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diff --git a/old/10668.txt b/old/10668.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a4c1627 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/10668.txt @@ -0,0 +1,12227 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The War and Democracy +by R.W. Seton-Watson, J. Dover Wilson, Alfred E. Zimmern, +and Arthur Greenwood + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The War and Democracy + +Authors: R.W. Seton-Watson, J. Dover Wilson, Alfred E. Zimmern, + and Arthur Greenwood + +Release Date: January 10, 2004 [EBook #10668] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WAR AND DEMOCRACY *** + + + + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Lazar Liveanu and PG Distributed +Proofreaders + + + + + +THE WAR AND DEMOCRACY + + +by + +R.W. SETON-WATSON, _D.Litt_. +J. DOVER WILSON +ALFRED E. ZIMMERN +and +ARTHUR GREENWOOD + + + +1915 + + * * * * * +TO + +The Workers' Educational Association + + * * * * * + + When wilt Thou save the people? + O God of mercy, when? + Not kings and lords, but nations! + Not thrones and crowns, but men! + Flowers of Thy heart, O God, are they; + Let them not pass, like weeds, away-- + Their heritage a sunless day. + God save the people! + + EBENEZER ELLIOTT. + +"To remake the map of Europe, and to rearrange the peoples in accordance +with the special mission assigned to each of them by geographical, ethnical +and historical conditions--this is the first essential step for all." + +MAZZINI (1832). + + * * * * * + + + +PREFACE + + +For many years past the prospect of universal war has haunted the dreams of +pacificists and militarists alike. Many of us, without denying its growing +menace, hoped against hope that it might be averted by the gradual +strengthening of international goodwill and mutual intercourse, and the +steady growth of democratic influences and political thought. But our +misgivings proved more prophetic than our hopes; and last August the great +war came upon us like a thief in the night. After four months of war we +feel that, in spite of the splendid response of the nation at large, in +spite of a unanimity which has no parallel in our previous history, there +are still large sections of the community who fail to realise the vastness +of the issues at stake, the formidable nature of the forces ranged against +us, and the true inner significance of the struggle. And yet all that is +worth living for depends upon the outcome of this war--for ourselves the +future of the democratic ideal in these islands and in the British Empire +at large, for the peoples of Europe deliverance from competing armaments +and the yoke of racial tyranny. But before our future can be secured, +sacrifices will be required of every citizen, and in a free community +sacrifice can only spring from knowledge. Moreover, if we are to put an end +to the intolerable situation of an unwilling Europe in arms, public opinion +must think out very carefully the great problems which have been thrown +into the melting-pot and be prepared for the day of settlement. + +The present volume has been written as a guide to the study of the +underlying causes and issues of the war. It does not pretend to cover the +whole of so vast a field, and it will have attained its aim if it provides +the basis for future discussion. It originated in the experience of its +five writers at the Summer Schools for working-class students held in +connection with the Workers' Educational Associations. In the early days of +August, at the outbreak of the war, Summer Schools were in full swing +at Oxford, Cambridge, Eton, Bangor, and Durham, and it at once became +apparent, not merely that the word "citizen" had suddenly acquired a new +depth and significance for the men and women of our generation, but also +that for the individual citizen himself a large new field of study and +discussion had been opened up on subjects and issues hitherto unfamiliar. +This book was planned to meet the need there expressed, but it is hoped +that it may be found useful by a wider circle of readers. + +We have called the book _The War and Democracy_, because our guiding idea +throughout has been the sense of the great new responsibilities, both of +thought and action, which the present situation lays upon British Democracy +and on believers in democracy throughout the world. + +In devoting one chapter to a survey of the issues raised for settlement by +the war, we must disclaim most emphatically all idea of dividing the +lion's skin before the animal has been killed. Our object has not been to +prophesy, but merely to stimulate thought and discussion. The field is so +vast and complicated that unless public opinion begins to mobilise without +further delay and to form clear ideas as to how the principles laid down +by our statesmen are to be converted into practice, it may find itself +confronted, as it was confronted in 1814, with a situation which it can +neither understand nor control, and with a settlement which will perpetuate +many of the abuses which this war ought to remove. Our best excuse is +supplied by the attitude of many leaders of German political thought--men +like Franz von Liszt, Ostwald; and Paul Rohrbach--who are already mapping +out the world according to their victorious fancies. + +_December 1914._ + +R.W.S.-W. J.D.W. A.E.Z. A.G. + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER I + +INTRODUCTORY + +By ALFRED E. ZIMMERN, M.A., late Fellow and Tutor of New College, Oxford; +Author of _The Greek Commonwealth_ + + +CHAPTER II + +THE NATIONAL IDEA IN EUROPE, 1789-1914 By J. DOVER WILSON, M.A., Gonville +and Cains College, Cambridge, late Lecturer in the University of +Helsingfors, Finland + +1. NATION AND NATIONALITY 2. THE BIRTH OF NATIONALISM: POLAND AND THE +FRENCH REVOLUTION 3. THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA AND THE INTERNATIONAL IDEA +4. THE NATIONAL IDEA IN BELGIUM AND THE PROBLEM OF SMALL NATIONS 5. THE +NATIONAL IDEA IN ITALY: THE IDEAL TYPE 6. THE NATIONAL IDEA IN GERMANY: A +CASE OF ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT 7. THE MAP OF EUROPE, 1814-1914 + + +CHAPTER III + +GERMANY By ALFRED E. ZIMMERN + +1. THE GERMAN STATE 2. THE REAL GERMANY 3. PRUSSIA 4. GERMANY SINCE 1870 + + +CHAPTER IV + +AUSTRIA-HUNGARY AND THE SOUTHERN SLAVS By R.W. SETON-WATSON, D.Litt., New +College, Oxford, author of _Racial Problems in Hungary, The Southern Slav +Question_, etc. + +INTRODUCTION + +1. AUSTRIA AND THE HABSBURGS 2. HUNGARY AND MAGYAR MISRULE 3. THE DECAY OF +THE DUAL SYSTEM 4. THE GENESIS OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS 5. THE RENAISSANCE +OF SERBIA 6. SERBO-CROAT UNITY 7. THE BALKAN WARS 8. THE MURDER OF THE +ARCHDUKE 9. THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS + + +CHAPTER V + +RUSSIA By J. DOVER WILSON + +1. THE RUSSIAN STATE 2. RELIGION 3. THE REVOLUTIONARY MOVEMENT AND ITS +SIGNIFICANCE 4. THE SUBJECT NATIONALITIES + + +CHAPTER VI + +FOREIGN POLICY [_Contributed_] + +A. THE MEANING OF FOREIGN POLICY + +1. THE FOREIGN OFFICE 2. THE WORK OF THE FOREIGN OFFICE 3. THE BALANCE OF +POWER 4. THE ESTIMATION OF NATIONAL FORCES + +B. THE DEMOCRATISATION OF FOREIGN POLICY + +1. DEMOCRACY AND PEACE 2. FOREIGN POLICY AND POPULAR FORCES 3. FOREIGN +POLICY AND EDUCATION + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE ISSUES OF THE WAR By R.W. SETON-WATSON + +1. IS THERE AN IDEA BEHIND THE WAR? 2. THE AIMS OF BRITISH STATESMANSHIP +3. BRITAIN AND GERMANY 4. NATIONALITY AND THE GERMAN EMPIRE (1) +ALSACE-LORRAINE, (2) SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN, (3) POLAND 5. THE FUTURE OF +AUSTRIA-HUNGARY--MINIMUM AND MAXIMUM LOSSES 6. THE SOUTHERN SLAV QUESTION +7. THE ROUMANIAN QUESTION 8. CAN THE DUAL MONARCHY BE REPLACED? 9. BOHEMIA +AND HUNGARY 10. GERMANY AND AUSTRIA 11. ITALIAN ASPIRATIONS 12. THE BALKAN +SITUATION: BULGARIA AND GREECE 13. THE FUTURE OF TURKEY 14. RUSSIA AND +CONSTANTINOPLE 15. ASIATIC TURKEY 16. RUSSIA AND POLAND 17. GENERAL AIMS + + +CHAPTER VIII + +SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC ASPECTS OF THE WAR By ARTHUR GREENWOOD, B.Sc., Lecturer +in Economics at the University of Leeds + +INTRODUCTION + +A. STATE ACTION IN INDUSTRY AND COMMERCE + + +B. IMMEDIATE SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC EFFECTS OF THE WAR + +1. FOREIGN TRADE 2. UNEMPLOYMENT AND SHORT TIME 3. TRADE UNIONS, +CO-OPERATIVE SOCIETIES, AND DISTRESS 4. THE NEW SPIRIT + +C. AFTER THE WAR + +1. GENERAL EFFECTS 2. POSSIBLE INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENTS 3. SOCIAL EFFECTS +AND THE NEW OUTLOOK + + +CHAPTER IX + +GERMAN CULTURE AND THE BRITISH COMMONWEALTH By ALFRED E. ZIMMERN + +1. THE TWO ISSUES 2. CULTURE 3. CULTURE AS A STATE PRODUCT 4. GERMAN AND +BRITISH IDEALS OF EDUCATION 5. GERMAN AND BRITISH IDEALS OF CIVILISATION 6. +THE PRINCIPLE OF THE COMMONWEALTH 7. THE FUTURE OF CIVILISATION 8. THE TWO +ROADS OF ADVANCE: INTER-STATE ACTION AND COMMON CITIZENSHIP + + +INDEX + + +MAPS + +THE PARTITION OF POLAND +EUROPE IN 1815 +GERMANY IN 1815 +PRUSSIA SINCE THE ACCESSION OF FREDERICK THE GREAT +AUSTRIA-HUNGARY: PHYSICAL +THE FRANCO-GERMAN FRONTIER +AUSTRIA-HUNGARY: POLITICAL DIVISIONS +RACIAL AND NATIONAL BOUNDARIES IN CENTRAL EUROPE + + + +CHAPTER I + +INTRODUCTORY + + +"It seems to me that the amount of lawlessness and crime, the amount of +waste and futility, the amount of war and war possibility and war danger +in the world are just the measure of the present inadequacy of the world's +system of collective organisations to the purpose before them. It follows +from this very directly that only one thing can end war on the earth, and +that is a subtle mental development, an idea, the development of the idea +of the world commonweal in the collective mind."--H.G. WELLS in 1908. + +THIS is a testing time for Democracy. The people of Great Britain and the +Dominions, to whom all the world looks as the trustees, together with +France and America, of the great democratic tradition, are brought face +to face, for the first time, with their full ultimate responsibility as +British citizens. Upon the way in which that responsibility is realised +and discharged depends the future of the democratic principle, not only in +these islands, but throughout the world. + +Democracy is not a mere form of government. It does not depend on ballot +boxes or franchise laws or any constitutional machinery. These are but its +trappings. Democracy is a spirit and an atmosphere, and its essence is +trust in the moral instincts of the people. A tyrant is not a democrat, for +he believes in government by force; neither is a demagogue a democrat, for +he believes in government by flattery. A democratic country is a country +where the government has confidence in the people and the people in the +government and in itself, and where all are united in the faith that the +cause of their country is not a mere matter of individual or national +self-interest, but is in harmony with the great moral forces which rule the +destinies of mankind. No form of government is so feeble as a democracy +without faith. But a democracy armed with faith is not merely strong: it +is invincible; for its cause will live on, in defeat and disaster, in the +breast of every one of its citizens. Belgium is a living testimony to that +great truth. + +British Democracy has carried this principle of confidence to the furthest +possible point. Alone among the States of Europe, Great Britain relies for +her existence and for the maintenance of her world-wide responsibilities +upon the free choice of her citizens. Her privileges are extended to all: +her active obligations are forced upon none. Trusting in the principle of +individual freedom, and upon the sound instinct and understanding of her +people, she leaves it to each citizen to make his choice whether, and in +what manner, he shall serve his country. Never have responsibilities so +arduous and so urgent been laid upon the citizens of any community: and +never have the citizens been so free to choose or to decline the burden. +The world will judge Great Britain, and judge Democracy, according to the +measure of our free response. + +What is the nature of the responsibility cast upon us at this crisis? + +It is threefold. It concerns the present, the past, and the future. There +are three questions which every citizen must needs ask, and try to answer, +for himself. The first and most urgent is a matter of present decision: +What is my duty here and now? The second involves a judgment of past +events: Why is it that we are at war? Are we fighting in a just cause? The +third involves an estimate of the future and of the part which British +public opinion can and should play in shaping it: What are the issues +involved in the various belligerent countries? What should be the +principles of a just settlement? How can Great Britain best use her +influence in the cause of human progress and for the welfare of the peoples +involved in the war? + +It is with the second and especially with the third of these +responsibilities that this volume is concerned. + +"What is the war about?" "Are we fighting in a just cause?" Every one by +now has asked himself this question, and most people have studied some at +least of the evidence, and tried to satisfy themselves as to the answer. +The Foreign Office White Paper and numberless books and pamphlets have +enlightened the public on many of the questions at issue. Yet the fact +remains that the necessity of this educative campaign involves a confession +of failure--or at least of grave neglect--on the part of British democracy. +Under our democratic constitution the people of Great Britain have assumed +the responsibility for the management of their own affairs. One great +department of those affairs, the most vital of all, they and their +representatives have systematically neglected. Deeply engaged and +interested in domestic problems, they have left the control of their +foreign relations in the hands of expert advisers. And so it was with +something like stupefaction that they discovered, one day in August, that +they were called upon to honour the obligations contracted in their name. + +There has been no desire to evade those obligations. But there has been a +very real desire to understand them, and also a fixed determination never +again to allow such a lack of contact, on vital issues, between the mind of +the people and the activities of their ministers. + +But no mere changes in the machinery of democratic control can avail to +save the people from the consequences of their own ignorance and neglect. +There is only one way in which we can achieve full Democracy in this +country, and that is through Education. + +In the sphere of domestic affairs, particularly in connection with social +and industrial questions, the people have slowly realised this hard truth. +After a generation or more of attempts and failures and disillusionments +many thousands of workpeople have learnt the lesson that power without +knowledge is not power at all, and that knowledge, whether for public +affairs or for any other purpose, cannot be gained without effort and +discipline. They have come to realise that Democracy needs, for its full +working, not only schools in which to train its young, but also--what +no Democracy save those of the ancient world has ever possessed--such +facilities for the education for its adult citizens, engaged in the active +work of the community, as will enable them to maintain unimpaired their +intellectual freshness and vigour, and to face with wisdom and courage the +problems for which, as citizens, they have assumed responsibility. They +have come to think of Education, not as a time of tutelage or training, but +as a part of active life itself, woven of the same texture and concerned +with the same issues, as being, in fact, the effort to understand the world +in which they live. But they have naturally tended to confine those issues +within the limits of their own domestic interests and experience. They +are called upon now to widen their horizon, and to apply the democratic +conception of education to the new problems which have arisen owing to the +part which Great Britain is now playing in the affairs of Europe. + +It is never easy to think things out clearly and coldly. But it is hardest +of all in the crisis of a great war, when men's minds are blurred by +passionate emotions of sorrow, anxiety, and indignation. Hence a time of +war is the heyday of fallacies and delusions, of misleading hopes and +premature disillusionments: men tend to live in an unreal world of phrases +and catchwords. Yet never is it more necessary than at such a period, in +the old Greek phrase, "to follow the argument whithersoe'er it leads," +to look facts squarely in the face, and, particularly, the great ugly +outstanding fact of war itself, the survival of which democrats, especially +in Great Britain and the United States, have of recent years been so +greatly tempted to ignore. + +People speak as if war were a new sudden and terrible phenomenon. There is +nothing new about the fact of war. What is new about this war is the scale +on which it is waged, the science and skill expended on it, and the fact +that it is being carried on by national armies, numbering millions, instead +of by professional bodies of soldiers. But war itself is as old as the +world: and if it surprises and shocks us this is due to our own blindness. +There are only two ways of settling disputes between nations, by law or +by war. As there is as yet no World-State, with the power to enforce +a World-law between the nations, the possibility of war, with all its +contingent horrors, should have been before our eyes all the time. The +_occasion_ of this war was no doubt a surprise. But that it could happen at +all should not be a surprise to us, still less a disillusionment. It does +not mark a backward step in human civilisation. It only registers the +fact that civilisation is still grievously incomplete and unconsolidated. +Terrible as this war is in its effect on individual lives and happiness, it +ought not to depress us--even if, in our blindness, we imagined the world +to be a far better organised place than it actually is. The fact that many +of the combatants regard war as an anachronism adds to the tragedy, but +also to the hope, of the struggle. It shows that civilised opinion is +gathering strength for that deepening and extension of the meaning and +range of citizenship which alone can make war between the nations of the +world as obsolete as it has become between the nations of the British +Empire or between the component parts of the United States. + +It was perhaps inevitable that British citizens in particular, removed from +the storm centres of Continental Europe, and never very logical in their +thinking, should have failed to realise the possibility of another great +war, similar to the Napoleonic struggle of a hundred years ago. For nearly +half a century the great European States had been at peace: and we had come +to look upon their condition, and the attachment of their peoples, as being +as ancient and as stable as our own. We had grown used to the map of Europe +as it had been left by the great convulsions between 1848 and 1871. Upon +the basis of that map and of the governments represented on it, and in +response to the growing needs of the world as a whole, we had embarked on +every kind of international co-operation and cosmopolitan effort. The Hague +Congress, convened by the Tsar of Russia, looked forward to the day when +war, and the causes of war, should be obsolete. The Socialist Movement, a +growing force in all industrial communities, stood for the same ideal, and +for the international comradeship of the working class. Law and medicine, +science and scholarship followed suit; and every summer, in quest of +health and change, thousands of plain citizens have crossed international +frontiers with scarcely greater sense of change than in moving from +province to province in a single State. Commerce and industry, the greatest +material forces of our time, have become inextricably international, and +in the palpable injury in which a war would involve them some thinkers +of clear but limited vision saw the best hope of averting a European +conflagration. + +And yet, throughout these two generations of economic and social +development, the fear of war has never been absent from the mind of Europe. +Her emperors and statesmen have talked of peace; but they have prepared for +war, more skilfully and more persistently than ever before in the history +of Europe or of the world. Almost the entire manhood of every European +nation but England has been trained to arms; and the annual war budget of +Europe rose, in time of peace, to over 300 million pounds. The States of +Europe, each afraid to stand alone against a coalition of possible rivals, +formed themselves into opposing groups; and each of the groups armed +feverishly against the other, fearful lest, by any change in the diplomatic +or political situation, they might be caught unawares and suffer loss. +Thus, it ought not to have surprised us that finally, through the accident +of a royal murder, the spark should be fired and the explosion ensue, +and that merchants and manufacturers, propagandists and philanthropists, +scholars and scientists, should find the ground shaken beneath their +feet and the projects patiently built up through years of international +co-operation shattered by the events of a few days. + +Now that the war has come it is easy to see that they were mistaken. They +had built up the structure of a cosmopolitan society without looking to +the foundations. The economic activities of mankind have indeed brought a +World-Society and a World-Industry into being; but its political analogue, +a World-State, can only be formed, not through the co-operation of +individuals or groups of individuals, but through the union of nations and +the federation of national governments. The first task of our time for +Europe, as we shall try to show in the next chapter, is to lay firm the +foundations of those nations by carrying to victory the twin principles of +Nationality and Democracy--to secure that the peoples of Europe shall be +enabled to have governments corresponding to their national needs and +responsible to their own control, and to build up, under the care +and protection of those governments, the social institutions and the +civilisation of their choice. So long as there are peoples in Europe under +alien governments, curtailed in the use of their own language,[1] in the +propagation of their literature and ideas, in their social intercourse, in +their corporate life, in all that we in Great Britain understand by civil +liberty, so long will there be men who will mock at the very idea of +international peace, and look forward to war, not as an outworn instrument +of a barbarous age, but as a means to national freedom and self-expression. +Englishmen sometimes forget that there are worse evils than open war, both +in political and industrial relations, and that the political causes for +which their fathers fought and died have still to be carried to victory on +the Continent. Nationality and their national institutions are the very +life-blood of English people. They are as natural to them as the air +they breathe. That is what makes it sometimes so difficult for them to +understand, as the history of Ireland and even of Ulster shows, what +nationality means to other peoples. And that is why they have not realised, +not only that there are peoples in Europe living under alien governments, +but that there are governments in Europe so foolish as to think that men +and women deprived of their national institutions, humiliated in their +deepest feelings, and forced into an alien mould, can make good citizens, +trustworthy soldiers, or even obedient subjects. + +[Footnote 1: The German official _communique_ on August 26, 1914, reports +as follows: "All the newspapers in Belgium, with the exception of those in +Antwerp, are printed in the German language." This, of course, is on the +model of the Prussian administration of Poland. The Magyars are more +repressive even than the Germans. See the bibliography given in _General +Books_ below.] + +The political causes of the present war, then, and of the half century +of Armed Peace which preceded it are to be found, not in the particular +schemes and ambitions of any of the governments of Europe, nor in their +secret diplomacy, nor in the machinations of the great armament interests +allied to them, sinister though all these may have been, but in the nature +of some of those governments themselves, and in their relation to the +peoples over whom they rule. + +"If it were possible," writes Prince Buellow, who directed German policy +as Imperial Chancellor from 1900 to 1909, "for members of different +nationalities, with different language and customs, and an intellectual +life of a different kind, to live side by side in one and the same State, +without succumbing to the temptation of each trying to force his own +nationality on the other, things on earth would look a good deal more +peaceful. But it is a law of life and development in history that where +two national civilisations meet they fight for ascendancy. In the struggle +between nationalities one nation is the hammer and the other the anvil; one +is the victor and the other the vanquished."[1] No words could indicate +more clearly the cause that is at stake in the present war. They show us +that there are still governments in Europe so ignorant as to believe that +the different nationalities of mankind are necessarily hostile to one +another, and so foolish and brutal as to think that national civilisation, +or, as the German Professors call it, "culture," can and indeed must be +propagated by the sword. It is this extraordinary conception which is at +the back of protests like that of Professor Haeckel and Professor Eucken +(men whom, in the field of their own studies, all Europe is proud to +honour) against "England fighting with a half-Asiatic power against +Germanism."[2] + +[Footnote 1: _Imperial Germany_, by Prince Bernhard von Buelow, English +translation, 1st ed. pp. 245-6 (London, 1914).] + +[Footnote 2: Protest of Professors Ernst Haeckel and Rudolf Eucken of Jena, +quoted in _The Times_ from the _Vossische Zeitung_ of August 20, 1914.] + + +There are not only half-Asiatics, there are real Asiatics side by side with +England; and England is not ashamed of it. For she does not reckon the +culture of Europe as higher than the culture of Asia, or regard herself as +the hammer upon the anvil of India. + +Prince Buelow's words, and the theory of policy underlying them, really go +to the root of the whole trouble in European politics. They explain +the Balance of Power, the competition in armaments, the belief in the +inevitability and the moral value of war, and all those common European +shibboleths which seem so inexplicable to citizens of the more +modern-minded States and communities of the world. Why should Germany and +Austria arm against France and Russia when Canada does not arm against +the United States? Why should a Balance of Power be necessary to the +maintenance of European Peace when we do not consider the preponderance +of a single Power, such as the United States in North, Central and South +America, or Great Britain in the Pacific or Southern Asia dangerous to the +peace of the whole world? Why, finally, to press Prince Buelow's logic home, +if members of different nationalities cannot live side by side without +playing the game of Hammer and Anvil together, are not the English spending +the whole of their energy fighting the Welsh, the Scotch, and the Irish in +the United Kingdom, the Dutch in South Africa, and the French in Canada, +not to speak of the Jews in every part of the British Empire? The fact is +that the statesmen of Germany and Austria-Hungary, and of Russia also, have +missed the chief lesson of recent history and politics: that in the growing +complexity of world-relations power is falling more and more, of necessity, +into the hands of States which are not Nations but Commonwealths of +Nations, States composed, like the British Empire and the United States, of +a variety of nationalities and "cultures," living peacefully, each with its +own institutions, under a single law and a single central government. + +But the time is not ripe yet for a Commonwealth of Europe. The peoples of +Europe have yet to win their liberties before they can be free to dream of +a United States of Europe. So long as the Emperors and statesmen of Central +Europe believe, like the Mahomedans of old, that propaganda can be imposed +by the sword, they can only be met by the sword, and controlled by the +sword. Not till they have been conquered and rendered harmless, or +displaced by the better mind of the peoples whom they have indoctrinated, +can Europe proceed along the natural course of her development. + +So far we have been concerned--as we shall be concerned throughout this +book--with the _political_ causes underlying the war. But it would not be +right to ignore the fact that there are other deeper causes, unconnected +with the actions of governments, for which we in this country are jointly +responsible with the rest of the civilised world. + +This war is not simply a conflict between governments and nations for the +attainment of certain political ends, Freedom and Nationality on the one +side and Conquest and Tyranny on the other. It is also a great outburst +of pent-up feeling, breaking like lava through the thin crust of European +civilisation. On the _political_ side, as we have said just now, the war +reveals the fact that civilisation is still incomplete and ill-organised. +But on the _moral_ side it reveals the fact that modern society has broken +down, that the forces and passions that divide and embitter mankind have +proved stronger, at the moment of strain, than those which bind them +together in fellowship and co-operation. "What we are suffering from," +says one of the greatest of living democrats,[1] "is something far more +widespread than the German Empire. Is it not the case that what we are in +face of is nothing less than the breakdown in a certain idea and hope of +civilisation, which was associated with the liberal and industrial movement +of the last century? There was to be an inevitable and glorious progress +of humanity of which science, commerce, and education were to be the main +instruments, and which was to be crowned with a universal peace. Older +prophets like Thomas Carlyle expressed their contempt for the shallowness +of this prevailing ideal, and during this century we have been becoming +more and more doubtful of its value. But we are now witnessing its +downfall. Science, commerce, and education have done, and can do, much for +us. But they cannot expel the human spirit from human nature. What is +that? At bottom, love of self, self-interest, selfishness individual and +corporate. As a theory, the philosophy of selfishness has often been +exposed. But, to an extent that is difficult to exaggerate, it has been the +motive, acknowledged and relied upon without shame or apology in commerce, +in politics and in practical life. Our civilisation has been based on +selfishness, our commerce on competition and the unrestricted love of +wealth, our education on the motive of self-advancement. And science and +knowledge, made the instrument of selfishness and competition, have armed +man against man, class against class, and nation against nation, with +tenfold the power of destruction which belonged to a less educated and +highly organised age." + +[Footnote 1: _The War and the Church_, by Charles Gore (Oxford, Mowbray, +1914).] + +The civilised world has been shocked during the past months at the +spectacle of the open adoption by a great Power of this philosophy +of selfishness. Men had not realised that the methods and principles +underlying so much of our commercial and industrial life could be +transferred so completely to the field of politics or so ruthlessly pressed +home by military force. But it is well for us to remember that it is not +Prussia, even in the modern world, who invented the theory of Blood and +Iron or the philosophy of Force. The Iron Law of Wages is a generation +older than Bismarck: and "Business is Business" can be no less odious a +watchword than "War is War." Treitschke and Nietzsche may have furnished +Prussian ambitions with congenial ammunition; but Bentham with his purely +selfish interpretation of human nature and Marx with his doctrine of the +class-struggle--the high priest of Individualism and the high priest of +Socialism--cannot be acquitted of a similar charge. If the appeal has been +made in a less crude and brutal form, and if the instrument of domination +has been commercial and industrial rather than military, it is because +Militarism is not the besetting sin of the English-speaking peoples. Let +us beware, therefore, at this moment, of anything savouring of +self-righteousness. + +"Some of us," says Bishop Gore, "see the chief security" against +this disease which has infected our civilisation "in the progress of +Democracy--the government of the people really by the people and for the +people. I am one of those who believe this and desire to serve towards the +realising of this end. But the answer does not satisfy me. I do not know +what evils we might find arising from a world of materialistic democracies. +But I am sure we shall not banish the evil spirits which destroy human +lives and nations and civilisations by any mere change in the methods +of government. Nothing can save civilisation except a new spirit in the +nations." + +The task before Europe, then, is a double one--a task of development and +construction in the region of politics, and of purification and conversion +in the region of the spirit. "For the finer spirits of Europe," says the +great French writer, Romain Rolland, who is none the less a patriot because +he is also a lover of Germany, "there are two dwelling-places: our earthly +fatherland, and that other, the City of God. Of the one we are the guests, +of the other the builders. To the one let us give our lives and our +faithful hearts; but neither family, friend, nor fatherland, nor aught that +we love has power over the spirit which is the light. It is our duty to +rise above tempests and thrust aside the clouds which threaten to obscure +it; to build higher and stronger, dominating the injustice and hatred of +nations, the walls of that city wherein the souls, of the whole world may +assemble."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Article in the _Journal de Geneve_, translated in the +_Cambridge Magazine_ and reprinted in _Public Opinion_, Nov. 27, 1914. + +Those who hold that Christianity and war are incompatible would seem to be +committed to a monastic and passively anarchist view of life, inconsistent +with membership in a political society. But whatever the relation between +Christianity and war, there can be no question of the relation between +Christianity and _hatred_. Hatred (which is not the same thing as moral +indignation) is a poison which corrodes and embitters, and so degrades, and +thereby weakens, the national spirit. It is a pity that some of our most +prominent newspaper-proprietors do not understand this.] + +Internationalism as a political theory has broken down: for it was based on +a false conception of the nature of government and of the obligations of +citizenship. The true internationalism--a spirit of mutual understanding +and fellowship between men and nations, to replace the suspicions, the +competition, and the watchful selfishness of the past generation--is the +moral task that lies before Europe and America to-day. If Great Britain is +to lead the way in promoting "a new spirit between the nations" she needs a +new spirit also in the whole range of her corporate life. For what Britain +stands for in the world is, in the long run, what Britain is, and, when +thousands are dying for her, it is more than ever the duty of all of us to +try to make her worthier of their devotion. + + + +CHAPTER II + + +THE NATIONAL IDEA IN EUROPE, 1789-1914 + + Europe, what of the night?-- + Ask of heaven, and the sea, + And my babes on the bosom of me, + Nations of mine, but ungrown. + There is one who shall surely requite + All that endure or that err: + She can answer alone: + Ask not of me, but of her. + + Liberty, what of the night?-- + I feel not the red rains fall, + Hear not the tempest at all, + Nor thunder in heaven any more. + All the distance is white + With the soundless feet of the sun. + Night, with the woes that it wore, + Night is over and done. + + A.C. SWINBURNE, _A Watch in the Night._ + +Sixty-two years ago reaction reigned supreme in Europe after the great +national and social uprisings of 1848, and England looked on passively +while the hopes of freedom were crushed in Bohemia, Hungary, and Italy. +Mazzini, the noblest of Italian patriots, the most prophetic soul among +nineteenth-century nationalists, selected this moment of profound despair +to publish an essay, entitled _Europe, Its Condition and Prospects_, which, +burning with the passion of an inextinguishable faith, pierced the veil of +the future and foreshadowed in an almost miraculous fashion the situation +which faces Europe and England to-day. Nothing printed in this country +since the war broke out expresses more clearly the real issues of the +mighty conflict and the part our country is called to play in it than the +following words, in reference to the unredeemed peoples of Europe, uttered +by the great Italian more than half a century ago: + +"They struggled, they still struggle, for country and liberty; for a word +inscribed upon a banner, proclaiming to the world that they also live, +think, love, and labour for the benefit of all. They speak the same +language, they bear about them the impress of consanguinity, they kneel +beside the same tombs, they glory in the same tradition; and they demand to +associate freely, without obstacles, without foreign domination, in order +to elaborate and express their idea, to contribute their stone also to the +great pyramid of history. It is something moral which they are seeking; +and this moral something is in fact, even politically speaking, the most +important question in the present state of things. It is the organisation +of the European task. In principle, nationality ought to be to humanity +that which division of labour is in a workshop--the recognised symbol of +association; the assertion of the individuality of a human group called by +its geographical position, its traditions, and its language, to fulfill a +special function in the European work of civilisation. + +"The map of Europe has to be re-made. This is the key to the present +movement; herein lies its initiative. Before acting, the instrument for +action must be organised; before building, the ground must be one's own. +The social idea cannot be realised under any form whatsoever before this +reorganisation of Europe is effected; before the peoples are free to +interrogate themselves, to express their vocation, and to assure its +accomplishment by an alliance capable of substituting itself for the +absolute league which now reigns supreme. + +"If England persist in maintaining a neutral, passive, selfish part, she +will have to expiate it. A European transformation is inevitable. When it +shall take place, when the struggle shall burst forth at twenty places at +once, when the old combat between fact and right is decided, the peoples +will remember that England stood by, an inert, immovable, sceptical witness +of their sufferings and efforts. The nation must rouse herself and shake +off the torpor of her government. She must learn that we have arrived at +one of those supreme moments in which one world is destroyed and another +is to be created; in which, for the sake of others and for her own, it is +necessary to adopt a new policy." + +England to-day has adopted this "new policy"; she has responded to +Mazzini's appeal by stepping into the arena and declaring herself ready to +take part in "the organisation of the European task"; her sons are dying on +the Continent in defence of the principle of nationality, in support of +the rights of other nations to that liberty which her insular position has +secured for herself for many centuries, the liberty "to associate freely, +without obstacles, without foreign domination, in order to elaborate and +express their idea." She is fighting, moreover, not only on behalf of the +threatened freedom of Belgium, France, and Serbia, on behalf of the +unborn freedom of Poland, Alsace-Lorraine, and the subject races of the +Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires, but also on her own behalf. It is not +merely that she recognises that her Empire is in danger; she recognises +also that she is unable to work out her own salvation, unable to carry on +her industrial development and her schemes for the betterment of her people +in security, while the Continent at her doors remains in constant peril +of change. "The social idea cannot be realised under any form whatsoever +before this reorganisation of Europe is effected." + + +Sec.1. _Nation and Nationality_.