My dear Colleague,
War is odious and your work is fine. So I am with you against war; but do you really believe that we can do anything in behalf of peace except wave our arms and utter sounds? To me war is a thing fated, and the apple side of my nature—mankind is divided into pears and apples, idealists and others—the terrible apple side of me, then, takes from me all hope of success in the campaign which I am ready to undertake with you.
Remember me to Madame Suttner, and believe me wholly
Yours, Alphonse Daudet
And to me a famous German poet wrote:
Honored Baroness:
Is there need of an express assurance of my warmest approbation of the ends and aims of the Peace League? And yet, as I am convinced that mankind, ruled as they are more by passions and instincts than by reason and love, will approach these ends only by the civilizing labors of centuries if they ever do at all, it goes against my grain to express in solemn protests, from which I am unable to hope for any practical result, pious wishes which for a nobler humane minority are self-evident. As long as European civilization is still threatened by a half-Asiatic barbarism which will never submit to an arbitrator’s decision but will yield only to force, I regard the Ceterum censeo of such congresses even as a danger, like everything else by which our readiness for defense, indispensable in the interest of the world’s peace, is impaired.
With sincere respect
Yours very devotedly
Paul Heyse