, 29. + +Malines, 21. + +Manifesto of Intellectuals, 27. + +Mann, Thomas, 28, 113, 163. + +Marck, Ludwig, 156. + +Marx, Karl, 186. + +Maury, M. Lucien, 168. + +Medicines for the soul, 91. + +Mesnil, Jacques, 14. + +Meyer, M. Arthur, 46. + +Michelet, 186. + +Middle Ages, the great monasteries of the early, 55. + +Militarization of the intellect, 63. + +Minds, the effort of great, 107. + +Minority vitally interested in maintaining these hatreds, 49. + +Miracle, men call the sudden appearance of a hidden reality a, 94. + +Mobilization of the forces of the pen, this, 60. + +Modernism, the noble chimera of, 49. + +Moerlins, Frau Marie von Buelow-, 146. + +Moliere, 113. + +Moloch, 48, 108. + +Moral epidemic, 11. + +Moral triumph, France has won in this war a prodigious, 100. + +Moroccans, 41. + +Mozart, 163. + + +Nations subject to Russia are asking agonized questions, 73. + +Natorp, Paul, 146. + +"Necessity knows no law," 31. + +_Nederlandsche Anti-Oorlog Raad_, 127. + +Neutral countries are too much effaced, 52. + +Neutrality, Belgium's, 34. + +Newman, Cardinal, 184. + +Newspaper-press of the warring nations, 133. + +Newspapers, of both countries give publicity only to prejudiced stories + unfavorable to the enemy, 81; + jests in, 170; + those who behind the line ring the bells, make speeches, and write, 175; + they lie--consciously or unconsciously, 178. + +Nietzsche, 58. + +Nivernais, my own little town in the, 89. + +Nordhausen, Richard, 155. + +_Notre-Dame la Misere_, 91. + + +Ode to a Howitzer, an, 155. + +Official agencies, 29. + +Officialdom, heroes of, 91. + +Omega workshops, the, 12. + +Organization, 111. + +Ostwald, 28, 111, 164. + + +Paladins of God, the, 39. + +Pamphleteer, a maladroit, 17. + +Pangermanism, 68. + +Panslavism, 68, 71. + +Passion, the language of, 143. + +Patrimony of the human race, the, 21. + +Patriotism, the true formula of, 185. + +Peace, man deteriorates in, 28; + armed, 39; + of Europe, the, 137. + +Pedants of Barbarism, 29. + +Pedants, the megalomania of, 167. + +Peguy, Charles, 31, 32, 37. + +Pen dipped in blood, a, 79; + armies of the, 144. + +Perrier, E., 44. + +Perrette of the fable, 113. + +Petzold, 155. + +Pioch, Georges, 14. + +Plutarch, 186. + +Polemics is like a theft from these unfortunates, time devoted to, 98. + +Policy, German, 20. + +Pontiff, the new, 49. + +Pope Pius X died of grief to see the outbreak of this war, 48. + +Prelude to the great war of the nations, 2. + +Prenant, Mr., 52. + +Press, the war-preaching French, English and German, 49; + an unscrupulous, 80; + bullies of the, 91. + +Prisoner, the moral situation of the military, 82. + +Prisoners, civil, 85; + of war, 97; + Agency, 177. + +Priests are marching with the colors, 46. + +Problem of freedom, the, 7. + +Protest, the poverty of, 17. + +Proudhon, 2. + +Prussian Imperialism, 26, 50, 57. + +Psychologic necessity, 131. + +Public opinion, 53. + +Public safety, the famous doctrine of, 31. + +Publicists trying to rouse the energies of the nation, 102. + + +Questions which divided you, the, 41. + + +Race, the idol of, 108. + +Racial frenzy, 48. + +Rade, Martin, 146. + +Rappoport, Charles, 187. + +Reason, the unity of, 16. + +Red Cross, the, 82, 88. + +Redeemer, the, 33. + +Reger, 59. + +Regnier, de, 44. + +Renaitour, J. M., 14. + +Renan, 53. + +Repatriation, 90. + +Reprisals, a desire for, 100. + +Responsible for the longer duration of this horrible war? who are, 134. + +Retaliation, 51. + +Revolution, an internal, 73. + +Rheims, 9; + Cathedral, 23, 24. + +Rhine, your neighbors across the, 105. + +Riga, 66. + +Rivalry, the world-wide tragedy of, 128. + +Rodin, 17. + +Roentgen, 61. + +Rolland, Romain, 8; + letters to, 64; + attacks against, 97. + +Roman Empire at the time of the Tetrarchy, the, 