"A versatile artist in these matters, a gifted butcher of men, Mr. von Moltke, one day spoke the following words to some delegates of peace:
"'War is sacred and divinely instituted; it is one of the sacred laws of the world; it nurtures in men all the great and noble sentiments,—honour, disinterestedness, virtue, courage,—and, to be short, keeps men from falling into the most hideous materialism.'
"Thus, uniting into herds of four hundred thousand men, marching day and night without any rest, not thinking of anything, nor studying anything, nor learning anything, nor reading anything, not being useful to a single person, rotting from dirt, sleeping in the mire, living like the brutes in a constant stupor, pillaging cities, burning villages, ruining peoples, then meeting another conglomeration of human flesh, rushing against it, making lakes of blood and fields of battered flesh, mingled with muddy and blood-stained earth and mounds of corpses, being deprived of arms or legs, or having the skull crushed without profit to any one, and dying in the corner of a field, while your old parents, your wife, and your children are starving,—that's what is called not to fall into the most hideous materialism.
"The men of war are the scourges of the world. We struggle against Nature, against ignorance, against obstacles of every sort, in order to make our miserable life less hard. Men, benefactors, savants use their existence in order to work, to find what may help, may succour, may ease their brothers. They go with vim about their useful business, accumulate discovery upon discovery, increasing the human spirit, expanding science, giving every day a sum of new knowledge to the intelligence of man, giving every day well-being, ease, and force to their country.
"War arrives. In six months the generals destroy twenty years of effort, of patience, and of genius.
"This is what is called not to fall into the most hideous materialism.
"We have seen what war is. We have seen men turned into brutes, maddened, killing for the sake of pleasure, of terror, of bravado, of ostentation. Then, when law no longer exists, when law is dead, when every notion of right has disappeared, we have seen men shoot innocent people who are found on the road and who have roused suspicion only because they showed fear. We have seen dogs chained near the doors of their masters killed, just to try new revolvers on them; we have seen cows lying in the field shot to pieces, for the sake of pleasure, only to try a gun on them, to have something to laugh at.
"This is what is called not to fall into the most hideous materialism.
"To enter a country, to kill a man who is defending his home, simply because he wears a blouse and has no cap on his head, to burn the habitations of wretched people who have no bread, to smash the furniture, to steal some of it, to drink the wine which is found in the cellars, to rape the women who are found in the streets, to burn millions of dollars' worth of powder, and to leave behind them misery and the cholera,—this is what is called not to fall into the most hideous materialism.
"What have the men of war done to give evidence of even a little intelligence? Nothing. What have they invented? Cannon and guns. That is all.