The items at which we have glanced were not all or even the most important acts of Germany's dawning tragedy. It was not merely that she revealed herself to the world, but that she revealed herself to herself. The moving picture of Kultur, of fake idealism, of humaneness, which she had unreeled before our charitable eyes was stopped, and stopped forever. The film, exposed momentarily to the flame of truth, exploded and left on the screen the hideous picture of Germany as she was. No more sham for a naked nation. In went the unmasked Prussian to outrage and murder, to bind and burn. When a Government violated its word to the world, why should the individual check his passions? All the world, at first unbelieving, watched the procession of horror, and then, against its wishes, against all the ingrained faith that the long years had stored within the human breast, the world saw that it was dealing with nothing less than a monster.
England's day, this? Yes, and a glorious anniversary for her. She has indeed kept her "solid engagement to do her utmost." In a million graves are men of the British Empire who did not consider the price at which the compact would be kept. Their lives for a scrap of paper—and welcome! When we think that we are winning the war—and nobody denies that it is American men and food and ships and guns that are winning it now—let us look back to the 4th of August, 1914, and remember what nation it was that stood between the beast and his prey, scorning all his false offers of kindness to Belgium, his promises not to rob France, and his hypocritical cry of "kindred nation" to the England he really hated.
But it is not alone England's day. It is the day of the opening of the world's eyes to the criminality of Prussia. It is the anniversary of Germany's loss of the war. We—America, France, England, Italy, and the rest of us—will win it, but Germany lost it herself with the one stroke at Gemmenich. She believed it a masterpiece of cunning. It was the foul thrust of a coward and the deliberate mistake of a fool.
The New York Sun, August 4, 1918.
FOOTNOTES:
[4] COURTESY OF THE NEW YORK SUN