--The social idea and the national idea have +been for a century past the twin pivots of European development. The +political structure of the Continent has oscillated this way and that +according as these ideas have in turn assumed ascendancy over men's minds; +and when, as in 1848, both claimed attention at the same time, the whole +edifice was shaken to its very foundations. In England, on the other hand, +it is the social idea alone which has been a motive force in the nineteenth +century, although she has always had to reckon with the national idea +across the St. George's Channel. Owing to her fortunate geographical +situation, she acquired national unity many centuries ago and has always +been able to defend it successfully against the danger of external +aggression. The national idea, therefore, has long ceased to be an +aspiration, and consequently a revolutionary force, among us; it has +been realised in actual fact, we have grown as accustomed to it and as +unconscious of it as of the air we breathe. Thus Englishmen, as their +attitude towards Ireland has shown, find it difficult to understand exactly +what the principle of nationality means to those who have never possessed +national freedom or are in constant danger of losing it. This is perhaps +especially true of the English working classes, who grew to the full +stature of political consciousness some fifty years after the last serious +threat to our national existence was made by Napoleon, and upon whom the +burden of the social idea presses with peculiar weight. And yet, unless +the significance of the principle of nationality and the part which it has +played in the history of modern Europe be realised, it is impossible to +enter fully into the true meaning of the present tremendous conflict. + +What then is nationality? The question is more difficult to answer than +appears at first sight. A nationality is not quite the same thing as a +nation. For example, there is a German nation, ruled by the Kaiser +Wilhelm II., but this does not include twelve million people of German +nationality who are the subjects of the Emperor of Austria; or again, +there is the Swiss nation, which is made up of no less than three distinct +nationalities. Still less are the terms state and nationality synonymous; +for, if they were, then the natives of India might claim to be of the same +nationality as ourselves, or, _vice versa_, the United States would be +regarded as part of the British Empire because a large proportion of their +inhabitants happen to be of British descent. The word "race" brings us +somewhat nearer to the point, but even this will not satisfy us when we +remember that the Slavonic race, for example, consists of a large number of +nationalities, such as the Russians, the Poles, the Czechs, the Serbs, the +Montenegrins, etc., or that the English (as distinguished from the other +three nations of the United Kingdom) belong to the same Teutonic race as +the Germans. Nevertheless, a belief, whether well grounded or not, in +a common racial origin is one of the root principles of the idea of +nationality. + +"What is a nation?" the great Magyar nationalist, Kossuth, asked a Serb +representative at the Hungarian Diet of 1848. The reply was: "A race +which possesses its own language, customs, and culture, and enough +self-consciousness to preserve them." "A nation must also have its own +government," objected Kossuth. "We do not go so far," explained his +interlocutor; "one nation can live under several different governments, and +again several nations can form a single state."[1] Both the Magyar and the +Serb wore right, though the latter was speaking of "nationality" and the +former of "nation." The conversation is in fact instructive in more +ways than one. It would be difficult to find a better definition of +_nationality_ than that given by the Serb speaker. A common language, a +common culture, and common customs: these are the outward and visible signs +which make a people conscious of its common race, which make it, in other +words, a nationality. + +[Footnote 1: R.W. Seton-Watson, _The Southern Slav Question_, p. 46.] + +The element of "consciousness" is all-important. There are, for example, +members of the Finnish race scattered all over northern Russia, but they +evince no consciousness of any kind that they are allied to the nationality +which inhabits the country of Finland. Again, it is only within recent +years that the Serbs and the Croats in the south-west corner of the +Austro-Hungarian Empire have begun to realise that the only things +which divide them one from the other are a difference of religion and a +difference of alphabet; and now that the realisation of this fact has +spread from the study to the market-place, we see the formation of a new +nationality, that of the Serbo-Croats. The researches of historians and +other learned men have done an immense deal to stimulate the development of +nationalities during the past century, but they are unable of themselves +to create them. The fact of kinship is not enough; community of language, +customs, and culture is not even enough; to be a real nationality a people +must be conscious of all these things, and not merely conscious, but +sufficiently conscious to preserve them and, if need be, to die for them. + +Now the interesting thing for us about a nationality is that it is always +striving to become a _nation_. A nation, as we have seen, may be composed +of several nationalities; but such cases are rare, and are due to peculiar +geographical conditions, as for example in Switzerland and Great Britain, +or to external pressure, as in Belgium, which have as it were welded +together the different racial elements into a single whole. In general, +therefore, a nation is simply a nationality which has acquired +self-government; it is nationality _plus_ State. "Ireland a nation," the +warcry of the Irish Nationalist party, is a claim, not a statement of +fact; Ireland will become a nation when its desire for self-government +is satisfied. The case is instructive because it shows that it is not +necessary for a nationality to become a _sovereign_ State in order to be in +the full sense of the word a nation. It is perfectly possible, as our Serb +remarked, for several nations to form a single sovereign state; but as a +general rule all such nations will be allowed to manage their own internal +affairs. The self-governing Dominions of the British Empire and the Magyars +of Hungary are nations, though they are subordinate to their respective +imperial governments in questions of peace and war, treaty obligations, +etc. + +The real test of national existence is ultimately a sentimental one. Does +the nationality inhabiting a given country regard the government under +which it lives as a true expression of its peculiar genius and will? Does +the State, of which it forms a part, exist by its consent, or has it been +imposed upon it by some alien authority or nationality? Is it a territorial +unity, or has it been split up into sections by artificial frontiers? All +these questions must be answered before we can say of any nationality that +it is also a nation. The "national idea," therefore, which has been one of +the chief factors in modern history, is essentially an idea of development. +Its root is the conception of nationality, that is of a people consciously +united by race, language, and culture; and from this springs the larger +conception of nationhood, that is of a nationality possessing its own +political institutions, governed by its own consent, and co-extensive with +its natural boundaries. As we shall see later, political development +does not always stop at the Nation-State. Further growth, however, is +extra-national in character; it may either take the parasitical form of one +nation imposing its will and its "culture" upon other nations, or it may +assume the proportions of that highest type of polity yet known to mankind, +a commonwealth of nations freely associating together within the confines +of a single sovereign State.[1] + +[Footnote 1: See Chapter IX. for further treatment of this.] + + +Sec.2. _The Birth of Nationalism: Poland and the French Revolution_.--With +these general principles in mind let us now consider the national idea at +work in the nineteenth century. Nations, in the sense just defined, have +of course long existed in Europe. England, Scotland, and Switzerland are +nations whose life-histories date right back to the Middle Ages. Joan of +Are was a nationalist, and France has been a nation since the end of the +Hundred Years' War in 1453. Spain became a nation a few years later by the +expulsion of the Moors and the union of Castille and Aragon under Ferdinand +and Isabella. Holland, again, acquired her national freedom in her great +struggle against Spain in the sixteenth century. But it was not until the +end of the eighteenth century that nationalism became a real force in +Europe, an idea for which men died and in whose name monarchies were +overthrown. "In the old European system," writes Lord Acton, "the rights of +nationalities were neither recognised by governments nor asserted by the +people. The interest of the reigning families, not those of the nations, +regulated the frontiers, and the administration was conducted generally +without any reference to popular desires. Where all liberties were +suppressed, the claims of national independence were necessarily ignored, +and a princess, in the words of Fenelon, carried a monarchy in her wedding +portion."[1] The State was, in short, regarded as a purely territorial +affair; it was the property, the _landed_ property, of the monarch, who in +his capacity of owner controlled the destinies of the people who happened +to live upon that territory. Conquest or marriage might unite in the hands +of a single monarch the most diverse peoples and countries, the notorious +case of the kind being that of the Emperor Charles V., who in the sixteenth +century managed to hold sway over Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, Naples, +and a large part of the New World. + +[Footnote 1: _History of Freedom_, p. 273.] + +The golden age of the dynastic principle was, however, the eighteenth +century, and the long and tedious wars of that period were nearly all +occasioned by the aggrandisement of some royal house. The idea of a nation +as a living organism, as something more than a collection of people +dwelling in the same country, speaking the same language and obeying +the same ruler, had not yet dawned upon the world. Apart from England, +Scotland, Switzerland, and Holland, no European nation had really become +conscious of its personality as distinct from that of its hereditary +monarch. And as we have seen, until nationality becomes keenly +self-conscious, the national idea remains unborn. Only some great internal +cataclysm or an overwhelming disaster inflicted by a foreign power could +evoke this consciousness in a nation; and fate ordained that the two +methods should be tried simultaneously at opposite ends of Europe. France, +"standing on the top of golden hours," and Poland, crushed, dismembered, +downtrodden--it would be difficult to say which of these contributed the +more to the great national awakening in Europe. + +Poland was the first and greatest martyr of the nationalist faith. By its +constitution, which was that of an oligarchical republic with an elective +king, Poland was placed beyond the pale of a Europe ruled upon dynastic +principles. Its very existence was an insult to the accepted ideals +of legitimacy and hereditary monarchy, and it was impossible for any +particular house to acquire it in the honest way of marriage. This was +particularly annoying to its immediate neighbours, Prussia, Russia, and +Austria, all of whom had grown into great powers while Poland, torn by +internal dissension, sank lower and lower in the political scale. It is +significant that the earliest suggestion of partition came from Frederick +the Great of Prussia, who was obliged to take Russia and Austria into his +counsels, as he knew that they would never allow him to annex the whole +country himself. Indeed, from first to last, the story of the Polish +partitions is a good example of Prussian _Realpolitik_. At length, after +much hesitation on the part of Russia and Austria, the Powers agreed among +themselves in 1772 to what is known as the First Partition, whereby the +three monarchs enriched their respective territories by peeling, as it +were, the unfortunate republic on all its frontiers. Perhaps the most +remarkable fact about the whole disgraceful concern is that it did not +appear in the least disgraceful, either morally or politically, to the +public opinion of the age. Meanwhile Poland by a heroic effort converted +herself in self-defence into a hereditary constitutional monarchy on the +model of England. Prussia, playing the part of Judas, pretended to welcome +these reforms at first and lent the Poles its encouragement; but when +Russia took up arms on behalf of the Polish reactionary party, and the +country turned to Prussia to aid it in defending the constitution, the +treacherous Frederick William not only declined to do so, but began to +send his troops to occupy Polish territory. The upshot was the further +dismemberment of Poland known as the Second Partition (1793). "No sophistry +in the world," writes Mr. Nisbet Bain, "can extenuate the villainy of the +Second Partition. The theft of territory is its least offensive feature. It +is the forcible suppression of a national movement of reform, the hurling +back into the abyss of anarchy and corruption of a people who, by +incredible efforts and sacrifices, had struggled back to liberty and order, +which makes this great political crime so wholly infamous. Yet here again +the methods of the Russian Empress were less vile than those of the +Prussian King. Catherine openly took the risk of a bandit who attacks an +enemy against whom he has a grudge; Frederick William II. came up, when the +fight was over, to help pillage a victim whom he had sworn to defend."[1] +After this the end came rapidly. The heroic patriot Kosciuszko headed a +popular rising against Russia; but after a remarkable resistance to the +combined forces of the three partitioning powers, the insurrection was +finally suppressed in torrents of blood. The crowned bandits nearly +quarrelled between themselves over the booty, but eventually in 1795 +Austria, Russia, and Prussia signed a treaty which left nothing of Poland +on the map at all. + +[Footnote 1: _Slavonic Europe_, p. 404.] + +The effect upon the subsequent history of the world of this crime against +humanity, carried out by the three most absolute dynasties in Europe, was +incalculable. "The annihilation of the Polish nationality has probably +done more to endanger the monarchies of Europe than any one political act +accomplished since the monarchies of Europe were first founded. To trace +its effects in all their various ramifications would lead us a long way. +It is sufficient here to notice that the destruction of Poland, like the +destruction of Jerusalem, produced a "dispersion," and that as the Jews +of the dispersion have discharged a peculiar office in the economy of the +world as usurers and financiers, so, too, have the Poles of the dispersion +as agents and vectors of revolution. In all the republican movements of the +Continent the Poles have taken a leading part. They are to be found in +the Saxon riots of '48; in the Berlin barricades; in the struggle for the +Republic in Baden; in the Italian and Hungarian wars of liberation; in +the Chartist movement, and in the French Commune. Homeless and fearless, +schooled in war and made reckless by calamity, they have been the nerve +of revolution wherever they have been scattered by the winds of +misfortune."[1] And what Mr. Fisher, in this passage, puts in a concrete +fashion, Lord Acton has expressed with equal emphasis, if more abstractly. +"This famous measure," he writes of the final partition, "the most +revolutionary act of the old absolutism, awakened the theory of nationality +in Europe, converting a dormant right into an aspiration, and a sentiment +into a political claim. 'No wise or honest man,' wrote Edmund Burke, 'can +approve of that partition, or can contemplate it without prognosticating +great mischief from it to all countries at some future date.' Thenceforward +there was a nation demanding to be united in a State--a soul, as it were, +wandering in search of a body in which to begin life over again; and +for the first time a cry was heard that the arrangement of States was +unjust--that their limits were unnatural, and that a whole people was +deprived of its right to constitute an independent community. Before that +claim could be efficiently asserted against the overwhelming power of its +opponents--before it gained energy, after the last partition, to overcome +the influence of long habits of submission, and of the contempt which +previous disorders had brought upon Poland--the ancient European system was +in ruins, and a new world was rising in its place."[2] + +[Footnote 1: _The Republican Tradition in Europe_, pp. 212-213.] + +[Footnote 2: _History of Freedom_, p. 276.] + +[Illustration: _Present State Boundaries_--THE PARTITION OF POLAND.] + +The last sentence reminds us that, while in the East the dynastic principle +was displaying with cynical indifference its true character to the world, +events were occurring in the West which threatened to shake its very +foundations. If Poland was the first martyr of the national idea, +Revolutionary France was its first evangelist, for the new gospel which +France preached was the gospel of Liberty, and nationalism is an extension, +a variant of this gospel. In France itself, at the time of the +Revolution, the doctrine of Liberty was interpreted in its individual and +constitutional sense, which involved the abolition of class privileges +and of political institutions that conflicted with or did not adequately +express what Rousseau called the "general will." There was no national +question to be settled in France, and she could therefore devote herself +exclusively to the development of the "social idea," the establishment of +democratic government, the foundation of a republic, and in general the +determination of what should be the relations between the individual and +the State, a question which in course of time led on to the problem of +Socialism. + +But indirectly the French Revolution did an enormous deal to promote the +national idea in Europe. In the first place, the execution of Louis XVI. +and the proclamation of the Republic administered a blow to the theory of +legitimacy upon which the dynastic principle rested, from which it never +recovered. If the French nation could rise and abolish its native dynasty, +was there not hope that some day the Italian, Hungarian, and Polish nations +might also rise and throw off the still more objectionable yoke of their +foreign rulers? In the second place, the Revolution in and for itself +produced a tremendous effect upon the rest of Europe, and in every country +men awoke from the long sleep of feudalism to the desire of sweeping away +antiquated constitutions and rebuilding them upon a democratic basis. + +It is, however, sufficient to glance at a map of Europe at the end of the +eighteenth century to see why these dreams could not be at once realised. +Of what real value were ideals of democratic reform to the peoples dwelling +in Italy, Germany, or the Austrian Empire? Look, for example, at Germany, +split up like a jig-saw puzzle into over three hundred different States, +each with its petty prince or grand-duke. Her poets and philosophers might +sing of liberty and dream Utopian dreams, and here and there an experiment +in popular government might be tried by some princeling who had caught +the liberal fashion; but her political fabric, together with the rivalry +between Prussia and Austria, kept her disunited and strangled all real +hopes of reform. In short, the first and most crying need of Europe was not +the abolition of antiquated constitutions, but the redrawing of anomalous +frontiers. + +The doctrine of the sovereignty of the people proclaimed in France +presupposed the doctrine of the solidarity of the people proclaimed by the +dismembered nations of Europe. France could set its house in order; but +Belgium, Germany, Italy, Bohemia, Hungary, etc., had as yet no house of +their own. The house had to be built before it could be furnished on the +latest democratic lines; and before it could be even built, the ground had +to be wrested from the hands of absentee landlords or cleared of the little +dynastic State-shanties which cumbered it. The Polish nationalists became +the backbone of the republican movement in Europe; the French republicans +proclaimed the independence of nations as one of their cardinal principles. +Thus the social idea and the national idea were originally intimately +connected. They were the twin children of Poland and the French Revolution, +and in their cradle it was hard to tell them apart, so strongly were the +features of each stamped with the likeness of Liberty. + +For a time it seemed that the new ideas would carry all before them. Even +before France had herself abolished the monarchy, Belgium threw off the +Austrian rule and declared for a republic. And when in 1792 France found +herself at war with the Austrian and Prussian governments, and in the +following year with practically all the governments of Europe, her +victorious armies were everywhere greeted as saviours by the subject +peoples. But the old dynastic states proved to be of tougher material than +was expected. Moreover, it was not long before France found herself in +conflict with the national aspirations which she had called into existence. +The various republics which France set up all over Europe soon discovered +that they were nothing but tributary states of their "deliverer"; and when +Napoleon began his career of undisguised conquest, he unwittingly did even +more than the Revolution to strengthen the national idea in Europe, for the +nationalities had now become thoroughly hostile to France and fought in +alliance with their old dynasties to throw off the yoke of the hated +foreign tyrant. + +This strange change in France from liberator to despot is worthy of some +attention. It is not good for a nation, any more than for an individual, +to be too successful. Moreover, the doctrine of liberty, whether in the +individualist or nationalist sense, if carried to extreme, is liable to +abuse. All to-day are aware that sheer individualism in the economic sphere +is an almost unmitigated evil; sheer individualism in the political sphere +and sheer nationalism are equally evil. France at the beginning of last +century was suffering from too much success, too much political liberty, +too much nationalism. Having overthrown the old _regime_ within the State +quickly and easily, she began to think she could do without the State +altogether: the result was anarchy, for which the only remedy is despotism. +Having, again, suddenly become conscious of her power and mission as a +nation, she began to send her armies across her frontiers to carry the +gospel of her peculiar "culture" to other and more benighted nations: the +result was occupation, which degenerated into conquest. Despotism within +and conquest without, both being summed up in the one word Napoleon--such +was the fate of the Mother of Liberty, who had loved her child "not +wisely but too well." Yet Napoleonism was a very necessary stage in the +development of modern Europe. It was the tramp of the invader which +did more than anything else to awake sleeping nationalism all over the +Continent; it was before the roar of Napoleon's cannon that the artificial +boundaries which had divided peoples crumbled to dust. Napoleon cleared the +ground, and even did something toward laying the foundations of the great +modern Nation-States, Germany and Italy. What Napoleon did for Europe at +the beginning of the nineteenth century, Germany, the Napoleon-State among +nations to-day, is doing for Europe at the beginning of the twentieth +century. + + +Sec.3. _The Congress of Vienna and the International Idea_.--The overthrow of +Napoleon was due in a large measure to the spirit of nationalism which his +conquests had evoked against him among the various peoples of Europe; the +rewards of that overthrow, however, were reaped not by the peoples, but by +the dynasties and State-systems of the old _regime_. The Congress of the +Powers which met at Vienna in 1814 to resettle the map of Europe, after +the upheavals and wars of the previous twenty-five years, was a terrible +disappointment; and we, who are now hopefully looking forward to a similar +Congress at the end of the present war, cannot do better than study the +great failure of 1814, and take warning from it. The phrases which heralded +the approaching Congress were curiously and disquietingly similar to those +on the lips of our public men and journalists to-day when they speak of +the "settlement" before us. "The Parliament of Man, the Federation of the +World," which had become a remote dream when Tennyson first coined the +expression in 1842, seemed in 1814 on the eve of accomplishment. The work +of the Congress was to be no less than "the reconstruction of the moral +order," "the regeneration of the political system of Europe," the +establishment of "an enduring peace founded on a just redistribution +of political forces," the institution of an effective and a permanent +international tribunal, the encouragement of the growth of representative +institutions, and, last but not least, an arrangement between the Powers +for a gradual and systematic disarmament. "It seemed," writes Sir A.W. +Ward, "as if the states composing the European family, free once more to +take counsel together on terms of independence, were also free to determine +their own destinies."[1] The Congress of Vienna was to inaugurate a +New Era. Such of these views, however, as pointed in a democratic or +nationalistic direction represented the expectations of the peoples, +not the intentions of the crowned heads and diplomatists who met at the +Austrian capital. Among the members of the Congress the only man who at +first voiced these aspirations of the world at large was the Russian Tsar, +Alexander I., and such concessions to popular opinion as were made were due +to what the English plenipotentiary, Lord Castlereagh, described as the +"sublime mysticism and nonsense" of the Emperor. + +[Footnote 1: _Cambridge Modern History_, vol. ix. p. 577.] + +Instead, therefore, of establishing a new era, the Congress did its utmost +to restore the old one. Everything which had happened in Europe since +the outbreak of the French Revolution was regarded as a bad dream, the +principles of popular freedom and national liberty were completely ignored, +and an attempt was made to rivet again on the limbs of Europe the shackles +of the antiquated frontiers which had been struck off by the hammer of +Napoleon. Everywhere the "national idea" was trampled upon. Germany and +Italy were put back again into the eighteenth century, Austria's territory +in the latter country being largely increased; Norway was unwillingly yoked +with Sweden, and Belgium with Holland; Switzerland was made to surrender +her democratic constitution and to return to the aristocratic cantonal +system of the past; and, lastly, Poland remained dismembered. + +The Allies, while fighting Napoleon, had issued the following proclamation +to the world, couched in language almost identical with that used by the +Allies who are now fighting Germany: "Nations will henceforth respect their +mutual independence; no political edifices shall henceforth be erected on +the ruins of formerly independent States; the object of the war, and of the +peace, is to secure the rights, the freedom, and the independence of +all nations."[1] The Congress of Vienna failed to redeem these pledges: +firstly, because its members had not grasped the principle of nationality, +and used "nation" and "State" as if they were synonymous terms; secondly, +because they did not represent the peoples whose destinies they took it +upon them to determine, and made no attempt whatever to consult the +views of the various masses of population which they parcelled out among +themselves like so much butter. They honestly tried to lay the foundations +of a permanent peace; but their method of doing so was not to satisfy the +natural aspirations of the European nations and so leave them nothing to +fight about, but to establish such an exact equipoise among the great +States, by a nice distribution of the aforesaid butter in their respective +scales, that they would be afraid to go to war with each other, lest they +might upset the so-called "balance of power." The "settlement" of 1814, +therefore, left a heritage of future trouble behind it which has kept +Europe disturbed throughout the nineteenth century, and is directly +responsible for the present war. The real settlement is yet to come; and if +we of this generation are to make it a final one we must avoid the errors +committed by the Congress of a hundred years ago. + +[Footnote 1: Alison Phillips, _Modern Europe_, p. 8.] + +Yet, when all is said, the Congress of Vienna represents an important +milestone along the road of progress. It is a great precedent. As a +disillusioned contemporary admitted, it "prepared the world for a more +complete political structure; if ever the powers should meet again to +establish a political system by which wars of conquest would be rendered +impossible and the rights of all guaranteed, the Congress of Vienna, as +a preparatory assembly, will not have been without use."[1] There is a +prophetic ring about this, very welcome to us of the twentieth century. +We cannot think altogether unkindly of our great-grandfathers' ill-judged +attempt to avert the calamity which has now broken over us. + +[Footnote 1: Friedrich von Gentz, quoted in _Camb. Mod. Hist._ vol. x. p. +2.] + +Nor was the Congress altogether barren of positive result; for it gave +birth to that conception of a "Confederation of Europe," which, though +never realised, has been one of the guiding ideas of nineteenth-century +politics. As this solution of the world's problems is likely to be urged +upon us with great insistency at the conclusion of the present war, it will +be well to look a little more closely into it and to see why it failed to +secure the allegiance of Europe a hundred years ago. The Congress had met +at Vienna and settled all outstanding questions, to the satisfaction of +its members; why should it not meet periodically, and constitute itself +a supreme international tribunal? The question had only to be asked to +receive the approbation of all concerned. The dreamer, Alexander I., at +once saw the destinies of the world entrusted to a Holy Alliance, which +would rule according to "the sacred principles of the Christian religion"; +and even the more practical mind of Castlereagh conceived that a council of +the great powers, "endowed with the efficiency and almost the simplicity of +a single State," was a possibility. + +Yet, it is quite clear to-day that, at that time and under those +conditions, the establishment of a permanent and effective Confederation of +Europe would have proved disastrous to the world. The Congress of Vienna +was followed by further congresses in 1818, 1819, 1820, and 1822; and each +succeeding conference revealed to Europe more clearly the true character +of the new authority into whose hands the power was slipping. Certain very +dangerous tendencies became, for example, apparent. The first conference +had assembled to confer the blessings of order upon a continent ravaged by +the revolutionary and Napoleonic wars of France. Hence the Confederation of +Europe started life as a kind of anti-Jacobin society, whose main business +it was to suppress revolution, whether it took the nationalistic or +democratic form. Furthermore, the interference with the internal affairs of +France in 1814 and 1815 tended to establish a precedent for interference +with the internal affairs of any country. The Holy Alliance, therefore, +soon assumed the character of a "Trust" of absolute monarchs, determined +to aid each other when threatened by risings or agitations among their +peoples, and to crush liberal aspirations wherever they were to be found in +other parts of Europe. The popular desire for peace was exploited in the +interests of unpopular government; settlement by conference in regard +to international matters was extended to settlement by a cabal of +irresponsible crowned heads in regard to internal constitutional and +national questions; a clique of despots threatened the liberties of the +world and proposed to back up their decisions by using their armies as +police. One government, however, even in that period of reaction, refused +to lend its countenance to such proceedings. England at first protested and +at length took up an attitude of complete opposition, and it is due to her +that the Confederation never became really effective. She had to choose +between peace and liberty, and she chose the latter.[1] + +[Footnote 1: See Alison Phillips, _The Confederation of Europe_, together +with his chapter on "The Congresses, 1815-1822" in vol. x. of the +_Cambridge Modern History_. The whole subject of the Concert of Europe, +which can only be touched upon here, is of great importance. It is again +referred to in Chap. VIII.; see pp. 374 ff.] + +The truth is that there were three ideas in the air at the beginning of the +nineteenth century, all excellent in themselves, but quite impossible to be +realised at one and the same period. Two of these, the social or democratic +idea and the national idea, were made, as we have seen, living issues by +the French Revolution; the third, which may be called the international +idea, was raised by the Congress of Vienna. It was an old idea, of course, +for it had been embodied in that shadowy "Holy Roman Empire" which was the +medieval dream of Rome the Great; but its form was new, and now for the +first time it became a dream of the future rather than a dream of the past. +What men did not see then, and still for the most part fail to see, is that +the human race can only work out these three ideas properly in a certain +order. Democracy and nationhood may, as in the case of Italy, be acquired +by a people at the same moment; but without the realisation of the national +idea it is hardly possible to conceive of democratic government for any +country. The national idea, therefore, precedes the social idea, as Mazzini +rightly insists. Still more must it precede the international idea. By +this it is not meant that every nation in the world must have grown to +self-consciousness and have possessed itself of freedom before we come +within sight of a world-concert and world-peace. But certainly in Europe +itself the national question had to be settled before there could be any +chance of establishing an international tribunal. It is equally certain +that the social idea also claims preference of the international idea. The +great danger of setting up "an effective machine for regulating the affairs +of Europe" is that the machine may get into the wrong hands. The Holy +Alliance is a warning, which should not be forgotten. It became an +obstruction to progress, a strait-waistcoat which threatened to strangle +the liberties of Europe, because it got into the hands of a "vested +interest," the dynastic interest, which was hostile both to nationalism and +democracy. + +Since 1814, however, there have been great strides along the paths both of +democracy and of nationalism. And if Germany loses this war, the congress +of the settlement will meet in a very different atmosphere from that in +which its predecessor assembled at Vienna. It will be a conference of +powers victorious over Reaction not Revolution, and pledged to the support +of a liberal programme. And yet if such a conference became a permanent +feature of European life, if, in other words, a new attempt were made to +set up an international tribunal, it might easily become as dangerous to +the liberties of the people as ever was the Holy Alliance. The dynastic +principle it is to be hoped, will never again threaten the world's peace or +progress; but there are other vested interests besides the dynastic one. +During the nineteenth century economic development has given an enormous +impetus to international movements and cosmopolitanism generally. +Unfortunately political development, though great, has not by any means +kept pace with the economic; in other words, it is still possible in most +countries, and in some more possible than in others, for a small oligarchy +to gain control of the political machine. + +Again, if there is one thing in the world more international than Labour, +it is Capital; and, as Mr. Norman Angell has shown, it is the capitalist +who is hardest hit by international war and who stands to gain most from +its abolition. European capital is almost certain to have a large say in +the settlement, and considerable influence in the counsels of any new +Concert of Europe that might come into existence. Now suppose--a not +impossible contingency--that a ring of capitalists gained complete control +of some politically backward country like Russia, and suppose a grave +crisis arose in the Labour world in England or France, what would be easier +than for arrangements to be made at the international conference for the +transference of Russian troops to the west, "to preserve the sacred rights +of property and the peace of Europe"? This may seem a somewhat fantastic +supposition, yet it was precisely in this way and on grounds like these +that the Holy Alliance interfered with the internal affairs of European +countries during the second and third decade of last century, and even as +late as 1849 we have Russia, still faithful to the principles of thirty +years before, coming to the assistance of Austria in her suppression of the +liberties of Hungary. It was a healthy instinct in the English people that +led them to break up the Concert of Europe in 1818--"a system which not +only threatened the liberties of others, but might, in the language of +the orators of the Opposition, in time present the spectacle of Cossacks +encamped in Hyde Park to overawe the House of Commons";[1] and, if the +prevailing "internationalism" has not quite blinded their eyes to-day, +they will scrutinise with the greatest possible care any new proposals to +re-erect the Concert of Europe as a permanent and authoritative tribunal. +What the world needs at present is more nationalism and more democracy. And +it is only after these two great nineteenth-century movements have worked +themselves out to the full, at least on the continent of Europe, that +mankind will be able safely to make experiments towards the realisation of +the third and crowning principle, the principle of a European Commonwealth. + +[Footnote 1: _Cambridge Modern History_, vol. x. p. 16.] + +[Illustration: EUROPE IN 1815] + +The national problems which the Congress of Vienna bequeathed to posterity +may be seen at a glance by looking at a political map of Europe in 1815. +The entire centre of the Continent from Ostend to Palermo, and from +Koenigsberg to Constantinople, was left a political chaos. And it is not too +much to say that the history of Europe from 1814 to 1914 is the history of +the settlement of this vast area. The only State whose frontiers have not +altered during this period is Switzerland, and even that country seized the +opportunity which a disturbed Europe offered her in 1848, to substitute a +unified federal system for the constitution imposed upon her in 1815. +The rest of the area falls into six sections: (1) The kingdom of the +Netherlands, containing the two distinct and often antagonistic nations, +Belgium and Holland; (2) the German nationality split up into no less +than thirty-eight[2] sovereign States, loosely held together in a +"confederation"; (3) the Italian nationality, distributed under eight +independent governments, including four duchies, two kingdoms, the Papal +States, and the provinces under Austrian rule; (4) the Polish nationality, +divided up between the three Powers, Prussia, Russia, and Austria; (5) the +Austrian Empire, comprising a dozen distinct nationalities; and (6) the +Ottoman Empire, in which at least five different Christian peoples groaned +beneath the sway of the Mohammedan Turk. Thus, if we may regard the +inhabitants of the southern Netherland provinces, for the moment, as of one +nationality, there were roughly ten great nationalities, the Germans, the +Italians, the Belgians, the Poles, the Bohemians, the Hungarians, the +Southern Slavs, the Rumanians, the Bulgarians, and the Greeks, all left +with national aspirations unsatisfied, all hampered by State frontiers +which had no correspondence with their natural boundaries. Can we wonder +that there have been wars in the nineteenth century? Should we not rather +wonder that those wars have not been greater and more numerous? For the +Congress of the Powers in 1814 having failed to give the nationalities what +they wanted, nothing remained for them but to seize it for themselves. The +only alternative to settlement by conference is "blood and iron," and it +is with "blood and iron" that nearly every nationality which has attained +nationhood in the last hundred years has cemented the structure of its +State. + +[Footnote 2: Napoleon had succeeded in reducing the number from 360 to 38.] + +It is not our purpose in the present chapter to deal with the whole of this +vast area; the three eastern sections, Poland, the Austrian Empire, and +Turkey, present special problems of their own, and therefore need special +treatment. Still less do we intend to write a history of the nineteenth +century, or even to adhere to a chronological treatment. Rather our object +is to exemplify the principle of nationality by watching it at work in +the three western sections of the central European area; to show how the +national idea has been moulded in Belgium, Italy, and Germany, by the +various problems which the nationalities in these countries have had to +face, and the forces which they have overcome; and, lastly, to indicate the +part which an over-developed nationalism in Germany has played in bringing +about the war of 1914. + + +Sec.4. _The National Idea in Belgium and the Problem of Small Nations_.--The +problem of the Netherlands, which it will be convenient to deal with first, +introduces us to an aspect of nationhood which we have hitherto not touched +upon. "The chief forces which hold a community together and cause it +to constitute one state," wrote Sir John Seeley, "are three,--common +nationality, common religion, and common interest. These may act in various +degrees of intensity, and they may also act singly or in combination."