erate, affectionate, incapable of doing evil and
almost of conceiving it, go to make up her moral strength; amongst them
are friends that I shall never cease to esteem. I know how many intrepid
minds work ceaselessly in German science for the conquest of the truth.
But I see on the one hand these good people so over-confident, so
tractable, with their eyes shut, ignorant of the facts and unwilling to
recognize anything but what it is the pleasure of their Government that
they shall know; and on the other, the clearest minds of Germany,
historians and savants, trained for the criticism of texts, basing their
conviction on documents which all emanate from one alone of the parties
concerned, and by way of peremptory proof referring us to the _ex-parte_
affirmations of their Emperor, and of their Chancellor, like
well-behaved scholars, whose only argument is _Magister dixit_. What
hope remains of convincing such people that there exists a truth beyond
that master, and that in addition to his White Book we have in our hands
books of every kind and of every color, whose testimony demands the
attention of an impartial judge? But do they so much as know of their
existence, and does the master allow his class to handle the manuals of
his enemies? Our disagreement is not only as regards the facts of the
case; it is due to difference in mind itself. Between the spirit of
Germany today and that of the rest of Europe there is no longer a point
of contact. We speak to them of _Humanity_; they reply with
_Uebermensch_, _Uebervolk_, and it goes without saying that they
themselves are the Uebervolk. Germany seems to be overcome by a morbid
exaltation, a collective madness, for which there is no remedy but time.
According to the view of medical experts in analogous cases such forms
of madness develop rapidly, and are suddenly followed by profound
depression. We can then but wait, and in the meantime defend ourselves
to the best of our ability from the madness of Ajax.

Certainly Ajax has given us plenty of work to do. Look at the ruins
around us! We may bring aid to the victims--yet how little can we
achieve? In the eternal struggle between good and evil the scales are
not evenly balanced. We need a century to re-create what one day can
destroy. The fury of madness, on the other hand, endures only for a day;
patient labor is our lot throughout the years. It knows no pause, even
in those hours when the world seems at an end. The vine-growe