"Poor old Freddy!" Margaret said. "If he could only hear us now, he'd think I was anti-war, and you were pro-war." She sighed. "If he could only see you in a Tommy's uniform, defending the morality of taking human lives!"
"Qui sait, Meg? He probably sees far more of it than you or I do. Don't you make any mistake about that. He knows that I'm fighting in the war because I'm anti-war, with a vengeance. If this war isn't won by the Allies, Meg, there will be no end to war. It will never cease; it will burst out at intervals until the Kaiser's Alexandrian and Napoleonic dream is accomplished. If he wins this war, he'll turn his eyes in other directions, for new worlds to conquer. With Europe subdued, there is Egypt, India, America. Lamartine said, 'It is not the country, but liberty, that is most imperilled by war.'"
"What did he mean?" Margaret asked.
"'That every victorious war means for the victorious nation a loss of political liberty, whilst for the vanquished it is a foundation of inspiration and democratic progress.'" [1]
"Oh, Mike, and if we win? I mean, when we win?"
"As our cause is the cause of right over might, ours is not a war of aggression or annexation. He was speaking of an aggressive war."
"Who was speaking?"
"Well, I was voicing Hermann Fernau, the brave Liberal who is exiled from the Fatherland. I can't give you his exact words, but he says something like this in his wonderful book, Germany and Democracy: 'For what would happen if we Germans emerged victorious from this war? Our victory would only mean a strengthening of the dynastic principle of arbitrary power all along the line. Those of us who bewail the political backwardness of our Fatherland must realize that a German victory would prolong this backward condition for centuries. And not only Germany, but the whole of Europe, would have to suffer the consequences.'"
"Fancy a German saying that!"
"There are some sane Germans left, darling. Fernau belongs to the small band of German Liberals who have been driven from their country."