[1] +In the Low Countries religion has up to the present been a stronger +nation-making force than nationality. Three nationalities, each with its +own language, live there side by side,--the Dutch, the Flemings, and the +Walloons; but of these the Dutch and the Flemings are very closely allied +racially, Flemish being only a slight variant of the Dutch language. It +would therefore seem natural on the face of it that these two sections +would amalgamate together, leaving the Walloons to attach themselves +to their French cousins. That it is not so is due to the fact that the +Flemings and the Dutch are adherents of two different and mutually hostile +creeds, and that this distinction in their faith has been stamped upon +the national memories by the whole history of their past. Holland, the +stronghold of Calvinism, had at the end of the sixteenth century thrown off +the yoke of Catholic Spain and asserted its independence, while the Belgic +provinces, after Alva had cruelly crushed out such Protestantism as existed +among their peoples, returned to the faith and the allegiance of their +fathers, and remained part of the Hapsburg inheritance until the Congress +of Vienna. Thus the cleavage between Protestantism and Catholicism has made +two nations out of one Low German nationality in the Netherlands, as it +threatens to do with one Celtic nationality in Ireland. On the other hand, +their common Catholic faith has welded Flemings and Walloons together, +making one nation out of two nationalities far more racially distinct than +the Flemings and the Dutch, and this amalgamation has acquired a certain +flavour of common nationality from the fact that the language of the upper +classes is French. + +[Footnote 1: _Expansion of England_, p. 59.] + +It is obvious therefore that the attempt of the diplomatists in 1814 to +ignore both historical and religious differences and to combine Holland +and Belgium into a single State was doomed at the outset. Fifteen years of +constant friction were followed in 1830 by a rising in Brussels against +"Dutch supremacy," which quickly spread to the rest of Belgium. The Great +Powers, recognising the inevitable, interfered on behalf of Belgium, she +was declared a neutral State, separate from Holland, and took to herself a +king in the person of Leopold I. It is, however, highly significant that +directly the Dutch menace was removed from Belgium the internal cleavage of +nationality began to be felt. "In 1815 the differences between Flemish and +Walloon were to a large extent concealed beneath a veneer of French culture +and French manners. Among the upper and commercial classes no language but +French was ever spoken; and in their dislike of Dutch supremacy the Flemish +Belgians took a sort of patriotic pride in their borrowed speech, and for a +time relegated their native tongue to the level of a rustic _patois_."[1] +And yet, on the other hand, "the separation of Belgium from Holland had no +sooner taken place than the newly aroused national spirit began to show +itself among the Flemish-speaking part of the people by a revival of +interest in their ancestral Teutonic language.... King William I.'s attempt +to make Dutch the official language had met with universal opposition; but +as early as 1840 a demand was put forward for the use of the Flemish tongue +(which is closely akin to the Dutch) on equal terms with French in the +Legislature, the Law Courts, and the Army. As the years passed by, the +movement gathered ever-increasing numbers of adherents, and the demand was +repeated with growing insistence."[2] In 1897 the Flemish party attained +its ambition, and Flemish became the official language of the country, side +by side with French. The remarkable thing about this Teutonising movement +is that its mainstay has always been the extreme Catholic party, which +on religious grounds had been the most violent opponent of the attempted +Teutonification by the Dutch. The opposition between Flemish and Walloon, +indeed, became so marked in recent years that many feared that the Belgian +nation was about to split into two. Germany has, however, postponed this +national calamity for generations if not for ever, and the Belgium +which arises like a phoenix from the ashes of this third attempt at +Teutonification will, we cannot doubt, be a Belgium indissolubly knit +together by common memories of a glorious struggle for freedom and cemented +by the blood and tears of the whole population. Germany, like Napoleon a +century ago, will call many nations into being; the first and not the least +of her creations is a transfigured and united Belgium. + +[Footnote 1: _Cambridge Modern History_, vol. x. p. 521.] + +[Footnote 2: _Ibid_. vol. xi. p. 693.] + +As a frontier State, a link between the Latin and Teutonic races to both of +which her peoples are akin, Belgium offers an extremely interesting study +of the national idea at work. The peoples of Germany and France, which have +been perpetually at war with each other since the times of Julius Caesar, +have almost always met on her fair and prosperous plains to fight their +battles, since she is geographically the gateway from one to the other. +Neither could afford to let the other occupy her territory, and so she +has won her independence as a State; both have constantly threatened her +existence in times past, and so have forced upon her bi-lingual population +that consciousness of common interests which if strong enough may become as +firm a basis for national unity as actual community of nationality. + +It should be noticed further that it has become the practice in recent +times to guarantee the neutrality of small frontier States like Belgium +which lie at the mercy of their greater neighbours, a practice intended +not only to preserve the integrity of such States but also to prevent +the frequent occurrence of war by closing, as it were, the military gate +between the hostile countries.[1] It remains to be seen whether the +violation of these principles by Germany has the effect of strengthening +them in the future, rather than the reverse. In any case, we may expect to +see attempts to apply the same principles to other parts of Europe. Already +the northern and southern ends of the frontier between Germany and France +are neutralised by the existence of Belgium and Switzerland; why, it may +be asked, should not the whole frontier be treated in the same way by +neutralising the disputed territory of Alsace-Lorraine? Perhaps, too, a +neutral Poland would form a useful buffer between Germany and Russia. Such +neutralisation, it should be noted, need not necessarily carry with it +independence. Poland and Alsace-Lorraine might form part of Russia and +France respectively, and still be neutralised by a guarantee of other +powers. A precedent exists for this in the terms of the cession of the +Ionian Islands to Greece in 1864, while Savoy, though a province of France, +is technically neutralised territory.[2] Cases like these, however, it must +be admitted, are extremely anomalous and could hardly stand the strain of +a serious war. But, then, as recent experience has shown us, not even +independent neutralised States are safe when all Europe is aflame. The +truth is that the whole conception of neutrality implies the existence of +some power above and beyond the State, it may be simply a group of powerful +States who are able to impose their will upon the rest of Europe, it may +be a general Congress, like the Congress of Vienna. Since the Concert of +Europe disappeared and gradually gave place to the two opposing alliances +of great powers, there has been no such authority in the civilised world. +The results are before us in the ruined cities and starving population of +violated Belgium. + +[Footnote 1: The neutralisation of sovereign States is very recent in +origin. Switzerland and Luxembourg are the only other instances. The former +was neutralised in 1815, the latter in 1867.] + +[Footnote 2: _Cambridge Modern History_, xi. 642. See for the whole +question of neutralised States, Lawrence, _Principles of International +Law_, Sec.Sec. 246-248.] + +As independent States, therefore, small nations can only survive, in +the long run, if their neutrality is permanently guaranteed by some +international authority, which is itself permanently capable of enforcing +its decrees upon recalcitrant States. Sovereignty and independence, +however, are not, as we have seen, essential to full nationhood, provided +the nation possesses a certain amount of "home-rule" and regards the +government under which it lives as a true expression of its genius and +will. For example, from 1809 till the setting in of Russian reaction in +1899, the Finnish nation enjoyed all the privileges of complete nationhood +except actual sovereignty. There is, therefore, a future for small nations, +either as autonomous proteges of great powers, like Russia, or as partners +in some commonwealth of nations, like the British Empire. + +But there is yet another consideration to be faced. Why, it is asked, +should we trouble ourselves about the preservation of small nationalities +at all? "The State is power," and it is only the really powerful State, +therefore, that can and ought to survive. There is something laughable in +the idea of a small State; it is weakness trying to pose as strength. And +as for nations which have lost their independence and have bowed to the +yoke of the conqueror, their fate is incorporation. How can they hope or +expect to retain their separate existence and their peculiar culture when +they have surrendered the power upon which these privileges depend? "No +nation can permit the Jews to have a double nationality"; and the same +applies to Poles, Finns, Alsatians, Irishmen, and Belgians.[1] This is the +point of view of Bernhardi, Treitschke, and the German Government. This +is the theory which is said to justify the practice of Prussianisation, +Russianisation, Magyarisation, and so on. It raises the whole question +of the value and significance to civilisation of the existence of small +nations. Treitschke, of course, and his school are convinced that they +possess neither value nor significance. In small States there is developed +that beggarly frame of mind which judges the State by the taxes that it +raises; there is completely lacking in small States the ability of the +great State to be just; all real masterpieces of poetry and art arose upon +the soil of great nationalities--such are a few of Treitschke's dogmatic +utterances on this subject.[2] But it is not merely the Germans who think +small beer of small nationalities. Listen to Sir John Seeley: "The question +whether large states or small states are best is not one which can be +answered or ought to be discussed absolutely. We often hear abstract +panegyrics upon the happiness of small states. But observe that a small +state among small states is one thing, and a small state among large states +quite another. Nothing is more delightful to read of than the bright days +of Athens and Florence, but those bright days lasted only so long as the +states with which Athens and Florence had to do were states on a similar +scale of magnitude. Both states sank at once as soon as large country +states of consolidated strength grew up in their neighbourhood. The lustre +of Athens grew pale as soon as Macedonia arose, and Charles V. speedily +brought to an end the great days of Florence. Now if it be true that a +larger type of state than any hitherto known is springing up in the world, +is not this a serious consideration for those states which rise only to the +old level of magnitude?"[3] The answer to which is, "Yes, indeed, if + the good old plan + That he should take who has the power, + And he should keep who can + +is to be the guiding principle in European politics of the future." But +surely Sir John Seeley's argument, though undoubtedly telling as regards +the sovereign independence of small _States_, tells for and not against the +preservation of small _nations_. Was it to the interest of the world as a +whole that Athens and Florence should be crushed? Is it not true, in spite +of Treitschke, that the great things of earth have been the product of +small peoples? We owe our conceptions of law to a city called Rome, our +finest output of literature and art to small communities like Athens, +Florence, Holland, and Elizabethan England, our religion to an +insignificant people who inhabited a narrow strip of land in the Eastern +Mediterranean. And small nations are as valuable to the world to-day as +they have ever been. Denmark has enriched our educational experience by the +establishment of her famous high schools, which we can hardly imagine her +doing had she been a province of Prussia; Norway has given us the greatest +of modern dramatists, Henrik Ibsen; and Belgium has not only produced +Maeterlinck and Verhaeren, but is industrially the most highly developed +country on the continent. The world cannot afford to do without her small +peoples, who must be either independent or autonomous if they are to find +adequate expression for their national genius, if they are to obtain proper +conditions in which "to live, think, love, and labour for the benefit of +all." Can we guarantee to them this freedom? That is one of the great +questions which this war will settle.[4] + +[Footnote 1: See _Selections from Treitschke_, translated by A.L. Gowans, +pp. 17-20, 58-61.] + +[Footnote 2: See _Selections from Treitschke_, pp. 17-20, 58-61.] + +[Footnote 3: _The Expansion of England_, p. 349. See also p. 1, "Some +countries, such as Holland and Sweden, might pardonably regard their +history as in a manner wound up."] + +[Footnote 4: See J.M. Robertson, _Introduction to English Politics_, pp. +251-390; Mr. H.A.L. Fisher's pamphlet on _The Value of Small States_, in +which, however, the distinction between _states_ and _nations_ is not +made clear; and the article on "Nationalism and Liberalism" in _The Round +Table_, December 1914.] + + +Sec.5. _The National Idea in Italy: The Ideal Type_.--Let us now turn to +Italy, a country which has in the past been as much of a European Tom +Tiddler's ground as Belgium, though for rather different reasons. Italy +is inhabited by a race speaking a common language and observing a common +religion, she has historical memories as glorious as those of any other +country in the world, and her natural boundaries are almost as well-defined +as those of Great Britain; yet it was not until the latter half of the +nineteenth century that she managed to become a nation. The chief reason +why she remained a "geographical expression" long after England, France, +and Spain had acquired national unity was the fact that she was until +comparatively recent times an example of the less containing the greater. +Throughout the Middle Ages she was a suburb, not a country. Rome was the +capital of the world, Italy only its environs. Moreover, since all roads +lead to Rome, and the lord of Rome was the master of Europe, the roads +Romeward were worn by the tramp of the armies of all nations. Thus Italy +was constantly subject to invasion, and the state-systems with which the +Congress of Vienna resaddled her in 1814 were little more than relics of +past military occupations of her soil by foreign armies. The main problem, +therefore, in the making of modern Italy was how to get rid of the heavy +burden of the past, how to deal with Rome and all that Rome stood for. + +The problem would have been insoluble had not the prestige of Rome declined +considerably since the Middle Ages, a prestige which sprang from the fact +that she was the capital of two Empires--the spiritual Empire of the +Papacy, and the secular Empire founded by Charles the Great. The former had +suffered from the Reformation and the rise of the great Protestant nations, +the latter had been growing feebler and feebler for centuries, until it +was abolished as an institution by Napoleon. Yet Italy in 1814 still lay +helpless and divided at the feet of Rome. The Pope held under his immediate +sway a large zigzag-shaped territory running across the centre from sea to +sea, and, as spiritual leader of half Europe, he could at any moment summon +to his assistance the Catholic chivalry of the world. "The Roman emperor" +no longer existed, but "the Austrian emperor" was another title for the +same man, holding much the same territory; and the fact that he had +renounced his vague suzerainty over the rest of Europe did not prevent him +exercising a very real suzerainty in Italy, not merely over the eastern +half of the Lombard Plain which definitely belonged to Austria, but also +over the other States of the peninsula which were, in theory at least, +independent. The kingdom of the two Sicilies in the South, the grand duchy +of Tuscany on the West, and the smaller duchies of Parma, Modena, and +Lucca were only stable in so far as Austria bolstered up their corrupt and +unpopular governments. Even the Papal States themselves, equally undermined +with corruption and unpopularity, ultimately rested upon the same support. +Thus Austria represented for Italy all that evil past of which she wanted +to be rid: the foreign yoke against which her newly conscious spirit of +nationality revolted, the dynastic frontiers which were abhorrent to her +desire for unity, the absolute _regime_ under which her soul, after feeding +on the principles of the French Revolution, lay gagged and bound. The first +step to be taken towards the creation of Italy was the expulsion of the +Austrians. + +This fact in itself purified the struggle for Italian freedom and raised +Italian nationalism to heights of nobility and heroism almost unparalleled +in history. The nation had not merely to be unified, but _delivered_, and +delivered from the oppression of that power which was the mainstay of +reaction in Europe. Nor was it simply a question of national freedom; +Austria had declared war upon individual and constitutional liberty also, +and used all her power to suppress them wherever they dared to raise their +head. From beginning to end of her fight for national existence, Italy +never forgot that she was also fighting for individual liberty, or ceased +to be conscious that the downfall of Austria in Italy would mean the +downfall of reaction in Europe. The banner which Mazzini raised in 1831 had +the words "Unity and Independence" on the one side and "Liberty, Equality, +and Humanity" on the other. Italy was indeed greatly blessed, inasmuch as +in seeking her own deliverance she could not help bursting the bands of +brass which bound the whole world in captivity. + +It is not possible here to tell the glorious story of the resurrection +of Italy, or even to say anything of the three heroes at whose hands she +received her freedom--Cavour who gave her the service of his brain, Mazzini +who devoted to her the love and passion of his great heart, and Garibaldi +who fought for her with the strength of his own right arm. It must suffice +to indicate very briefly the various stages in the development of her +national idea, and the manner in which she finally realised it. Liberal +principles took root in Italy at the time of the French Revolution, and +the first glimmerings of nationalism were due to Napoleon, who bundled the +princes out of the peninsula and even for a time exiled the Pope himself. +But it was constitutional rather than national freedom which seemed most +urgent to the generation which succeeded Napoleon. The Carbonari, as the +early Italian revolutionaries were called, confined themselves almost +entirely to the demand for a constitution in the various existing States, +and though they eagerly desired the expulsion of Austria, they did so not +because she prevented Italian unity, but because she forbade political +reform. Their risings, therefore, local and disunited in character, were +bound to fail; the first fifteen years after the Congress of Vienna were +occupied by a series of attempts to substitute a constitutional for an +absolute _regime_ in different parts of Italy, attempts which Austria +crushed with a heavy hand. + +The period which followed, 1830-1848, belongs to Mazzini and his "Young +Italy" party. His task was to fire Italy for the first time with the ideal +of national unity and independence. The conception of unity was a difficult +one for Italians to grasp; all history seemed to fight against it. There +were, for example, not only the traditions connected with Rome to be +reckoned with, but there was also the difference between north and south, +and, perhaps most important of all, the local spirit of independence +associated with the great cities like Venice, Milan, Florence, Naples, etc. +Thus, over against Mazzini's ideal of a single unified State there arose +the counter-ideal of a federal system. In this, however, later events +proved Mazzini to be right. Where he failed in foresight was in regard to +the constitutional character of the State he dreamed of. He wished not +only to abolish all existing frontiers in Italy, but to do away with all +existing state-systems. The only Italy he could conceive was a republic, +and Italy was not ripe for a republic, which was, for the rest, a form +of government too much bound up with the disruptive traditions of the +City-States to be acceptable.[1] But if Italy was not to be a republic, she +must be a monarchy, and where could she find a prince to put at the head of +her united State? Clearly, she would accept no one who was not the declared +enemy of Austria and the declared friend of constitutional reform. For a +month or so in 1846 it seemed that the Pope himself might be prevailed upon +to undertake the role; and the elevation of Pius IX. to the Chair of St. +Peter was greeted with wild enthusiasm in Italy because he was believed to +be a Liberal. These hopes proved illusory, however, and so the eyes of all +patriots turned more and more in the direction of Piedmont. + +[Footnote 1: It is noticeable that Greece also played with the idea of a +republic at first and eventually selected a monarchical form of government. +As a matter of fact, not a single nation-State, formed in Europe since the +Congress of Vienna, has adopted the republican principle.] + +This principality, which was part of the kingdom of Sardinia, ruled over +by the semi-French house of Savoy, shared the northern plain of Italy +with Austria, and at first showed neither anti-Austrian nor Liberal +proclivities. Victor Emmanuel came back smiling in 1814, saying that he had +been asleep for fifteen years; the old _regime_ was restored as though +the Revolution had never been; and a rising of the Carbonari in 1821 was +suppressed with the aid of Austrian troops. But in 1831 a king, Charles +Albert, came to the throne, who realised that it was the mission of his +house to drive the Austrians from Italy, and who was enlightened enough to +begin to institute reforms, as unostentatiously as possible, so as not to +attract the unwelcome attention of Vienna. Then came the great outburst +of 1848, which was the culmination of Mazzini's propaganda for the past +sixteen years. At first all went well. The Austrian army was almost +expelled from the peninsula; constitutions were granted in Rome, Naples, +Tuscany, and Piedmont; Venice and Rome declared themselves republics. +But no real scheme for all Italy emerged; the Mazzinians were heroic but +unpractical; and next year Austria returned once more, dealt as before +piecemeal with the revolted provinces, and finally crushed the hopes of +Italy again at the battle of Novara. Yet all was not lost. The republican +dreams of Mazzini were, it is true, at an end. But Piedmont had stepped +into Mazzini's shoes; she had championed the cause of freedom against +Austria; and, when the latter reasserted her sway, she alone of the various +States refused to abrogate the newly-acquired constitution. + +Thus began the third period in the emancipation of Italy, the period of +Cavour, who became head of the Piedmontese cabinet in 1850. His aim was +first to make Piedmont the model State and champion of all Italy. He +believed fervently in liberty--"Italy," he said, "must make herself by +means of liberty, or we must give up trying to make her"--and he was at +the same time one of the ablest and most practical statesmen who have ever +guided the destinies of a nation. In ten years he made the State of the +north-west an oasis of freedom and good government which attracted the best +intellects of Italy to its service, and henceforth Piedmont became the +centre of Italian aspirations. A new propaganda movement was set on +foot, called the National Society, which rejected both federalism and +republicanism and declared in favour of a united Italy under the crown of +Victor Emmanuel of Savoy; and when the chance of French support came in +1858, Cavour felt it was time to act. This time the end crowned the work. +Austria was deprived of everything but Venice; Tuscany and Romagna declared +for incorporation by plebiscite; Garibaldi conquered Sicily and the south; +and by the end of 1860 the King of Sardinia was king of practically the +whole of Italy. All that still remained to be won was Venice, which Austria +ceded in 1866; Rome, which the French had occupied in the name of the Pope, +and were forced to evacuate in 1870; and the Italia Irredenta of to-day, +viz. the Trentino, Trieste, and Istria, which may be recovered as a result +of the present war. It is worthy of note also that the trans-Alpine +provinces, Savoy and Nice, which had been part of the dominions of the +Sardinian kingdom, were ceded to France in 1858-1859 as a return for her +aid, thus rounding off the western frontier of the new kingdom of Italy so +as to correspond fairly closely with the boundary of nationality. + +The foundation of modern Italy shows us the "national idea" at its best; +it was accomplished by noble means and by noble minds; and the latter, in +their perpetual struggle against the forces of reaction, were never allowed +to forget the claims of individual as well as of national freedom. Three +tests of true nationhood, it will be remembered, were suggested at +the beginning of this chapter: a state-frontier co-extensive with the +nationality-frontier, a unitary state-system, and a form of government +recognised by the inhabitants as an expression of their general will. +Italy fulfils all these conditions; for, though the first has not yet been +perfectly realised as regards Italia Irredenta, the exception is after +all a trifling one. Thus the development of the national idea in Italy is +almost a model of what such a development should be, and we have dwelt +somewhat at length upon it for that very reason. The work of Mazzini and +Cavour provides us with a standard of comparison which should be found very +useful in dealing with the national idea in other countries. + + +Sec.6. _The National Idea in Germany: a Case of Arrested +Development_.[1]--Nothing, for example, could be more instructive, both as +a study in nationalism and as an aid to the understanding of the present +situation in Europe, than a comparison between the making of modern Italy +and the making of modern Germany. At first sight the German Empire, with +its marvellous progress, its vast resources, and its world-wide ambitions, +would appear to be an even more successful example of national development +than the kingdom of Italy. Its demand for "a place in the sun," its +hustling diplomacy, its military spirit, its obvious intention to expand +territorially, if not in Europe itself then in Asia or Africa, are all +taken as symptoms of this success. No doubt there is a certain amount of +truth in this view. The truculence of German foreign policy is to be partly +attributed to that form of swollen self-consciousness and self-complacency +to which all nations are subject more or less, and which is most likely, +one would suppose, to be found in countries where a nationality had +recently succeeded in making itself into a nation. The natural instinct to +regard one's own nation as the peculiar people of God and to look down on +other nations as "lesser breeds without the law" is a phenomenon which must +be constantly reckoned with in any comprehensive treatment of nationalism. +Every nation has its own variety of it; in England it is Jingoism, in +France Chauvinism, in Italy Irredentism, in Russia Pan-Slavism, and so on. +These are instances of over-development of the national idea, due either +to some confusion between race and nationality, or to simple national +megalomania, which usually subsides after a healthy humiliation, such as we +suffered in England, for example, in the Boer War or as Russia suffered in +her struggle with the Japanese. + +[Footnote 1: The student is advised to read the chapter on Germany before +beginning this section.] + +Yet a careful examination of the German body-politic will reveal symptoms +unlike those to be found in any other nation. German nationalism is +over-developed in one direction because it is under-developed and imperfect +in other directions. Apply our three tests to the German nation, and it +will be found to fail in them all. National boundary and State frontier do +not coincide because there are still some twelve million Germans living +outside Germany, in Austria-Hungary;[1] Germany is a State, but not a +unitary State, for she still retains the obsolete "particularism" of the +eighteenth century, with its petty princes and dynastic frontiers; and +lastly, the government of Germany cannot claim to express the general will, +while more than a third of the voters in the empire are sworn to overthrow +the whole system at the earliest opportunity. The German nation, in +fact, is suffering from some form of arrested development, and arrested +development, as the criminologists tell us, is almost invariably +accompanied by morbid psychology. That Germany at the present moment, and +for some time past, has been the victim of a morbid state of mind, few +impartial observers will deny. It has, however, not been so generally +recognised that this disease--for it is nothing less--is due not to any +national depravity but to constitutional and structural defects, which are +themselves the result of an unfortunate series of historical accidents. Let +us look a little closer into this matter, considering the three defects in +German nationalism one by one, and using the story of Italy as an aid to +our investigation. + +[Footnote 1: There are also Germans living in Switzerland, the Baltic +Provinces of Russia, and the United States of America; but these may be +regarded as lost to the German nation as the French Canadians are lost to +France.] + +First, then, why was it that, while the unification of Italy led to the +inclusion of the whole Italian nationality within the State frontiers, with +the trifling exceptions above referred to, the unification of Germany was +only brought about, or even made possible, by the _exclusion_ of a large +section of the nationality? Germany, like Italy, was hampered by traditions +inherited from the mediaeval Roman Empire, represented by an ancient +capital which stood in the path of unity. Why was it that, while Italy +could not and would not do without Rome, Germany was compelled to surrender +Vienna and to exclude Austria? The answer is: because the unification of +Germany was only possible through the instrumentality of Prussia, which +would not brook the rivalry of Austria, and therefore the latter had to go. +The problem of the making of Germany as it presented itself to the mind +of Bismarck was first of all a problem as to which should be _supreme_ in +Germany, Prussia or Austria; in other words Bismarck cared more for the +aggrandisement of Prussia than for the unity of Germany.[1] To the mind +of Cavour the problem of the unification of Italy presented itself in +a totally different light. For him there was no question of the +aggrandisement of Piedmont, though he no doubt felt pride in the thought +that the House of Savoy was to possess the throne of Italy. Austria was +expelled from Italy in 1860, not that Piedmont might take her place as +ruler of the peninsula, but that Piedmont might disappear in the larger +whole of an emancipated Italy. Austria was expelled from Germany in 1866 in +order that Prussia might rule undisturbed. Thus, though the Austro-Prussian +War of 1866 was an essential step in the foundation of the modern German +State, its motives and results were not in the least comparable to those +which inspired and followed the Italian War of Liberation in 1859-60. In +the first place the Austrians were not foreigners but Germans, whom it was +necessary for reasons of State not of nationality to place outside the rest +of Germany. Germany had, in fact, to choose between national unity and +State unity; and she chose the latter, partly because Prussia really +decided the matter for her, partly because she realised that the +establishment of a strong German State was the essential prelude to the +creation of a strong united nation. Austria had to be shut out in 1866 in +order that she might be received back again at some later date on Germany's +own terms. In the second place Austria was in no sense the oppressor of +Germany as she had been of Italy. She was simply the presiding member of +the German Confederation who, as the rival of Prussia, as the inheritor of +the mediaeval imperial tradition, as the ruler of millions of non-Germanic +people, would have rendered the problem of German unification almost +insoluble. It was therefore necessary to get rid of her as gently and as +politely as possible. After the crushing victory at Koeniggraetz, Bismarck +treated Prussia's ancient foe with extraordinary leniency; for he had +already planned the Dual Alliance in his mind; knowing as he did that, +though in Germany Austria might be an inconvenient rival to Prussia, in +Europe she was the indispensable ally of Germany. And so, though the +ramshackle old German imperial castle was divided in two, and the northern +portion, at any rate, brought thoroughly up to date, the neighbours still +lived side by side in a "semi-detached" kind of way. It would be a mistake +then to call the war of 1866 a war of deliverance. Indeed, since the defeat +of Napoleon at Leipzig, Germany has had no such war. That is in a great +measure her national tragedy. Italian nationalism was spiritualised by the +very fact that it had to struggle for decades against a foreign oppressor, +and the foundations of her unity were laid on the heroic memories of her +efforts to expel the intruder. This spiritualisation, these heroic memories +were Germany's also in 1813-14, but the opportunity of unification was +allowed to slip by, and when the task was performed fifty years later it +was through quite other means and in a very different spirit. And yet, +though there was no one to expel, Germany could only hope to attain unity +by fighting. In 1848 she made an attempt to do so by peaceable means, and a +national Parliament actually assembled at Frankfurt to frame a constitution +for the whole country. But the attempt, noble as it was in conception, +proved a dismal failure, and it became clear that national unity in Germany +was to be won "not by speeches and majority resolutions, but by blood and +iron." The words are Bismarck's, and the task was his also. Set them beside +the words of Cavour about Italy and liberty, quoted above, or compare the +harsh unscrupulous spirit of the great German master-builder with the +spirit of Mazzini, Cavour, and Garibaldi, and you get a measure of the +difference between the developments of the national idea in Germany and in +Italy. Yet Bismarck's famous sentence expressed the truth of the matter for +Germany. Austria had been put outside the German pale, and Germany north of +the Main had accepted unity under the hegemony of Prussia, but there still +remained the four great States of South Germany to bring in. They had been +the allies of Austria in 1866, and Prussia, had she willed it, might +have incorporated them by conquest. But Bismarck saw that they must put +themselves willingly under Prussia if the German Empire was to be a stable +concern; he therefore left them alone to think it over for a while. Sooner +or later they would have to come in, since now that Austria had been +excluded there remained only the choice between dependence on France and +union with Prussia. Bismarck deliberately played upon South Germany's fear +of France, and Napoleon III's restless foreign policy admirably seconded +his efforts. But a war was necessary to bring matters to a head. The +opportunity came in 1870, and Bismarck was able to make it appear a war not +of his own choosing. The Southern States threw themselves into the arms of +Prussia; France was crushed, and Alsace-Lorraine annexed; the German Empire +was proclaimed, and modern Germany came into being. There had been no +foreigner to expel from German soil, but Bismarck found that an attack upon +France served his purpose equally well. + +[Footnote 1: Perhaps it would be fairer to say that he was incapable of +distinguishing between them. See his _Reflections_, i. pp. 315, 316.] + +Germany was made by a war of aggression, resulting in territorial expansion +at the expense of another nation; Italy by a war of liberation, driving +the alien from her soil. And the subsequent history of the two nations is +eloquent of this difference in their origins. Since 1860 Italy has in the +main occupied herself with domestic reforms, with the working out of the +"social idea" which had had to wait upon the realisation of the "national +idea." She has had, it is true, her "adventures," more especially in +Africa, and her Jingoism, which has taken the natural form of Irredentism +or the demand for the recovery of Italian provinces still left in Austrian +hands; but she has never threatened the peace of Europe, or sought power at +the expense of other nationalities. Since 1870, on the other hand, Germany +has had to sit armed to defend the booty taken from France. "We have earned +in the late war respect, but hardly love," said General von Moltke soon +after the conclusion of peace. "What we have gained by arms in six months +we shall have to defend by arms for fifty years." At the beginning of 1914 +more than forty out of the fifty years named by Moltke had passed by and +the situation had undergone no material change. "The irreconcilability of +France," writes the late Imperial Chancellor of Germany, "is a factor that +we must reckon with in our political calculations. It seems to me weakness +to entertain the hope of a real and sincere reconciliation with France, so +long as we have no intention of giving up Alsace-Lorraine. And there is no +such intention in Germany."[1] The annexation of two small provinces has +thus made a permanent breach between two great nations, a breach which has +poisoned the whole of European policy during the past half century, which +has widened until it has split Europe into two huge armed camps, and +which has at last involved the entire world in one of the most terrible +calamities that mankind has ever known. + +[Footnote 1: _Imperial Germany_, von Buelow, p. 69.] + +Why did Bismarck annex Alsace-Lorraine? To strengthen, he said, the German +frontier against France. But there was another reason. Fear of France had +brought the Southern States into the Empire; fear of France should keep +them there. The permanent hostility of France was necessary to assure the +continuance of Prussia's position as the supreme military power in Germany. +And so the plundered provinces became the very corner-stone of the German +imperial system. There is surely something very strange about all this. Why +should it be necessary to retain the loyalty of nearly half Germany by what +practically amounts to terrorisation? The answer is that Germany is not a +single national State but a number of _dynastic_ States, federated together +under the control of one predominant partner. In other words, the problem +of Alsace-Lorraine has led us to the consideration of the second flaw in +the development of the national idea in Germany. + +The union of Italy meant a clean sweep of all the old dynastic frontiers +and States which had strangled the country for so long; the union of +Germany, on the contrary, riveted these obsolete chains still more firmly +than ever on the country's limbs. Bismarck claimed that this was necessary, +inasmuch as the Germans, unlike all other nations, were more alive to +dynastic than to national loyalty; that, in short, Germany was not really +ready in 1870 for true unity.[1] The chief reason, however, for the +retention of the old frontiers was that they suited the aims of Prussia. +The reformers of 1848, as Professor Erich Marcks somewhat naively says, +"had wanted to place Prussia at the head, but only as the servant of the +nation; Prussia was also to cease to be a State by itself, a power on its +own account. She was to create the nation's ideal--complete unity--and then +to merge herself in the nation. But Prussia would not and could not do +this. She was far too great a power herself; _she could very well rule +Germany, but not serve_."[2] Both Germany and Italy at first played with +the idea of a Confederation, but each was eventually forced to look to one +of its existing States to give it the unity it desired. There was only one +possible choice for each: for Germany, Prussia; for Italy, Piedmont; but +while Piedmont was content to serve, Prussia was too proud to do anything +but rule. The dynastic State frontiers were therefore retained because +Prussia refused to sacrifice her own State frontiers. The "unification of +Germany," in short, was an episode in the gradual expansion of the Prussian +dynastic State, which had begun far away back in the thirteenth century.[3] +It assumed the air of a national movement, because Prussia cleverly availed +herself of the prevailing nationalistic sentiment for her own ends. The +German Empire is therefore something unique in the annals of the world; it +is at once a nation-State, like Italy, France, and Great Britain, and also +a military Empire, like Rome under Augustus, Europe under Napoleon, Austria +under Joseph II., _i.e._ a State in which the territory that commands the +army holds political sway over the rest of the country. It is not mere +accident of geographical proximity, or even the kinship between Austrians +and Germans, which has led to the long and unshakable alliance of Germany +with the Hapsburg dominions. They are associated by common political +interests and by similarity of political structure. Each stands for the +supremacy of one dynastic State over a number of subordinate States or +nationalities. + +[Footnote 1: The chapter entitled "Dynasties and Stocks" in the +_Reflections_ should be carefully studied on this point. Bismarck was +obviously uncomfortable about the old frontiers.] + +[Footnote 2: _Lectures on the History of the Nineteenth Century_, p. 104.] + +[Footnote 3: See Chap. III. p. 95.] + +Her common nationality leads us to forget that the German Empire should +more rightly be called the Prussian Empire.