ed it because we were sure we could win it." (Zukunft,
August, 1914.) But in general the official spokesmen of Germany keep up
the claim that their country was attacked and forced to fly to arms to
protect herself.

"Gentlemen," said the Imperial Chancellor to the members of the
Reichstag on August 4,1914, "we are now acting in self-defense.
Necessity knows no law. Our troops have occupied Luxembourg and have
possibly already entered on Belgian soil. [A little earlier in the
speech he confessed that they had also invaded France.] Gentlemen, that
is a breach of international law. The French Government has notified
Brussels that it would respect Belgian neutrality as long as the
adversary respected it. But we know that France stood ready for an
invasion. France could wait. We could not .... The injustice we
commit--I speak openly--we will try to make good as soon as our military
aims have been attained. He who is menaced as we are, and is fighting
for his all, can only consider the one and best way to strike."
[Footnote 1] (The word which Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg actually used
was "durchhauen", which means "to hew, or hack, a way through.")

[Footnote 1: Out of several translations of this speech I have chosen as
the fairest the one printed by the American Association for
International Conciliation, November, 1914, No. 84.]

It was against such weak excuses as this, against the vain pretext that
the German war-lords were the attacked instead of the attackers, that
Herr Harden made the frank protest which I have quoted above.

Meantime the falsehood of the tales of French preparation for invasion
and of actual violations of German territory has been exposed by the
evidence of Germans themselves. General Freytag-Loringhoven, in his
essay on "The First Victories in the West," has shown that the French
high command was taken off its guard by the swift stab through
Luxembourg and Belgium, and could not get the Fifth Army Corps to the
Douai-Charleroi line until August 22. The municipal authorities of
Nuremburg have declared that they have no knowledge of the dropping of
bombs on that city by French aviators.

The falsehood of the Chancellor's promise that Germany would "make good
her injustice" to Belgium after attaining her military aims is
foreshadowed to-day. (September 27.) The newspapers of this morning
contain a semi-official press statement in regard to a note verbale
handed by the Foreign Secretary to the Papal