41. + +Rotten, Dr. Elizabeth, 146. + +Rouanet, 14. + +Rubens, 21. + +Rulers, 42. + +Rumors circulate only too easily, 80. + +Russia, our alliance with, 57; + nations subject to, 73; + generous promises of, 140. + +Russian, autocracy, the, 50; + writers have been our guides for the last forty years, 59; + the hand of the, Government, 70; + evils of, Government, 71; + domination very oppressive, 73. + + +Sacrifice, the ecstasy of, 32. + +Sacrilegious conflict, a, 40. + +Sancho Panza, 95. + +Savageries, 21. + +Scheler, Max, 162. + +Schickele, Rene, 160. + +Schleinitz, Nora Freiin von, 146. + +Schneeli, Dr., 81. + +Schrenck, 110. + +Schultze, Siegmund-, 146. + +Seeherrschaft of Britain, 145. + +Seippel, M. Paul, 52. + +Senegalese, 41. + +Sepoys, 41. + +Sermon on the Mount, the, 110. + +Shaw, Bernard, 43. + +Shameful record, a, 17. + +Sikhs, 41. + +Silence itself is an act, at such a time, 22; + the heroic discipline of France in, 170. + +Sin, the unpardonable, 32. + +Socialism, the leaders of, 40; + drifting, 190. + +Socialists, German, 45; + Italian, 46; + unite and attack both Kaiser and Czar, 49. + +Society of friends of foreigners in distress, 146. + +Sons of sorrow, geniuses are, 34. + +Soudanese, 41. + +Spirit above flesh, put, 24; + is the light, the, 54. + +Spiritual forces, 10; + guides of the human race, 151. + +Sport, this bloody and puerile, 42. + +Stepping-stone, a human, 10. + +Stern, Josef Luitpol, 155. + +Sterheim, Carl, 161. + +Strauss, 53; + Richard, neurotic jugglers with orchestral effects, 59. + +Strawinsky, 59. + +Sudermann, 61. + +Switzerland, 49; + the generous heart of, 54. + + +Tenderness is wisdom, 157. + +Teutonic colossus, the, 47. + +Thermopylae of Liege, the, 93. + +Thiesson, Gaston, 14. + +Thoma, Hans, 29. + +Till Ulenspiegel, 95. + +Tillys, modern, 51. + +Tokio, 43. + +Tolstoi, 16, 59. + +Trakl, George, 165. + +Trustfulness, culpable, 26. + +Turks, 41. + + +Uebervolk, 78. + +Unamuno, Miguel de, 111. + +Underhand means, 42. + +Unified Europe, a, 125. + +Union of Democratic Control, 137. + +United States of Europe, a, 112. + +Unity of European Future, 152. + + +Valmy, a hero of, 48. + +Vandervelde, 189. + +Verdict of history, the, 132. + +Verhaeren, 95. + +Vices which are profitable, 109. + +Victory below means defeat above, 33. + +Vierordt, Heinrich, 160. + +Voltaire, the motto of, 51. + +Von Biberstein, Baron Marschall, 171. + +Von Unruh, Fritz, 155, 172. + + +Wagner, 58. + +War, that lies behind the present conflict, the greater, 10; + as a fatality, 20; + is war, 30; + international, 47; + between the Western nations, no reason for, 49; + the delightful promise of a perpetual, 105; + of the pen, 131. + +Warsaw, 54. + +Wedekind, Franz, 155. + +Weingartner, 61. + +Wells, 43. + +Werfel, Franz, 156. + +Whitman, Walt, 7; + and Tolstoi, 16. + +William II, 46. + +Wolff's Agency, 27. + +Wood, James, 12. + +Workers' International, the, 188. + +Wound will heal, a good open clean, 105; + wounded of both countries are living in terms of friendship, in + Germany and France alike, 82. + +Writers, German, 154. + +Wundt, 44, 61. + + +Zangwill, Israel, 137. + +Zorothowo, 58. + +Zweig, Stefan, 165. + + +THE OPEN COURT + +INTERNATIONAL SERIES OF BOOKS ON THE GREAT WAR + + +=Above the Battle.= By Romain Rolland. 