took the
world--governments--human beings--to find the truth of the very old
phrase that "he who findeth his life must lose it."

_Englishman_. The simple fact of that phrase before the Great War was
not commonly grasped. People thought it purely religious and reserved
for saints and church services. As a working hypothesis it was not
generally known. The every-day ideals of our generation, the friendships
and brotherhoods of nations as we know them would have been thought
Utopian.

_American_. Utopian? Perhaps our civilization is better than Utopian.
The race has grown with a bound since we all went through hell together.
How far the civilization of 1914 stood above that of 1614! The
difference between galley-slaves and able-bodied seamen, of your and
our navy! Greater yet than the change in that three hundred years is the
change in the last one hundred. I look at it with a soldier's somewhat
direct view. Humanity went helpless and alone into a fiery furnace and
came through holding on to God's hand. We have clung closely to that
powerful grasp since.

_Englishman_. Certainly the race has emerged from an epoch of intellect
to an epoch of spirituality--which comprehends and extends intellect.
There have never been inventions such as those of our era. And the
inventors have been, as it were, men inspired. Something beyond
themselves has worked through them for the world. A force like that was
known only sporadically before our time.

_American_. (_Looks into old ditch_.) It would be strange to the lads
who charged through horror across this flowery field to hear our talk
and to know that to them and their deeds we owe the happiness and the
greatness of the world we now live in.

_Englishman_. Their short, Homeric episode of life admitted few
generalizations, I fancy. To be ready and strong and brave--there was
scant time for more than that in those strenuous days. Yet under that
simple formula lay a sea of patriotism and self-sacrifice, from which
sprang their soldiers' force. "Greater love hath no man than this, that
a man lay down his life for his friends." It was their love--love of
country, of humanity, of freedom--which silenced in the end the great
engine of evil--Prussianism. The motive power of life is proved, through
those dead soldiers, to be not hate, as the Prussians taught, but love.

_American_. Do you see something shining among the flowers at the bottom
of the ditch?

_Englishman_. Why, yes. Is