More terrible still the scheme invented by the Kaiser and the War Staff for breaking down the conscience of the German soldier. The simple peasants of Bavaria, the artisans of Saxony, until a generation ago, were reared in the morals of Martin Luther. By common consent Luther is one of the great men of modern times. At a critical moment in history he stood forth affirming Paul's statement that every man must give an account of himself unto God. Since Pope Julius could not give his account unto God, Martin Luther claimed religious liberty as to creed and conduct for himself. Since no kaiser could give his account unto God, Martin Luther claimed the right of self-government, through political democracy. Since no philosopher could give his account, Luther demanded liberty of thought and speech. Carrying out this principle, when three hundred years had passed, the free nations stood forth clothed with political democracy, educational democracy, religious democracy, industrial democracy. Just as we trace some river back to a spring on the mountainside, so we trace these great institutions of the Reformation back to Martin Luther, who received his ideas from Paul and John, from Huss and Savonarola, reinforced by John Calvin and Erasmus.
The Soldier's Token
But Luther's ethics were the ethics of Moses. For several generations the German peasants had been taught that it was criminal to kill, steal, burn, rape and pillage. They knew by heart the words of Jesus, "Woe unto him who offends against one of my little ones; it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depths of the sea." Plainly the Ten Commandments stood squarely in the pathway of the Kaiser's ambition. Unless his ambitions for world rule were to be defeated, some scheme had to be invented to free the German soldier from conscience, and break the fetters of divine law.
Therefore the soldier's token was invented. It comes under Jesus' special condemnation, in that not only the Kaiser and the War Staff pursued crime, but "taught men so." These tokens are made of stiff cardboard or of aluminum. At the top is a portrait of Deity as the Kaiser conceives him to be; in one hand the Kaiser's God holds a sickle, for the death-harvest. Beneath, the Kaiser and his War Staff wrote these words, "Strike him dead; the Day of Judgment will not ask you for reasons."
The soldier might read this: "You can slay, pillage, loot, burn, rape, leave thousands of bodies massacred and mutilated on the ground, but remember that your Kaiser and your War Staff will stand between you and the avenging God, and will see to it that the Judge of all the earth makes you no trouble on the great day of accounting." The Kaiser's God, however, is our Devil. For three years the Kaiser has had the Devil all mixed up with God,—being unable to distinguish between them. Whenever the Kaiser uses the word "Gott," Americans always substitute the word "Devil." With one change the soldier's token is quite accurate,—"Strike them dead,—old men, girls and children,—the Devil will not ask you for reasons. Hell and damnation are fully satisfied with all you Germans have done."
Eitel Anders
But when the German soldier boy took this token out of his pocket, and looked at his license to crime, what effect did it have upon him? Here is the diary of Eitel Anders. It is believed that he belonged to the 14th Bavarian regiment. The diary was taken from his body upon the battle-field, and is similar to hundreds of others. "We crossed the bridge over the Maas at 11:50 in the morning. We then arrived at the town of Waendre. When we went out of the town, everything was in ruins. In one house a whole collection of weapons was found [the Mayor had ordered the women to bring to his house every weapon that they could find, that the Germans might have no excuse for saying that any one had struck their soldiers or fired a gun]. All the inhabitants, without exception, were brought out and shot. This shooting was heart-breaking, as they all knelt down and prayed, but praying is no ground for mercy. A few shots rang out, and they fell back into the green grass and slept forever. It is real sport." But how did Eitel Anders sleep that night? We know that Macbeth did not sleep after he murdered Duncan and Banquo. Did the Kaiser succeed in stultifying conscience in Eitel Anders? The next day the soldier made another entry;—mark the opening words: "This morning, in happy mood and high spirits, we passed through Taturages. But before this we cleaned up the suburb of Mons, and burned the houses. The inhabitants came out of the houses into the open plain. Here many heart-breaking scenes occurred. It was really terrible to watch."
Plainly the soldier's token and the Kaiser's scheme succeeded. Having stated that he had murdered men, young Eitel Anders sleeps well at night, and the "next morning in happy mood and high spirits" wakened to plan fresh crimes. Macbeth had no German soldier's token to help him sleep at night. Conscience became the whisper of God in his soul. Sleep forsook his eyes, and slumber his eyelids. Shakespeare's murderer did not dare trust himself out under the stars that blazed with anger, but Eitel Anders' sleep was not disturbed by the blood upon his hands, because he really believed the Kaiser would be able to stand between him and the Great Day of Judgment.
After General Clauss shot fifteen aged men in the streets of Gerbéviller, too, that officer rode away with a light heart, quite free from the remorse that unseated the reason of Macbeth. Plainly the Kaiser's scheme succeeded. It destroyed conscience in many German officers and soldiers alike. To-day, the men of Germany without moral sense or any remorse following their crimes are like a sky that holds an empty socket where once the summer-making sun had shined. They are like human bodies out of which the intellect has passed, leaving only gibbering idiots. The German "Laws of War on Land," their Handbook of Military Tactics, has organized crime into a science, and killed in men the spiritual optic nerve. Germany to-day is an intellectual machine, and her officers and her soldiers at last can commit crimes without remorse, which proves that they are becoming moral idiots.