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"What is happening is like a punishment which falls on the world." + +[4] A telegram from Berlin (Wolff's Agency), reproduced by the _Gazette +de Lousanne_, August 29, 1914, has just announced that "the old town of +Louvain, rich in works of art, exists no more to-day." + +[5] Written after the bombardment of Rheims Cathedral. + +[6] When I wrote this, I had not yet seen the monstrous article by +Thomas Mann (in the _Neue Rundschau_ of November 1914), where, in a fit +of fury and injured pride, he savagely claimed for Germany, as a title +to glory, all the crimes of which her adversaries accuse her. He dared +to write that the present war was a war of German Kultur "against +Civilization," proclaiming that German thought had no other ideal than +militarism, and inscribes on his banner the following lines, the apology +of force oppressing weakness: + + "_Den der Mensch verkuemmert im Frieden,_ + _Muessige Ruh ist das Grab des Muts._ + _Das Gesetz ist der Freund des Schwachen,_ + _Alles will es nur eben machen._ + _Moechte gern die Welt verflachen,_ + _Aber der Krieg laesst die Kraft erscheinen...._" + +(_Man deteriorates in peace. Idle rest is the tomb of courage. Law is +the friend of the weak, it aims at levelling all; it would reduce the +world to a level. War brings out strength._) + +Even so a bull in the arena, mad with rage, rushes with lowered head on +the matador's sword, and impales himself. + +[7] As one of these 'pedants of barbarism' (so Miguel de Unamuno rightly +describes them) writes, "one has the right to destroy; if one has the +force to create" (Wer stark ist zu schaffen, der darf auch +zerstoeren).--Friedr Gundolf: _Tat und Wort im Krieg_, published in the +_Frankfurter Zeitung_, October 11th. Cf. the article of the aged Hans +Thoma, in the _Leipziger Illustrierte Zeitung_ of October 1st. + +[8] _Jean-Christophe_, part V, "La Foire sur la Place." In vol. III of +the English version.--TRANS. + +[9] At the very hour I wrote these lines, Charles Peguy died. + +[10] Alludes to a Viennese writer who had told me, a few weeks before +the declaration of war, that a disaster for France would be a disaster +for the liberal thinkers of Germany too. + +[11] See note, p. 193. + +[12] Liebknecht has since gloriously cleared his honor of the +compromises of his party. I here express admiration of his attitude. (R. +R., January 1915.) + +[13] Recently published in the _Corriere della Sera_ and translated by +the _Journal de Geneve_, September 1914. + +[14] _Le Temps_, September 4, 1914. + +[15] Issues of September 16 and 17, 1914: _La Guerre et le Droit_. + +[16] Letter dated September 15, 1871, published in _Reforme +intellectuelle et morale_. + +[17] Open letter of Dr. Ernst Dryander, the First Court Preacher and +Vice-President of the Higher Ecclesiastical Council, to C. E. Babut, +Pastor of Nimes, September 15, 1914 (published in _l'Essor_ for the 10th +October and the _Journal de Geneve_, 18th October). + +[18] The newspapers of both countries give publicity only to prejudiced +stories unfavorable to the enemy. One would imagine that they devote +themselves to collecting only the worst cases, in order to preserve the +atmosphere of hatred; and those to which they give predominance are +often doubtful and always exceptional. No mention is made of anything +that would tell in a contrary direction of prisoners who are grateful +for their treatment, as in the letters which we have to transmit to +their families--in which, for example, a German civil prisoner speaks of +a pleasant walk, or of sea bathing, he has been allowed to enjoy. I have +even come across the case of an entomologist who is peacefully absorbed +in his researches, and profiting by his enforced sojourn in the South of +France to complete his collection of insects. + +[19] On this point, I would echo the appeal in the article cited above, +from the _Neue Zuercher Zeitung_. + +[20] Published by the _Daily Telegraph_, London, 1914. + +[21] The Editor of a great Paris paper having offered to publish my +reply to those who attacked me, I sent him this article, which never +appeared. + +[22] Paul Bourget. + +[23] The Evangelical pastor