AFTER THE WAR.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 145082, 6 September 1916, Page 8

AFTER THE WAR.

HOW REGARD THE GERMAN? WHERE SODDIBRS' JUDGMENT.’ EXCEI/S. '‘Before Hie close of this wur, whose days of grief and horror appear to be numbered, let ns for the last time weigh in our minds those words of hatred and malediction which it has very often wrung from us!” Thus writes Maurice Maeterlinck’in the. New York Eorum, the translation into English being by Alox. Tcixcira d 6 Mattes.’ We have to do with the strangest of enemies. Ho has knowingly and deliberately, while in the full possession of his faculties and without necessity or excuse, revived all iho crimes which we supposed to be forever buried in the barbarous past. Ho has trampled under foot all the precepts which man had so painfully won from the cruel darkness of his beginnings; he has violated all the laws of justice, humanity, loyalty, and honour, from the highest, which are almost godlike, to the fihnptad,. the most elementary, which still belong lo the lower worlds. There is no longer any doubt on this point; it has been proved over and over again, until wo have attained a final certitude. But, on the other hand, it is no less certain that he has displayed virtues which it would be unworthy of us to deny; lor wo honour ourselves in recognising the valour of those whom wo axo fighting. He has gone to his death in deep, compact, disciplined musses, with a blind, hopele-ss, obstinate heroism, of which no such lurid example had over yet been known, and which has many times compelled our admiration and our pity. He has known how to sjmrifiee himself, with unprecedented and perhaps unequalled abnegation, to an idea which wc know to be false, inhuman. and even somewhat m vm, In* which ho believes to ho just and lolly; and a sacrifice of this kind, wha-LCver its object, is always tho proof of a force which survives those who devote themselves to making it, and must command rcapoci.

ENEMY HATED, NOT THE MAN

Question the. men returning from tho trenches; they detest the enemy, they abhor the aggressor, the unjust and arrogant aggressor, .uncouth, too often cruel and treacherous; hut they do not hate the man; they do him justice; they pity him; and, after tho battle, in the defenceless wounded soldier or disarmed prisoner they recognise, with astonishment, a brother in mislortune, who, like themselves, is submitting to duties am! laws which, like themselves, he. too, behoves lofty and necessary. I rider the insufferable enemy thoy see an unhappy man who likewise is bearing the burden of life. They forgot Hie things that divide them to recall only those which unite them in a common destiny; and they teach us a. groat lesson. Better than ourselves, who ate iar from danger, at the contact of profound and fearful verities and realities they are already beginning te discern something that wo cannot yet perceive; and their obscure instinct is probably anticipating tho judgment of history and our own judgment, when wo seo more clearly. I s'l us learn from them to be just and to distinguish that which wo are bound to despise and loathe from that whirh we may pity, lovo and respect. Setting aside the unpardonable aggression and the inexpiable violation of treaties, this war, despite its insanity, has come near to being a bloody but magnificent proof of greatness, heroism, and the spirit of sacrifice. Humanity was ready to rise above itself, to surpass all 'that it has hitherto accomplished. It has surpassed it.

NATION AI. S A CHI FICE. Never before had nations boon seen capable, for months in succession, pcrtajr lor years, of renouncing their repose, tV.r-r security, their Health, their comfort, all that they possessed and loved, down to their very life, in order to acconipli-h what they believed to be their duty. Never before had nations been seen abut were a-hle as a whole to understand and admit that the happiness of ouch of those who live in this time of trial is of no consequence compared with the honour of those who live no more or the happiness of those wlk> are not yet alive. Wo stand on heights that had not been attained before. And. if, on the enemies’ side, this unexampled renunciation had .not been poisoned at.its. source; if tbo war which t’tev are waging against us had been as tine, as loyal, as generous, aw chivalrous as that which, wo arc .waging against them, wo may well believe that it would have boon tbo last, and that it would have ended, not in battle, but like the awakening -from an evil •I realn, in a noble and fraternal amazement. They liavo made that impossible;- and this, we may bo sure, is tbo disappointment which the future will bH it most difficult to forgive them. Till! BURDEN OF HATRED. What are wo to do now? Jlust we bate the eiiemv to tbo end of lime? Tbo burden of - hatred is the heaviest that man con boar upon this earth; and wo should faint under the, weight of it. On the other hand, we do not wish once more to bo tbo dupes and victims of confidence and love. Hero again our soldiers, in their simplicity, wdiich is so clear-seeing and so' close to the truth, anticipate the future and teach us what to adroit and what to avoid Wo have soon that they do not hate tbo man; but they do not trust him at all. They discover the human being in him only when ho is unarmed. They know, from bitter experience, that so long as ho possesses weapons, ho cannot resist tho frenzy of destruction, treachery and slaughter ; and that he docs not become kmd)y until ho is rendered powerless.