he force of their own peoples' thought and purpose, while
the concrete terms of actual settlement came from the military leaders
who have no thought but to keep what they have got. The negotiations
have been broken off. The Russian representatives were sincere and in
earnest. They cannot entertain such proposals of conquest and
domination.

The whole incident is full of significance. It is also full of
perplexity. With whom are the Russian representatives dealing? For whom
are the representatives of the Central Empires speaking? Are they
speaking for the majorities of their respective parliaments or for the
minority parties, that military and imperialistic minority which has so
far dominated their whole policy and controlled the affairs of Turkey
and of the Balkan states which have felt obliged to become their
associates in this war? The Russian representatives have insisted, very
justly, very wisely, and in the true spirit of modern democracy, that
the conferences they have been holding with the Teutonic and Turkish
statesmen should be held within open, not closed, doors, and all the
world has been audience, as was desired. To whom have we been listening,
then? To those who speak the spirit and intention of the Resolutions of
the German Reichstag of the ninth of July last, the spirit and intention
of the liberal leaders and parties of Germany, or to those who resist
and defy that spirit and intention and insist upon conquest and
subjugation? Or are we listening, in fact, to both, unreconciled and in
open and hopeless contradiction? These are very serious and pregnant
questions. Upon the answer to them depends the peace of the world.

But, whatever the results of the parleys at Brest-Litovsk, whatever the
confusions of counsel and of purpose in the utterances of the spokesmen
of the Central Empires, they have again attempted to acquaint the world
with their objects in the war and have again challenged their
adversaries to say what their objects are and what sort of settlement
they would deem just and satisfactory. There is no good reason why that
challenge should not be responded to, and responded to with the utmost
candor. We did not wait for it. Not once, but again and again, we have
laid our whole thought and purpose before the world, not in general
terms only, but each time with sufficient definition to make it clear
what sort of definitive terms of settlement must necessarily spring out
of them. Within the last we