f'ljc $mnnrimi MONDAY, JANUARY 10, 1916. THE GERMAN MIND

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2665, 10 January 1916, Page 4

The Dominion MONDAY, JANUARY 10, 1916. THE GERMAN MIND

"We are steeped in the beliefs, handed .down to us by our fathers, which tell us that mercy and truth and honour are worth while; but the Germans regard such things as medieval foolery which they have outgrown. Wo believe that culture means the ostracising of the . crude and bestial element in human life; but the Germans, on the contrary, arc of opinion that culture is tho frank-recognition of those elements." Thus writes a- contributor in tho Fortnightly Beview, in an interesting, but somewhat futile endeavour to reach a definite understanding of the German mind. The German has taken the majority of people of non-Teutonic descent by surprise, it is true, and the task of explaining exactly how he came to be the kind of man that he is is not easy. There are numerous theories, surmises, deductions; but not one of the number seems to meet the appalling situation. "German civilisation and that of the rest of the world have marched _ along' separate lines," says the writer already quoted, and we agree; still, the knowledge of this separation the world's onward march 1 towards a fuller, completer civilisation helps the investigator but little. Inevitably he falls back on the further inquiry;' what were the forces that caused the separation 1 The Gorman mind of late has been truly baffling, if we may judge by the utterances of the Kaiser and his Ministers, and from the printed I effusions of generals, professors, and others—some of them known out of Germany, others not. With a perversity which is incomprehensible to sane and intelligent beings, from the Kaiser downwards, Great Britain is denounced as the author, the real cause of the war. To make an assertion of this kind, in view of the j facts known, implies an intellectual and mora] obliquity on the part of its authors which renders reasonable discussion with them impossible. But from amidst this welter of lies fchero arc slowly emerging indica l tions that tho truth is not unrealised in Germany. Herr Harden, whose paper, Die Zukunft, has just been once more suppressed by the authorities of the Wilhelmstrassej for a time, seemed ki stand alone in all Germany in his fearless declaration of the truth. "Let us drop our miserable attempts to excuse Germany's action," he wrote soon after the war began. "Let us have done with paltry abuse of the enemy. Not against our will, and as a nation taken by surprise' did we hurl ourselves, into this gigantic venture. We willed it; we had to will it. We do not stand before the judgment seat of Europewe acknowledge no such jurisdiction." That statement was bold, and it was true. In reading it the impression is created ■ that had the Kaiser possessed the simple attribute of candour this would have been the sort of defiant avowal that ho would have iterated and reiterated to his soldiers and to his people 'I do not stand before the judgment seat of Europe: I acknowledge no such jurisdiction," is a pronouncement which would harmonise with tho aims of one who has caused to be broken every law of civilisation, and who personally aims at world domination." But, again, tho Germans started on the wrong line, Teutonic tact and truthfulness, like Teutonic diplomacy, have always been weak In plain terms, the Kaiser is but an impudent and foolish dissembler. "My heart bleeds for Louvain," he is reported to have said, after the perpetration of foul horrors by his soldiery in Belgium. Compared with the unspeakable hypocrisy of their author, tho delencc of Germany's acts by one of the Kaiser's 1 agents is preferable. A German officer, Von Diskurth, wrote in the Hamburger iVachrkhtcii that Germans must be bavbui.-ia.no. "Lot thoin cease to U!!s <\£ (Jw cathedral of Eeims and nil the

castles in Franco which have shared its late," ho wrote. "Those things do not interest, us. Our troops must ' achieve victory. What else matters ?" The Christmas manifesto of the German Humanity League provides further evidence _ that all the Kaiser's subjects remain no longer in eager anticipation of success. "To-day the German naino is a by-word in civilisation, anc! the German Hag has become a badge of infamy," might have been written in any country of the Allies. The voicc ot' this league has been heard before, but it lias been as the voice of one crying in the wilderness. And we can take it that its influence now will be small upon the Kaisek and his war lords. Yet, like the grain of mustard seed, the sentiments of the league will probably grow, and nothing will so effectually assist tteir growth as tlje visible _ approach of defeat for the Kaiser's armies, and of disaster for the German Empire. We may expect protests against the war,' demands that it should be ended, and denunciations of ths Kaiser from Germany in ever-increasing volume as the fate of the Fathcriand becomes every day dearer.