THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES SATURDAY, APRIL 14, 1917. GERMANY VERSUS MANKIND.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 16978, 14 April 1917, Page 6

THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES SATURDAY, APRIL 14, 1917. GERMANY VERSUS MANKIND.

£[n the carefully expressed address to Congress in which, ten days ago President Wilson spoke the words which meant that the United States accepted the gage of battle with Germany he declared: "We are at the beginning of an age which will insist that the same standards of conduct and responsibility for wrong must be observed among nations and Governments as among individual citizens." In other portions of his speech the President expressed the pent-up conclusions forced upon him after many months of endeavour to keep the peace. It took the United States Government over two and a-half years to acquiesce in the inevitable, and publicly pronounce that friendship on its part with the German Government was impossible. Its provocation had been incessant, and the final outrage, unrestricted submarining warfare against mankind virtually > without discrimination, proved the last straw. Thereupon President Wilson spoke openly and boldly amid the plaudits of his countrymen. " An irresponsible German Government,'' he said, " has thrown aside all considerations for humanity and right and is running amok. . . . \y e are glad- to fight for the peace, liberty, and rights of small and great nations, and make the world safe for democracy.'" Think what we may about the reluctance of the United States Government to declare openly, for fear of precipitating a rupture with the Central Powers, those things concerning Germany and her atrocious deeds which the Allies had the right to expect from it, there ia no gainsaying the importance of that moment in the war period which let Germany see herself in her true colours in an indictment framed by the most powerful neutral Government in the world. The hypocritical and lymg messages which passed from Berlin to Washington and the serious and judicial replies to them, which seemed to accept them on their pretended merits, constituted a spectacle painful for the contemplation of the Allies in their consciousness of German mendacity and of the justice of their cause. Happily that chapter of diplomacy is ended, and Germany ha 3 herself entirely to thank that such is the case. The coalition against her has been increased by the addition of the great Republic which perhaps above all other nations in the world has been wont to boast of independence and liberty, and which certainly made a most long-suffering fight for neutrality., As- Mr Lloyd George' said on Thursday, the advent of the United States into the conflict "finally stamps the war as a struggle for human liberty against military autocracy." Upon other neutral Powers the' lesson and the example have not been lost. Some of these are in no position actively to resent, or resist German disregard for their national rights, but the friends still left to Germany among the nations are no better than such as a tyrant and bully may always possess—weaker vessels bound to her by fear and by association in an evil cause. What new standard of ideals Germany in a chastened spirit will be content with after this great war is over it is not for us to attempt to say. When she has got rid of those leaders who have been responsible for . her extraordinary departure from the path of national ' honour and rectitude she may find that the wax has after all brought

her to a sanity and a sens© of decency tliat may later on secure her ro-admission within the pal© of civilisation.

The spectacle which G-ermany has presented in this war will probably stand in history as the most remarkable example the world has known of the last attempt of a barbarous and callous oligarchy to spread its tyranny over the surrounding nations. All Germany has become infected with the spirit of militarism, the term being used in its worst sense, and the Allies in fighting for national honour, humanity, and justice have had to contend with a state of mind on the part of the enemy to which it is hard to find any. modern parallel. To them the association of military attributes— courage, discipline, and patriotism— with such deeds as the Germans, from their leaders downwards, have shown themselves capable of committing, is revolting. Germany has besmirched her name so thoroughly that the memory of her barbarism and moral perversion as manifested during the present war will be ineffaceable. The great burden of blame'will assuredly rest upon those pernicious forces the influence of which the Allies are making it their purpose to destroy, and with which they are resolute to hold no parley. History, as Froude has finely put it, ' "is voice for ever sounding across the centuries the laws of Right and Wrong. Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall; but the moral law is written on the tablets of eternity." The civilised world has to-day a greater recognition than perhaps ever "before of this profound truth. In the verdict of history Germany will see herself in very different guise from that which Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg has endeavoured to forecast for her. In the considered judgment of civilised mankind she stands utterly condemned. Probably she is now beginning really and saclly to learn the tremendous force existent in the concentrated contempt and abhorrence of the world. By her frenzied evildoing, calculated crimes, and brutal savagery she has aroused a just resentment which will waste no sentiment upon her. The decision of the United States is the latest example of that far-reaching answer which the nations that stand for the highest ideals of civilisation and democracy have returned to Germany's insolent challenge. In his recent book " The Mark of the Beast'' Sir Theodore Cook observes that the German people are smitten with the infection of some hideous moral distemper forced on Germany by th© sinister reversion of Prussia to the Tartar savage, by a Prussian terrorism derived from morbid' insensibility to others' sufferings gombined with extreme sensitiveness to their own. "The stain," he writes, "runs through from top to bottom; just as the official ' War-book' lays it down that on occasion it will be profitable to massacre prisoners, so their navy shoots helpless sailors—its own as well as ours—when they are sk^Sgli ll ? in the sea; Every tender feeling which the foe, possesses becomes a mere hostage for his tractability, because it can be violated if he proves contumacious. If his army beats you, torture his women. If his patriotism defies you, burn his churches and defile his home. If you cannot beat him in fair fight, crush him - with sheer horror. If you cannot bring htm to his knees by fear, stain him with anguish for his loved ones. When you take him prisoner starve! him slowly and leave him to die of typhus. This is the creed published to the * world by the bestial and servile people who have become the enemy of the whole race; and this is why the destruction of Prussian power is one of the inevitable, objects of the war." So little of exaggeration does this indictment involve that an examination of even a fraction of the evidence upon which it is built must convince the most -open-minded of its justice. And, in these later days, with the growing desperation of her struggles Germany seems bent on displaying to the whole world the full depravity of her soul by excelling herself in deeds of horror and shame. Hospital ships and ships bearing relief to the Belgians have become targets for which her submarines are greedy. She is indulging in a carnival of destruction in territories in France upon which her grip is relaxing, and the testimony of neutral witnesses goes to show that even her civilian popula&on finds satisfaction in • metinoout the vilest insult and ill-treatment to unfortunate prisoners of war, while the German Red Cross is no better than a branch of th© German military machine, having forfeited the right to be regarded as an organisation for the good of humanity by its attitude towards non-Germans. But these things are not done with impunity. They will bring their own retribution.- Her sowing has been , such that Germany may well fear the reaping of the whirlwind. This will assuredly be her punishment.