hich I
will not repeat here because it is merely technical; and then how the
soldiers of the republic, rallied by the cry, "The country is in
danger," and thrilled by "The Marseillaise" (written only five months
before, but already it had changed the beat of nearly every heart in
France), made such a stand that it not only halted Prussia and her
allies, but so completely broke their conquering spirit that without
firing another shot they took themselves off beyond the Rhine.

"We," Foch used to tell his students, "are the successors of the
revolution and the empire, the inheritors of the art, new-born upon the
field of Valmy to astonish the old Europe, to surprise in particular
the Duke of Brunswick, the pupil of Frederick the Great, and to tear
from Goethe, before the immensity of a fresh horizon, this profound
cry: 'I tell you, from this place and this day comes a new era in the
history of the world!'"

It is that new era which Foch typifies--that new era which his
adversaries, deaf to Goethe's cry and blind to Goethe's vision, have
not yet realized.

It was "the old Europe" against which Foch fought--the old Europe which
learned nothing at Valmy and had learned nothing since; the old Europe
that fought as Frederick the Great fought and that had not yet seen the
dawn of that new day which our nation and the French nation greeted
with glad hails much more than a century ago.

In 1792 Prussia measured her military skill and her masses of trained
men against France's disorganization--and overlooked "The
Marseillaise."

In 1914 she weighed her might against what she knew of the might of
France--and omitted to weigh certain spiritual differences which she
could not comprehend, but which she felt at the first battle of the
Marne, has been feeling ever since, and before which she had to retire,
beaten but still blind.

In 1918 she estimated the probable force of those "raw recruits" whom
we were sending overseas--and laughed. She based her calculations on
our lack of military tradition, our hastily trained officers, our
"soft," ease-loving men uneducated in those ideals of blood and iron
wherein she has reared her youth always. She overlooked that spiritual
force which the "new era" develops and which made our men so responsive
to the command of Foch at Chateau Thierry and later.

"The immensity of a fresh horizon" whereon Goethe saw the new era
dawning, is still veiled from the vision of his countrymen. But ac