law of Europe by attacking the neutrality of Belgium, but we were
ready to fight if they did. A fine cartoon in _Punch_, of August, 1870,
shows armed England encouraging Belgium, who stands ready with spear and
shield, with the words--'Trust me! Let us hope that they won't trouble
you, dear friend. But if they do----' To-day they have; and England has
drawn her sword. How could she have done otherwise, with those
traditions of law so deep in all Anglo-Saxon blood--traditions as real
and as vital to Anglo-Saxon America as to Anglo-Saxon England;
traditions which are the fundamental basis of Anglo-Saxon public life
all the world over? America once fought and beat England, in
long-forgotten days, on the ground of law. That very ground of law--that
law-abidingness which is as deeply engrained in the men of Massachusetts
to-day as it is in any Britisher--is a bond of sympathy between the two
in this great struggle of the nations.

To Germans our defence of public law may seem part of the moral
hypocrisy of which in their view we are full. What we are doing, they
feel, is to strike at Germany, our competitor for 'world-empire', with
its dangerous navy, while Germany is engaged in a life and death
struggle with France and Russia. We too, they feel, are Machiavellians;
but we have put on what Machiavelli called 'the mantle of superstition',
the pretence of morality and law, to cover our craft. It is true that we
are fighting for our own interest. But what is our interest? We are
fighting for Right, because Right is our supreme interest. The new
German political theory enunciates that 'our interest is our right'. The
old--the very old--English political theory is, 'The Right is our
interest'. It is true that we have everything to gain by defending the
cause of international law. Should that prevent us from defending that
cause? What do we not lose of precious lives in the defence?

This is the case of England. England stands for the idea of a public law
of Europe, and for the small nations which it protects. She stands for
her own preservation, which is menaced when public law is broken, and
the 'ages' slow-bought gain' imperilled.

(Treitschke's _Politik_, lectures delivered in Berlin during the years
1875 to 1895, was published in two volumes in 1899. General Bernhardi's
book, _Deutschland und der naechste Krieg_, was published in 1911, and
has been translated into English under the title _Germany and the Next
War_. See also