[1] Nor is there any reason at +all why the Empire of Prussia should stop its process of expansion at the +national boundaries; it has indeed already stepped beyond them, into Poland +in the east, into Denmark in the north, into France in the west. Why should +not the process be carried farther still and Germany become in Europe, nay, +in the world, what Prussia is in Germany? By preserving her identity as +a State, and by establishing her hegemony, Prussia, in the name of the +national idea of Germany, has been able to spread her own ideals throughout +the Empire, in other words to undertake that Prussianisation of Germany +which is the most striking fact in her history since 1870. Piedmont was +swallowed up in Italy, Germany has been swallowed up in Prussia; she has +become the sharer of her victories and the accomplice of her crimes. And so +under the tutelage of the spirit of Bismarck the docile German people have +adopted the Prussian faith; and the policy of aggression and conquest once +entered upon, there was no drawing back. Bismarck fed the youthful nation +upon a diet of blood and iron, and its appetite has grown by what it +fed on. The success of 1870 turned the nation's head; the annexation of +Alsace-Lorraine gave it the first taste of conquest. Germany began to +imagine that German character and German culture possessed some magical +and unique quality which would alone account for this success. Dreams of a +European Empire, of infinite expansion, of world-power, floated before the +national consciousness. The German people were no longer content, to use +Mazzini's words, "to elaborate and express their idea, to contribute their +stone also to the pyramid of history"; they now craved to impose their +idea upon the world at large, and to place their stone on the top of the +pyramid. Modern Germany is an example of nationalism "gone wrong," just as +Napoleon was an example of democratic individualism "gone wrong." The Man +of Destiny has been followed by the Nation of Destiny, the "super-man" by +the "super-nation." Both have had to face a world in arms arrayed against +them. + +[Footnote 1: German writers are fond of calling it "Prussia-Germany" +(_Preussen-Deutschland_), a phrase of Treitschke's.] + +Thus the national idea in Germany has been cramped, contorted, and +perverted by the Prussian system and the dynastic frontiers. Had the dreams +of 1848 been realised, there might have been no Franco-German War, no +Alsace-Lorraine question, no war of 1914. And what of our third test of +nationhood? Do the people of Germany feel that their government adequately +expresses their general will, that it is truly representative, by which is +not necessarily meant that it is democratic in form?[1] There is no +doubt that in 1848 the educated classes of Germany did actually desire a +democratic form of polity. In that year Germany was as liberal as Italy; +she also had risings in almost every State, not excluding Prussia itself, +which were everywhere answered with promises of a "constitution." But when +reaction came in Germany, as in Italy, Prussia did not, like Piedmont, +stand out for freedom and make itself the model State of Germany; on +the contrary she reverted to her old military absolutism at the first +opportunity. And so the dreams of German liberty, like the dreams of +complete German unity, disappeared before the stern necessity of accepting +the supremacy of a politically reactionary State; and the Prussianisation +which followed did much to neutralise altogether the liberalising +influences of the south. It is therefore possible to maintain that the +political institutions of Germany have come to represent more and more the +genius and will of the population. "The Germany of the twentieth century," +maintains a recent writer, "is not two but one. The currents have mingled +their waters, and the Prussian torrent now has the depth and volume of the +whole main-stream of German thought."[2] + +[Footnote 1: _e.g._ Russia has a representative government in this sense, +though she is without "representative institutions" in the democratic +sense.] + +[Footnote 2: _Round Table_, Sept. 1914, p. 628.] + +It may be so; it may be that the Germany of Goethe, Schiller, and Beethoven +has been absorbed by the Germany of Bismarck, Moltke, and Roon; but it +must not be forgotten at the same time that, since their day, yet another +Germany has come into being, the Germany of Marx, Engels, and Bebel, a +Germany which is represented by more than a third of the voters in the +Empire. The old line of cleavage had barely closed up when a new and much +more fundamental schism appeared in the State, that between imperialism and +social democracy. The existence of this tremendous revolutionary force in +Germany, determined to overthrow the militarist _regime_ of Prussia and to +re-establish the State on a democratic basis, is an unanswerable proof +that the government of the Empire is not in any true sense representative. +Prussia has in this direction also impeded the development of the national +idea and given mechanical unity at the expense of spiritual unity. It has +created a vast political party of irreconcilables in the country, men +who have been led to feel that they have neither part nor promise in the +national life, and who therefore elect to stand outside it. "Our Social +Democratic party," writes von Buelow, "lacks a national basis. It will have +nothing to do with German patriotic memories which bear a monarchical +and military character. It is not like the French and Italian parties, a +precipitate of the process of national historical development, but since +its beginning it has been in determined opposition to our past history as a +nation. It has placed itself outside our national life."[1] And again: "In +the German Empire, Prussia is the leading State. The Social Democratic +party is the antithesis of the Prussian state."[2] Nevertheless, the +Imperial Government, not finding it possible to suppress the social +democrats, does its best to employ them for its own ends. It uses them +in fact as it uses irreconcilable France, namely, for the purpose of +terrorisation, since it has discovered that the spectre of socialism is as +effective to keep the middle classes loyal as the spectre of French +revenge is to keep the Southern States loyal. But it also hopes in time to +eradicate socialism from the State. "A vigorous national policy" Prince +von Buelow declares to be "the true remedy against the Social Democratic +Movement"; and though he makes no specific mention of war, it is obvious +that a war like that in which Germany is at present engaged is the most +vigorous form a national policy could possibly take. Was the outbreak of +war last August in part occasioned by the desire on the side of the German +Government to win over the workers of Germany? If so, it had yet another +spectre ready to its hand for the purpose--the spectre of Russia. + +[Footnote 1: _Imperial Germany_, p. 184.] + +[Footnote 2: _Ibid_. p. 186.] + +In any case, with Germany in this condition, Europe could hardly have +avoided a great war at some time or other; and 1914 follows naturally, +almost inevitably, from 1870. The unification of 1870 was far from +complete. The German national idea still awaits development in the +direction of racial unity, political unity, and constitutional freedom. It +is Prussia that bars the way in all these directions, Prussia, which, in +itself not a nation but a military bureaucracy, a survival of the old +territorial dynastic principle which the world has largely outgrown, has +stamped its character and system upon the German people. "Prussia," says +one of its apologists, "has put an iron girdle round the whole of German +life."[1] But in the end life proves itself stronger than iron bands. +Germany was bound to make another attempt to reach complete nationhood. She +is doing so now. Prussia fights for conquest, for world-power, and makes +docile Germany imagine that she is fighting for these also; but what +Germany is really fighting for, blindly and gropingly, is freedom and +unity. She has indeed "to hack her way through." But it is not, as she +supposes, hostile Europe which hems her in and keeps her from her "place in +the sun"; it is the Prussian girdle and the Prussian chains which hamper +the free movements of her limbs and hold her close prisoner in the shadow +of the Hohenzollern castle. The overthrow of Prussia means the release of +Germany; and France, who gave Germany greatness in 1870, may with the help +of the Allies be able in the near future to give her an even greater gift, +the gift of liberty. + +[Footnote 1: _Lectures on the History of the Nineteenth Century_, p. 106.] + + +Sec.7. _The Map of Europe, 1814-1914_.--We have now watched the national idea +at work in the three western countries of that Central European area which +the Congress of Vienna left unsettled in 1814, and in a later chapter +we shall see the same principle acting in the two great divisions of +South-East Europe, Austria-Hungary and the Balkan Peninsula. Let us, then, +use this opportunity to pause for a moment, take a general survey of the +map, and consider in broad outline what has actually been accomplished +during the past century and what still remains to do. + +From 1814 to 1848, exhausted by the effort of the Revolutionary and +Napoleonic Wars and disillusioned by reactionary statesmanship, the larger +nations slumbered: but Belgium and Greece secured their present liberties, +and outside Europe the national movement spread throughout the South +American Continent. Then came 1848, the "wonderful year" of modern history. +"There is no more remarkable example in history of the contagious quality +of ideas than the sudden spread of revolutionary excitement through +Europe in 1848. In the course of a few weeks the established order seemed +everywhere to be crumbling to pieces. The Revolution began in Palermo, +crossed the Straits of Messina, and passed in successive waves of +convulsion through Central Italy to Paris, Vienna, Milan, and Berlin. It +has often been remarked that the Latin races are of all the peoples of +Europe most prone to revolution; but this proposition did not hold good +in 1848. The Czechs in Bohemia, the Magyars in Hungary, the Germans in +Austria, rose against the paralysing encumbrance of the Hapsburg autocracy. +The Southern Slavs dreamed of an Illyrian kingdom; the Germans of a united +Germany; the Bohemians of a union of all the Slavonic peoples of Europe. +The authority of the Austrian Empire, the pivot of the European autocracy, +had never been so rudely challenged, and if the Crown succeeded in +recovering its shattered authority it was due to the dumb and unintelligent +loyalty of its Slavonic troops."[1] + +[Footnote 1: H.A.L. Fisher, _The Republican Tradition in Europe_, p. 193.] + +Many of these risings were doomed to failure, but between 1848 and 1871 the +alien governments in the Italian peninsula were abolished, making way for +a unitary government, in the form of a constitutional monarchy, which +embraces with small exceptions the whole of the Italian population of +Europe. In 1871, after three successful wars in seven years against +Denmark, Austria, and France, a Federal Government was established in +Germany, with the kingdom of Prussia as its leading State and the King of +Prussia as its monarch, with the title of German Emperor. This was a step +forward, though the new Germany was neither a unitary nor a constitutional +State. The Austrian territories have also come in for their share of the +general ferment, and Francis Joseph came to the throne in 1848 amid the +uprisings of his subject peoples; but these were successfully tided over, +though the Hungarian portion of the Austrian dominion achieved national +recognition and institutions in 1867. + +After 1871 the national movement moved farther east. In 1878 Roumania and +Serbia, both national States, were declared sovereign powers independent +of Turkey; Bulgaria achieved its recognition as a principality; and +Montenegro, a small mountain community, which had never submitted to the +Turks, increased its territory and became a recognised European State. +In 1908 and 1910 Bulgaria and Montenegro became kingdoms like their +neighbours; and in 1913, after the two Balkan Wars, all the five Balkan +States--Roumania, Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece, and Montenegro--obtained +accession of territory, and the principality of Albania was constituted +out of the Albanian portion of the old Turkish dominion. Finally, in quite +another region of Europe, Norway, which had been joined in an anomalous +union with Sweden since 1814, satisfied her national aspirations unopposed +by becoming an independent Constitutional Monarchy in 1905. + +All this represents a considerable clearing up of the Central European +problem. Nevertheless, much still remains to be done. Poland is as she was +in 1814, a dismembered nation. The Czechs of Bohemia, the Roumanians of +Transylvania, and the Southern Slavs, not to mention other and smaller +subject races, continue to demand their freedom from the joint tyranny of +Vienna and Budapest. Russia has not yet solved the problem of Finland, nor +England the problem of Ireland. The Turk still occupies Constantinople. And +finally, the Prussianised nationalism of Germany has created new questions +of nationality in Alsace-Lorraine and Schleswig. All these problems +together were as so much tinder ready to take fire directly the spark fell. +They were the cause of the "armed peace" of the past forty-three years; +they are the cause of the war to-day. The conflagration of 1914 is a proof +of a profound dissatisfaction among civilised nations with the existing +political structure of the Continent. Alsatians, Poles, Czechs, Finns, +Serbo-Croats, Roumanians, and the rest "still struggle for country and +liberty; for a word inscribed upon a banner, proclaiming to the world +that they also live, think, love, and labour for the benefit of all." The +framework of society does not fit the facts of nationality, and so the +framework has gone to pieces. "The map of Europe has to be re-made. That is +the key to the present movement." + + + +BOOKS + + +I. NATIONALITY + +MAZZINI. _Essays_. The Scott Library. 1s. + +MAZZINI. _Duties of Man_, etc. Everyman Library. 1s. + +Anything written by Mazzini, the prophet of the national idea, can be +recommended. + +LORD ACTON. _History of Freedom and other Essays_. 1907. 10s. net. + +Contains an acute historical analysis of nationality in the nineteenth +century. The conclusion reached is that "the theory of nationality is more +absurd and more criminal than the theory of socialism," but though the +summing up is unfavourable, the whole essay is a masterly exposition of the +national idea by one of the greatest of historical students. It forms a +very useful foil to Mazzini. + +HENRY SIDGWICK. _The Elements of Politics_. 1897. 14s. net. + +Chapter xiv., on "The Area of Government," contains useful paragraphs +on the distinction between Nation, State, and Nationality; see esp. pp. +222-225. + +SIR JOHN SEELEY. _The Expansion of England_. First published in 1883. 4s. +net. + +SIR JOHN SEELEY. _Introduction to Political Science_. 1896. 4s. net. + +Both these books, the first in particular, are important in this +connection. There is no one chapter or section devoted exclusively to the +consideration of nationality, but there are constant references to the +subject. The point of view is, moreover, instructive. Seeley is, perhaps, +the nearest English approach to Treitschke. + +J.M. ROBERTSON. _Introduction to English Politics_. 1900. 10s. 6d. net. + +Critical from the Rationalistic as Acton is from the Catholic point of +view. See esp. Part V., "The Fortunes of the Lesser European States," which +after a preliminary essay on Nationality, which the author declares to be +"essentially a metaphysical dream," while "the motive spirit in it partakes +much of the nature of superstition," goes on to give a valuable account of +the development of the "small nations," Holland, Switzerland, Portugal, +etc., by way of showing their value to civilisation as a whole. + +P. MILYOUKOV. _Russia and its Crisis_. 1905. 13s. 6d. + +Chap. ii. contains some interesting matter on Nationalism, especially of +course as it has been developed in Russia. + +J.S. MILL. _On Representative Government_. 2s. + +Chap, xvi., "Of Nationality as connected with Representative Government." + + +II. GENERAL HISTORICAL WORKS, ETC. + +ALISON PHILLIPS. _Modern Europe. 1815-1899_. 1903. 6s. net. + +An excellent general history of Europe, 1815-1899. + +SEIGNOBOS. _A Political History of Contemporary Europe since 1814_. 2 vols. +1901. 5s. net each. + +One of the best general histories of this scope available. It is a +translation from the French, with good bibliographies. + +_Lectures on the History of the Nineteenth Century_. Cambridge. 1902. 4s. +6d. net. + +A series of studies, by recognised authorities, of various aspects of +modern European history. Chap. ii., on "The International History of +Europe during the Nineteenth Century," by the late Professor Westlake, is +suggestive on the topic of nationality; chaps. v. and vi., on Germany, by a +German professor, are interesting as giving the German view of unification +by Bismarck; and chaps. ix. and x., on "The Struggle for Italian Unity," +and "Mazzini," by Mr. Bolton King, are especially valuable. + +H.A.L. FISHER. _The Republican Tradition in Europe_. 1911. 6s. net. + +Traces the development of the republican, as distinct from the nationalist +tradition, in modern Europe, and therefore forms a useful complement +to other writers. Chap. ix., on "Italy," and chap. x., on "The German +Revolution," are excellent accounts of "1848" in those two countries. + +H.A.L. FISHER. _The Value of Small States_. Oxford Pamphlets. 2d. + +E. LEVETT. _Europe since Napoleon_. 1913. Blackie. 3s. 6d. + +A useful little text-book. + +_The Cambridge Modern History_. Vols. ix., x., xi., xii. 16s. net per vol. + +Indispensable for knowledge of the facts of the period. + +R. NISBET BAIN. _Slavonic Europe, 1447-1796_. 1908. 5s. 6d. net. + +Chap. xviii. gives a good account of the partitions of Poland. + +BOLTON KING. _A History of Italian Unity_. 2 vols. 1899. 24s. net. + +BOLTON KING. _Mazzini_. 1903. Dent, Temple Biographies. 4s. 6d. net. + +BISMARCK. _Reflections and Reminiscences_. 2 vols. 1898. Smith Elder. + +Out of print. To be bought second-hand. + +BUeLOW. _Imperial Germany_. 1914. Cassell. 2s. net. + +The last two are indispensable for a true understanding of the principles +which underlie the German Empire. + +T.J. LAWRENCE. _Principles of International Law_. 1910. 12s. 6d. net. + +A useful text-book. See also _Cambridge Mod. Hist_. vol. xii. chap. xxii. + + + +CHAPTER III + +GERMANY + +"The Germans are vigorously submissive. They employ philosophical +reasonings to explain what is the least philosophic thing in the world, +respect for force and the fear which transforms that respect into +admiration."--MADAME DE STAEL (1810). + +"Greatness and weakness are both inseparable from the race whose powerful +and turbid thought rolls on--the largest stream of music and poetry at +which Europe comes to drink."--ROMAIN ROLLAND (_Jean Christophe_). + + +Sec.1. _The German State_.--The German Nation is one of the oldest in Europe: +the German State is almost the youngest--of the great States quite the +youngest. + +Englishmen sometimes wonder why there are so many Royal princes in +Germany--why it is that when a vacant throne has to be filled, or a husband +to be found for a princess of royal standing, Germany seems to provide +such an inexhaustible choice. The reason is that Germany consisted, until +recently, not of one State but of a multitude of States, each of which had +a court and a dynasty and sovereign prerogatives of its own. In 1789, at +the outbreak of the French Revolution, there were 360 of these States of +every sort and size and variety. Some were Kingdoms, like Prussia, some +were Electorates, like Hanover (under our English George III.), some were +Grand Duchies, some were Bishoprics, some were Free Cities, and some +were simply feudal estates in which, owing to the absence of a central +authority, noble families had risen to the rank of independent powers. +These families were the descendants of those "robber-barons" whose castles +on the Rhine and all over South and West Germany the tourist finds so +picturesque. Prince William of Wied, the first Prince of Albania, is a +member of one of them, and is thus entitled to rank with the royalties of +Europe: the father-in-law of ex-King Manoel of Portugal, the Prince of +Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, a branch of the Kaiser's own family, is another +familiar recent instance. And every one remembers Prince Albert of +Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the husband of Queen Victoria. + +In 1789 the possibility of a German National State was so remote that +Germans had not even begun to dream of one. Each little Principality was +jealously tenacious of its local rights, or, as we should say, of its +vested interests, as against the common interests of Germany. Most of +them were narrow and parochial in their outlook; and the others, the +more broad-minded, were not national but cosmopolitan in spirit. To the +tradition of municipal thinking, which had lasted on uninterruptedly in the +Free Cities of Germany from the Middle Ages, Germany owes the excellence of +her municipal government to-day. To the broad and tolerant humanism of +her more enlightened courts, such as Weimar and Brunswick, we owe the +influences that shaped the work of Goethe and of Lessing, two of the +greatest figures in European thought and letters. + +Into these peaceful haunts of culture and parochialism Napoleon, with the +armies and the ideas of Revolutionary France, swept like a whirlwind, +breaking up the old settled comfortable life of the cities and countryside. +One of the greatest of German writers, the Jew Heine, has described in a +wonderful passage what the coming of Napoleon meant to the inhabitants of a +little German Principality. It is worth transcribing at some length, for +it gives the whole colour and atmosphere of the old local life in Western +Germany, which has not even yet entirely passed away. The speaker is an old +soldier giving reminiscences of his boyhood: + +"Our Elector was a fine gentleman, a great lover of the arts, and himself +very clever with his fingers. He founded the picture gallery at Duesseldorf, +and in the Observatory in that city they still show a very artistic set of +wooden boxes, one inside the other, made by himself in his leisure hours, +of which he had twenty-four every day. + +"In those days the Princes were not overworked mortals as they are to-day. +Their crowns sat very firmly on their heads, and at night they just drew +their nightcaps over them, and slept in peace, while peacefully at their +feet slept their peoples; and when these woke up in the morning they said, +'Good morning, Father,' and the Princes replied, 'Good morning, dear +children.' + +"But suddenly there came a change. One morning when we woke up in +Duesseldorf and wanted to say, 'Good morning, Father,' we found our Father +gone, and a kind of stupefaction over the whole city. Everybody felt as +though they were going to a funeral, and people crept silently to the +market-place and read a long proclamation on the door of the City Hall. It +was grey weather, and yet thin old tailor Kilian stood in his alpaca coat, +which he kept for indoor use only, and his blue woollen stockings hung down +so that his miserable little bare legs were visible above them and his thin +lips were trembling, while he murmured the words of the proclamation. A +veteran soldier at his side read somewhat louder, and at every few words a +tear trickled down into his honest white beard. I Stood by him and cried +too, and asked him why we were crying. And then he told me: 'The Elector +expresses you his gratitude'--then he went on reading, and at the words +'for your loyal and trusted obedience, and releases you from your duties,' +his tears broke out afresh.... While we were reading, the Elector's arms +were being taken down from the City Hall, the whole place became as +terrifyingly quiet as though there were going to be an eclipse of the sun, +and all the City Councillors went about hanging their heads as though no +one had any more use for them... + +"When I woke up next morning, the sun was shining as usual, drums were +beating in the streets, and when I came down to breakfast and said +good-morning to my father I heard how the barber had whispered to him while +he was shaving him that the new Grand Duke Joachim was to receive the +homage of his subjects at the City Hall to-day, that he came of a very good +family and had been given the Emperor Napoleon's sister in marriage, and +had really a very good presence, and wore his fine black hair in curls, and +would shortly enter the city in state and would certainly please all the +ladies. Meanwhile, the drumming continued in the street, and I went and +stood outside the door and watched the French troops marching in, those +glorious happy Frenchmen, who marched through the world with songs and +shining sabres, the gay firm-set faces of the Grenadiers, the bear-skins, +the tricolour cockades, the gleaming bayonets, the merry skilful horsemen, +and the huge great drum-major with his silver-embroidered uniform, who +could throw his drum-stick with its gilt button up to the first floor, and +his eyes up even to the girls in the second floor windows. I was pleased +that we were to have soldiers billeted on us--my mother was not--and I +hurried to the market-place. There everything was quite different now. The +world looked as if it had had a new coat of paint. A new coat-of-arms was +hanging on the City Hall, the iron railings on the balcony were covered +with tapestry hangings, French Grenadiers were standing sentry, the old +City Councillors had put on new faces, and were wearing Sunday clothes, and +looked at one another in French and said 'Bon jour,' ladies were looking +out of all the windows, curious bystanders and smart soldiers thronged +the square, and I and the other boys climbed on to the big horse of the +Elector's statue and looked down on the gay crowd."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Heine, _Collected Works_, i. 228 (Book _Le Grand_).] + +Napoleon and his French soldiers, "marching through the world with songs +and shining sabres," brought the Germans more than this happy thrill of +excitement and a supply of new and more elegant princes. They brought them +that which gave strength to their own right arm--the spirit of Nationality. +"The soul of the German people," says a recent German writer, "has always +lain very deep down, and has seldom come to the surface to become the +spirit of the time and to inspire the movements of the world. Hardly ever +except in times of the deepest adversity has it come to the surface: but +then it has claimed its rights, or rather, discovered its duties."[1] +Napoleon, by humiliating her, laid bare the soul of Germany, as Germany +herself has laid bare the soul of Belgium to-day. His arrogant pretensions +roused the Germans as they had never been roused since the days of the +Reformation; while at the same time his attempts to secure the support of +the bigger German principalities by enlarging them at the expense of the +smaller, simplified the map and laid the foundations of a United Germany. +The thinkers and dreamers of Germany, stung at last into a sense of +political reality, awoke from their dreams of cosmopolitanism and devoted +their powers to the needs of the German nation. + +[Footnote 1: Daab's Preface to Paul de Lagarde, _German Faith, German +Fatherland, German Culture_, p. vi. (Jena, 1913).] + +The years between 1806 and 1813, between the disastrous battle of Jena +and the overwhelming victory of Leipzig, are the greatest years in German +history. Shaking off the torpor and the prejudices of centuries the German +nation arose and vanquished its oppressors. + +But with the twilight of that glorious day the bats returned. The defeat of +Napoleon was not only the defeat of French domination but the defeat of the +French Revolution, and of the principles of Democracy and Nationality which +inspired it. The unity of spirit which the Germans had achieved on the +battlefield they were unable to transform after the victory into a unity of +government or institutions. The Congress of Vienna, which redrew the map +of Europe after the Revolutionary wars, did so, not in accordance with +the principle of nationality or the wishes of the peoples of Europe but +according to what was called "legitimacy," that is to say, the interests +of the princes. There was only one idealist at the Conference, the Russian +Emperor Alexander, and he was put off with empty phrases. + +[Illustration: Germany of 1815.] + +For Germany the result of the Conference was the reestablishment, in +smaller numbers and with larger units of territory, of the old undemocratic +principalities, and of a Confederation embodying their dynastic interests. +Several of the larger States, such as Bavaria, Wuertemberg, Saxony, and +Hanover, which Napoleon had raised to the status of kingdoms, were +confirmed in their new dignities, and the kingdom of Prussia, the largest +of them all, acquired, out of the debris of the old Archbishopric of +Cologne and other small ecclesiastical and temporal States, the important +provinces of Westphalia and the Rhineland, which have made possible for +her the industrial growth of the last half century. Cologne, Duesseldorf, +Elberfeld, Essen, and other great industrial centres of Western Germany +will next year be celebrating the centenary of their Prussian connection. +But the chief State in the Confederation and its undisputed head was +Austria, which had for centuries enjoyed the prestige of supremacy over the +German States; and it was the Austrian statesman Metternich who was mainly +responsible for the Vienna settlement. + +The German Confederation of 1815-1866 went far outside the boundaries of +modern Germany. It included lands belonging to three non-German monarchs. +The King of Holland was a member of it in virtue of the Dutch provinces of +Limburg and Luxemburg; the King of Denmark for the Duchies of Schleswig and +Holstein; and the Emperor of Austria (who, then as now, ruled over Hungary, +Austrian Poland, and the Southern Slav provinces) for Bohemia, Moravia, and +German-speaking Austria up to and beyond Vienna. The Confederation was in +fact in no sense a national State, and was never intended to be so. It was +a loosely knit assortment of principalities and free cities. Germany +was still broken up and divided in a manner almost inconceivable to the +inhabitants of an old-established unity like Great Britain or France. At +least five different kinds of money, for instance, were in use in the +different States of the Confederation, and, as stamp-collectors know, the +postal system was bewildering in its complexity. More important was +the deep gulf between different parts of the country due to religious +divisions. The Reformation, which left England with a National Church, left +Germany hopelessly divided; and the division between the Protestants in the +north and east, and the Catholics in the west and south, is still, half +a century after the establishment of the United Empire, a source of +difficulty. + +Yet the Confederation has one undeniable achievement to its credit. It +paved the way for German unity by facilitating the Zollverein, or Customs +Union, which was extended between 1830 and 1844 to practically all the +German States except those under Austrian rule. But the far-reaching +importance of this development was not at that time appreciated. Western +Europe was tired after the great Napoleonic struggle and was not in a mood +for big designs. To all outward appearance Germany seemed to have relapsed, +after the thrill and glamour of the Wars of Liberation, into the stuffy +atmosphere of the old eighteenth century life. Only a very patient, a very +docile, and a very philosophic and law-abiding people would have endured +such an anti-climax; and it is these qualities, together with a certain +clumsiness and helplessness due to their complete inexperience of the +responsibilities of a larger citizenship, which go far to explain the +subsequent history of Germany. + +But in the evil days after the Congress of Vienna the _idea_ of German +unity lived on, and formed a constant theme of discussion and speculation, +like the idea of the unity of Poland and of the Southern Slavs in the +present generation. The stirring memories of the Great Revolution were like +a constant refrain at the back of men's minds all through that dreary time. +In 1830, when the French established a Liberal Monarchy and the Belgians +freed themselves from the unwelcome supremacy of Holland, there was much +excitement throughout Germany. But nothing serious occurred until 1848, +when the Liberal and Nationalist movement, which had been gathering force +throughout the educated classes of Western Europe for a generation, at +length came to a head. The whole of Germany was in a ferment, a strong +Republican movement manifested itself, and in almost every one of the many +capital cities there was a rising with a demand for a free constitution +and parliamentary government, and for the consolidation of German national +unity in accordance with the same democratic ideals. The princes had no +alternative but to give way, and, as a result, local Constitutions were +granted, and a national Parliament was summoned to meet at Frankfurt, to +draw up a national German Constitution on democratic lines. + +The task before the Frankfurt Parliament was similar to that which has +confronted British statesmen several times during the last century, in +framing the Dominion of Canada, the Commonwealth of Australia, and the +Union of South Africa--the task of welding a number of separate State +governments with the free consent of their populations into a homogeneous +and democratic central authority. But in the case of an old and still +largely feudal country like Germany the task was infinitely more difficult, +for it could not be successful without a levelling-up of the political +ideals of the backward States, such as Prussia, and the elimination of many +ancient associations and dynastic interests. The Frankfurt Constitution did +actually come into being, and it was nobly planned. It guaranteed to every +German citizen the rights of civil liberty, equality before the law, and +responsible parliamentary government, both central and local. But the mind +of the German nation was not yet equal to its new responsibilities. The +Frankfurt Parliament, like the first Russian Duma, was out of touch with +realities; it wasted precious time on the discussion of abstract questions +of principle, and failed to meet the practical needs of the moment. +While it sat and talked, the enthusiasm which had created it gradually +evaporated. Meanwhile the more reactionary States, and the princes whose +prerogatives were endangered, became more and more openly hostile. All +through 1849 the Parliament was losing members by defection, and by the end +of the year its influence had sunk to vanishing point. + +The movement which collapsed thus ignominiously was not a popular agitation +in the English sense of the term: like other movements of its generation it +sprang, not from the people but from the well-to-do, and its strength lay +among the professional and educated classes. The Frankfurt Parliament was +a predominantly middle-class assembly: lawyers and professors, always an +important element in German national life, were strongly represented in +it and largely responsible for its failure. Its collapse was a bitter +disappointment, and drove many of its leaders into exile abroad, more +particularly to the United States, where some of them, such as Carl +Schurz, lived to play a noteworthy part under more democratic political +institutions. + +After the failure of the Frankfurt Constitution it slowly became clear to +far-sighted Germans that there was only one way in which German unity could +come about. If, unlike the separate provinces of Canada and South Africa, +the German States would not voluntarily sink their identity in a larger +whole, unity could only come through their acceptance of the supremacy of +one of the existing States. + +There were only two possible candidates for the supremacy, Austria and +Prussia. Austria was still, at that time, as she had been for centuries, +in a position of undisputed headship. But her German policy was always +hampered because she had also to consider her non-German subjects. +Prussia, a younger and more homogeneous State, with a better organised +administration and a better disciplined people, was preparing to assert +herself. In 1862, at a moment when liberalism was gathering strength in +Prussia, Count Bismarck became chief Minister of the Prussian Crown and +the dominating force in Prussian policy. Bismarck was a Conservative and a +reactionary, wholly out of sympathy with the ideals of 1848. His immediate +object was to secure the supremacy of Prussia among the German States. +In the very first months of his leadership he made it clear, in a famous +sentence, by what methods he hoped to achieve his end. "The great questions +are to be settled," he told the Prussian Diet, with a scornful hit at the +Confederation, "not by speeches and majority resolutions, but by blood and +iron." + +He was not long in translating words into action. In 1864 the King of +Denmark died, and difficulties at once arose as to the succession to the +Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, which still belonged to the German +Confederation. Austria and Prussia intervened jointly in the name of the +Confederation, and, as a result, the Duchies were separated from Denmark, +Schleswig being administered by Austria and Holstein by Prussia. The object +of this rather clumsy plan, which originated with Bismarck, was to create +difficulties which would enable him to pick a quarrel with Austria. In 1866 +this manoeuvre proved successful. Bismarck goaded Austria into war and +succeeded, after a six weeks' campaign, in expelling her from the German +State system, following this up by rounding off her own dominions with the +annexation of a number of the smaller pro-Austrian States, amongst them the +kingdom of Hanover. His victory also had the effect of completely checking +the growing agitation for the establishment of responsible government in +Prussia.[1] + +[Footnote 1: On this point see Bismarck's _Recollections_, and the good +short account in Powicke's _Bismarck_.] + +Having made Prussia supreme in Germany, Bismarck was now in a position +to solve the problem of German unity. He resolved to employ the same +well-tried method. In 1870 the somewhat high-handed manner of Napoleon III. +made it possible for him to bring about a war between the German States +and France, in which Germany, under Prussian leadership, was completely +victorious. In the flush of their success, after the capture of Paris in +January 1871, the lesser States of Germany agreed to enter into a Federal +Union under Prussian supremacy and to accept the King of Prussia as its +head, with the title of Emperor. + +Thus, at length, Germany became a National State, with a national +constitution. The term Empire is misleading, for to English ears it +suggests the government of dependencies. Germany is not an Empire in that +sense: she is a Federation, like the United States and Switzerland, of +independent States which have agreed to merge some of their prerogatives, +notably the conduct of foreign affairs and of defence, in a central +authority. Since some of these independent States were, and still are, +monarchies, a higher title had to be provided for the Chief of the +Federation. An ace, as it were, was needed to trump the kings. After much +deliberation the title Emperor was agreed upon; but it is noteworthy that +the Kaiser is not "the Emperor of Germany": he bears the more non-committal +title of "German Emperor." + +The German Imperial Constitution, devised by Bismarck in 1871, falls far +short of the Frankfurt experiment of 1848. It does indeed provide for +the creation of a Reichstag, or Imperial Parliament, elected by all +male citizens over twenty-five. But the Reichstag can neither initiate +legislation nor secure the appointment or dismissal of Ministers. In +the absence of ministerial responsibility to Parliament, which is the +mainspring of our English Constitutional system, the Reichstag might be +described as little more than an advisory body armed with the power of +veto. Like the English Parliament in the days of Charles I.'s ship-money, +the Reichstag could in the last resort refuse supplies, and so bring the +machinery of government to a standstill. But this situation has never yet +arisen or seemed likely to arise. The Government has ridden the Reichstag +with a strong hand, turning awkward corners by concessions to the various +groups in turn, and the Reichstag has responded to this treatment. Bismarck +"took his majorities where he could get them"; and Prince Buelow's book +contains some illuminating pages about the clever methods which that +statesman adopted to "manage" his Parliaments. + +Above the Reichstag is the Bundesrat or Federal Council, on which all the +Federated States are represented, Prussia having seventeen members as +against forty-two from the other States. The Bundesrat sits in secret; its +members are selected by the different State Governments and vote according +to instructions received. All Bills originate in the Bundesrat before they +are submitted to the Reichstag, and are re-submitted to the Bundesrat, to +be passed or vetoed, after alteration in the Reichstag. The twenty-six +members of the German Federation represented in the Bundesrat comprise four +kingdoms (Prussia, Bavaria, Wuertemberg, and Saxony), a number of Grand +Duchies and smaller ducal States, three Free Cities (Hamburg, Luebeck, and +Bremen), and the Imperial Territory of Alsace-Lorraine. All these (except +the last named) preserve their own local Parliaments and institutions, and +the second largest, Bavaria, even preserves in peace-time, like the British +self-governing Dominions, her own military organisation and has also her +own postal system. But Prussia in size, influence, and military strength +is by far the most important, and for practical purposes her power +preponderates over that of all the other States combined. The real control +of legislation naturally lies with the State which controls two-fifths +of the votes in the Bundesrat, where legislation is initiated and can +be vetoed; it is wielded by the Kaiser, as King of Prussia, and by his +Imperial Chancellor, President of the Bundesrat and always a Prussian +Minister. The Imperial Chancellor, who is the only Imperial Minister, is +chosen by the Kaiser and is responsible to him alone: he countersigns all +the Kaiser's orders and edicts, and has the function, it may be added, of +explaining away his indiscretions. + +It is inevitable, under these circumstances, that the policy and +legislation of the central government should largely reflect Prussian views +and ideals. On the other hand, the temper of the rest of Germany must +always be kept in mind. As Prince Buellow, the late Imperial Chancellor, +says: "If the Empire is governed without reference to Prussia, ill-will +towards the Empire will grow in that country. If Prussia is governed +without reference to the Empire, then there is the danger that mistrust and +dislike of the leading State will gain ground in non-Prussian Germany.... +The art of governing in our country will always have to be directed chiefly +towards maintaining the harmony between Germany and Prussia, in the spirit +as well as in the letter."