Thank God, the flowing tide of unlimited Teutonic ambition let loose over the world, more than four years ago, has met with inaccessible summits where love of Justice, respect of Right, devotion to human Civilization, obedience to Christian Law, heroism of sacrifices, were so deeply entrenched, that they could not be reached and conquered. From this commanding altitude, they not only continue to defy the tyrants bent on dominating the universe, but they are mightily smashing their power.
From the overshadowing point of view which cannot be forgotten, or wilfully abandoned, nothing has changed since the German Empire, in her delirious aspirations, challenged the world to the almost superhuman conflict by which she felt certain to succeed in realizing her fond dream of universal domination.
At the outbreak of the war, ever since, to-day, to-morrow, there were, there are and there will be but three alternatives to the restoration of peace:—
1.—A victorious German peace imposed on beaten and cowed belligerents: the peace of the "defeatists."
2.—A peace by compromise, patched up by disheartened "pacifists," lured by cunningness, winning where force would have failed to succeed, to agree to conditions pregnant with all the horrors of a new and still greater struggle in the near future.
3.—A peace the result of the indomitable courage and perseverance of all the nations who have joined together to put an end to Germany's ambition to rule the world, and to destroy the instrument created for that iniquitous purpose: Prussian militarism.
There could be a fourth alternative to peace, but it would be possible only by a miracle which, we can grant without hesitation, the world has perhaps not yet deserved.
It would be peace restored by the sudden conversion of Germany to the practice of sound Christian principles, acknowledging how guilty she has been, repenting for her crimes, agreeing to atone for them as much as possible, and taking the unconditional pledge to henceforth behave like a civilized nation.
All must admit that there is not the slightest hope of such a move from a nation whose autocratic Kaiser, answering, in February last, an address presented to him by the burgomaster of Hamburg, thundered out, in his usual blasting manner, that the neighbouring peoples, to enjoy the sweetness of Germany's friendship, "must first recognize the victory of German arms."
As an inducement to the Allies to bow to his wishes, he pointed to Germany's achievement in Russia, where a beaten enemy, "perceiving no reason for fighting longer," clasped hands with the generous Huns. The world has since learned with appalling horror with what tender mercy the barbarous Teutons reciprocated the grasping of hands of defeated Russia, tendered to them by the "bolshevikis" traitors.