X.—Germany stands for Reaction.
“There still remains for us to examine one deeper reason why Germany is distrusted and disliked in Europe. She is mainly distrusted because she continues to be the reactionary force in international politics. Outside the sphere of German influence the democratic ideal has triumphed all over the civilized world, after centuries of heroic struggle and tragic catastrophes. But in Germany the old dogma is still supreme. Wherever German power has made itself felt for the last forty years—in Italy and Austria, in Russia and Turkey—it has countenanced reaction and tyranny. In politics Germany is to-day what Austria and Russia were in the days of the Holy Alliance, the power of darkness. Whilst in the provinces of science and art the German people are generally progressive, in politics the German Government is consistently retrogressive. It cannot be sufficiently emphasized and repeated that, more than any other State—more even than Russia—Prussia stands in the way of political advance. It was Prussia that helped to crush the Polish struggle for freedom in 1863; when, a few years ago, English public opinion was protesting against the Armenian massacres, the Kaiser stood loyally by Abdul Hamid and propped his tottering throne; when the Russian Liberals were engaged in a life-and-death struggle with Czardom, the Kaiser gave his moral support to Russian despotism. It is not too much to say that it is the evil influence of Prusso-Germany alone which keeps despotism alive in the modern world.”