[1] + +[Footnote 1: _Imperial Germany_, pp. 191-192.] + +Why should the government of Germany be such an "art"? And why should there +be any difficulty in maintaining a harmonious spirit between Prussia and +non-Prussian Germany? To answer these questions we must widen the scope of +our inquiry. So far we have considered only the growth and development +of the German State. It is now time to turn from the German State to the +German people. + + +Sec.2. _The Real Germany_.--The difficulty of establishing German Unity +has lain in the fact that there have really always been two Germanies, +different in history, in temper, in ideals, and in their stages of +development in civilisation. There has been Prussia, or North-Eastern +Germany; and there has been the real Germany, the Germany of the South and +West. It is only since 1870, and especially within the reign of the present +Kaiser, that, through education and common experience; the two have become +fused into one; but even now, beneath the uniform surface of German life +and public opinion, there is a great inner distinction. + +Let us take what we have called the real Germany first. This Germany, the +Germany of the Rhine country, of Frankfurt and Heidelberg and Cologne and +Nueremberg, is the Germany which so many Englishmen know and admire. This +Germany is an integral part of the civilisation of Western Europe, and is +closely akin to ourselves. It has grown and developed alongside with France +and the Netherlands and England, sharing in all the great spiritual and +social movements of the West. It has passed, with them, through the Middle +Ages, the Revival of Learning, the Reformation, and the long struggle +against the domination of France. Its famous cities with their Cathedrals +and Town Halls breathe the same proud, free, municipal spirit as those of +their great neighbours in the Netherlands, Ghent, Antwerp, Louvain, Bruges, +Ypres and the rest. Its scholars and teachers, poets, painters, and +musicians, from Luther to Goethe, have made their special German +contribution to the civilised life of the West--a contribution as great and +as unique as that of Renaissance Italy or Elizabethan England. Its people +are very similar in character to their neighbours of kindred stock. As +industrious as the Dutch, as persevering as the Scotch, as steady and +good-hearted as the English, good workers, good citizens, devoted in their +family relations, they have found it easy to live at peace and on a good +understanding with their neighbours, and when they have migrated abroad, +they have by common confession made the best of settlers, both in the +United States and in the British Dominions. + +Yet they have developed certain characteristic qualities in their social +and political life, which distinguish them sharply from their western +neighbours. History, which has deprived them, until recently, of a wider +citizenship, has left them timid, docile, dreamy and unpractical in just +that sphere of action where Englishmen have learnt for centuries to think +and to act for themselves. Patriotism with Englishmen is an instinct. We +do not much care to wave flags or make speeches or sing songs about it: we +assume it as the permanent background of our national life and our national +consciousness. With the Germans this is not so. In Germany, partly owing +to German history, partly owing to the constitution of the German mind, +patriotism is not an instinct but an _idea_. Now ideas do not grow up in +men's minds by a natural process. They have to be implanted. The Germans +have needed to be _taught_ to be patriotic. The makers of German patriotism +a century ago were teachers and philosophers. They did not simply appeal to +their patriotic instincts, as Englishmen would have done: they argued the +point and _proved_ that Germany was worth fighting for: they founded a +school of patriotic German philosophy. There are few more curious documents +in history, or more instructive for the light they shed on future +events, than the famous _Speeches to the German Nation_ addressed to his +fellow-countrymen by the philosopher Fichte in 1808, when his country was +under the heel of Napoleon. They are not speeches at all, but philosophical +lucubrations, discussing in abstract terms the whole subject of the nature +of patriotism and of Germany's right to exist as a nation. One argument, +for instance, on which he lays great stress, is that Germany is marked out +to be a great political power because of the peculiar excellence of the +German language, which he shows to his satisfaction to be superior to +French, Italian, and other Latin languages. Again, he points out that there +is no word in the German language for "character" (_Karakter_), a word +borrowed from the Greek; the reason is, he explains, that there is no need +for one, because to have character and to be German are the same thing--a +curious foretaste of the German arrogance of to-day. Yet these speeches, +which, issued in England at such a crisis, would have found no readers, +reverberated through Germany and helped to create the self-confident spirit +which freed her from the invader. Then, as now, under the inspiration of +ideas which they had accepted from professors and philosophers, Germans +fought for the German language and for German culture. But whereas in 1814 +they fought to preserve them, in 1914 they are fighting to impose them. + +Just as patriotism in Germany is wholly different from what it is in +England, so also is democracy, and all those elements in the national life +which feed and sustain it. British democracy does not depend upon our +popular franchise or on any legal rights or enactments. It depends upon the +free spirit and self-respect of the British people. We have been accustomed +for centuries to the unrestrained discussion of public affairs; and we +treat our governors as being in fact, as they are in name, our "ministers" +or servants. There is a force called public opinion which, slow though it +may be to assert itself, British statesmen have been taught by experience +to respect. It is as true of British as it is of American democracy that +"you can fool half the people all the time; and you can fool all the people +half the time; but you cannot fool all the people all the time." But the +German people, as a people, lacks this irreplaceable heritage of political +self-respect. It has never yet dared to tread the path of democracy without +leading strings. It has not yet learned to think for itself in politics, +or formed the habit of free discussion and practical criticism of public +affairs. This is the vital fact which must be borne in mind in all +comparisons between German and British democracy. The Germans have a +Parliament, elected by Universal Male Suffrage. But this Parliament is +powerless to control policy, because the nation behind it does not give it +sufficient support. It is because of the absence of the driving force of a +public opinion in Germany that the German people submit complacently to the +infringements on political liberty which form part of the normal _regime_ +of German life--the domineering arrogance of officers and officials, +the restraints upon the Press and the shameless manufacture of news +and inspiration of opinion from official sources, the control of the +Universities, the schools, and the public services by the State in the +interest of "orthodox" political opinions, and the ridiculous laws which +have sent editors and cartoonists to prison in scores for criticising the +behaviour and utterances of the Emperor or the Crown Prince. In England and +in America underground attempts are sometimes made to injure the careers of +men whose opinions are considered "dangerous" by those who employ them. +In Germany such interference with freedom of political thought is not the +exception: it has become the rule. No man can make a successful career +in the public service (and education is a public service) unless he is +considered politically "orthodox" (_gesinnungstuechtig_); and orthodoxy does +not simply mean abstention from damaging criticism or dangerous opinions: +it means, in practice, deference to the opinions of those who "know +better," that is, to the clique of Prussian generals and bureaucrats who, +together with the Kaiser, control the policy of the country. + +British readers who do not know Germany may think the foregoing indictment +of German political incapacity severe. It is not so severe as Prince +Buellow's. The portion of the late Imperial Chancellor's book which deals +with domestic policy opens with these crushing sentences: "The history of +our home policy, with the exception of a few bright spots, is a history of +political mistakes. Despite the abundance of merits and great qualities +with which the German nation is endowed, political talent has been denied +it.... We are not a political people." A page or two later he goes even +further and quotes with approval a dictum that the Germans are +"political donkeys." That a modern statesman should think this of his +fellow-countrymen is remarkable enough; that he should say it outright is +a still more remarkable proof of his unshakeable belief in their +submissiveness. Therein lies the whole tragedy of the present situation. +The German people, so kindly and, alas! so docile, is suffering, not for +its sins, but for its deficiencies; not for its own characteristic acts or +natural ambitions, but for what it has too tamely allowed others, Prussian +statesmen and soldiers, with alien ideals and an alien temper, to foist +upon it, until it has become an integral part of its natural life and +consciousness. Germany has been indoctrinated and Prussianised not only +into acquiescence, but into sympathy with the policy of its rulers. + + +Sec.3. _Prussia_.--This brings us to the consideration of the second and more +powerful of the two Germanies--namely, Prussia. In order to understand +Prussia and the Prussian spirit we must plunge ourselves into an atmosphere +wholly different from that of the Germany that has just been described. The +very names of the two countries mark the measure of the difference. Germany +means the country of the Germans, as England means the country of the +English. But the name Prussia commemorates the subjugation and extinction +by German conquerors and crusaders from the west of the Prussians or +Bo-Russians, a tribe akin to the Letts and Lithuanians. The old Duchy of +Prussia, which now forms the provinces of East and West Prussia at the +extreme North-East of the present German Empire, consisted of heathen lands +colonised or conquered, between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries, by +a great religious and military organisation known as the "Knights of the +Teutonic Order." While Southern and Western Germany was passing, with the +rest of Western Europe, through the transition between mediaeval and modern +Europe, what is now North-Eastern Germany was still in a wholly primitive +stage of development, and the Knights of the Teutonic Order, with crusading +fervour, were spreading Christianity and German "culture" by force of +arms, converting or repelling the Slavonic population and settling German +colonists in the territory thus reclaimed for civilisation. The great +British admirer of Prussia, Thomas Carlyle, in the first volume of his +_Frederick the Great_, gives a vivid account of their activities in their +forts or "burgs" of wood and stone, and helps us to realise what memories +lie behind the struggle between German and Slav to-day, and why the word +"Petersburg" has become so odious to the Russians as the name of their +capital. "The Teutsch Ritters build a Burg for headquarters, spread +themselves this way and that, and begin their great task. The Prussians +were a fierce fighting people, fanatically anti-Christian: the Teutsch +Ritters had a perilous never-resting time of it.... They built and burnt +innumerable stockades for and against: built wooden Forts which are now +stone Towns. They fought much and prevalently, galloped desperately to and +fro, ever on the alert. How many Burgs of wood and stone they built in +different parts, what revolts, surprisals, furious fights in woody, boggy +places they had, no man counted; their life, read in Dryasdust's newest +chaotic Books (which are of endless length, among other ill qualities) is +like a dim nightmare of unintelligible marching and fighting: one feels +as if the mere amount of galloping they had would have carried the Order +several times round the Globe.... But always some preaching, by zealous +monks, accompanies the chivalrous fighting. And colonists come in from +Germany; trickling in, or at times streaming. Victorious Ritterdom offers +terms to the beaten Heathen; terms not of tolerant nature, but which will +be punctually kept by Ritterdom." Here we see the strange stern, medieval, +crusading atmosphere which lies behind the unpleasant combinations, so +familiar to us to-day in France and Belgium, of Uhlans and religion, of +culture and violence, of "Germanisation" and devastation. When we hear the +German professors of to-day preaching of the spread of German culture by +the German arms, and when we feel disgust at the exaggerated religious +phraseology which pervades the Kaiser's oratory and seems to accord so ill +with his policy and ambitions, we must remember the peculiar origins of the +Prussian State and how comparatively recent those origins are. "I have once +before had occasion," said the Kaiser at Marienburg in East Prussia on June +5, 1902, "to say in this place how Marienburg, this unique Eastern bulwark, +the point of departure for the culture of the lands east of the Vistula, +will always be a symbol for our German mission. There is work for us +again to-day. Polish arrogance wishes to lay hands on Germanism, and I am +constrained to call my people to the defence of its national possessions. +Here in Marienburg I proclaim that I expect all the brothers of the Order +of St. John to be at my service when I call upon them to protect German +ways and German customs." The Kaiser's crusading appeals are not +hypocritical or consciously insincere: they are simply many centuries out +of date--a grotesque medley of medieval romanticism and royal megalomania. +What was possible for the warrior knights in North-East Germany five or six +centuries ago is a tragic absurdity and an outrageous crime to-day among +a spirited and sensitive people like the Poles--still more so in a highly +civilised national State such as Belgium or France. It is an absurdity that +only a theatrical monarch could conceive and a crime that only a military +autocracy could attempt to enforce. + +In the sixteenth century the Reformation, spreading throughout the North of +Europe, undermined the basis of the Teutonic Order. The Grand Master of +the time transformed himself into a Lutheran Prince holding the hereditary +Duchy of Prussia as a vassal of the King of the neighbouring Slavonic +State of Poland. In 1611 the Duchy was amalgamated with the territory of +Brandenburg farther west, and in 1647 the enlarged Prussian territories +won their emancipation from Poland. Prussia now became a distinct State, +essentially German in character (as opposed to the Poles and Lithuanians on +its Eastern border), but still remaining for a time outside the community +of the other German States. + +The union between Prussia and Brandenburg had brought Prussia under the +rule of the House of Hohenzollern, which, although originally a South +German family, had borne rule in Brandenburg since 1415. Under the +Hohenzollerns Prussia rapidly increased in territory and influence until in +1701 the ruler of the day, the grandfather of Frederick the Great, took on +himself the title of King. Under Frederick the Great, Prussia's career of +conquest and aggrandisement continued. Seizing a convenient opportunity, he +invaded and annexed the Austrian province of Silesia, and later joined with +Austria and Russia in promoting the shameful Partition of Poland. The old +conquering and "civilising" policy of the Teutonic Knights was continued, +but under new conditions and in a brutal and cynical spirit which rendered +it impossible of success. "The surest means of giving this oppressed nation +better ideas and morals," wrote Frederick the Great, in words quoted +with approval by Prince Buelow, "will always be gradually to get them to +intermarry with Germans, even if at first it is only two or three of them +in every village." This spirit in Prussian policy may have extinguished the +ancient Prussians, but it has not yet begun to Germanise the Poles, and has +gone far to de-Germanise the Alsatians. But it explains the utterances and +justifies the sincerity of those who believe that to-day, as in the early +days of her history, Prussia is fighting on behalf of "culture." + +Prussia remains to-day, what she has been for the last two centuries, an +aggressive military monarchy. "Prussia attained her greatness," says Prince +Buelow, "as a country of soldiers and officials, and as such she was able +to accomplish the work of German union; to this day she is still, in all +essentials, a State of soldiers and officials." Power rests in the hands +of the monarch and of a bureaucracy of military and civil officials, +responsible to him alone, and traditionally and fanatically loyal to the +monarch who is, before all things, their War Lord. + +The Prussian outlook is so foreign to Western habits of thought that it is +well that we should try to understand it at its best. Prussia proper has +not been rich, like the rest of Germany, in poets and imaginative writers; +but she is fortunate to-day in possessing in the greatest living Greek +scholar, Professor von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, a man who by birth and +breeding is able to put the highest interpretation upon the aims and spirit +of the Prussian State. To Wilamowitz Prussia is not only nearer and dearer +than Athens. She is better, and more advanced. At the close of a wonderful +address on "the glory of the Athenian Empire," in which he has employed all +the resources of his wide learning to paint a picture of Ancient Greece +at her best, Wilamowitz breaks into this impassioned peroration: "But one +element in life, the best of all, ye lacked, noble burghers of Athens. +Your sages tell us of that highest love which, freed from all bodily +entanglements, spends itself on institutions, on laws, on ideas. We +Prussians, a rough, much-enduring tribe of Northerners, may be compacted +of harder stuff; but we believe that love is on a higher level when the +fullest devotion to an institution and an idea is inseparably linked with +an entirely personal devotion to a human being; and at least we know how +warm such a love can make a loyal heart. When our children have scarce +learned to fold their hands before God, we set a picture before them, we +teach them to recognise the noble features; we tell them, 'This is our good +King.' Our young men, when they are of age to bear arms, look with joy and +pride on the trim garb of war, and say, 'I go in the King's coat.' And when +the nation assembles to a common political celebration, the occasion is no +Feast of the Constitution, no Day of the Bastille, no Panathenaic Festival. +It is then that we bow in reverence and loyalty before him who has allowed +us to see with our own eyes that for which our Fathers dreamed and +yearned, before him who ever extends the bounds of the Kingdom in Freedom, +Prosperity, and Righteousness, before his Majesty the Emperor and King."[1] + +[Footnote 1: _Speeches and Lectures_, 3rd edition, Berlin, 1913, p. 65. The +"good King" referred to is the old Emperor William, as the address dates +from 1877.] + +Here, far better expressed than in the Kaiser's speeches, we see the spirit +of the Prussian Junker at its best. It is narrow, old-fashioned, and, to +democratic ears, almost grotesque. Yet, if it survives uncorrupted by the +dangers to which progress always exposes a military caste, it will not be +easy either to crush by defeat or to transform by humiliation. + +It is among the old Prussian nobility and the large landed proprietors +in the original Prussian provinces, who have come to be known as the +"Junkers," that this spirit prevails. They stand for the old stern +repressive military discipline and unchanging Conservatism in its extremest +form, regarding with well-founded suspicion and misgiving symptoms of +development in any direction whatsoever. No party in Germany acquiesced +more unwillingly in the changes necessitated by her commercial and +industrial development. Even their militarism stopped short at the +Army, and it required a substantial increase in the protective tariff +safeguarding their agricultural interests to purchase their reluctant +adhesion to the Kaiser's policy of naval expansion. Even now the German +Navy, the pride of the commercial and industrial classes throughout the +German Empire, is regarded by them with uneasy suspicion as a parvenu +service, in which the old Prussian influences count for less in promotion +than technical skill and practical efficiency. + +The institutions of the Prussian State represent the spirit of its ruling +caste. If the German Empire is not democratic, Prussia lags far behind it. +The electoral system in use for the Prussian Lower House is too complicated +to explain here. Its injustice may be gauged from the fact that in 1900 +the Social Democrats, who actually polled a majority of the votes, secured +seven seats out of nearly 400. The whole spirit and practice of the +Government is inimical to inborn British conceptions of civil liberty and +personal rights. There is one law and code of conduct for officers and +another for civilians, and woe betide the civilian who resists the military +pretensions. The incidents at Zabern in Alsace in 1913 are still fresh +in public memory, reinforced by evidence of a similar spirit in German +military proclamations in France and Belgium. But it is important to +realise that these incidents are not exceptional outbursts but common +Prussian practice, upheld, as the sequel to the Zabern events proved, by +the highest authority. + +Prussia, and through Prussia Germany, is in effect ruled in accordance with +the wishes of the official caste: and short of a popular rising nothing but +defeat can dethrone it. "Any one who has any familiarity at all with our +officers and generals," says an authoritative German writer, in words that +we may hope will be prophetic, "knows that it would take another Sedan, +inflicted on us instead of by us, before they would acquiesce in the +control of the Army by the German Parliament."[1] No clearer statement +could be given as to where the real power lies in Germany, and how stern +will be the task of displacing it. + +[Footnote 1: Professor Delbrueck (who succeeded to the chair of history +in Berlin held so long by Treitschke), in a book published early in 1914 +(_Government and the Popular Will_, p. 136).] + +The foreign policy of Prussia has reflected the same domineering spirit. +Its object has been the increase of its power and territory by conquest or +cunning: and by the successful prosecution of this policy it has extended +Prussian authority and Prussian influence over a large part of Western +Germany. The best way of illustrating this will be to quote a passage from +the _Recollections of Prince Bismarck,_ who directed Prussian policy from +1862 to 1890. In 1864 trouble arose as to the succession to the Duchies of +Schleswig and Holstein on the Danish border. Prussia had no claim whatever +to the Duchies; but she coveted Holstein because it would give her a +Western sea-board, with the results that we all know. Bismarck describes +the arguments which he used to persuade his Royal Master to assert +his claim. "I reminded him," he writes, "that each of his immediate +predecessors had won an addition to the Monarchy": he then went through the +history of the six previous reigns, and ended by encouraging King +William to be worthy of his ancestors. His advice, as we have seen, was +successfully adopted. + +[Illustration: PRUSSIA SINCE THE ACCESSION OF FREDERICK THE GREAT] + +The conquest of France in 1870, by means of the military power of Germany +under Prussian leadership, made Prussia supreme in Germany, and the German +army supreme in Central Europe. The Treaty of Frankfurt in May 1871, by +which the new French Republic ceded to the German Empire the two French +provinces of Alsace and Lorraine, marked the opening of a new epoch in +European history, the period of the Armed Peace, which ended in 1914. It +marked also the opening of a new epoch in Germany, some features of which +we must now examine. + + +Sec.4. _Germany since 1870_.--German history from 1871 to 1914 falls into two +well-defined periods. During the first period, from 1871 to 1888, Germany +was ruled by her Imperial Chancellor, Prince Bismarck. But the accession of +the present Kaiser led to a change, not in the letter, but in the spirit of +the new constitution, and since 1890, when William II. "dropped the pilot" +and selected a more amenable successor, the real control of policy has lain +with the Emperor. + +The relations between Prince Bismarck and the old Emperor, who was over +ninety when he died in 1888, form a touching passage in modern history. +Although his grandson has publicly claimed for him a peculiar measure of +divine inspiration, his strength lay in his implicit confidence in his +great minister. Bismarck's attitude to him, as described in his _Memoirs_, +is rather like that of an old family retainer who has earned by long and +faithful service the right to assert his views and to pit his judgment +against his master's. His one formidable antagonist was the Empress; and +long experience, he tells us, enabled him to judge whether difficulties in +persuading the old Kaiser to adopt a given line of policy were due to +his own judgment or conceived "in the interests of domestic peace." The +faithful servant had his own appropriate methods of winning his way in +either case. + +But with the new Kaiser the old minister's astuteness availed nothing, +and the story of Bismarck's curt dismissal, after thirty-eight years +of continuous service, from the post which he had created for himself, +illustrates the danger of framing a constitution to meet a particular +temporary situation. Bismarck, put out of action by his own machinery, +retired growling to his country seat, and lived to see the reversal of his +foreign policy and the exposure of Germany, through the Franco-Russian +Alliance, to the one danger he always dreaded, an attack on both flanks. + +Like Germany's present rulers, Bismarck was not a scrupulous man; but +unlike them he was shrewd and far-sighted, and understood the statesmen and +the peoples with whom he had to deal. The main object of his foreign policy +was to preserve the prestige of the German army as the chief instrument of +power in Central Europe, and to allow the new Germany, after three wars in +seven years, time to develop in peace and to consolidate her position as +one of the Great Powers. + +The situation was not an easy one; for Germany's rapid rise to power, +and the methods by which she had acquired it, had not made her popular. +Bismarck's foreign policy was defensive throughout, and he pursued it along +two lines. He sought to strengthen Germany by alliances, and to weaken her +rivals by embroiling them with one another. The great fruit of his policy +was the formation, completed in 1882, of the Triple Alliance between +Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy. + +There was nothing sentimental about the Triple Alliance. The Italians hate +the Austrians, whom they drove out of Venice as recently as 1866, while +neither the German Austrians nor the other races in the Dual Monarchy have +any love lost for the Prussians. But Bismarck decided that this combination +was the safest in Germany's interest: so he set to work to play upon +Austria's fear of Russia, and to embroil Italy with France in North Africa; +and his manoeuvres were duly rewarded. + +But this was not sufficient. Faced with the implacable hostility of France, +on account of the lost provinces, Bismarck saw danger of trouble from a +French Coalition with the two remaining Great Powers, Britain and Russia. +Bismarck never liked England; but he never made his successors' mistake of +despising her. He cultivated good relations, but he rejected the idea of an +alliance, because, as he said, "the English constitution is not compatible +with treaties of assured continuity." In other words, he fought shy of +British democracy, which he felt to be an incalculable factor. This threw +him back upon Russia. + +The relations between the German and the Russian peoples have never been +cordial. But between the reactionary bureaucracies of the Prussian and +Russian governments there was a strong bond of mutual interest, which +Bismarck exploited to the full. Both had popular movements to hold in +check, both had stolen goods to guard in the shape of their Polish +possessions, and both had an interest in the preservation of reactionary +institutions. The influence of Prussia upon Russia, and of the efficient, +highly-organised, relentless Prussian machine upon the arbitrary, +tyrannical, but far less efficient and inhuman bureaucracy of Russia, has +been wholly sinister[1], both for Russia and for Europe. Bismarck's object, +of course, was not so much to keep down the Russian revolutionaries as to +check the aspirations of the Panslavists, whose designs for the liberation +of the Slav nationalities, as we now see them unfolding, threaten the +stability both of Prussia and of Austria-Hungary. + +[Footnote 1: The same remark applies to the influence of Germany on +Turkey.] + +Throughout the 'eighties Bismarck succeeded in keeping on foot a secret +understanding with Russia. How deeply he had implanted the necessity of +this policy in the mind of William I. is brought home by the fact that it +was the thought uppermost in the old man's mind as he lay on his deathbed. +"Never lose touch with the Tsar," whispered the old man to his grandson, +when he was almost too weak to speak. "There is no cause for quarrel." + +The old Emperor died in 1888. In 1890 the young Emperor "dropped the +pilot." In the same year Russia refused to renew her secret treaty. In 1891 +the first Franco-Russian Treaty was signed, and the diplomatic supremacy +of Europe passed from the Triple Alliance to be shared between the two +opposing groups with which we have been familiar in recent years. + +The disappearance of Prince Bismarck marked the beginning of a new phase in +German policy and in German life. The younger generation, which had come +to maturity, like the Kaiser, since 1870, had never known the old divided +Germany, or realised the difficulties of her statesmen. Every one wondered +what use the young Kaiser would make of the great Army bequeathed to him. +He was believed to be a firebrand. Few believed that, imbued with Prussian +traditions, he would keep the peace for twenty-five years; fewer still +that, when he broke it, Germany would have the second Navy in the world. + +But we are not now concerned with the baffling personality of the Kaiser +himself. What is important for us here is the general attitude of mind +among the German public of the Kaiser's generation, which has rendered +possible the prosecution of the cherished ideas of their ruler. + +The school of thought which has been steadily gaining force, under official +encouragement, during the last twenty-five years is best summed up in +the popular watchwords, "Germany's place in the sun" and "World-Policy" +(_Weltpolitik_). These phrases embody, for Germans, who always tend to be +abstract in their thinking, not only a practical policy, but a philosophy +of human society and government. + +This is not the place in which to analyse in detail the outlook upon life +(_Weltanschauung_) of the man in the street in modern Germany. It is a +confused and patchwork philosophy, drawn, consciously or unconsciously, +from many quarters--from the old cosmopolitan tradition of German culture, +dating from Goethe and Leasing; from the brave and arrogant claims +of Fichte and the prophets and poets of the Napoleonic era; from the +far-reaching influence of Hegel and his idealisation of the Prussian State; +from the reaction to "realism" in politics after 1848; from the prestige +of Bismarck and the deep impression made by the apparent success of his +methods and principles; from the gifted Prussian historians, Treitschke and +Sybel, who set their own interpretation upon Bismarck's work and imprinted +it, by speech and pen, upon the mind of the German nation; and from a +hasty interpretation of the theories of writers like Nietzsche and +Thomas Carlyle, with their exaltation of "heroes" and "supermen," their +encouragements to "live dangerously," their admiration for will-power +as against reason and feeling, and their tirades against legal shams, +"ballot-box democracy," and flabby humanitarianism. + +The practical object of the policy of _Weltpolitik_ can be simply stated. +It is to extend to the other continents, and to the world as a whole, +the power and the prestige secured for Germany in Europe by the work of +Bismarck. "When Germany had won a mighty position on a level with the older +Great Powers," says Prince Buelow, "the path of international politics +lay open to her ... In the Emperor William II. the nation found a +clear-sighted, strong-willed guide who led them along the new road." + +Some such expansion of German influence was inevitable from the facts of +her economic development since 1871. The population of the Empire, which +in 1871 was 41,000,000, has now risen to 65,000,000. The resources of the +country, the neglect of which during the days of disunion had forced +so many Germans to emigrate for a livelihood, have been rapidly and +scientifically developed. Already in the 'eighties "Made in Germany" had +become a familiar talisman, and, before the outbreak of the present war, +Germany ranked with the United States as the second greatest commercial +power in the world. + +Simultaneously, of course, there has been a great change in the +distribution of the population. In the year 1850 65 per cent, and in 1870 +47 per cent of the working population were engaged in agriculture. By 1912 +the proportion had sunk to 28.6 per cent. + +It was inevitable also that Germany should share with the other Great +Powers in the work of colonial government. The adjustment of the relations +between the advanced and backward races of mankind is the greatest +political task of our age; it is a responsibility shared jointly between +all the civilised States, and when in the 'eighties and 'nineties the vast +regions of Africa were partitioned amongst them, Germany, late in the +field, asserted her claims and received her share in the responsibility. + +Rapid economic development and a colonial empire--what was there in these +to cause hostility between Germany and Great Britain? The United States +have passed through a similar development and have accepted a similar +extension of responsibility far outside their own continent. America is a +great, a growing, and a self-respecting Power; yet Americans see no ground +for that inevitable conflict of interests between their country and Great +Britain which forms the theme of so many German books, from Prince Buelow's +candid self-revelations down to less responsible writers like Bernhardi. + +The explanation lies in the nature of German thought and ambitions. When +Germans speak of "a place in the sun," they are not thinking of the spread +of German trade, the success of German adventure or enterprise, or of +the achievements of Germans in distant lands. They are thinking of the +extension of the German State. British influence beyond the seas has been +built up during the last four centuries by the character and achievements +of British pioneers. Downing Street has seldom helped, often hindered, and +generally only ratified the accomplished facts of British settlement and +influence. That is not the Prussian theory or the Prussian method. It is +for the State to win the territory, and then to set the people to work +there, on lines laid down from above. The individual Englishman, when +he goes out to colonise, carries England with him, as a part of his +personality. Not so the German, at least on the Prussian theory. "The _rare +case_ supervened," says Prince Buelow,[1] of an instance typical of the +building up of the British Empire, "that the establishment of State rule +_followed and did not precede_ the tasks of colonising and civilisation." +The State itself, on this theory, has a civilising mission of expansion +towards which it directs the activities of its citizens. + +[Footnote 1: _Imperial Germany_, 1st ed., p. 249.] + +Under the influence of ideas such as these, Germany, since the accession of +William II., has built a Navy second to that of Great Britain alone. + +What was the purpose of the building of the German Navy? The German +official answer is that its purpose was the protection of German trade. "We +are now vulnerable at sea," says Prince Buelow. "We have entrusted millions +to the ocean, and with these millions, the weal and woe of many of our +countrymen. If we had not in good time provided protection for them ... +we should have been exposed to the danger of having one day to look on +defencelessly while we were deprived of them. We should have been placed in +the position of being unable to employ and support a considerable number of +our millions of inhabitants at home. The result would have been an +economic crisis which might easily attain the proportions of a national +catastrophe." + +These words may yet prove prophetic. But the catastrophe will not be the +result of Germany's lack of a Navy; it will be the result of challenging +the naval supremacy of Great Britain. + +Prince Buelow's argument assumes, as a basis, the hostility of Great +Britain. This assumption, as we know, was unjustified; and its persistence +in the German mind can only be set down to an uneasy conscience. The hard +fact of the matter is that it is impossible for Germany or for any other +Power successfully to defend her foreign trade in case of war with Great +Britain. No other Power thinks it necessary to attempt to do so, for no +other Power has reason to desire or to foresee a naval conflict with Great +Britain. + +Ever since 1493, when the Pope divided the monopoly of traffic on the ocean +between Spain and Portugal, and English mariners flouted his edict, +Great Britain has stood for the policy of the Open Sea, and there is no +likelihood of our abandoning it. The German official theory of the purpose +of their Navy, with its suspicious attitude towards British sea-power, was, +in effect, a bid for supremacy, inspired by the same ideas which made +the German army, under Bismarck, supreme in Central Europe. The Kaiser's +speeches on naval matters, notably his famous declaration that "our future +is on the water," provide an official confirmation, if one were needed, of +the real nature of Germany's naval ambitions. + +But what right, it may be asked, has Great Britain to this naval supremacy? +Why should we, more than any other Power, claim one of the elements for our +own? Has not Germany some reason to be jealous? Why should we not allow +her, together with ourselves, "a place on the Ocean"? + +The answer to this lies in the character of the British Empire. One quarter +of the human race live under the Union Jack, scattered throughout the +oceans and controlled from a small island in the Western seas. For Great +Britain, alone among the States of the world, naval supremacy, and nothing +less, is a daily and hourly necessity. India realised this truth recently +in a flash when, after generations of silent protection by British +sea-power, German shells fell one night at Madras. Any Power that +challenges the naval supremacy of Great Britain is quarrelling, not with +the British Government or the British people, but with the facts of +history, of geography, and of the political evolution of the world. The +British Empire has not been built up, like the German, by the work of +statesmen and thinkers; it is not the result, as Germans think, of +far-seeing national policy or persistent ambition and "greed." It has +slowly taken shape, during the last four centuries, since intercourse was +opened up by sea between the different races of mankind, in accordance with +the needs of the world as a whole. Its collapse, at the hands of Germany or +any other Power, would not mean the substitution of a non-British Empire +for a British. It would inaugurate a period of chaos in all five continents +of the world. + +The rulers and people of Germany, who counted on the "decadence" of Great +Britain and the disintegration of her unorganised Empire, did not realise +these simple facts. Their lack of perception was due partly to their +political inexperience; but a deeper reason for it lies in their wholly +false estimate as to what "world-policy" and "world-empire" mean. Trained +in the Prussian school, they thought of them, like soldiers, in terms of +conquest, glory, and prestige. That way lies Napoleonism. None of the great +Powers is wholly free from blame on this score. But until Germans realise, +as the other Powers are slowly realising, that the true basis of Empire is +not a love of glory but a sense of responsibility towards backward peoples, +it will be hard to readmit them into the comity of the Great Powers. Only +a sense of common purposes and ideals, and of joint responsibility for +world-problems, can make the Concert of Europe a reality. + +Such is the general attitude of mind among the German public of the younger +generation. Let us now turn to the effect of this new outlook upon the +political parties and groupings. + +The chief result has been the extinction in Germany, as a political force, +of the great liberal movement of the mid-nineteenth century which in +England, France, and other Western countries has grown and developed during +the last generation along lines corresponding to the needs of the new +century. The younger generation of middle-class Germans, indoctrinated +with "orthodox" and "national" opinions at school and on military service, +eschew the ideals which attracted their fathers and grandfathers in 1848; +and, although so-called "liberal," "free-thinking," and Radical parties +still exist, they have steadily been growing more militarist. Militarism in +its new guise, bound up with ideas of industrial and commercial expansion, +is far more attractive to them than in the form of the Prussian Army. The +Emperor's Navy Bills were from the first more popular in commercial and +industrial circles than with the old Prussian Conservatives. But as the +years went on the Kaiser succeeded in converting both the Junkers to his +Navy Bills and the middle classes to his Army Bills, so that by 1913, when +he demanded the "great national sacrifice" of a levy of 50 million pounds +by a tax, not on income, but on property, there was no difficulty whatever +about "managing" the Reichstag. "The Army Bill of 1913," says Prince Buelow, +"met with such a willing reception from all parties as had never been +accorded to any requisition for armaments on land and sea.... So far as man +can tell, every necessary and justifiable Army and Navy Bill will always be +able to count on a safe Parliamentary majority."