that it must come from outside oneself?
Otherwise I could make myself happy this moment, by inventing an enormous
victory in Flanders. And I suppose (now I come to think of it) that the
Germans do.

By the fulness of your faith and even the fulness of your despair, you that
remember Rome, have earned a right to prevent all our quarrels being
quenched in such cold water from the north. But it is not too much to say
that neither religion at its worst nor republicanism at its worst ever
offered the coarse insult to all mankind that is offered by this new and
nakedly universal monarchy.

There has always been something common to civilised men, whether they
called it being merely a citizen; or being merely a sinner. There has
always been something which your ancestors called _Verecundia_; which is at
once humility and dignity. Whatever our faults, we do not do exactly as
the Prussians do. We do not bellow day and night to draw attention to our
own stern silence. We do not praise ourselves solely because nobody else
will praise us. I, for one, say at the end of these letters, as I said at
the beginning; that in these international matters I have often differed
from my countrymen; I have often differed from myself. I shall not claim
the completeness of this silly creature we discuss. I shall not answer his
boasts with boasts; but with blows.

My front-door is beaten in and broken down suddenly. I see nothing outside,
except a sort of smiling, straw-haired commercial traveller with a notebook
open, who says, "Excuse me, I am a faultless being, I have persuaded
Poland; I can count on my respectful Allies in Alsace. I am simply loved in
Lorraine. _Quae reggio in terris_ ... What place is there on earth where
the name of Prussia is not the signal for hopeful prayers and joyful
dances? I am that German who has civilised Belgium; and delicately trimmed
the frontiers of Denmark. And I may tell you, with the fulness of
conviction, that I have never failed, and shall never fail in anything.
Permit me, therefore, to bless your house by the passage of my beautiful
boots; that I may burgle the house next door."

And then something European that is prouder than pride will rise up in me;
and I shall answer:--

"I am that Englishman who has tortured Ireland, who has been tortured by
South Africa; who knows all his mistakes, who is heavy with all his sins.
And he tells you, Faultless Being, with a truth as deep as his own guilt,
and as