Schrenck in an article on "War and the New +Testament," quoted with approval by the Rev. Ch. Correvon in the +_Journal religieus_ of Neuchatel, November 14th. + +[24] In a declaration to the editor of the Swedish paper _Dagen_. + +[25] The famous "Appeal to the Civilized Nations" had been sent out +shortly before this by the ninety-three German intellectuals. + +[26] Holland. + +[27] "To let a people," he said, "or still more a fraction of a people, +decide international questions, for instance, which state shall control +them, is as good as making the children of a house vote for their +father. It is the most ridiculous fallacy that human wit has ever +invented." + +[28] The _Svenska Dagbladet_ sent to the principal intellectuals of +Europe an inquiry on the subject of the results which the war would +have, "for international collaboration, in the domain of the spirit." It +asked "with anxiety, to what extent it would be possible, once peace was +concluded, to establish relations between the scientists, writers, and +artists of the different nations." + +[29] The literary appreciation of the work cited is here treated as of +secondary importance, in order that evidence may be discovered with +regard to the thought of Germany. + +[30] See the article of Josef Luitpol Stern, "Dichter," in _Die Weissen +Blaetter_, March 1915. + +[31] Hohe Gemeinschaft. + +[32] Fremde sind wir auf der Erde alle. + +[33] _Die Ueberschaetzung der Kunst_ (December 1914). + +[34] _Von der Vaterlandsliebe_ (January 1915). + +[35] December 1914. + +[36] _Hymne auf den Schmerz_ (January 1915).--It is to be noted that the +_Forum_ is read in the trenches, and that it has received many letters +of approval from the front. (_Der Phrasenrausch und seine Bekaempfer_, +February 1915.) + +[37] I take the phrase from M. Lucien Maury in an article written before +the war: (_Journal de Geneve_) March 30, 1914. This is quoted recently +by M. Adolphe Ferriere who, in his remarkable Doctor's thesis, _La loi +du Progres_ attempts to solve the tragic problem of the part played by +the elite. + +[38] The review _Die Tat_, published by Eug. Diederichs at Jena, prints +long extracts from them in its issue for May 1915. + +[39] With an introduction by C. E. Babut. + +[40] His principal philosophical work is his Doctor's thesis: _La +realite du monde sensible_ (1891). Another thesis (in Latin) dates from +the same year: _Des origines du socialisme allemand_, in which he goes +back to the Christian socialism of Luther. + +His great historical work is his _Histoire sociale de la Revolution_. +Very interesting is his discussion with Paul Lafargue on _l'Idealisme et +le materialisme dans la conception de l'histoire_. + +[41] "The need of unity is the profoundest and noblest of the human +mind" (_La realite du monde sensible_). + +[42] "This young democracy must be given a taste for liberty. It has a +passion for equality; it has not in the same degree an idea of liberty, +which is acquired much more slowly and with greater difficulty. We must +give the children of the people, by means of a sufficiently lofty +exercise of their powers of thinking, a sense of the value of man and +consequently of the value of liberty, without which man does not exist." +(To the teachers, January 15, 1888.) + +[43] "As for myself, I have never made use of violence to attack +beliefs, whatever they may be; nay, more, I have always abstained even +from that form of violence which consists in insult. Insult expresses a +weak and feverish revolt, rather than the liberty of reason." (1901.) + +[44] "The true formula of patriotism is the equal right of all countries +to liberty and justice; it is the duty of every citizen to increase in +his own country the forces of