[1] + +[Footnote 1: _Imperial Germany_, p. 169.] + +Prince Buelow's "safe Parliamentary majority" means, of course, a majority +sufficient to outvote the Social Democrats, with whom every German +Government has to reckon as a permanent opposition. + +So far we have left the Social Democrats out of the picture. It was +necessary to do this, in discussing German policy and the relation between +the German Government and Reichstag opinion; for the German Government +itself habitually leaves them out of the picture. Hitherto in Germany, so +far as opinion on political questions has mattered at all, it is upper-and +middle-class opinion that has counted, as it counted in England up to fifty +years ago. To the German Government and to the ordinary educated German +the Social Democratic party, though it numbers in its voting ranks over 4 +million German workmen and others, does not represent German opinion at +all: it represents something un-German and anti-German--a public enemy. +Between the Social Democrats and the rest of society a great gulf is fixed, +across which no intercourse is possible: as the pioneers who attempted to +introduce the Workers' Educational Association into Germany found, such +intercourse is forbidden from either direction. The Social Democrats are +the "Red Danger," "men who," in the Kaiser's words, are "the enemies of +Empire and Fatherland," and "unworthy" (except, of course, in war-time) +"to bear the name of Germans." We must go back a hundred years in English +history to realise the depth of the animosity between the Social Democratic +party and the rest of German society. "The word Radical," says an English +historian, "conveyed a very different meaning in 1816 to what it does +now.... The hands of the Radicals were supposed to be against every man, +and every man's hand was against them. Scott, when he talks of rebels in +arms, always styles them Radicals. 'Radicalism is a spirit,' wrote the +Vicar of Harrow in 1820, 'of which the first elements are a rejection of +Scripture, and a contempt of all the institutions of your country, and +of which the results, unless averted by a merciful Providence, must be +anarchy, atheism, and universal ruin.'"[1] The Vicar of Harrow in 1820 very +fairly sums up the substance of innumerable German speeches, pamphlets, and +election addresses in 1912 on the subject of the Social Democrats. + +[Footnote 1: Spencer Walpole, _History of England_, vol. i. p. 348.] + +How is this extraordinary position maintained? How is it possible that in a +modern, largely industrial community, the representatives of working-class +opinion should be regarded as public enemies? + +The chief reason lies, of course, in the fact that the German Empire is not +a democracy and is not governed by ministers responsible to Parliament. The +immense numbers and rapid growth of the Social Democrats have therefore not +really been a menace to the Government. In fact, it has even been held in +some quarters that it has been to the interest of the German Government, +which is based on the Prussian military caste, to manoeuvre the Social +Democrats into an extreme position and then to hold them up as a terrible +example of what democracy means. "This," they can tell the German people, +"is the alternative to Prussian rule." A dangerous policy, it may be +argued, for the Social Democrats may some day secure a majority in the +Reichstag. The Prussian answer to this is that, without a redistribution +of seats, this is barely conceivable; and that, were it to take place, +the Reichstag would promptly be dissolved for new elections on a narrower +franchise. Bismarck himself contemplated this course, and his successors +would not shrink from it. + +Another reason why it has been possible for the Government to ignore the +Social Democrats has been the absence of a practical alternative programme +on the part of the Social Democrats themselves. "If I had to make out a +school report for the Social Democratic Movement," said Prince Buelow in +the Reichstag on one occasion, "I should say, 'Criticism, agitation, +discipline, and self-sacrifice, I. _a_; positive achievements, lucidity of +programme, V. _b._'" The taunt is not undeserved. The Socialist Movement +in Germany has suffered, like so many German movements, through a rigid +adherence to logical theories. Under the leadership of old revolutionary +thinkers like Bebel it has failed to adapt itself to the facts of modern +German life. The vague phrases of its republican programme, survivals from +a past epoch of European thought, have attracted to it a large mass of +inarticulate discontent which it has never been able to weld into a party +of practical reformers. In the municipal sphere and in the field of Trade +Unionism, under the education of responsibility, German Socialism can show +great achievements; but in national policy it has been as helpless as the +rest of the German nation. + +What effect, it will be asked, is the war of 1914 likely to have on the +German working-class movement? In 1848 middle-class Germany made its stand +for democracy. May we hope for a similar and more successful movement, +in the direction of Western ideals and methods of government, from +working-class Germany as a result of 1914? + +It is a tempting prophecy; but the outlook is not propitious. Germany, +Prussian and South German, noble, bourgeois, and working class, has rallied +round the Emperor in this crisis of national history, as the brutal and +cynical directors of German policy calculated that she would. For the +Social Democratic Movement the war comes with a peculiar appeal. It is a +war against Russia, a country about which the German workman knows little +and understands less, but which he considers to be the home of a reaction +far blacker than that of his own country. A war of aggression against +the Western Powers would have found the Social Democrats divided. By +representing Russia as the aggressor and the Western Powers as the +shameless allies of the "Mongol," German diplomacy, more successful within +than without, made certain of enlisting Socialist support. + +Moreover, the Socialists too have to pass through a natural reaction from +their refusal to recognise the forces of Nationality--from Utopian dreams +of international action by the peoples across the barriers of separate +governments. For the first time in the history of the party, German +Socialism has been allowed to be patriotic. It is an exhilarating and +heartening experience, and it is certain to leave an indelible mark upon +the spirit of the movement. The great party organisation, hitherto confined +to the sterile work of agitation, is being used to cope with the many +problems created by the war; and this work, rather than revolutionary +agitation, is likely to occupy it for some time to come. + +A veil has fallen upon Germany: German books and papers are stopped at our +ports: we cannot know through what thoughts the German nation is passing. +But as we look with the mind's eye across the North Sea, past devastated +Belgium to the populous towns of industrial Germany, we see a people +skilful, highly instructed, and mechanically intelligent, yet equally +devoid either of personal initiative or of great and inspiring leadership. +Two generations of Prussian education have left German public life +practically empty of names of more than local reputation. Great changes are +needed--a change of institutions and a change of spirit; yet whence this +will come we cannot divine. Only, as democrats, we can say with confidence +that if the true spirit of the German people is to be liberated from its +long imprisonment, its freedom must be won, not from without, but from +within. Not Europe but only the Germans can make Germany herself again. + + + +BIBLIOGRAPHY + +BOOKS + + +1. GERMAN HISTORY + +BRYCE. _Holy Roman Empire_. (Deals with mediaeval Germany, but also +contains a most interesting final chapter on Germany in the Nineteenth +Century, written in 1873.) 1904. (7s. 6d.) + +CARLYLE. _Frederick the Great_, vol. i. (Best account in English of the +earlier history of Prussia.) (2s. 6d.) + +H.A.L. FISHER. _Napoleonic Statesmanship: Germany_. 1903. (12s. 6d.) +(Germany in the Napoleonic era.) + +SEELEY. _Life of Stein_. 1878. 3 vols. (30s.) (The standard work in English +on reorganisation of Prussia after Napoleon.) + +BISMARCK. _Reflections and Reminiscences_. (The guiding mind in Germany, +1862-1888.) 2 vols. 1898. (Can only be bought second-hand.) + +HEADLAM. _Life of Bismarck_. 1899. (6s.) (Heroes of the Nations.) + +HOLLAND. _Germany to the Present Day_. 1913. (2s. net.) A useful short +history if supplemented by other books. + +POWICKE. _Bismarck_. 1914. (6d.) (People's Books.) (Excellent.) The two +great modern German historians are Treitschke and Sybel, for whom see +Gooch's _History and Historians in the Nineteenth Century_, pp. 140-53. +Treitschke's history is not available in English: Sybel's has been +translated under the title, _The Founding of the German Empire by William +I._ vols., New York, 1890-1891. + + +2. GERMANY UNDER WILLIAM II. + +BUeLOW. _Imperial Germany_. 1914. (2s. net.) (The mind of the German +Government.) + +SAUNDERS. _The Last of the Huns_. 1914. (1s. net.) (In spite of its +objectionable title this volume, by the late correspondent of the _Times_ +in Berlin, is written with fairness and lucidity, and contains much +valuable information.) + +HENRI LICHTENBERGER. _Germany and its Evolution in Modern Times._ 1913. +(10s. 6d net.) (Translated from the French: suggestive, especially on +economic questions and on the movements of German thought.) + +W.H. DAWSON. _The Evolution of Modern Germany_. 1908. (5s. net.) (The best +general account of modern Germany in English.) + +C. TOWER. _Germany of To-day._ 1913. Home University Library. (Is.) (Good.) + +C. SAROLEA. _The Anglo-German Problem_. (2s.) (A useful popular account of +German political conditions and German policy.) + +_Board of Education Special Reports_, vols. iii. and ix. (3s. 3d. and 2s. +7d.) Articles by Dr. M.E. Sadler on German Education. + +_Memoirs of Prince Hohenlohe_. (Imperial Chancellor, 1894-1900.) 2 vols. +1906. (24s. net.) + +The Britannica War Books. _Germany_. (2s. 6d. net.) By W. Alison Phillips +and J.W. Headlam. (A somewhat carelessly abridged reprint from the standard +article in the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_.) + + +3. GENERAL BOOKS + +H.S. CHAMBERLAIN. _The foundations of the Nineteenth Century_. English +translation. 2 vols. 1910. (25s. net.) (This book had an immense vogue in +Germany, and was particularly recommended by the Kaiser to his subjects. +It is full of interesting, if ill-founded, generalisations tending to +emphasise the importance of Race and to glorify the German race.) + +THOMAS. _German Literature_. (6s.) + +ROBERTSON. _German Literature_. 1914. Home University Library. (1s.) + +HERFORD AND OTHERS. _Germany in the Nineteenth Century_. Manchester. 1912. +(2s. 6d.) Essays on different aspects of German development. + +BERNHARDT. _Germany and the Next War_. 1912. (2s. net.) (The philosophy and +aims of Gorman militarism worked out.) + +CRAMB. _Germany and England_. 1914. (2s. 6d. net.) (An account of +Treitschke and his school of thought: interesting for the light it throws +on German misconceptions about Great Britain.) + +TREITSCHKE. _Selections from his Lectures on Politics_. 1914. + +Translated by A.L. Gowans. (2s. net.) + +The writings of the following German professors will be found interesting +if procurable: Oncken, Meinecke (both contributors to the _Cambridge Modern +History_), Delbrueck, Sombart, Erich Marcks (see his lectures on Germany in +_Lectures on the History of the Nineteenth Century_, edited by Kirkpatrick, +Cambridge, 1900, 4s. 6d.), Schiemann, Lamprecht, Schmoller, and F. von +Liszt. + +_Note_.--Such considered German writings as have come to hand since the +outbreak of the war show little tendency to cope with the real facts of the +situation, or even to seek to understand them. They seem to indicate two +developments in German opinion. + +(1) A great consolidation of German national unity (except, of course, in +Poland and Alsace-Lorraine). + +(2) A tendency to forgo the consideration of the immediate issues and to +hark back in thought to 1870 or even to the Wars of Liberation. It +is difficult to judge of a nation in arms from the writings of its +stay-at-homes; but no one can read recent articles by the leaders of German +thought without feeling that the Germans are still, before all things and +incurably, "the people of poets and philosophers," and that, by a tragic +irony, it is the best and most characteristic qualities of the race which +are sustaining and will continue to sustain it in the conflict in which its +dreams have involved it. + + + +CHAPTER IV + +AUSTRIA-HUNGARY AND THE SOUTHERN SLAVS + +"For a century past attempts have been made to solve the Eastern Question. +On the day when it appears to have been solved Europe will inevitably be +confronted by the Austrian Question."--ALBERT SOREL (1902). + + +In April 1909, a week after the international crisis evoked by Austria's +annexation of Bosnia had come to an end, I paid my first visit to Cetinje, +the tiny mountain-capital of Montenegro, and was assured by the Premier, +Dr. Tomanovi, that the conflict had merely been postponed, not averted--a +fact which even then was obvious enough. "But remember," he said, "it is +a question of _Aut aut_ (either, or)--either Serbia and Montenegro or +Austria-Hungary. One or other has got to go, and you may rest assured that +in four, or at most five, years from now there will be a European war over +this very question." At the time I merely regarded his prophecy as a proof +of Serb megalomania, but it has been literally fulfilled. + +In 1908-1909 Austria-Hungary, with the aid of her German ally, enforced +her wishes in respect of Bosnia upon a reluctant Europe; but instead of +following up this success by a determined effort to solve the Southern Slav +question on an Austrian basis, she allowed the confusion to grow yearly +worse confounded, and gradually created an intolerable situation from +which a peaceful exit was well-nigh impossible. The actual event which +precipitated the struggle, the event from which the diplomatic contest of +last July, and thus the great war, first proceeded, was the assassination +of the Archduke Francis Ferdinand and his wife at Sarajevo on June 28 and +the consequent acute friction between Austria-Hungary and Serbia. But the +murder, as will be shown later, was merely made the pretext for Austria's +declaration of war. The real causes lie far deeper, and can only be +properly understood on the basis of an historical survey. + +My apology for inflicting so many unfamiliar details upon the reader is +that the key to the whole situation lies in Austria-Hungary, and that upon +the fate of its provinces and races in this war depends to a very great +extent the question whether the new Europe which is to issue from this +fiery ordeal is to be better than the old Europe which is crumbling in +ruins before our eyes. For the moment a thick fog of war obscures this +point of view; but the time will assuredly come when it will emerge in its +true perspective. + +In recent years it had become a cheap journalistic commonplace to refer to +the coming "inevitable" struggle between Teuton and Slav, and the present +war is no doubt widely regarded as proving the correctness of this theory, +despite the fact that the two chief groups of Teutons are ranged on +opposite sides, and that the Slavs enjoy the active support of Celts and +Latins also. That such a struggle has come, is in the last resort due to +the false conceptions of Nationality which underly the policy of the two +central Powers, Germany and Austria-Hungary. The freedom from foreign +oppression which the Germans so nobly vindicated against Napoleon has not +been extended to their own subject races, the Poles, Danes, and Lorrainers; +and recent years have seen the accentuation of a conflict the germs +of which may be detected as far back as the fatal crime of the Polish +Partition in the eighteenth century. The policy of Germanisation in Austria +has been gradually undermined by causes which it would take too long to +enumerate, but its sting has survived in the maintenance of a foreign +policy which treats 26,000,000 Slavs as a mere _annexe_ of militant +Germanism and as "gun-fodder" for the designs of Berlin; while in Hungary +the parallel policy of Magyarisation has increased in violence from year +to year, poisoning the wells of public opinion, creating a gulf of hatred +between the Magyars and their subject races (the Slovaks, Roumanians, +Croats, Serbs, etc.), and rendering cordial relations with the neighbouring +Balkan States impossible. Nor is it a mere accident that official Germany +and official Hungary should have pursued an actively Turcophil policy; for +the same tendencies have been noticeable in Turkey, though naturally in a +somewhat cruder form than farther west. Just as the Young Turk policy +of Turkification rendered a war between Turkey and the Balkan States +inevitable, so the policy of Magyarisation pursued by two generations of +Hungarian statesmen sowed the seeds of war between Austria and the Southern +Slavs. In the former case it was possible to isolate the conflict, in the +latter it has involved the greater part of Europe in a common disaster. + +The struggle centres round the Austro-Serbian dispute. Let us then attempt +a brief survey of the two countries. + + +Sec.1. _Austria and the Habsburgs_.--Let us begin with Austria-Hungary. In +this country many misconceptions prevail regarding Austria-Hungary; nor is +this surprising, for it is unique among States, and whether we regard it +from a political, a constitutional, a racial, or a social point of view, +the issues are equally complicated and difficult to sum up. With the aid +of a good gazetteer it is easy enough to elicit the facts that the +Austria-Hungary of to-day is a state of fifty-two million inhabitants, +divided into three component parts: _(a)_ the Empire of Austria, _(b)_ the +Kingdom of Hungary, each with subdivisions which will be referred to later, +and _(c)_ the annexed provinces of Bosnia-Herzegovina, jointly administered +by the two Governments. But this bald fact is meaningless except in +connection with the historical genesis of the Habsburg State. + +[Illustration: AUSTRIA-HUNGARY; PHYSICAL] + +Austria--_Oesterreich_--is the ancient Eastmark or frontier province, the +outpost of Carlovingian power against the tribes of the east, then of +the mediaeval German Empire against Slav and Magyar. Under the House of +Habsburg, which first rose to greatness on the ruins of a Greater Bohemia, +Austria grew steadily stronger as a distinct unit. Two famous mottoes sum +up the policy of that dynasty in the earlier centuries of its existence. +_Austriae est Imperare Orbi Universo_ (Austria's it is to Rule the +Universe) ran the device of that canny Frederick III., who, amid much +adversity, laid the plans which prompted an equally striking epigram about +his son and successor Maximilian, the "Last of the Knights"--_Bella gerant +alii, tu, felix Austria, nube_ (Let others wage war; do thou marry, O +fortunate Austria!). There were three great stages in Habsburg marriage +policy. In 1479 Maximilian married the heiress of Charles the Bold, thus +acquiring the priceless dowry of the Low Countries (what are now Belgium +and Holland). In 1506 his son Philip added the crown of Spain and the +Indies by his marriage with the heiress of Ferdinand and Isabella. In +1526, when the battle of Mohacs placed Hungary at the mercy of the Turks, +Maximilian's grandson Ferdinand, in his wife's name, united Bohemia, +Hungary, and Croatia with the Austrian duchies. + +Henceforth for over two centuries Austria and Habsburg became the bulwark +of Christendom against the Turks; though delayed by wars of religion and by +the excesses of religious bigotry, they yet never lost sight of the final +goal. Twice--at the beginning and at the end of this period, in 1527 and +1683--the Turks were before the very walls of Vienna, but the second of +these occasions represents their final effort. In the closing years of the +seventeenth and the first two decades of the eighteenth centuries the tide +finally rolled back against them. Foremost among the victors stands out the +great name of Prince Eugene, comrade-in-arms of our own Marlborough, whose +song, "Prinz Eugen, der edle Ritter" (Prince Eugene, the noble Knight), +has been sung in July and August 1914 on the streets of Vienna, just as +"Marlbrook s'en va-t-en guerre" might be sung by our Belgian allies. The +peace of 1718 represents Habsburg's farthest advance southwards; Belgrade +and half of present-day Serbia owned allegiance to Vienna. Then came the +check of 1739, when these conquests were restored to the Sultan. Due merely +to incompetent generals, it need not have been permanent, had not Frederick +the Great created a diversion from the north. By the time that the War of +Austrian Succession and the Seven Years' War were over, that expansion +southwards which had seemed so certain was irrevocably postponed. The +organisation of fresh "Military Frontiers," the colonisation of waste lands +in South Hungary--all was admirable so far as it went, but was already a +defensive rather than an offensive measure. Meanwhile a formidable rival +appeared in the shape of the Russian colossus, and the history of two +centuries is dominated by Austro-Russian rivalry in the Balkans. Here +we are confronted by the first of those lost opportunities in which the +history of modern Austria is unhappily so rich. + +During the eighteenth century Austria became, as it were, the chief home +of bureaucratic government, first under Maria Theresa, one of the greatest +women-sovereigns, then under her son Joseph II. A series of "enlightened +experiments" in government, typical of the age of Voltaire and of +Frederick, and honestly conducted _for_ the people, though never _by_ the +people, ended as such experiments are apt to end, in failure. The most that +can be said is that the bureaucratic machine had become more firmly fixed +in the groove which it was henceforth to occupy. + +The failure of Joseph II. was above all due to his inability to recognise +the meaning of Nationality, to his attempt to apply Germanisation as the +one infallible remedy for all internal difficulties in his dominions. The +idea of Nationality, already gaining strength, obtained a fresh impetus +from the French Revolution. While in the west it sowed the seeds of United +Italy and United Germany, which the nineteenth century was to bring to +fruition, in the Balkans it stirred waters which had seemed dead for +centuries, and led to the uprising of the Serbs and Greeks, then of the +Roumanians, and finally a generation later of the Bulgarians. In the +Habsburg dominions the same movement revealed itself in the revival of +national feeling in Hungary, Bohemia, and Croatia, but nowhere more +strongly than in Hungary, where it was accompanied by a remarkable literary +revival and the appearance of a group of Magyar poets of real genius. + +The Kingdom of Hungary, which from 1526 to 1687 had been partially under +Turkish rule, led a vegetable existence during the eighteenth century. This +lull was a necessary period of recuperation after exhausting wars. +The ancient Hungarian constitution, dating in its essentials from the +thirteenth century, but fallen on evil days during the Turkish era, now +came more and more out of abeyance. Its fundamental principles were +reaffirmed by the famous laws of Leopold II. (1790-92), and after a further +relapse due to the Napoleonic wars, a long series of constitutional and +linguistic reforms were introduced by successive parliaments between 1825 +and 1848. + +Without entering into a discussion of the Hungarian constitution, it is +well to point out one factor which lies at the root of all political and +constitutional development in Hungary and explains the Magyar outlook +for centuries past, even up to the present day. Till 1840 Latin was the +official language of the country, and in that Latin the term for the +political nation was _Populus_, which we would naturally translate as +people. But populus contrasted in Hungarian law with plebs, the _misera +plebs contribuens,_ that phrase of ominous meaning to describe the mass of +the oppressed and unenfranchised people, the populus being the nobles, a +caste which was relatively very wide, but none the less a caste, and which +enjoyed a monopoly of all political power. Till 1848 only the populus could +vote, only the plebs could pay taxes--a delightful application of the +principle, "Heads I win, tails you lose!" In 1848 the distinction was +broken down in theory, the franchise being extended beyond the privileged +class by the initiative of that class itself. But in effect the distinction +has survived to the present day in a veiled form. Political power, and, +above all, the parliamentary franchise and the county elective bodies, +continued to be a monopoly--henceforth a monopoly of the Magyar nobility, +_plus_ those classes whom they had assimilated and attached to their +cause, _against_ the other races, forming more than half the population of +Hungary. This point of populus and plebs may seem at first sight somewhat +pedantic and technical; but in reality it is the key which explains the +whole social structure of Hungary, even its economic and agrarian problems. + +The period from the death of Joseph II. to the great revolutionary movement +of 1848 may be regarded, so far as eastern Europe is concerned, as a period +when nationality is simmering everywhere. It is a period of preparation for +the rise of national States--ushered in by the great crime of the Polish +Partition, to which so many modern evils may be traced, and closed by a +sudden explosion which shook Europe from Paris to Budapest, from Palermo to +Berlin. The first stage was of course the long Napoleonic war, during which +the seed was sown broadcast; the second, the era of reaction and political +exhaustion (1815-1848), when all that was best in Europe concentrated in +the Romantic movement in literature, art, and music. + +For Austria this period was bound up with the name of Metternich, who +personified the old hide-bound methods of the bureaucracy, the diplomacy of +a past age, to which the nations were mere pawns on a chessboard. Under him +the "Police-State" assumed its most perfect form, a form not even surpassed +by Russia from 1881 to 1905. + +Then came the year 1848, when the dams burst. The Hungarian constitution, +restored in its entirety, became for a time the watchword and inspirer +of the movement, while Austria for the first time received a serious +constitution. Unhappily the issue between Reaction and Progress was not +a clear one. The Magyars in Hungary unquestionably stood for historic +development and constitutional rights, but they also stood for racial +hegemony, for the forcible assimilation of all the other races, for a +unitary Magyar State instead of the old polyglot Hungary. They thus +drove all the other races to coalesce with the dynasty and the forces of +reaction. The result was a violent racial war, with all kinds of excesses. +Slovaks, Croats, Serbs, Roumanians, Saxons, all fought against the Magyars, +and finally the scale was turned by the Russian troops who poured across +the Carpathians in the name of outraged autocracy. + +There followed the inevitable reaction, which again can be best summed up +in two phrases--that of Prince Felix Schwarzenberg, "Austria will astonish +the world by her ingratitude," so strikingly fulfilled in the Crimean War, +when Austria left Russia in the lurch; and that of a Hungarian patriot, +"The other races have received as reward what we Magyars receive as +punishment." In short, the statesmen of Vienna, untaught by experience, +reverted to the old bureaucratic and absolutist _regime_. + +For ten years (1849-1859) this endured--Clericalism rampant, financial +ruin, stagnation everywhere. Then Nationality burst its bonds once more. +The war with Napoleon III. ended in Austria's loss of Lombardy and the +creation of the Italian kingdom. Faced by the bankruptcy of the whole +political and financial system, Francis Joseph launched into a period of +constitutional experiment. Following the line of least resistance, +as throughout his long reign, he inclined now to federalism, now to +centralism, and he was still experimenting when the war of 1866 broke out. +For Austria this war was decisive, for its results were her final expulsion +both from Germany and from Italy, and the creation of that fatal Dual +System which has distorted her whole subsequent development. + +Under the Ausgleich or Compromise of 1867 the Dual Monarchy is composed of +two equal and separate States, the Empire of Austria and the Kingdom of +Hungary, each possessing a distinct parliament and cabinet of its own, but +both sharing between them the three Joint Ministries of Foreign Affairs, +War, and Finance. The chiefs of these three offices are equally responsible +to both Delegations, which are committees of the two Parliaments, sitting +alternately in Vienna and Budapest, but acting quite independently of each +other. + +This system really secured the political power in Austria and Hungary to +two races--the Germans and the Magyars, and they, as the strongest in each +country, bought off the two next strongest, the Poles and the Croats, by +the grant of autonomy to Galicia and Croatia. The remaining eight were not +considered at all. At first this ingenious device seemed to offer fair +prospects of success. But ere long--for reasons which would lead us too +far--the German hegemony broke down in Austria, and the whole balance was +disturbed. It gradually became clear that the system was only workable when +one scale was high in the air. The history of the past forty-seven years is +the history of the gradual decay of the Dual System. Austria has progressed +in many ways; her institutions have steadily grown freer, her political +sense has developed, universal suffrage has been introduced, racial +inequalities have been reduced though not abolished, industry, art, and +general culture have advanced steadily. But she has been continually +hampered by Hungary, where racial monopoly has grown worse and worse. The +Magyar Chauvinists attempted the impossible--the assimilation by seven +million people of twelve million others. Yet in spite of every imaginable +trick--a corrupt and oppressive administration, gross manipulation of the +franchise, press persecution, the suppression of schools and ruthless +restriction of every form of culture--the non-Magyar races are stronger +to-day than in 1867. And the result of the struggle has been in Hungary a +decay of political standards, a corruption of public life, such as fills +even the greatest optimists with despair. + + +Sec.2. _Hungary and Magyar Misrule_.--Such an assertion may seem to run +counter to the common idea of Hungary as the home of liberty and the +vanguard of popular uprisings against despotism, and it is certainly +incompatible with the arrogant claim of Magyar Statesmen that "nowhere +in the world is there so much freedom as in Hungary." At the risk of +disturbing the proportion of this chapter, I propose to give a few classic +illustrations of Magyar methods, selected almost at random from an +overwhelming mass of damning evidence. + +On paper Hungary possesses a most admirable and enlightened law +guaranteeing "the Equal Rights of Nationalities" (1868); in practice, it +has remained almost from the very first a dead letter. Let us take the +field of education. Every effort, legal and illegal, has been made to +Magyarise the educational system, with the result that in all the primary +and secondary schools under State control Magyar is the exclusive language +of instruction, while the number of denominational schools has been +steadily diminished and their sphere of action, as more favourable to the +non-Magyar races, materially restricted. Fifty years ago the Slovaks, who +even then numbered over two millions, possessed three gymnasia (middle +schools) which they had founded and maintained by their own exertions. +In 1875 all three were arbitrarily closed by orders of the Hungarian +Government, and since that date the unhappy Slovaks have not been allowed +a single secondary school in which their own language is taught, while the +number of their primary schools has been reduced from 1821 in 1869 to 440 +in 1911. The deliberate aim is, of course, to prevent the growth of a +Slovak middle class. It is quite a common thing for schoolboys to be +persecuted or even dismissed for showing Slovak proclivities or even +talking their mother--tongue "ostentatiously" on the street. Only last year +a brilliant young Slovak student, known to me personally, was deprived by +the Magyar authorities of a scholarship in Oriental languages, for no +other reason than that he was "untrustworthy in a national sense"![1] +Such instances are even more frequent among the Roumanians of Hungary. +A specially notorious case occurred in March 1912 at Grosswardein, when +sixteen Roumanian theological students were expelled from the Catholic +seminary for the "demonstrative use" of their language, which was regarded +as offensive by their fellow-students and professors! + +[Footnote 1: This document is in my possession.] + +Linguistic restrictions are carried to outrageous lengths. There is not +a single inscription in any language save Magyar in any post office or +railway station throughout Hungary. Slovak medals and stamps, produced +in America and bearing such treasonable inscriptions as "For our Slovak +language" and "I am proud to be a Slovak," have been confiscated in +Hungary. Only Magyar inscriptions are tolerated on the tombstones of the +Budapest cemeteries. The erection of monuments to Roumanian or Slovak +patriots has more than once been prohibited, and the funds collected have +been arbitrarily seized and applied to Magyar purposes. National colours, +other than the Magyar, are strictly forbidden. Two years ago, at the +funeral of a Roumanian poet at Kronstadt (Transylvania) gendarmes pressed +up to the hearse and clipped off the colours from a wreath which had been +sent by the Society of Journalists in Bucarest. About the same time a nurse +was sent to prison because a child of three was found wearing a Roumanian +tricolor bow, and its parents were reprimanded and fined. Last July on the +very eve of war, fifteen theological students, returning to Bucarest from +an excursion into Transylvania, were arrested at the frontier by Hungarian +gendarmes, hauled by main force out of the train, sent back to Hermannstadt +and kept for days in gaol; their offence consisted in waving some Roumanian +tricolors from the train windows as they steamed out of the last station in +Hungary! + +No law of association exists in Hungary, and the government uses its +arbitrary powers to prohibit or suppress even such harmless organisations +as temperance societies, choral unions, or women's leagues. Perhaps the +most notorious examples are the dissolution of the Slovak Academy in +1875 and of the Roumanian National Party's organisation in 1894; but the +treatment meted out to trades unions and working-class organisations, both +Magyar and non-Magyar, for years past, has been equally scandalous. The +right of assembly is no less precarious in a country where parliamentary +candidates are arrested or expelled from their constituencies, where +deputies are prevented from addressing their constituents, where an +electoral address is often treated as a penal offence. + +As for Hungary's electoral system, the less said the better. +Gerrymandering, a narrow and complicated franchise, bribery and corruption +on a gigantic scale, the wholesale use of troops and gendarmes to prevent +opposition voters from reaching the polls, the cooking of electoral rolls, +illegal disqualifications, sham counts, official terrorism, and in many +cases actual bloodshed--such are but a few of the methods which preserve a +political monopoly in the hands of a corrupt and increasingly inefficient +racial oligarchy, in a country where the absence of the ballot places the +peasant peculiarly at the mercy of the authorities. Small wonder, then, if +the non-Magyar races of Hungary, who on a basis of population would have +had 198 deputies, never were allowed to elect more than 25, and if even +this scanty number was at the infamous elections of 1910 reduced by +terrorism and corruption to eight! + +In judicial matters the situation is no less galling. Petitions are +not accepted in the courts, unless drawn up in Magyar, and the whole +proceedings are invariably conducted in the same language. The non-Magyar +"stands like an ox" before the courts of his native land, and a whole +series of provisions exists for his repression, notably the monstrous +paragraphs dealing with "action hostile to the State," with the "incitement +of one nationality against another" and with the "glorification of a +criminal action"--applied with rigorous severity to all political opponents +of Magyarisation but never to its advocates. Let me cite one classic +example of the latter. In 1898 a well-known Slovak editor was sentenced +to eight months' imprisonment for two articles severely criticising the +Magyarisation of place-names in Hungary. On his return from prison he +was met at the railway station of the little county town by a crowd of +admirers: songs were sung, a short speech of welcome was delivered and a +bouquet of flowers was presented. The sequel of this perfectly orderly +incident was that no fewer than twenty-four persons, including Mr. Hurban +the leading Slovak poet, were sentenced to terms of imprisonment varying +from fourteen days to six months. The three girls who had presented the +flowers were let off with a fine of L16. + +Perhaps the reader will regard me as a very dangerous conspirator, when I +tell him that in June 1910 an old lady of seventy-three, the widow of a +high-school headmaster, was fined L4 because I had called at her house for +twenty minutes on election day without its being notified to the police, +and that in June 1914 an enquiry was instituted by the local authorities +against some Slovak friends who had entertained me to luncheon! And yet I +can honestly assert that I have never been guilty of any worse crime than +Captain Grose, of whom Burns warned my countrymen a hundred years ago in +the famous line: + + A chiel's amang ye takin' notes! + +The fabric of Magyar rule is far too rotten and corrupt to regard with +equanimity any extensive note-taking on the part of the outer world. + +Whole books might be written to illustrate the contention that in matters +of education, administration, and justice, of association and assembly, of +the franchise and the press, the non-Magyar nationalities of Hungary have +long been the victims of a policy of repression which is without any +parallel in civilised Europe. It is this Magyar system, from which I have +lifted but a corner of the veil, that is one of the mainsprings of the +present war, and if there is to be a new and healthy Europe in the future, +this system must be swept away root, branch and stock. To such lengths has +national fanaticism driven the Magyars that in 1906 it was possible for an +ex-Premier of Hungary, speaking in open Parliament amid the applause of the +majority, to lay down the following axiom: "The legal State is the aim: +but with this question we can only concern ourselves when we have already +assured the national State.... Hungary's interests demand its erection on +the most extreme Chauvinist lines." Men who applaud such a sentiment +are worthy allies of those so-called statesmen who regard international +treaties as "a mere scrap of paper." + + +Sec.3. _The Decay of the Dual System_.