A KINDLY VOICE FROM GERMANY
That all Germany is not given over to the doctrine of hate is shown by the following extract from an article by Prof. Ernst von Troeltsch in the Frankfürter Zeitung:
“We must not allow hatred to be magnified into theory or a system or let it be the guiding maxim that controls our existence. Hatred may inspire us with courage and driving power, but it is, politically speaking, in the long run, an evil counsellor. It gives rise to a bitter and fantastical idea of politics, which cannot be pursued, and therefore brings dangerous disappointment in its train. And in its influence on our moral and spiritual life hatred is most dangerous. Everyone is agreed that we need a deepening of our moral and spiritual sense, and hopes to see a new Germany rise out of the unparalleled sacrifices which we have made. This new Germany is not to be a compound of hate, but to spring from the creation of new sources of national strength. All her past whether it be based on Christian and Conservative ideas or on Liberal ideals, protests against race hatred, and all these theories which base the conduct of real politics on hate—theories which are not born in the field, but at the writing-desk, whose standard-bearers are not soldiers, but the self-important Philistine, and the bombastic writer at home.... We do not need to cultivate hate, but to deepen our insight into the terrible seriousness of the moment, and this all-important hour of our fate.”
If Prof. Troeltsch represents any considerable body of German sentiment the note he sounds is an encouraging one. Every country has its yellow journals, its pot-house strategists, and its writing-desk statesmen, who are fond of elaborating pompous theories and showing their bravery by delivering hard words instead of hard knocks. Perhaps a good deal of the quoted literature that comes out of Germany voicing hated and arrogant purpose of world-domination originates with the bombastic Philistines described by the Professor, and not from the real representative men of the nation. If so, when peace comes to be seriously discussed it may be possible to agree upon terms that will not be repugnant to our Christian civilization.