dismissing
them at the end with uplifted hand,--"go to your homes, and pray."

And we went. In dead silence. That immense crowd. Quietly, like
people going out of church; moved, like people coming away from
communion. I walked beside Helena, who was crying, with my head very
high and my chin in the air, trying not to cry too, for then they would
have been more than ever persuaded that I'm a promising little German,
but I did desperately want to. I could hardly not cry. These cheated
people! Exploited and cheated, led carefully step by step from
babyhood to a certain habit of mind necessary to their exploiters, with
certain passions carefully developed and encouraged, certain ancient
ideas, anachronisms every one of them, kept continually before their
eyes,--why, if they _did_ win in their murderous attack on nations who
have done nothing to them, what are they going to get individually?
Just wind; the empty wind of big words. They'll be told, and they'll
read it in the newspapers, that now they're great, the mightiest people
in the world, the one best able to crush and grind other nations. But
not a single happiness _really_ will be added to the private life of a
single citizen belonging to the vast class that pays the bill. For the
rest of their lives this generation will be poorer and sadder, that's
all. Nobody will give them back the money they have sacrificed, or the
ruined businesses, and nobody can give them back their dead sons.
There'll be troops of old miserable women everywhere, who were young
and content before all the glory set in, and troops of dreary old men
who once had children, and troops of cripples who used to look forward
and hope. Yes, I too obeyed the Kaiser and went home and prayed; but
what I prayed was that Germany should be beaten--so beaten, so punished
for this tremendous crime, that she will be jerked by main force into
line with modern life, dragged up to date, taught that the world is too
grown up now to put up with the smashings and destructions of a greedy
and brutal child. It is queer to think of the fear of God having to be
kicked into anybody, but I believe with Prussians it's the only way.
They understand kicks. They respect brute strength exercised brutally.
I can hear their roar of derision, if Christ were to come among them
today with His gentle, "Little children, love one another."

Your Chris.

_Berlin, Sunday, August 2nd, 1914_.

My precious mother,