--The radical divergence of political +development in Austria and in Hungary, its paralysing effect upon the +foreign policy of the Monarchy as a whole, coupled with the growth +of national feeling among the minor nationalities and their steady +emancipation from the economic thraldom of the German and the Jew--all this +has slowly but surely undermined the Dual System and rendered its final +collapse inevitable. Indeed for some time past it has merely owed its +survival to the old age of the Emperor, who has a natural reluctance to +destroy his own creation. For some years it has been known that his heir, +Francis Ferdinand, was the advocate of far-reaching changes, which would +have taken the form of a compromise between a federalist and a centralist +system. His abrupt removal from the scene was secretly welcomed by all +those whose political and racial monopoly was bound up with the existing +_regime_. + +German dominance in Austria, it should be added, meant a close alliance +with the German Empire; and every fresh effort of the subject races to +emancipate themselves from Germanising or Magyarising tendencies forged the +chains of the alliance closer and increased the dependence of the Magyar +oligarchy upon Berlin. As in mediaeval times, so in the twentieth century +Habsburg policy is explained by two famous Latin mottoes--_Viribus unitis_ +("Union is strength") and _Divide et impera_ ("Divide and rule"). Between +these two watchwords Francis Joseph and his advisers have wavered for +sixty-five years. + +What then are the forces which have held Austria-Hungary together under +Francis Joseph? First unquestionably comes the dynasty; for it would be +difficult to over-estimate the power exercised by the dynastic tradition on +the many races under Habsburg sway. Next comes the Joint Army; for there is +no finer body of men in Europe than the Austrian officers' corps, poorly +paid, hard-worked, but inspired to the last man with unbounded devotion to +the Imperial house, and to a large extent immune from that spirit of caste +which is the most offensive feature of the allied German army.[1] Hardly +less important are the Catholic Church, with its vast material resources +and its powerful influence on peasant, small tradesman and court alike, +and the bureaucracy, with its traditions of red tape, small-mindedness, +slowness of movement and genial _Gemuetlichkeit_ ("easy-goingness"). It is +only _after_ these forces that we can fairly count the parliaments and +representative government. And yet there are no fewer than twenty-three +legislative bodies in the Monarchy--the two central parliaments of Vienna +and Budapest, entirely distinct from each other; the two Delegations; the +provincial Diets, seventeen in Austria, one in Croatia; and the Diet of +Bosnia, whose every legislative act requires the ratification of the Joint +Minister of Finance and of the Austrian and Hungarian Governments. + +[Footnote 1: It is in no way a "preserve" of the aristocracy, being largely +recruited from the middle and even lower-middle class.] + +Against all this there is one supremely disintegrating force--the principle +of Nationality. Only a map can make clear the racial complications of +the Dual Monarchy, and even the largest scale map fails to show how +inextricably the various races are interwoven in many districts of Hungary +or Bohemia. The following table offers at least a statistical survey: + +(1) Racial-- Austria. Hungary. Bosnia. + Germans 9,950,266 2,037,435 .. + Czechs {6,435,983 .. .. + Slovaks { 1,967,970 .. + Poles 4,967,984 .. .. + Ruthenes 3,518,854 472,587 .. + Magyars (including + 900,000 Jews) .. 10,050,575 .. + Croats } 783,334 1,833,162 {1,875,000 + Serbs } 1,106,471 { + Slovenes 1,252,940 .. .. + Roumanians 275,422 2,949,032 .. + Italians 768,422 27,307 .. + Others .. 374,105 .. + +(2) Religious-- + Roman Catholic 22,530,000 10,888,138 451,686 + Uniate Catholic 3,417,000 2,025,508 .. + Orthodox 660,000 2,987,163 856,158 + Calvinist } 589,000 2,621,329 .. + Lutheran } 1,340,143 .. + Mohammedan .. .. 626,649 + Jewish 1,314,000 932,458 .. + Minor Sects 56,000 91,748 .. + +Total population 28,324,940 20,886,487 1,898,044 + + +Sec.4. _The Genesis of the Southern Slavs._--The foregoing survey of +tendencies in Austria-Hungary is utterly incomplete and inadequate, but it +may perhaps serve as a basis for further study. Let us now consider her +rival in the dispute which has led to the great war--Serbia. + +Here, at the outset, it cannot be emphasised too strongly that those who +regard the problem merely as a dispute between the government of Vienna and +the government of Belgrade have not grasped even its elements. The Southern +Slav question goes far deeper and wider than that; it must be treated as a +whole, and of it Serbia is only a part. In any study of the Slavonic races +the first fact which emerges is that they fall naturally into two main +groups--the northern and the southern--divided by a solid wedge of three +non-Slavonic races, the German, the Magyar, and the Roumanian, stretching +from the Kiel Canal to the Black Sea. It is with the southern group that we +are concerned. + +The Southern Slavs fall into four sections--the Slovenes, Croats, Serbs, +and Bulgars, who between them occupy the whole country from southern +Carinthia to central Thrace. The significance of the Bulgars will be dealt +with elsewhere, and of the Slovenes it will suffice for our present purpose +to say that they are a small and ancient race, of vigorous stock and +clerical leanings, whose true importance lies in their geographical +position and its latent possibilities for the future. The Croats and Serbs +occupy the border-line between West and East, between Rome and Byzantium, +between Catholicism and Orthodoxy. Broadly speaking, every Croat is a +Catholic, every Serb an Orthodox. Broadly speaking again, the Croat +language is Serb written with Latin characters, the Serb language Croat +written in the Cyrilline alphabet. + +Despite their common language, the two kindred races have never all been +united under a single ruler. From the ninth to the end of the eleventh +century the Duchy, then Kingdom, of Croatia was governed by native princes, +upon whose extinction it was conquered by Hungary. For eight centuries +Croatia has enjoyed an autonomous position under the Holy Crown of St. +Stephen; its scope has varied according to the political constellation, +but till 1912 its constant tradition had remained unbroken. Meanwhile the +Dalmatian coast towns remained a bone of contention between Venice and +Hungary; but the marble Lions on their battered walls are still the best +proof of the triumph of Italian culture within them. Ragusa alone resisted +both Venetians and Turks, and preserved herself inviolate as the home of +commerce and the muses, until her tiny Republic was destroyed by Napoleon +in 1808. The Kingdom of Serbia developed on more distinctively Slavonic +lines. During its great days in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries +under the Nemanja dynasty it dominated the Balkan Peninsula, produced a +code of law which is unique in mediaeval records, developed a prosperous +commerce and mining industries, and seemed on the point of striking a new +note in architecture. Her greatest Tsar, Stephen Dushan, died mysteriously +of poison, when his hosts were already thundering at the gates of +Constantinople (1356). But the greatness of his empire did not survive him, +and only a generation later Serbian independence received its death-blow +on the fatal field of Kosovo--the Flodden of the Balkans, but an event +far direr in its consequences than Flodden was to Scotland. Bosnia and a +fragment of Serbia lingered on under more or less independent rulers till +the middle of the fifteenth century. Then the Turkish night replaced the +Turkish twilight. From 1463 to 1804 the national life of the Serbs lay +utterly crushed. In Serbia their nobility was literally wiped out, in +Bosnia it accepted Islam in order to save its lands. The relations of +conqueror and conquered are best characterised by the single fact that +a Christian who failed to dismount from his horse on meeting a Turk was +liable to be killed on the spot. + +Throughout this period of utter gloom only two things served to keep alive +the Serb tradition--their splendid popular ballads, unequalled in Europe +for directness and imagination, save, perhaps, by the ballads of the +Anglo-Scottish Border; and the clergy of the Orthodox Church, poor ignorant +despised peasants like their flock, yet bravely keeping the national flame +burning. The one bright spot was the tiny mountain eyrie of Montenegro, +which stubbornly maintained its freedom under a long succession of +warrior-priests. + +The Serb Patriarchate, which had long had its seat in Ipek, migrated to +Austria in 1690, at the special invitation of the Emperor Leopold I., and +has ever since been established (though the title of patriarch lapsed for a +time) at Karlowitz on the Danube. Large settlements of refugee Serbs from +Turkey followed their spiritual chief to Croatia, Slavonia and the southern +plains of Hungary between 1690 and 1740. The special privileges granted to +them by the emperor were, however, gradually undermined and revoked by the +Hungarian Estates. Meanwhile the "Military Frontiers" were extended on +essentially democratic lines: a land-tenure subject to military service +bred a hereditary race of soldiers and officers devoted to the Imperial +idea, and it has taken many long long years of bungling on the part of +Viennese and Magyar diplomacy to efface that devotion. + +Thus the Habsburg dominions became the centre of culture for the Serbs, +whose literary revival came from Neusatz, Karlowitz and even Buda. It was +not only under Prince Eugene that they looked to the Habsburgs for aid. +Kara George, who led their first serious rising in 1804 more than once +offered himself to Vienna. + +In the Balkans the Serbs were the first to revolt, and won their own +freedom, with less help than Greeks, Roumanians or Bulgarians, and under +far less favourable circumstances. Thus Serbia is essentially a self-made +man among States, built from the foundations upwards, and possessing no +aristocracy and hardly even a middle class. Her curse has been the rivalry +of two, or rather three native dynasties, the Karageorgevitch, the +Obrenovitch and the Petrovitch; and this rivalry has borne fruit in three +dastardly political crimes--the murder of the heroic Black George in 1817, +by order of his rival Milosh Obrenovitch; of Prince Michael, Serbia's +wisest ruler, by the adherents of George's son; and finally of King +Alexander and his wife in June 1903. The history of the Southern Slavs +for the last century has been a slow movement towards national unity, +overshadowed, sometimes hastened, sometimes paralysed, by the rivalry of +Austria and Russia for the hegemony of the Balkan Peninsula. Till 1875 the +influence of the two Powers alternated in Belgrade, and there was nothing +definite to suggest which influence would win, though of course Russia may +be said to have possessed an advantage in her position as the foremost +Orthodox power and as the greatest among the Slavonic brotherhood of races. +That year, however, brought a fresh rising of Bosnia and Herzegovina +against Turkish rule, and in defence of this purely Serbo-Croat province +public opinion in Serbia and Montenegro rose. Side by side the two little +principalities fought the Turks and risked their all upon the issue. The +provinces were to the last man friendly and welcomed their action. Then, +when the battle seemed won, Austria-Hungary at the Congress of Berlin +stepped in and occupied Bosnia and Herzegovina--with the active approval +of Disraeli and Salisbury. The inhabitants resisted stoutly, but were +overcome. Thus was realised the first stage upon the road of the Austrian +advance towards Salonica. Serbia received compensation at Nia, Pirot, and +Vranja; Montenegro acquired the open roadstead of Antivari and a scrap of +barren coast-line; but the hearts of both still clung to Bosnia. + +Henceforth the friction between Vienna and Belgrade has been permanent, +though often latent. It was accentuated by the fact that King Milan was +little better than an Austrian agent, the most notorious example of this +being the ill-considered and ill-managed war with Bulgaria into which he +plunged Serbia at the instigation of the Ballplatz[1](1885). Afterwards, it +is true, Vienna intervened to rob the Bulgarians of the fruits of victory +and argued that Serbia was thus under her debt; but this crass application +of the principle of _divide et impera_ could not deceive any one. Milan was +a man of great ability, but vicious and corrupt. The ceaseless scandals +of his private life, the frequent political _coups d'etat_ in which +he indulged, tended to confirm the dislike of his subjects for the +Austrophilism with which he was identified. Alexander, his son and +successor, was even worse; indeed, it is not too much to say that he was +the most "impossible" monarch whom Europe has known since the days of the +Tsar Paul. His court was characterised by gross favouritism and arbitrary +revisions of the constitution; and his position became finally untenable +when he committed the fatal error of marrying Draga Mashin, a woman of no +position and notorious private character. Two incidents in her tragic story +remind us of similar scandals in English history--the fond delusion of Mary +Tudor and the legend of Mary of Modena's warming-pan. The last straw was +the design, widely attributed to her and the infatuated king, for securing +the succession to her brother, who had as little claim to the throne as +any other Serbian subject. On June 10, 1903, Alexander and Draga were +assassinated by a gang of Serbian officers, under circumstances of the +utmost brutality such as nothing can excuse. In the light of recent events, +however, it is important to note that both Austria and Russia knew of the +plot at least ten days before the murder and did nothing to stop it.[2] +On the day after the crime the _Fremdenblatt_, the organ of the +Austro-Hungarian Foreign Office, published a leading article couched in +terms of the utmost cynicism, and declaring that it mattered little to +Austria-Hungary which dynasty reigned in Serbia. The Serbian Government +might have been excused for enclosing a copy of this article in its reply +to the Austrian Note of July 23, 1914! + +[Footnote 1: The Austro-Hungarian Foreign Office.] + +[Footnote 2: In 1908 this was confirmed to me by a distinguished member of +the then Austrian Cabinet, since dead, who was certainly in a position to +know.] + +The Obrenovitch dynasty was thus at an end. Its rival, the Karageorgevitch +dynasty, returned to power--naturally under a black cloud of European +disgust and suspicion. King Peter is not, however, as black as he has +sometimes been painted. He fought gallantly in 1870 as a French officer; as +a young man he translated Stuart Mill's _Essay on Liberty_ into Serb, and +for a generation he lived by preference in democratic Geneva and in Paris. +Under him Serbia has for the first time enjoyed real constitutional +government. Quietly, as occasion arose, the regicides were removed to the +background, the old methods of favouritism were steadily discouraged, and +it is not too much to say that an entirely new atmosphere has been created +in Belgrade since 1903. Among the younger politicians in Serbia, as in +other Slavonic countries, the moral influence of Professor Masaryk, the +great Czech philosopher and politician, has grown more and more marked. + +The depth of Serb aspirations in Bosnia has two obvious grounds--on the one +hand, pure national sentiment of the best kind; on the other, the urgent +economic need for a seaboard, Serbia being the only inland country in +Europe save Switzerland, and not enjoying the latter's favoured position +in the immediate vicinity of great world-markets. Austria-Hungary, on her +part, set herself deliberately not merely to block this access to the sea, +but also to keep Serbia in complete economic dependence. Under the new +dynasty the little kingdom showed a keener desire to shake off its +vassalage and find new markets. The so-called "Pig War"--the breeding +of swine is Serbia's staple industry, and the founders of her two rival +dynasties were wealthy pig-breeders--proved an unexpected success, for new +trade outlets were found in Egypt and elsewhere. But the initial strain +hit every peasant in his pocket and thus greatly accentuated the feeling +against Austria-Hungary. At this stage came the Young Turk revolution and +its sequel, the annexation of Bosnia. To any impartial observer it had been +obvious from the first that those who dreamt of Austria-Hungary's voluntary +withdrawal from the two provinces were living in a fool's paradise. The +formal act of annexation merely set a seal to thirty years of effective +Austrian administration, during which the Sultan's rule had been confined +to the official celebration of his birthday. Educational and agrarian +problems had been neglected, popular discontent had smouldered, but at +least great material progress had been made. Roads, railways, public +buildings had been created out of nothing, capital had been sunk, a new +machine of government had been constructed. Austria had come to stay, and +Aehrenthal, in annexing the provinces, felt himself to be merely setting +the seal to a document which had been signed a generation earlier. He +had failed to reckon with the outcry which this technical breach of +international law evoked: like Bethmann-Hollweg, he had no blind faith in +"scraps of paper," and had no scruple in tearing up the Treaty of Berlin on +which the whole Balkan settlement had rested. Nowhere was the outburst of +feeling so violent as in Serbia and Montenegro, who had never ceased to +dream of the lost Serb provinces. For some months the two little States +challenged the accomplished fact, and seemed bent on staking their very +existence upon war with the great neighbouring Monarchy. Aehrenthal +remained unmoved by their cries of impotent fury and settled down to a +trial of strength with his rival Izvolsky, the Russian Foreign Minister, +who encouraged the sister Slavonic States in their resistance. At length +in March 1909 Germany stepped forward in "shining armour" to support her +Austrian ally, and Russia, to avoid European war, gave way and abandoned +the Serbs to their fate. Nothing was left but a humiliating submission: +the Serbian Government was obliged to address a Note to the Great Powers, +declaring that the annexation and internal condition of Bosnia did not in +any way concern her.[1] + +[Footnote 1: This declaration was made the basis of the Austrian Note to +Serbia in July 1914.] + + +Sec.5. _The Renaissance of Serbia._--From this diplomatic defeat dates the +renaissance of Serbia. It restored her to a sense of hard realities, and +taught her to substitute hard work for loud talk. So rough a challenge put +the national spirit on its mettle. The brief period between 1908 and 1912 +worked a real transformation in Belgrade, which could not fail to impress +those who took the trouble to look beneath the surface. Nowhere was the +change more marked than in the Serbian army, from which the regicide +elements had been slowly but steadily eliminated. The two Balkan wars of +1912-1913 revealed Serbia to the outside world as a military power, notable +alike for the elan of its infantry, the high efficiency of its artillery, +the close camaraderie of officers and men. The first use made of her +victories over the Turks was the occupation of northern Albania, her only +possible outlet to the sea so long as Dalmatia remains in Austrian hands. +Austria-Hungary, who had only remained inactive because she had taken a +Turkish victory for granted, now intervened, and by the creation of an +artificial Albanian State vetoed Serbia's expansion to the Adriatic. The +Austrian Foreign Minister, Count Berchtold, short-sighted and indolent then +as now, failed to realise that the North Albanian harbours, for obvious +reasons of physical geography, could never be converted into naval bases, +save at a prohibitive cost, and that their possession by Serbia, so far +from being a menace to Austria, would involve the policing of a mountainous +tract of country, inhabited by a turbulent and hostile population. It ought +to have been obvious to him that the moment had arrived for tempting +the Serbs into the Austrian sphere of influence by the bait of generous +commercial concessions through Bosnia and Dalmatia. Several far-sighted +politicians in Austria urged this course upon him, and the Serbian Premier +actually approached Vienna with far-reaching proposals in this very sense. +Their contemptuous rejection by Berchtold and the little clique of Foreign +Office officials who controlled his puppet figure, naturally strengthened +still further the bonds which united Belgrade and Petrograd. Serbia, shut +out from the Adriatic, had no alternative save to seek her economic outlet +down the valley of the Vardar towards the Aegean, and in so doing she came +into violent conflict with Bulgarian aspirations in Macedonia. These facts +alone would justify the assertion that the war between the Balkan allies +was directly due to Austro-Hungarian initiative; but it has also transpired +that the dissensions between Sofia and Belgrade were actively encouraged +from Vienna, that Magyar influences were brought to bear upon King +Ferdinand, and that war material was sent down the Danube from Hungary to +Bulgaria. The outward and visible sign of these intrigues was a speech of +the Hungarian Premier, Count Tisza, opposing the Tsar's intervention in +favour of peace and virtually inciting Bulgaria to fight it out. The +break-up of the Balkan League was the first condition to that Austrian +advance on Salonica which has always remained the ideal of the advocates +of a forward policy in Vienna and Budapest, and which lies at the root of +Austria-Hungary's action in provoking the present war. + +Serbia and Montenegro, however, are but one half of the problem. The issues +involved are wider and deeper than the quarrels of Vienna and Budapest with +Belgrade. Even if every man in Serbia were willingly prostrate before the +Habsburg throne, there could be no real peace until the internal problem of +Austria-Hungary's Southern Slav provinces is solved. What is at stake is +the future of eleven million people, inhabiting the whole tract of country +from sixty miles north of Trieste to the centre of Macedonia, from the +southern plains of Hungary to the North Albanian frontier. Of these, +roughly four millions are in the two independent kingdoms; the remaining +seven millions are divided between Austria (the provinces of Dalmatia, +Istria, and Carniola) and Hungary (the autonomous kingdom of +Croatia-Slavonia), while Bosnia-Herzegovina are governed jointly by Austria +and Hungary. The history of these provinces during the past generation is +one of neglect and misgovernment. Croatia has been exploited economically +by the Magyars, and the narrow interests of Budapest have prevented railway +development and hampered local industries by skilful manipulation of +tariffs and taxation. A further result is that even to-day Dalmatia (with +the exception of Ragusa) has no railway connections with the rest of +Europe, and those of Bosnia are artificially directed towards Budapest +rather than towards Agram, Vienna, and Western Europe. It is not too much +to say that the situation of those provinces had become less favourable +(if compared with surrounding standards) than it was at earlier periods of +their history; for the old system of trade-routes had broken down there as +elsewhere in Europe, but had not been replaced by modern communications. + + +Sec.6. _Serbo-Croat Unity._--Parallel with the new era instituted in Serbia +since 1903, a strong movement in favour of national unity took root among +her kinsmen across the Austro-Hungarian frontier. The disruptive tendencies +which had hitherto been so marked in Croatian politics began to weaken. +The so-called Serbo-Croat Coalition round which all the younger elements +speedily rallied, put forward an ambitious programme of constructive +democratic reform as the basis of joint political action on the part of +both races, and held stubbornly together when the inevitable breach with +the Magyar oligarchy occurred. The Magyar Government felt that every effort +must be made to restore that discord between Croat and Serb which had been +for a generation one of the main pillars of their racial hegemony. These +designs happened to coincide with the aims of the Foreign Office in Vienna +in connection with the annexation of Bosnia, and Budapest and Vienna +combined in a systematic campaign of persecution against the Serbs of +Croatia. "Wholesale arrests and charges of treason led up to the monster +trial at Agram, which dragged on for seven months amid scandals worthy of +the days of Judge Jeffreys. The Diet ceased to meet, the constitution of +Croatia was in abeyance, the elections were characterised by corruption and +violence such as eclipsed even the infamous Hungarian elections of 1910; +the Press and the political leaders were singled out for special acts of +persecution and intimidation." These tactics were revealed to the outside +world in the notorious Friedjung Trial (December 1909), resulting out of +a libel action brought by the Serbo-Croat Coalition leaders against Dr. +Friedjung, the distinguished Austrian historian. The documents, on the +basis of which he had publicly accused them of being paid agents of the +Serbian Government, had been supplied to him by the Austro-Hungarian +Foreign Office, and the trial revealed them as impudent forgeries, +concocted in the Austro-Hungarian Legation in Belgrade! The moral +responsibility for these forgeries was subsequently brought home to Count +Forgach, the Minister in Belgrade, and indirectly, of course, to Count +Aehrenthal himself as Foreign Minister. But Forgach, though publicly +denounced as "Count Azev,"[1] was not allowed to fall into disgrace; on +the contrary, he had become within two years of his exposure permanent +Under-Secretary at the Ballplatz, and inspirer of new plots to discredit +and ruin Serbia. + +[Footnote 1: An allusion to the notorious Russian _agent provocateur _who +was at one and the same time a member of the secret police and of the +revolutionary organisation.] + +The scandals of the Friedjung Trial led to the fall of the Governor of +Croatia, but there was no change of system. After a temporary truce the old +conflict revived, and within eighteen months the friction between Magyars +and Croats was as acute as ever. The Magyar Government employed every +possible device of administrative pressure in order to create dissensions +between the Croat and Serb parties--repeated elections, wholesale +corruption and violence, persecution of the Press and of the political +leaders. Yet so far from languishing under such a system, the movement for +unity gained fresh strength and extended to the kindred Slovenes, striking +root even among the extreme Clericals, who had hitherto regarded the +Orthodox Serbs with distrust and suspicion. + +In the spring of 1912 the conflict culminated in the abolition of the +Croatian constitution by the arbitrary decree of the Hungarian Premier, in +the appointment of a reactionary official as dictator, and a few months +later in the suspension of the charter of the Serb Orthodox Church. + + +Sec.7. _The Balkan Wars._--Never in history had a more inopportune moment +been chosen for such crying illegalities. For close upon the heels of the +demonstrations and unrest which they evoked, came the dramatic events of +the Balkan War, the crushing victories of the allies, the resurrection of +the lost Serb Empire, the long-deferred revenge for the defeat of Kosovo. +The whole Southern Slav provinces of Austria-Hungary were carried off their +feet by a wave of enthusiasm for the allies, and an impossibly strained +situation was reached when the Government of Vienna placed itself in +violent conflict with Serbia, vetoed her expansion to the sea, insisted +upon creating a phantom Albanian State, egged on Bulgaria against her +allies, and finally mobilised in order to impose its will upon the Serbs. +Every peasant in the Slavonic South naturally contrasted Magyar misrule +in Croatia with the splendid achievements of his Serb kinsmen across +the frontier. I know of poor villagers in the mountainous hinterland of +Dalmatia who, having no money to give to the cause of the Balkan Red Cross, +offered casks of country wine or even such clothes and shoes as they could +spare from their scanty belongings. The total subscriptions raised among +the Southern Slavs of the Monarchy in aid of the allies far exceeded any +sums previously raised for charitable purposes among so poor a population. +"In the Balkan sun," said a prominent Croat Clerical, "we see the dawn of +our day." + +The national rejoicings which "the avenging of Kosovo" evoked among the +Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes of Austria-Hungary were accompanied by lively +protests against the bare idea of an Austro-Serbian war, which, so far as +the Southern Slavs on both sides of the frontier were concerned, would have +been a civil war in the most literal sense of the word (and this civil +war, it must be remembered, is now actually being waged). The politicians, +however, though well-nigh unanimous in their enthusiasm for the cause +of the Balkan allies, could not at one breath throw off the habits of a +lifetime. Petty jealousies still divided them and were skilfully played +upon by the Magyar Government. The strain of five years of opposition and +persecution had produced its effect upon the Coalition leaders and rendered +them all too prone to further concessions. But the younger generation had +been profoundly affected by the Croatian dictatorship and the Balkan wars; +at an age when our youth think of nothing but cricket and football, the +students and even the schoolboys of Croatia, Dalmatia, and Bosnia became +engrossed in political speculation, brooded over the wrongs of their +disunited race, and dreamt of Serbia as the new Piedmont of the Balkans. To +all alike even the most advanced politician seemed no better than an old +fogey, and it is no exaggeration to assert that the existing parties had +lost all hold upon the overwhelming majority of those who in ten years' +time will represent the manhood and the intellect of the race. The +widespread nature of the movement may be illustrated by the school strike +of the spring of 1912, during which every boy and girl above the age of +fourteen in most of the primary and secondary schools of Croatia, Dalmatia, +and Bosnia played truant as a protest against the misgovernment of Croatia. +On that occasion a crowd of 5000 school children paraded the streets of +Agram shouting "Down with Cuvaj" (the Ban or Governor of Croatia), and +cheering the police when they tried to intervene! + +As in all such movements, the views of individuals varied in intensity: +some merely gave a theoretical adherence to the ideals of Mazzini or of +Mill, others swallowed the Nihilist doctrine of Bakunin and dreamt of +revolution, ushered in by terrorist propaganda. Out of this milieu came the +two young assassins who murdered the Archduke Francis Ferdinand. + + +Sec.8. _The Murder of the Archduke_.--By a hideous irony of fate Francis +Ferdinand was the one man capable of restoring order to an already +desperate internal situation. His very person was a programme and a +watchword, and it had long been an open secret that his accession would be +the signal for drastic reforms. It was his ambition to supersede the effete +Dual system by a blend of centralism and federalism such as would reconcile +the national sentiment of individual races with the consciousness of a +common citizenship and would at the same time restore to foreign policy the +possibility of initiative. This programme involved the emancipation of the +non-Magyar races of Hungary from the intolerable racial tyranny of the +Magyars, and at the same time a serious attempt to solve the Southern Slav +question by unifying the race under Habsburg rule. As his Imperial uncle +grew older and feebler, Francis Ferdinand is known to have elaborated his +designs, and a regular staff of able lieutenants had grouped themselves +round him. But on the very eve of action the strong man was removed, to the +scarcely veiled relief of all those elements in the State whose political +and racial monopoly was threatened by such far-reaching and beneficial +changes. + +The circumstances of the murder are still shrouded in mystery. It is known +that no proper measures were taken for the protection of the Archduke +and his wife in Bosnia, though it is still impossible to assign the +responsibility for such criminal negligence. It is notorious that in a +country like Bosnia, which has for years been infested with police spies +and informers, and where every movement of every stranger is strictly under +control, so elaborate and ramified a plot could hardly hope to escape the +notice of the authorities. It has even been asserted that Princip and +Cabrinovic, the two assassins, were _agents provocateurs_ in the pay of +the police, and though no proof is as yet forthcoming, there is nothing +inherently improbable in the idea.[1] Certain it is that the gravest +suspicion rests upon those who connived at the disgraceful anti-Serb riots +of which Sarajevo was the scene for nearly forty-eight hours after the +murder. + +[Footnote 1: The fact that they have only been sentenced to terms of +imprisonment, while some of their accomplices have been condemned to death, +has a much simpler explanation. Both men are under the age of twenty, and +therefore by Austrian law immune from the death penalty.] + +The murder provided an admirable pretext for aggression against Serbia, and +at the same time tended to revive all the latent prejudice with which the +country of the regicides was still regarded in the West. Yet those who seek +to establish a connection between the crime of Sarajevo and the Serbian +Government are on an utterly false scent. I have tried to describe +the atmosphere of universal and growing discontent which produced the +explosion. Those who know the Slavonic South are well aware that Bosnia, +Dalmatia, and Croatia are a seething pot which needs no stirring from the +outside, and that the assassins are but the natural successors of the wild +young students who during the last five years fired upon the Governors +of Croatia and Bosnia.[1] But quite apart from this, the complicity of +official Belgrade is rendered incredible by urgent considerations of +internal Serbian politics. After a long and delicate negotiation the +Concordat with the Vatican had just been concluded: the Orient railway +question had reached the critical stage: above all, a customs and military +union between Serbia and Montenegro was on the point of being concluded. +But, of course, quite apart from such considerations, Serbia was suffering +from the extreme exhaustion consequent upon waging two wars within a year, +and her statesmen, despite the rebuffs administered by Count Berchtold, +were genuinely anxious for a _modus vivendi_ with the neighbouring +Monarchy, as an essential condition to a period of quiet internal +consolidation. But this was the very thing which the controllers of +Austrian foreign policy--the phantom Minister Berchtold, the sinister +clique in the Foreign Office, and the Magyar oligarchy, led by that +masterful reactionary, Count Tisza, the Hungarian Premier--were anxious to +avoid. They had never reconciled themselves to the new situation in the +Balkans; and having twice backed the wrong horse (Turkey in the first +war, Bulgaria in the second) still continued to plot against the Bucarest +settlement of August 1913. Salonica still remained the secret Austrian +objective, and Serbia the main obstacle to the realisation of this dream. +Not for the first time, the interests of Vienna and Constantinople +coincided, and the occult interests which link Budapest with Salonica +played their part in the game. + +[Footnote 1: June 1910, June and November 1912, June 1913.] + +The crime of Sarajevo removed the chief restraining force in the councils +of the Monarchy and placed the fate of Europe at the mercy of a group of +gamblers in Vienna, Budapest, and Berlin. The military party, under Konrad +von Hoetzendorf, chief of the Austrian General Staff (who a year ago was +seriously speculating as to the collapse of Austria-Hungary), joined hands +with the Magyar extremists, whose political monopoly was threatened by the +advancing Slavonic tide, and with the inner ring of Prussian diplomacy, +which believed the psychological moment to have arrived for measuring +swords with Russia. The murder served as an admirable pretext to veil +grossly aggressive tactics. It was hoped that Russia might be manoeuvred +into a position where autocracy would rather abandon the Slav cause than +seem to condone assassination; and it was confidently believed that Britain +would hold aloof from a quarrel whose origin was so questionable. Stripped +of all outward seeming, the true issues of the conflict were very +different. Just as the policy of violent Turkification adopted by the Young +Turks inevitably provoked the Balkan War, so the policy of Magyarisation, +which has dominated Hungarian affairs for forty-five years and poisoned the +relations of Austria-Hungary with her southern neighbours, has led directly +to the present conflagration. + + +Sec.9. _The Future of the Southern Slavs_.--There have always been two fatal +obstacles to an Austrian solution of the Southern Slav problem,--Magyar +hegemony and the Dual System, to which alone that hegemony owed its +survival; and it is these two worn-out and reactionary ideas (if they can +be described as "ideas") that are at present fighting their death-struggle. +It was the ambition of Francis Ferdinand to achieve Serbo-Croat unity +within the Monarchy, and thus simultaneously to counteract the attractions +of Pan-Serb propaganda and to remove the most fertile source of friction +between Austria-Hungary and Serbia. His death destroyed the last chance of +such a solution; for the statesmen of Vienna and Budapest were not merely +incapable but openly hostile. An appeal was to be made to the arbitrament +of the sword. + +Long before war broke out it had become a commonplace of political theory +that the Southern Slav question could be solved in one of two ways--either +inside the Habsburg Monarchy or outside it--either with its help and under +its aegis, or against it and despite its resistance. With the outbreak of +war the problem assumed a new form; the alternatives are the absorption +of the two independent Serb States in the neighbouring Monarchy--in other +words, the union of the entire Southern Slav race under Habsburg rule--or +the liberation of her kinsmen in the Monarchy by Serbia as the Southern +Slav Piedmont. This latter ideal, it has always been obvious, could only be +achieved through the medium of a general European war, and it is in this +manner that it is actually in process of achievement. + +The Austrian Note to Serbia was deliberately framed in such a manner as to +be unacceptable by any State which valued its self-respect or prestige. The +military leaders desired war, while the Foreign Office, already committed +for years to a violently Serbophobe policy, was working hand in glove with +the German Ambassador Tschirschky, and with the very highest quarters in +Berlin. The German Government in its official case admits having given +Austria "a free hand against Serbia," while there are good grounds for +believing that the text of the Note was submitted to the German Emperor +and that the latter fully approved of (if he did not actually suggest) the +fatal time-limit of forty-eight hours, which rendered all efforts towards +peace hopeless from the outset. + +The Austrian case against Serbia, as embodied in this Note, rested upon a +secret investigation in the prison of Sarajevo. The persistent rumours that +the assassins are _agents-provocateurs_, and that pressure of a somewhat +drastic kind was brought to bear upon them after their arrest, cannot of +course be accepted as proved. But the essential point to bear in mind +is the fact that the details of the Austrian "case," as embodied in the +notorious Note of July 23, originated in the same quarter as the previous +attempts to slander and discredit Serbia. Count Forgach, the arch-forger +of the Austrian Legation in Belgrade, was permanent Under-secretary in the +Foreign Office, and as Count Berchtold's right hand and prompter in Balkan +affairs, was directly responsible for the pronounced anti-Serb tendencies +which have dominated the foreign policy of the Dual Monarchy since the +rise of the Balkan League. As a Magyar nobleman with intimate Jewish +connections, Forgach was an invaluable link between Magyar extremist policy +and Berlin on the one hand and Salonica and Constantinople on the other. +In view of his record as the inspirer of the Vasic forgeries, we are amply +justified in declining to accept any "evidence" prepared by him and his +subordinates, and insisting upon a full and open trial of the murderers as +the only conceivable foundation for charges of complicity. + +When all is said and done, however, the murder of the Archduke, though an +event of world-importance so far as the internal development and future +of the Dual Monarchy is concerned, is none the less a side-issue in the +Southern Slav question. This seeming paradox will not surprise those who +consider the currents of national life among the Southern Slavs. The +diplomatic conflict between Belgrade and Vienna or Budapest is but +the outcome of a far deeper and wider movement. We are witnessing the +birth-throes of a new nation, the rise of a new national consciousness, +the triumph of the idea of National Unity among the three Southern Slav +sisters--the Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes. Fate has assigned to Britain and +to France an important share in the solution of the problem, and it is our +duty to insist that this solution shall be radical and permanent, based +upon the principle of Nationality and the wishes of the Southern Slav race. +Only by treating the problem as an organic whole, by avoiding patchwork +remedies and by building for a distant future, can we hope to remove one of +the chief danger-centres in Europe. + + + +BOOKS + + +Unfortunately some of the indispensable books are in German or French, but +the following list offers a very considerable choice:-- + + +(A) AUSTRIA-HUNGARY + +_Austria-Hungary and Poland_, by H.W. Steed, W. Alison Phillips, and D. +Hannay. (Britannica War Books.) 