“There has recently appeared a book called Die Waffen nieder. I can only advise the gentlemen to devote a few hours to the reading of this novel; any one who then still has a predilection for war I can only pity.”
Of course opponents were not lacking. Anonymous letters of ridicule and of abuse; withering criticisms—“What the good old lady tells about her misfortunes is indeed very sad; but the conclusions drawn from them can elicit from the serious politician only a smile”; “emotional silliness”; “obtrusive, inartistic didacticism”; “Brummagem that totally fails of its purpose”; “the authoress ought to return to her short stories, in which she has shown a quite clever talent”; etc. Even one of the great in the realm of literature, Felix Dahn, sent out an epigram which went the rounds of the press, but which—the poet himself will concede this—cannot boast of much poetic beauty:
An die weiblichen und männlichen Waffenscheuen
Die Waffen hoch! Das Schwert ist Mannes eigen,
Wo Männer fechten, hat das Weib zu schweigen,
Doch freilich, Männer gibt’s in diesen Tagen,
Die sollten lieber Unterröcke tragen.[[22]]
Everything in this world is in reciprocity. What comes as a result is in turn the cause of new results. So here. I had written the book with the design of rendering, in my own way, a service to the peace movement, of whose incipient organization I had learned; and the relationships and experiences that grew out of the book have swept me more and more into the movement, so that at last I was compelled to go into it not only, as I had at first intended, with my pen, but with my whole being.
Meanwhile, during the time of the World’s Exposition of 1889 in Paris, a Peace Congress had been held there, presided over by Jules Simon. This was taken as an opportunity for creating also the institution of Interparliamentary Conferences. The year before, two men—Randal Cremer, member of the English Parliament, and the French deputy Frédéric Passy—had set to work to form an Interparliamentary Union. They enlisted the support of a number of their colleagues, and in the year of the Exposition these assembled in a first conference (of the English Parliament three hundred members were present), and it was agreed that adherents should be secured from the popular assemblies of all the European countries, and that every year an Interparliamentary Conference should be held. For the next conference, the second, London was named as the place of meeting.
To all this the contemporary world paid but little attention, one might say paid none at all. But I followed these events with the eagerest and most hopeful interest. Through the monthly periodical Concord, the organ of the London Peace Association, I was kept informed of what was going on, and I read attentively the reports of all the speeches delivered in the assemblies, and of the resolutions passed. But as yet the idea of taking part in the movement myself, otherwise than with my pen, never entered my mind.