liberty and justice. Those are but sorry +patriots who in order to love and serve one country, find it necessary +to decry the others, the other great moral forces of humanity." (1905.) + +[45] Or the extracts given by Charles Rappoport in his excellent book +_Jean Jaures, l'homme, le penseur, le socialiste_ (1915, Paris, +_l'Emancipatrice_), with an introduction by Anatole France. From this +book are quoted the passages referred to in the notes which follow. +_Jean Jaures_, a brochure by Rene Legand, should also be read. + +[46] Rappoport, _op. cit._, pp. 70-77. + +[47] Rappoport, p. 234. + +[48] In his speech at Vaise, near Lyon, July 25, 1914, six days before +his death, he said: "Every people appears throughout the streets of +Europe carrying its little torch; and now comes the conflagration." + +[49] Rappoport, p. 61. + +[50] Rappoport p. 369-70. + +[51] "Throughout the world there are six millions of us, organized +workmen, for whom the name of Jaures was the incarnation of the noblest +and most complete aspiration.... I remember what he was for the workmen +of other countries. I see still the foreign delegates who awaited his +words before forming their final opinions; even when they were not in +agreement with him they were glad to approach his point of view. He was +more than the Word: he was the Conscience." + +[52] Who has spoken more nobly than he of the eternal France, "the true +France, that is not summed up by an epoch or by a day, neither by the +day of long ago, nor the day that has just passed, but the whole of +France complete in the succession of her days, of her nights, of her +dawns, of her shadows, of her heights and of her depths; of France, who, +across all these mingled shades, all these half-lights and all these +vicissitudes, goes forward towards a brilliance which she has not yet +attained, but which is foreshadowed in her thought!" (1910.) + +See his masterly picture of French history, and his magnificent eulogy +of France, at the Conference of 1905, which he was prevented from +delivering in Berlin, and which Robert Fischer read in his place. + +[53] The terms Asia and Africa have not, of course, a geographical but +an ethnological signification. Turkey is not, and never has been, +European; and it is difficult to decide up to what points certain of the +Balkan Powers are European. + + * * * * * + + +Corrections of typographical erros made by the etext transcriber: + +Tolstoi=>Tolstoi + +Auslaender, Auslander=>Auslaender + +Deutschland Uber Alles=>Deutschland Ueber Alles + +Amedee=>Amedee + +Rene Schickele=>Rene Schickele + +Rene Legan=>Rene Legand + +Barres=>Barres + +Caesar=>Caesar + +Cornelienne=>Cornelienne + +Ferriere=>Ferriere + +Herve=>Herve + +Kulturtrager=>Kulturtraeger + +Leonhard=>Leonhard + +Liege=>Liege + +Peguy=>Peguy + +Regnier=>Regnier + +Thermopylae=>Thermopylae + +Zorothowa=>Zorothowo + +Graefin=>Graefin + +Notre-Dame la Misere=>Notre-Dame la Misere + +Moliere=>Moliere + +Jaures=>Jaures + +elan=>elan + +denouement=>denouement + +Dr. Ernst Drylander=>Dr. Ernst Dryander + +Idealogues=>Ideologues + +NEDERLANDSCHE ANTI-OORLOGRAAD=>NEDERLANDSCHE ANTI-OORLOG RAAD + +Sterheim=>Sternheim + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Above the Battle, by Romain Rolland + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOVE THE BATTLE *** + +***** This file should be named 32779.txt or 32779.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/7/7/32779/ + +Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team +at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned +images of public domain material from the Google Print +project.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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