been brought up to suppose that whatever was not German was inferior, to be tolerated only until it could be replaced by a German product, or, if not replaced, destroyed. Not content with puffing themselves up, the Germans have lately listened complacently to zealots who claim that it was a hidden Germanicism in Dante, Shakespeare, and other foreign masters1 which made them great, and that even Jesus Christ was honored by having a strain of Teutonic blood in his veins. If certain grave professors tell the truth, there have been only two literatures worthy of consideration the German and the Greek.

1 See Ludwig Woltmann's treatises. Vinci, he asserts, is plainly the German Wincke; Vecellio is Vetzel; Buonarotti is Bohnrodt! He claims as Germans many French celebrities Lafayette, Pascal, Voltaire, Cuvier, Descartes, Robespierre, Balzac, Musset, Lamartine, Hugo, Zola, and many others. Even if these claims were established, should we not ask: Why has Germany produced no Titians and Michael Angelos and Leonardos herself? Why no Voltaires and Balzacs and Hugos? If these types of genius appear in Italy and in France and not in Germany, a non-Kultured logic would deduce that it must be the Italian or the French strain in the blood, and not the German, which produced them.

To paraphrase what Whistler said of Nature, "Why drag in the Greek?"

A man who spends his life looking at himself in the glass cannot fail to reach the conclusion that he is unique, perfect, the pattern and standard of all men. This has been Germany's attitude for five-and-twenty years. Although Germans have traveled to all parts of the earth, establishing industrial colonies, prospecting for commercial enterprises, or filling professors' chairs, they have been so swallowed up by their Germanism that they have not understood the natures of the peoples among whom they moved. To a German the "psychology" of every one else is a sealed book. How could it be otherwise? For between the German and you and me, when he looks at us, there is the mirror, invisible to you and me, in which he is doting over his own features.

Far, indeed, has Kultur strayed from Culture - Kultur so repulsively self-bloated, wearing its ego on the outside, as the turtle

wears its skeleton, till it becomes thick, indurated, and at last, impenetrable; Culture, which looks beyond itself, seeks the best wherever it exists, recognizes the validity of different standards, and practices tolerance without in the least surrendering convictions. As Kultur has trumpeted its own praises everywhere, it is unnecessary to cite many specimens of it. I content myself with quoting a few lines from a letter written to a friend in Holland by Dr. Adolf Lassen, Professor of the Love of Wisdom (Philosophy), at the University of Berlin. The letter was written in the third month of the war:

No one can remain neutral to the German State and people. Either you must consider it the most perfect creation that history has produced up to now, or you acquiesce in its destruction; nay, in its extermination. A man who is not a German, knows nothing of Germany. We are morally and intellectually superior beyond all comparison as to our organizations and our institutions. . . . Our Army is the epitome of German excellence.

As Professor Lassen was eighty-four years old when he wrote this, we have a right to assume that his opinions were deliberate and mature, free alike from the exaggerations of a callow partisan and from the explosive fury of a young fanatic.

When an octogenarian, delivering himself in this fashion, represents the whirling thoughts of an entire nation, war must be imminent. The only alternative to war would be the insane asylum: but even Germany, with all her preparation, had made no provision for locking herself up. If a man tells you that he is the most perfect creation on earth, the sacred vessel in whom is preserved the essentials of the highest civilization, you dissemble your amusement and pass on. For a nation to make such a boast without blushing - Kultur never blushes portends

evil.

The stages by which Kultur led up to war are thus plain. First, it Prussianized the German people, by teaching the non-German

States that the interests of the Empire coincided with those of Prussia. Next, it kept assuring the Germans that they were the most marvelous of all races, an assertion which they had no reluctance in believing. And then Kultur preached that the other Powers, secretly conscious of their inferiority, were devoured by jealousy of Germany's superiority, and that, foreseeing that they must go down before it, they formed a league to ward off their own destruction by crushing Germany. This suggestion, artfully insinuated and repeated every day from all quarters throughout many years, became an overwhelming obsession.

The German Army, with the Krupp howitzer as its highest product, embodied Kultur; and the nation, obsessed to the point of fury, felt relief from suspense when its masters hurled the Army against the league of foes.