l the religions, now in
existence, proved hopelessly inadequate. We have seen it for ourselves
in the case of Christianity; and Nicolai shows, following Tolstoi, that
Buddhism is in no better case.

As far as Christianity is concerned, its abdication is of old date.
After the great compromise under Constantine, in the fourth century of
our era, when the emperor made the church of Christ a state church, the
essential thought of Jesus was betrayed by the official representatives
of the creed, and was delivered over to Caesar. Only among certain free
religious individualities, most of whom were charged with heresy, was
this essential thought preserved (to a degree) until our own time. But
its last defenders have lately denied it. The Christian sects which up
to now have invariably refused military service, for example the
Mennonites in Germany, the Dukhobors in Russia, the Paulicians, the
Nazarenes, etc., are participating in the war to-day.[57] "Simon Menno,
the founder of the Mennonites, who died in 1561, condemned war and
vengeance.... As late as 1813, the strength of moral conviction in the
members of this sect was still so great that, despite the patriotic
excitement of that year, so ruthless a soldier as York actually exempted
them from Landwehr service, by a decree dated February 18th. But in
1915, H. G. Mannhardt, Mennonite preacher in Danzig, delivered an
address glorifying feats of arms and martial heroes."

"There was a time," writes Nicolai, "when it was believed that Islam was
inferior to Christianity. At that date the Turkish armies were
threatening the heart of Europe. To-day the Turk has almost been driven
out of Europe, but morally he has conquered Europe. Unseen, the green
flag of the Prophet floats over every house in which there is talk of
the 'holy war.'"

German religious poems depict the fight in the trenches as "a test of
piety instituted by God." No one is now astonished at the absurd
contradiction in terms involved in speaking of "Christian warfare." Few
theologians or churchmen have dared to swim against the stream. In his
admirable book _La Guerre infernale_,[58] Gustave Dupin has pilloried
gruesome specimens of militarist Christianity. Nicolai gives other
samples, which it would be a pity to leave unrecorded. In 1915,
Professor Baumgarten, a Kiel theologian, placidly pointed out that there
is opposition between the morality of bellicose nationalism and the
morality of the Sermon on the Mount