British Vices—Cowardice and Laziness.
430. It is the English who may justly be accused of militarism—the people who, in addition to Irish and Scottish hirelings (they themselves, as a rule, prefer to remain at home) place Hindus and Indian mountaineers in the field.—Prof. W. Wundt, D.N.I.P., p. 143.
431. Envy is utterly foreign to the German nature. But one exception we must now admit. We old fellows ... look with envy at the young, who are risking their fresh life and strength for the Fatherland. Of this envy, at any rate, we must acquit England: its best youth remains quietly at home, and wins victories in the football field, leaving it to salaried hirelings to shed their blood.—Prof. G. Roethe, D.R.S.Z., No. 1, p. 11.
432. The doctrine of comfort, as a view of the world, certainly comes of evil, and a people who are filled with it, like the English, are little more than a heap of living corpses. The whole body of the people begins to rot.... In England to-day every trade unionist is stuck in the morass of comfort.—Prof. W. Sombart, H.U.H., p. 102.
433. As soon as it comes to the sanguinary reality, the English hireling's heart drops into his breeches. And the English Scotchmen have not even breeches for it to drop into.—O. Siemens, W.L.K.D., p. 19.
434. Whence should courage come?... In our German soldiers it springs from honest German wrath. But the Englishman must shout himself into courage. When the first English troops landed in France, they sang gaily and interrupted their songs by shouts of "Are we down-hearted?" Whereupon the English hireling sought to keep up his spirits by an answering shout of "No!" ... Only their own timidity suggests to the English such questions as to their courage. One need not be any great psychologist to realize this.—O. Siemens, W.L.K.D., p. 19.
435. The cunning and unscrupulousness of the pirate does, indeed, survive in the English sailor; he lies in ambush for neutral merchant-ships[!], lays mines in the fairway of neutral neighbour States, and commits deeds of violence of the most manifold kinds; but the resolution of the pirate, the daring intrepidity in attack, he no longer possesses.—"Germanus," B.U.D.K., p. 43.
436. The great majority of the English Army are to this day Keltic Irishmen and Keltic Scotchmen; the real Englishmen do not enlist. In the English battles of the past, Englishmen of the nobility no doubt were in command, but the armies consisted of foreign mercenaries, for the most part Germans.—H.S. Chamberlain, K.A., p. 51.
437. England might, in league with Germany, have dictated Kultur to the whole world ... if she had not been untrue to the Gospel of Work!—Prof. A. Schröer, Z.C.E., p. 61.
438. The English race ... must always be stimulated by the infusion of new blood, otherwise it would perish of its own indolence.—Prof. A. Schröer, Z.C.E., p. 21.