oo narrow a standard
by which to estimate anything concerning human conduct and character.
In the effort to meet and conquer Germany, let us beware of the mistake
of Germany. One of the world tragedies of this epoch is the way in which
Germany has sacrificed her spiritual heritage, first for economic, then
for purely military efficiency. When we recall that spiritual heritage,
as previously described, when we think of Schiller, Herder and Goethe,
Froebel, Herbart and Richter, Tauler, Luther and Schleiermacher, Kant,
Fichte and Schopenhauer, Mozart, Beethoven and Wagner, we stand aghast
at the way in which she has plunged it all into the abyss,--for what?
Shall it profit a people, more than a man, if it gain the whole world
and lose its own soul?

In such a time, then, all of us who believe in the spirit must hold high
the torch of humanistic culture. Education is for life and not merely
for efficiency. Of what worth is life, if one is only a cog-wheel in
the economic machine? It is to save the spiritual heritage of humanity
that we are fighting, and it is that heritage that education must bring
to every child and youth, if it fulfills its supreme trust. Education
for the purposes of autocratic imperialism seeks to make a people a
perfect economically productive and militarily aggressive machine.
Education for democracy means the development of each individual to the
most intelligent, self-directed and governed, unselfish and devoted,
sane, balanced and effective humanity.

XII

SOCIALISM AND THE WAR

One of the surprises of the War was the complete breakdown of
international socialism. Not only socialists, but those of us who had
been thoughtfully watching the movement from without, had come to
believe that the measure of consciousness of international brotherhood
it had developed in the artisan groups of many lands, would be a
powerful lever against war. We were wrong: the superficial
international sympathy evaporated like mist under the rays of a revived
nationalism. The socialists fell in line, almost as completely as any
other group, with the purely nationalist aims in each land.

This must have gratified certain despots; for one cause of the War, not
the cause, was undoubtedly the preference on the part of various
autocrats, to face an external war rather than the rising tide of
democracy within the nation. Temporarily, they have been successful,
but surely only for a brief time. The victory