The Evening Star TUESDAY, APRIL 11, 1916.

Evening Star, Issue 16086, 11 April 1916, Page 4

The Evening Star TUESDAY, APRIL 11, 1916.

If it- were not for its terribly tragicside, its daily stories Germany and of countless deaths the Truth. and wounds and horrors unspeakable, we should be tempted at times to regard Germany, her rulers, her politicians, and her Press, in this tho beginning of her coming days and years of agony,, with a touch of amused contempt. That we have long been in tho habit oil saying the German nation is demented is* true, but the greater number of us possibly have never paused to think out the- reality of the situation as it is in Germany to-day, and with the added certainty that th:it situation will hourly grow worse but never better for its victims. That Germany had long contemplated, and prepared for the war that now afflicts mankind, and that she deliberately and heartlessly struck a foul blow at European liberty when what she believed to be her hour had struck, all the world that is not German knows. But that she would strike in the manner she did and as she continues to do only the few thought probable. Yet, it may with some confidence be. affirmed, no one even dreamed, when the tide of battle turned against her, and when in the early days of September, 1914, she found herself robbed of her prey and balked of her goal, that Germany would, through her Kaiser and statesmen, unblushincdy proclaim, in varied accents of spectacular blasphemy, that this most wicked of wars—fin- they called it that—had been forced upon Germany by a conspiracy of envious Powers jealous of her commercial prosperity. Even less, if that were possible, did any think that- this amazing nation, after deluging Europe in blood, would, when she had grown tired of slaughter, and found all roads barred to her further progress, coolly turn and say to the enemies she has raised up against her: " Xow "we are ready to make peace, and you "will have to make it; if you do.not it "will cost you more in the end-." To such a pass has the Germany of William 11. arrived. Though still the possessor of a terribly destructive fighting machine, its fighting cannot save the nation that owns it. Germany is impotent to save herself, but powerful to inflict hurt upon herself and upon others as well. She cannot- win. and she knows she cannot; but- she clings obstinately, pertinaciously, but with an ever-dwind-ling hope, to "something happening." To this humiliating position mighty Germany has been brought by the crimes of her own rulers. In spite of her boasted, her continuous, her " marvellous" victories on land, the object of her desires is- as far from the possibility of realisation as ever it- was. "Jn vain does Germany protest : in vain do her war lords assure her that- the enemy ig beaten ; in vain do her inspired newspapers warn her enemies to make peace, while there is yet time—to every appeal the Allies turn a deaf ear and an unmoved heart. Germany is only now on the threshold of her stupendous awakening. She has yet to rea.p what the has sown. It is possible, said Abraham Lincoln—whose homelv and unacknowledged wisdom lias frequently and with comfort been quoted throughout these days of heartache and nights of sleeplessness—-to fool some of the people all of the time, and all of tho people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people- all of the time. The German Ka!*er, his Imperial Chancs'lor, and the Test of them know these and with the awful dvoad of tho liar and the craven they dread the revelation of the truth. Ti'iov know that it will come some day, but the hour is not yet. Herr Liebknecht has the truth of the matter in hira, but his fellowmember.* of the Reichstag- are not ripe to receive it. They continue under the hypnotic spall that lias been woven around them by Emperor, by Government, by war lords, by journalists, and by | their own wishes. When Berr Liobknechi | tells them, what all mankind ha 3 long | known, how that the first object of Gei" | many'a hatred and fears was Russia, and j not England; how that Germany forced the war on Europe; how that German? deliberately concocted and published misleading pronouncements—Socialist and Clerical, Liberal and Conservative unito in one mighty, prolonged outburst of rago, and savagely shout for his blood. It is the resurrection of old cries of the long ago—" crucify hiin !" and " to the lions.'" and Germans, in this their present hour, are in too dangerous a mood to' recall that it was tho crucified, not tho crucifiers, tho martyrs, not the lions, with whom rested the final triumph. What Herr Liebknecht is trying to tell his countrymen is an accepted commonplace among outsiders, but it is much too strong meat for those around him. Their immediate need is not for the truth, but for an object on which to vent their disappointment. Germany is not ready sveu yet to appreciate the frank admissions of Herr Maximilian Harden. We should be, In fact, warranted in saying ihat tho admissions of 12 months of this publicist .are unpalatable to the fiery bat- chastened journalist of a year later. Twelve months ago Herv Harden wrote: " ISfot - as weak-willed, blunderers have -we

''undertaken tho fearful risk of this war. 'Wo wanted it. Because we had to wish " it, and could wish it. May the Teuton " devil throttle those winners whose pleas ' for ex'cuses make us ludicrous in these 'hours of lofty experience . . . and never was there a war more just." These words were written in the early clays of 1915. We think we cart detect a change in those of 1916. It is a lie that Germany wants to wipe out her enemies, and that, if she cannot harvest the spoils to-morrow, she will the day after to-morrow arm for a new robber" campaign. It is a lie that this Germany can bo banished from Europe's future. She will never beg for peace. Gladly, however, will she greet the dawn which frees her from her terrible task, and permits the return to quiet creative work and the preparation of worthy and free common life. There ia no exulting, heaven-soaring spirit, born of assured victory, in the later rhetorical exuberance, but each alike reflects the faith of its hour. It is the privilege of this generation to be both participators in and spectators of the most awe-inspiring and the greatest tragedy of the ages. Yet it is not, perhaps, a recognition of the horror that lie has wrought upon the earth that will bring the Kaiser to his knees. He will be brought to them by the blows dealt to his vanity rather than by and through a realisation of his crimes. *Mr H. G. Wells, says a critic, has written "a vision of '" judgment in which a wicked king stands "up before God. and defiantly pleads "guilty to all his wickedness. Then the " Recording Angel reads out the true " record of his life, and in a moment the "king is dancing and weeping and rush- " ing about on tho palm of God's hand, "protesting that he was bad but not " utterly silly. It is his vanity that the " record wounds, and his torture is to hear "the truth about himself." It is some such torture as this that the German Kaiser has laid up for himself.