d national pride
would be reinforced by the sense of injustice; and the next war, the war of
revenge, would be prepared for, not only by every consideration of interest
and of passion, but by every cogency of righteousness. The fact that the
Germans are mistaken in their view of the origin of the war has really
nothing to do with the case. It is not the truth, it is what men believe
to be the truth, that influences their action. And I do not think any
study of dispatches is going to alter the German view of the facts.

But it is sometimes urged that the war was made by the German militarists,
that it is unpopular with the mass of the people, and that if Germany is
utterly defeated the people will rise and depose their rulers, become a
true democracy, and join fraternal hands with the other nations of Europe.
That Germany should become a true democracy might, indeed, be as great a
guarantee of peace as it might be that other nations, called democratic,
should really become so in their foreign policy as well as in their
domestic affairs. But what proud nation will accept democracy as a
gift from insolent conquerors? One thing that the war has done, and
one of the worst, is to make of the Kaiser, to every German, a symbol
of their national unity and national force. Just because we abuse their
militarism, they affirm and acclaim it; just because we attack their
governing class, they rally round it. Nothing could be better calculated
than this war to strengthen the hold of militarism in Germany, unless it
be the attempt of her enemies to destroy her militarism by force. For
consider--! In the view we are examining it is proposed, first to kill
the greater part of her combatants, next to invade her territory, destroy
her towns and villages, and exact (for there are those who demand it)
penalties in kind, actual tit for tat, for what Germans have done in
Belgium. It is proposed to enter the capital in triumph. It is proposed
to shear away huge pieces of German territory. And then, when all this
has been done, the conquerors are to turn to the German nation and say:
"Now, all this we have done for your good! Depose your wicked rulers!
Become a democracy! Shake hands and be a good fellow!" Does it not
sound grotesque? But, really, that is what is proposed.

I have spoken about British and French proposals for the treatment of
Germany. But all that I have said applies, of course, equally to German
proposals of the same kind for t