Copyright, Underwood & Underwood, N. Y.
DESTRUCTION OF A FRENCH HOSPITAL BY A GERMAN BOMB.
Utter disregard of humanity's laws is the German way of fighting. The photograph shows the basement of a hospital after it had been deliberately bombed by the Germans. To the left can be seen a mass of iron beds and human bodies intermingled. Such is German "Kultur."
Universal brotherhood for which Jesus lived and died, and for which the noblest men have always lived, has been turned back a thousand years by Germany, and that is her great crime. That is the accusation for which her military leaders will have to answer before the bar of God on the solemn Judgment Day. She sowed to the wind and she reaps the whirlwind. Not only has she stirred up bitterness and hate in the breasts of her own people, but by her foul deeds, the offspring of that hatred, she has planted a hate in the very beings and natures of the people of her enemy countries which almost equals it. In the earlier days of the war it was occasionally said that there was no hatred between the opposing soldiers and that the people of the conquered territories often fraternized with the German invaders. It was a lie. Although the men of France and Belgium were very scarce in the towns and cities, because most of them had gone to the trenches, and although the women were perhaps lonesome for companionship, yet woe be to that insulting German soldier who attempted to converse or walk with a French girl on the street, for he would receive such a withering look and answer as would make the blood run cold in any man with an ounce of self-respect. The girls of the conquered countries today would rather play with serpents than hold any kind of conversation or have any social intercourse with the haughty invaders.
In the beginning they tried to force their obnoxious attentions on the women; but they soon learned better and in the regions which they arrogantly possess today the German soldiers are the most shunned and lonely people that ever lived. Little babes just learning to talk are schooled to hate the Germans. Many a time I have seen young mothers with painstaking care drilling the little ones to lisp vengeance upon their enemy. Instead of the affectionate terms of "papa" and "mamma" which all nationalities first teach the infant the outraged inhabitants pronounce the words Les Allemands Boche, and The Kaiser Kaput. "The Germans are contemptible" and "Cut the head off the Kaiser."
No man need tell me that this universal feeling will soon die away and that when peace comes about normal relations will soon be restored. It is not human nature. Like the snake in the garden of Eden which brought the hatred of the race upon itself so that evermore "the heel of mankind shall crush the serpent's head," so has Germany brought down the maledictions of the human race upon her head, so that for a long time to come the hand of every man will be against her. This is the sad part of it all and this is the crime for which Germany will yet give account. I heard one soldier, who had had more than ordinary experience with their method of atrocity, say: "I'd like to have every man, woman, and child in Germany killed without mercy and I'd like to be there with the bayonet to finish up the job!"
I maintain that if God be just, not that man, but his enemy who drove him to that attitude will be held to account for his fearful hatred. When history is written and when Germany, instead of profiting by her sin, shall be eating the bitter fruits of her own unrighteousness then shall the Scripture be fulfilled in her ears, "Ye cannot gather grapes of thorns nor figs of thistles." "The way of the transgressor is hard," and "In like manner as ye sow, so shall ye reap, full measure, heaped up, shaken together, running over."
It is not merely a penalty placed by the Allied nations upon an offending country. It is not simply that we shall say we will "get even with her" and will take revenge for all her inhuman outrages, but it is that the immutable fiat of God goes forth, and that the one who flings himself against that great law shall pay to the uttermost farthing.