2s. 6d. net. Uncritical reprint of very +valuable articles from the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_. + +LOUIS LEGER. _History of Austria-Hungary_. 1889 (from French) (out of +print). + +GEOFFREY DRAGE. _Austria-Hungary_. 21s. net. 1909. A mine of economic +facts. + +H.W. STEED. _The Habsburg Monarchy_. 1914. (3rd ed.) 7s. 6d. net. Far the +best summary of tendencies, on the lines of Bodley's _France_ and Bryce's +_American Commonwealth_. + +R.W. SETON-WATSON (SCOTUS VIATOR). _Racial Problems in Hungary_. 1908. 16s. +net. + +R.W. SETON-WATSON. _Corruption and Reform in Hungary_. 1911. 4s. 6d. net. + +HON.C.N. KNATCHRULL-HUGESSON. _The Political Development of the Hungarian +Nation_. 1910. 2 vols. 14s. net. A good exposition of the extreme Magyar +Chauvinist point of view. + +R. MAHAFFY. _The Emperor Francis Joseph_. 1910. 2s. 6d. A useful +character-sketch. + +C.E. MAURICE. _Bohemia_. (Story of the Nations.) 1896. 5s. An admirable +text-book. + +C.E. MAURICE. _The Revolutionary Movement of_ 1848-49. 1887. 16s. The best +epitome in English. + +COUNT FRANCIS LUTZOW. _Bohemia_. 1896. (Everyman Library.) 1s. + +EMILY G. BALCH. _Our Slavic Fellow Citizens_. New York. 1910. The best book +on emigration. 10s. 6d. net. + + +(B) SERBIA AND THE SOUTHERN SLAVS + +W. MILLER. _The Balkans_. 1896. (Story of the Nations.) The best general +text-book. 5s. + +W. MILLER. _The Ottoman Empire, 1801-1913_. 1913. (Cambridge Historical +Series.) An excellent book, with a misleading title; it is really a history +of the Balkan Christians, with special reference to the Greeks. Turkish +history is only introduced incidentally. 7s. 6d. net. + +EMILE DE LAVELEYE. _The Balkan Peninsula_. 1887. (Out of print,) By a +distinguished Belgian professor, who was in his day recognised as an +authority on Balkan questions. + +LEOPOLD VON RANKE. _History of Servia_. 3s. 6d. (Bohn's Library.) This +brilliant and sympathetic study by the greatest of German historians is of +permanent value. + +SIR ARTHUR J. EVANS. _Through Bosnia on Foot_. 1877. (Out of print.) The +distinguished archaeologist took part, as a young man, in the Bosnian +rising against the Turks. + +R.W. SETON-WATSON. _The Southern Slav Question and the Habsburg Monarchy._ +1911. 12s. 0d. net. (Greatly modified and extended in a German edition +published in 1913.) + +R.W. SETON-WATSON. _Absolutism in Croatia_. 1912. 2s. net. + + +CEDO MIJATOVIC. _Servia of the Servians_. 1911. 16s. net. + +ELODIE MIJATOVIC. _Serbian Folklore._. 1874. + + +(C) THREE OTHER BOOKS DEALING WITH THE BALKANS ARE STRONGLY RECOMMENDED + +SIR CHARLES ELIOT (ODYSSEUS). _Turkey in Europe_. 2nd ed. 7s. 6d. net. + +H.N. BRAILSFORD. _Macedonia_. 1906. 12s. 6d. net. + +LUIGI VILLARI AND OTHERS. _The Balkan Question_. 1905. 10s. 6d. net. + + + +CHAPTER V + +RUSSIA + +"God will save Russia as He has saved her many times. Salvation will come +from the people, from their faith and their meekness. Fathers and teachers, +watch over the people's faith, and this will not be a dream. I have been +amazed all my life in our great people by their dignity, their true and +seemly dignity. I have seen it myself, I can testify to it; I have seen +it and marvelled at it; I have seen it in spite of the degraded sins and +poverty-stricken appearance of our peasantry. They are not servile; +and, even after two centuries of serfdom, they are free in manner and +bearing,--yet without insolence, and not revengeful and not envious. 'You +are rich and noble, you are clever and talented, well be so, God bless you. +I respect you, but I know that I too am a man. By the very fact that I +respect you without envy I prove my dignity as a man....' + +"God will save His people, for Russia is great in her humility. I dream of +seeing, and seem to see clearly already, our future. It will come to pass +that even the most corrupt of our rich will end by being ashamed of his +riches before the poor; and the poor, seeing his humility, will understand +and give way before him, will respond joyfully and kindly to his honourable +shame. Believe me that it will end in that; things are moving to that. +Equality is to be found only in the spiritual dignity of man, and that +will only be understood among us. If we were brothers, there would be +fraternity; but before that they will never agree about the division of +wealth. We preserve the image of Christ, and it will shine forth like a +precious diamond to the whole world. So be it, so be it!"--DOSTOIEFFSKY, +_The Brothers Karamazov._ + + +"The French are a decent civilised lot of people; but I wish we were not +allies of Russia." This, or something very like it, is the spoken or +unspoken thought of a very large number of persons, especially among the +working-classes in England at the present time. English suspicion of Russia +is no new thing, though there is no doubt that the suppression of the +revolution during the years 1906-1909 made it more general than ever +before. It was responsible, for example, for the Crimean War, and the +"crafty Russian" has become a catch-word almost as widely accepted in +England as the phrase "perfidious Albion" is upon the Continent. I have +seen Russia at her worst: I saw the revolution stamped out cruelly and +relentlessly; I have lived three years in Finland, and know the weariness +of spirit and aching bitterness of heart that comes to a fine and cultured +race in its perpetual struggle for liberty against an alien Government to +whom the word liberty means nothing but rebellion. And yet I am firmly +persuaded of the innate soundness of the Russian people, and of the +tremendous future which lies before it in the history of the world. I +believe too that the English are suspicious of Russia, not because Russia +is crafty or evil or barbaric, but because English people find it very +difficult to understand a race which is so extraordinarily different from +themselves. We fear the unknown; we suspect what is unlike ourselves; yet +we shall do well, in the present crisis, whether we are thinking of our +enemy Germany or our ally Russia, to remember the axiom laid down by Edmund +Burke, the greatest of English political thinkers: "It is impossible to +bring an indictment against a whole nation." + +In any case, for good or ill, Russia is our ally, and if Germany is beaten, +Russia seems likely to play as great a part in the settlement as she did in +1815. It therefore behoves us, in our own self-interest if for no higher +motive, to try and understand the spirit and ideals of a great people, who, +as they did a century ago at the time of Napoleon, are once again coming +forward to assist Europe in ridding herself of a military despotism. + + +Sec.1. _The Russian State._--Many of us do not realise the most obvious facts +about Russia. For example, our atlases, which give us Europe on one page +and Asia on another, prevent us from grasping the most elementary fact of +all--her vastness. Mr. Kipling has told us that "East is East and West +is West, and never the twain shall meet." But Russia confounds both Mr. +Kipling and the map-makers by stretching from the Baltic to the Pacific. +For her there is not Europe and Asia but one continent, and she is the +whole _inside_ of it. All Europe between the four inland seas, and all Asia +north of lat. 50 deg. (and a good deal south of it too)--that is Russia, a +total area of 8-1/4 million square miles! This enormous country, which +comprises one-sixth of the land-surface of the globe, is at present thinly +populated; it has roughly 20 persons to the square mile as against 618 to +the square mile in England and Wales. Yet for all that it contains the +largest white population of any single state on earth, numbering in all +171 million souls. Moreover, this population is increasing rapidly; it +has quadrupled itself during the last century, and with the advent of +industrialism the increase is likely to be still more rapid. Many among us +alive to-day may see Russia's population reach and perhaps pass that of +teeming China. As yet, however, industrialism is only at its beginning in +Russia; more than 85 per cent of the inhabitants live in the country, as +tillers of the soil. + +It will be at once evident that this fact gives her an immense advantage +over industrial nations in time of war. She has, on the one hand, an almost +inexhaustible supply of men to draw upon, while, on the other hand, her +simple economic structure is hardly at all affected. A great European war +may mean for a Western country dislocation of trade, hundreds of mills and +pits standing idle, vast masses of unemployed, leading to distress, poverty +and in the end starvation; for Russia it means little more than that the +peasants grow fat on the corn and food-stuffs which in normal times they +would have exported to the West. Furthermore, her geographical and economic +circumstances render Russia ultimately invincible from the military point +of view, as Napoleon found to his cost in 1812. She has no vital parts, +such as France has in Paris or Germany has in Silesia or Westphalia, upon +which the life of the whole State organism depends; she is like some vast +multi-cellular invertebrate animal which it is possible to wound but not +to destroy. Russia has much to gain from a great European war and hardly +anything to lose. + +At first sight, therefore, there seems to be a great deal in favour of +the theory, somewhat widely held at the moment, that to crush Germany and +Austria will be to lay Europe at the feet of Russia, and that when Germany +has been driven out of France and Belgium, the Allies in the West might +have to patch up a peace with her in order to drive the Russians out +of Germany. Behind this theory lies the assumption that Russia is an +aggressive military state, inspired by the same ideals as have led Germany +to deluge the world with blood. This is an assumption which is, I believe, +absolutely unwarranted by anything in the history or character of the +nation. + +Historically speaking, the Russian Empire is an extension of the old Roman +Empire; it is the direct heir of the Eastern Roman Empire, which had its +capital at Constantinople, as the mediaeval "Holy Roman Empire," founded by +Charlemagne in A.D. 800, was the heir of the Western Roman Empire, which +had its capital at Rome itself. But the Eastern Empire survived its Western +twin by a thousand years; the Goths deposed the last Roman emperor in 476, +the Turks took Constantinople in 1453. The Russian Empire, therefore, +which did not begin its political development until after the fall of +Constantinople, entered the field some six and a half centuries later than +the mediaeval empire of Charlemagne, which was indeed already falling +to pieces in the end of the fifteenth century. Thus Russia presents the +strange spectacle of a mediaeval State existing in the twentieth century, +and she is still in some particulars what Western Europe was in the Middle +Ages. She has, however, attained a unity, a strength and a centralisation +which the Holy Roman Empire never succeeded in acquiring. There is nothing +corresponding to the feudal system, with all the disruptive tendencies +which that system carried with it, in modern Russia; partly owing to the +constant danger of Mongolian invasion which threatened Russia for so many +centuries, partly as a result of Ivan the Terrible's destruction of the +_boyars_, who were analogous to the mediaeval barons, and of Peter the +Great's substitution of a nobility of service for that of rank, Russia +is politically more centralised than any mediaeval, and socially more +democratic than any modern, country. Russia has also solved that other +great problem which perpetually agitated the mediaeval world--the conflict +between the secular and the spiritual power. She is the most religious +nation in the world, but she has no Papacy; Peter the Great subordinated +the Church to the State by placing the Holy Synod, which controls the +former, under the authority of a layman, a minister appointed by the Tsar. +Yet, while she appears united and centralised when we think of her nebulous +prototype, the Holy Roman Empire, we have only to compare her with her +Western neighbours, and especially with that triumph of State-organisation, +Germany, to see how amorphous, how inefficient, how loose, how mediaeval is +the structure of this enormous State. + +Peter the Great, who was more than any other man the creator of modern +Russia, saw clearly that the only way of holding this inchoate State-mass +together was to call into existence a huge administrative machine, and he +saw equally clearly that, if such a machine was not itself to become a +disruptive force through the personal ambition and self-aggrandisement +of its members, it must be framed on democratic and not aristocratic +principles. As Mr. Maurice Baring puts it, "Peter the Great introduced +the democratic idea that service was everything, rank nothing. He had it +proclaimed to the whole gentry that any gentleman, in any circumstances +whatsoever and to whatever family he belonged, should salute and yield +place to any officer. The gentleman served as a private soldier and became +an officer, but a private soldier who did not belong to the nobility, and +who attained the rank of a commissioned officer, became, _ipso facto_, a +member of the hereditary nobility.... In the civil service he introduced +the same democratic system. He divided it into three sections: military, +civil, and court. Every section was divided into fourteen ranks, or +_Chins_; the attainment of the eighth class conferred the privilege of +hereditary nobility, even though those who received it might have been +of the humblest origin. He hereby replaced the aristocratic hierarchy of +pedigree by a democratic hierachy of service. Promotion was made solely +according to service; lineage counted for nothing. There was no social +difference, however wide, which could not be levelled by means of State +service." This is partly what was meant when it was stated in the last +paragraph that Russia was socially the most democratic of modern countries. +The system established by Peter the Great exists to-day. Russia is +governed, not by a feudal nobility like that which ground the faces of +the poor in France before the revolution of 1789, nor by a number of +capitalists who live by exploiting the workers; for neither feudal nobility +nor capitalism (as yet) has any real power in Russia. She is governed by a +civil service, and by a civil service more democratic than our own, where +the higher posts are as a rule only open to members of the upper and middle +classes, less exclusive than that of India, where the higher officials are +nearly all recruited from the members of an alien race--a civil service, +in short, whose only close parallel is the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic +Church. Imagine the Roman Church as a secular institution, with a monarch +at its head ruling by hereditary right instead of an elected president like +the Pope, and you get a very fair idea of the Russian Government machine. +All that we associate with the word aristocracy in the West, the hereditary +principle, primo-geniture, the accumulation of the land and capital of the +country in the hands of a small class, the spirit of caste, the traditions +of nobility handed down with the title-deeds from father to son, are either +non-existent or of comparative unimportance in Russian society. + +There is also none of the keen sensitiveness to minute social distinctions +and to the social proprieties which mark them that is so striking a feature +of the life in "democratic" England and to which we have given the name +"snobbery." There are of course social strata in Russia, but they are +broadly marked and there is no sense of competition between them. A peasant +is not ashamed of being a peasant, and when he meets a nobleman he meets +him on terms of spiritual equality while acknowledging his superior +position in the social scale. A twin-brother of English "snobbery" is +English "hypocrisy." This, as has been well said, is a kind of "social +cement," for it is a tribute to a standard of social conduct set up by the +dominant class in a nation. And since there exists no dominant class in +Russia, but only a dominant hierarchy drawn from all classes, hypocrisy is +absent from the Russian character. Mr. Stephen Graham, who was, I believe, +at one time a clerk in a London office, found our civilisation so +intolerable that one day he flung it off and escaped to Russia, where he +has lived as a peasant tramp for many years. To revolutionaries who met him +and expressed their astonishment that an Englishman should choose Russia of +all places to live in, he replied, "I came to Russia because it is the only +free country left in the world." There is, in truth, much to be said for +this startling remark. In no country on earth is there such unaffected +good-will, such open hospitality, such an instinctive respect for personal +liberty--liberty of thought and of manners--such tolerance for the +frailties of human nature, such an abundance of what the great Russian +novelist Dostoieffsky called "all-humanness" and St. Paul called "charity," +as in Russia. All this, of course, did not come about as a result of +the bureaucratic system; it springs like that system itself from the +fundamentally democratic spirit of the Russian people. + + +Sec.2. _Religion_.--The last paragraph will read strangely to those people +whose only ideas about Russia are gleaned from newspaper accounts of +the revolution of 1905. We shall come back to the revolution and its +significance later; but meanwhile we must notice another very striking fact +about Russian life--its all-pervading religious atmosphere. Russia is a +land of peasants. In England and Wales 78 per cent of the population live +in towns and the remaining 22 per cent in the country; in Russia something +like 87 per cent live in the country as against 13 per cent in the towns. +These figures are enough to show where the real centre of gravity of the +Russian nation lies. The peasant, or _moujik_, is a primitive and generally +an entirely illiterate person, but he possesses qualities which his more +sophisticated brothers in the West may well envy and admire, a profound +common-sense, a grand simplicity of life and outlook, and an unshakable +faith in the unseen world. + +The interior of Russia is almost wholly unknown in the West; until a few +years back it was as much of a _terra incognita_ as Central Africa. But the +revolution led English writers and journalists to explore it, and when the +dust and smoke of that upheaval, which had obscured the truth from the eyes +of Europe, passed away, an astonished world perceived the real Russia for +the first time. "Russia," writes Mr. Stephen Graham, who has done more +than any other man to bring the truth home to us, "is not a land of +bomb-throwers, is not a land of intolerable tyranny and unhappiness, of +a languishing and decayed peasantry, of a corrupt and ugly church; the +Russians are an agricultural nation, bred to the soil, illiterate as the +savages, and having as yet no ambition to live in the towns; they are as +strong as giants, simple as children, mystically superstitious by reason +of their unexplained mystery." Russia is in fact 145 million +peasants--ploughing and praying. And here once again one is reminded of the +Middle Ages. Cross the Russian frontier and you enter the mediaeval world. +Miracles are believed in, holy men are revered as saints, thousands of +pilgrims journey on foot every year to Jerusalem, which is to every true +believer the centre of the universe and therefore becomes at Easter almost +a Russian city. Russia is the most Christian country in the world, and her +people are the most Christ-like. The turbulence and violence, so contrary +to the Christian spirit, which was an inseparable feature of mediaeval +feudalism is absent from Russia; and the gospel of non-resistance, of +brotherly love, of patience under affliction, of pity and mercy, which +Tolstoi preached so eloquently to the world at large, he learnt from +two teachers--the peasant of modern Russia and the Peasant of ancient +Palestine, who was crucified upon the Cross. + +Yet it is a mistake to talk, as some do, of the power of the Russian +Church, or of "priestcraft." The Church has little political power or +social prestige. It is the power of religion, not that of ecclesiastical +institutions, which is the arresting fact about modern Russia. It is not +so much that Russia has a church, as that she _is_ a church. In England +we have narrowed religion down to one day of the week and shut it up in +special buildings which we call churches; in Russia it is impossible to +avoid religion. As you pass out of the gangway of the ticket-office at the +railway station, you find yourself in front of a sacred picture with a +lamp burning continually before it, and you are expected to utter a prayer +before beginning your journey. Every room in Russia has its _eikon_--is in +fact a chapel, every enterprise is sanctified by prayer and ceremony. All +English travellers in Russia have acknowledged this profound national sense +of religion, and contrasted it with the religious formalism of the West. +"Italy," wrote Mr. H.G. Wells, on his recent visit to Russia, "abounds +in noble churches because the Italians are artists and architects, and a +church is an essential part of the old English social system, but Moscow +glitters with two thousand crosses because the people are organically +Christian. I feel in Russia that for the first time in my life I am in a +country where Christianity is alive. The people I saw crossing themselves +whenever they passed a church, the bearded men who kissed the relics in the +Church of the Assumption, the unkempt grave-eyed pilgrim, with his ragged +bundle on his back and his little tea-kettle slung in front of him, who was +standing quite still beside a pillar in the same church, have no parallels +in England." Mr. Rothay Reynolds, in his interesting and sympathetic book +_My Russian Year_, writes in much the same strain: "In Russia God and His +Mother, saints and angels, seem near; men rejoice or stand ashamed beneath +their gaze. The people of the land have made it a vast sanctuary, perfumed +with prayer and filled with the memories of heroes of the faith. Saints and +sinners, believers and infidels, are affected by its atmosphere; and so it +has come about that Russia is the land of lofty ideals." And Mr. Stephen +Graham, again, in his _Undiscovered Russia_, speaks with glowing admiration +of the Russian Church. "The Holy Church," he says, "is wonderful. It is the +only fervid living church in Europe. It lives by virtue of the people +who compose it. If the priests were wood, it would still be great. The +worshippers are always there with one accord. There are always strangers in +the churches, always pilgrims. God is the Word that writes all men brothers +in Russia and all women sisters. The fact behind that word is the fountain +of hospitality and friendship." + +The religious aspect of Russian life has been dwelt upon at some length, +because it is the key to everything in Russia and has a direct bearing upon +the present war. "Religion in Russia," writes Mr. Maurice Baring, "is a +part of patriotism. The Russian considers that a man who is not Orthodox +is not a Russian. He divides humanity, roughly, into two categories--the +Orthodox and the heathen--just as the Greeks divided humanity into Greeks +and Barbarians. Not only is the Church of Russia a national church, owing +to the large part which the State, the Emperor, and the civil authority +play in it, but in Russia religion itself becomes a question of +nationality, nationalism, and patriotism." Russian Christianity, like +Russian Tsardom, is derived from the old Roman empire of Constantinople. +The Russian Church is a branch, and far the most important branch, of the +Greek Orthodox Church, which drifted apart from the Catholic Church, which +had its centre at Rome, and finally separated from it in the eleventh +century. As the greatest Orthodox Christian power in the world, Russia +naturally regards herself as the rightful protector of all Orthodox +Christians. Her mortal enemy, with whom so long as he remains in Europe any +lasting peace is impossible, is the Turk; and her eyes are ever directed +towards Constantinople, as the ancient capital of her faith. The spirit of +the Crusades is far from dead in the Russian people; the Crimean War, for +example, was fought in that spirit. + +It will be at once apparent that Russia takes and must continue to take +a profound interest in the Christian peoples of the Balkans. Greeks, +Roumanians, Servians, Bulgarians and Montenegrins all belong to the +Orthodox Church; all have been engaged throughout the nineteenth century +in a struggle for existence against the common foe, Islam. Moreover, all +except the two first-mentioned peoples are allied to Russia by ties of race +as well as by religion, since they are members of the Slavonic stock. To +the average Russian, therefore, the bulk of the Balkan peninsula is as +much Russia Irredenta, as the north-east coast of the Adriatic is Italia +Irredenta to the average Italian; and as a matter of fact there is a good +deal more to be said for Russia's case than for Italy's. There is, however, +another great power which possesses interests in the Balkans and which +is viewed by Russia with a suspicion and dislike hardly inferior to that +entertained towards Turkey--I mean the empire of Austria-Hungary. A +Catholic state, controlled by Germans and Magyars, Austria-Hungary contains +in its southern portion a population of over seven million Slavs, some +three millions of whom are of the Orthodox faith. The Dual Monarchy has +constantly outraged national and religious feeling in Russia by her +treatment of this Slavonic population, and her annexation in 1908 of Bosnia +and Herzegovina, both of them Slavonic countries, was regarded as an open +challenge to Russia. + +It is not therefore surprising that the Tsar has intervened in the present +crisis. Had it refused to come to the assistance of Servia when Austria +attacked her, the Russian Government would have been unable to face public +opinion. Even those who know Russia best are amazed at the complete +unanimity of the country in the matter of this war; and proof that it is +not merely a war of aggression inspired by Pan-Slavist sentiment may +be found in the fact that all political parties, revolutionaries, +constitutionalists and reactionaries, have enthusiastically approved it. +How far Germany misunderstood (or affected to misunderstand) the real state +of feeling in Russia may be seen in the despatch of July 26 by the British +Ambassador in Vienna, who, in talking the crisis over with the German +Ambassador and asking "whether the Russian Government might not be +compelled by public opinion to intervene on behalf of a kindred +nationality," was told that "everything depended on the personality of the +Russian Minister for Foreign Affairs, who could resist easily, if he +chose, _the pressure of a few newspapers._" England drew her sword in this +struggle on behalf of Belgium and in the name of civilisation and treaty +rights; Russia has done the same on behalf of Serbia and in the name of +common blood and a common altar. I, for one, firmly believe that her hands +are as clean as ours. + + +Sec.3. _The Revolutionary Movement and its Significance._--It is now time to +say something of the revolutionary movement of 1905 and of its ruthless +suppression which gave Russia so evil a reputation in the eyes of Western +Europe. It was my good fortune to be a resident in the dominions of the +Tsar during the critical years of 1906-9, to be present at a session of the +first Duma and to mingle with the members of that historic assembly in the +lobby of the Parliament House, to catch something of the extraordinary +belief in the coming of the millennium which was prevalent among all +classes in Petrograd in the first charmed months of 1906, and finally +to have been acquainted with active revolutionaries and their friends +throughout the whole of my period of residence. I can therefore speak with +a certain amount of inner knowledge of the revolution; and though I do not +wish to claim any particular authority for the opinions stated below, which +are after all nothing but the opinions of a single individual who has lived +for three years in a corner of the Russian Empire, yet they have at least +this advantage over those entertained on the subject by the average +Englishmen, viz. that they are based not on newspaper reports but on +actual experience, and that they were arrived at gradually and--it may be +added--with considerable reluctance, since they had, as it were, to win +their way through a number of my own personal sympathies and political +prejudices. There is, of course, no room here for any detailed treatment of +a movement upon which a big book might be written, and I shall therefore +have to limit myself to a few rather bald generalisations which I must +ask the reader to accept not as the truth, but as what one man of limited +experience and vision conceives to be the truth about the Russian +revolution. + +The main reason why English people get mistaken ideas about Russia is that +they imagine Russians to be nothing but Englishmen picturesquely disguised +in furs and top-boots, and because they interpret the political situation +in Russia in terms of English history and politics. As I have already tried +to show, Russians are built differently from English people, _from the soul +outwards_, while the political and social condition of the Russian Empire +is totally unlike anything that has ever existed in this country. If +therefore the real causes of the movement of 1905 and of its failure are to +be rightly understood, we must put away from our minds the desire to find +analogies in the English revolutions of 1642 and 1688, or the French +Revolution of 1789, or the social revolution of which Karl Marx dreamed; +Russia can only be interpreted in terms of Russian history and Russian +conditions. In one thing, however, the Russian revolution was like all +revolutions which have ever been or are ever likely to be, viz. that it was +concerned with two distinct issues, one a narrow question of political and +constitutional reform, and the other a far wider question involving an +attempt to reconstruct not merely the institutions of society but also to +transform the ideals and conceptions upon which society rested. + +Let us first of all consider the narrower political issue. This was simple +enough; the outbreak of 1905 had as its primary object the setting up of +some form of representative government which would control the bureaucratic +machine. It has been already pointed out that the constitution of modern +Russia was largely due to the genius of Peter the Great. During the +nineteenth century, however, it became apparent to thinking Russians that +the constitution, for the sake both of stability and efficiency, needed +development in the direction of popular representation. The plea of +efficiency was really far the stronger of the two. Had Peter the Great been +eternal, he might possibly have continued to exercise an effective control +over the administrative system which he created; for he was a man of +superhuman energy and will-power. But most Tsars, who are men of ordinary +capacity, found it impossible to do so. The consequence was that +the bureaucracy acquired what amounted in practice to absolute +irresponsibility. Now irresponsibility is demoralising to any +administration, however democratic be the principles upon which its +officials are selected. A bureaucracy, ruling without proper external +control, becomes a prey to the demons of red tape, routine, officialdom and +place-hunting; it tends to stifle individual initiative and the sense +of moral responsibility, since it forgets the real object of its +existence--the good government of the country--in its passion for +self-preservation and its desire to secure the smooth-working of the +machine; it becomes inhuman, intensely conservative and corrupt. Above all +it develops a hyper-sensitiveness to lay criticism, which compels it to do +all in its power--and in Russia that power is unlimited--to crush freedom +of speech and freedom of the press. The problem, however, of devising some +popular check upon its action was an extremely difficult one for the simple +reason that the mass of the Russian people never have taken, and even +to-day do not take, any interest in political questions. Nevertheless the +Tsar, Alexander II., who was one of the most enlightened monarchs that +ever sat upon the Russian throne, determined to attempt a solution. +Unfortunately on March 1, 1881, the very day when Alexander had given his +approval to a scheme of constitutional reform, involving the establishment +of representative institutions, he was assassinated by revolutionaries. +This fatal act put back the clock for twenty-five years, the court and the +nation were thrown into the arms of the bureaucracy as their only protector +against terrorism, and reaction reigned supreme. Meanwhile the bureaucracy +grew more corrupt, more tyrannical, more inefficient every day, while on +the other hand the party of reform, thrust as it were underground and +hunted like rats, became more and more bitter in spirit and more and more +extreme in theory. + +It is important to bear in mind that the struggle has never from beginning +to end been one which divided the nation as a whole into two hostile camps. +Public opinion, when it has not been indifferent, has swayed now to one +side and now to the other, according as it was stirred by some flagrant +act of oppression on the part of the bureaucracy or some outrageous act of +terrorism on the part of the revolutionaries. The truth is that the civil +war in Russia--for it was nothing less--was confined to quite a narrow +section of society. It has been said that there are practically speaking no +class distinctions in the English sense of the word, in Russia; there is, +however, a very real distinction between the _intelligentsia_ and the +peasants. The _intelligentsia_ are the few million educated Russians who +control, or seek to control, the destinies of the 145 million uneducated +tillers of the soil. There is nothing quite like them in this country, +though the expression "the professional class" describes them in part. +Broadly speaking, they are people who have passed through school and +university, and can therefore lay claim to a certain amount of culture; +their birth is a matter of no moment, they may be the children of peasants +or of noblemen. It is from this "class," if we can call it so, that both +the bureaucracy and the revolutionary movement draw their recruits. The +real tragedy of Russia is that neither the party of reform nor the party of +reaction shares, or even understands, the outlook and ideals of the people. +Russian culture is still so comparatively recent that it has not yet passed +out of the imitative stage; and, in spite of the work of Pushkin, Gogol, +and Dostoieffsky, the books that are read and studied in Russia are for +the most part translations from foreign authors. The result is that the +political and social ideas of the _intelligentsia_ are almost wholly +derived from countries whose structure is totally different from their +own. We shall presently see that this fact had an important bearing on the +development of the outbreak of 1905. It is sufficient here to notice +that the struggle was one between two sections of the _intelligentsia_, +political idealism against political stagnation, the Red Flag _versus_ Red +Tape. + +After twenty years of bureaucratic government the country as a whole began +to grow once again restless. In this period a proletariate had come into +being. It was a mere drop in the bucket of 145 millions of peasants, +but its voice was heard in the towns, and it was steeped in the Marxian +doctrines of Social Democracy. Moreover the peasants themselves had their +grievances. They cared nothing and understood less of the political +theories which the revolutionaries assiduously preached among them, but +they pricked up their ears when the agitators began to talk about land and +taxation. Up to 1861 the peasants had been serfs, the property, with the +land on which they lived, of the landowner. At their emancipation it was +necessary to provide them with land of their own; the State, therefore, +bought what was considered sufficient for the purpose from the landowners, +handed it over to the peasants, and recouped itself by imposing a land-tax +on the peasants to expire after a period of forty-nine years. This tax was +felt to be exceedingly onerous, and in addition to this by the beginning of +the twentieth century it became clear that the land acquired in 1861 was +not nearly enough to support a growing population. These factors, together +with the disastrous Russo-Japanese war, which revealed an appalling state +of corruption and incompetency in the government of the country, furnished +the revolutionaries with an opportunity which was not to be missed. A rapid +series of military and naval mutinies, agrarian disorders, assassinations +of obnoxious officials, socialist risings in the towns, during the +year 1905, culminating in the universal strike of October, brought the +Government to its knees, and on the 17th of the same month the Tsar issued +his manifesto granting freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and a +representative assembly. The revolution had, apparently, won on the +constitutional issue. + +Yet what looked like the end of bureaucratic absolutism proved to be +the destruction of the revolutionary party. Had the reformers of 1905 +concentrated their energies upon the task of turning the new legislature +into an adequate check upon the bureaucratic system, there is little doubt +they would have succeeded. As it was their success in this direction was +only partial. It is true that a Duma still sits at the Taurida Palace +at Petrograd, but it is elected on a narrow property franchise, and +its relations with the bureaucracy are as yet not properly defined; it +criticises but it possesses no real control. This failure of the revolution +was almost wholly due to the revolutionaries themselves, who, instead of +confining their attacks to the Government machine, sought to undermine the +entire structure of society and to overthrow the moral and religious ideals +of the nation. Moreover, their attitude was entirely negative, and they +possessed little or no constructive ability of any kind. Even the first +Duma, which contained the ablest politicians among the reformers, did +not succeed in passing acts of parliament, affirming the most elementary +principles of civil liberty; and it damaged itself irreparably in the +eyes of the country by refusing to condemn "terrorism" while demanding an +amnesty for all political offenders. The unique opportunity which the first +Duma afforded was frittered away in futile bickerings and wordy attacks +upon the Government. + +Meanwhile, though a temporary truce was observed during the Duma's +sessions, its dissolution on July 21, 1906, two and a half months after +opening, was the signal for a fresh outburst of outrages on both sides. The +country was fast drifting into anarchy; agrarian risings, indiscriminate +bomb-throwing, _pogroms_, highway robberies carried out in the name of the +"social revolution" and euphemistically entitled expropriation, outbreaks +of a horrible kind of blood-lust which delighted in motiveless murder for +the sake of murder, were the order of the day. The revolution was +strong enough neither to crush the reactionaries nor to control the +revolutionaries themselves. The foundations of the social structure seemed +to be dissolving in a welter of blood and crime, and public opinion, which +in its hatred of bureaucracy had hitherto sided with the revolution, +suddenly drew back in horror from the abyss which opened out in front of +it. Stolypin, the Strafford of modern Russia, who condemned the extremists +of both sides, was called to the helm of the State; his watchword, "Order +first, reform afterwards," was backed by the force of public opinion; and, +as he stamped out the revolution with a heel of iron, the country shuddered +but approved. The peasants were pacified by the remission of the hated tax, +and by measures for providing them with more land; and Russia sank once +more into her normal condition. + +But political incompetency is not a reason sufficiently weighty in itself +to account for the remarkable revulsion of public feeling against the +revolutionary party. Behind the narrow political issue lay the larger +philosophical and moral one; and it was the discovery by the country of the +real character and ultimate aims of the party which for a few months +in 1906 seized the reins of power that will alone provide a sufficient +explanation of one of the most astonishing political debacles of modern +history. The revolution was nothing less than an attempt by a small +minority of theorists and moral anarchists to force Western civilisation +upon Russia, and not Western civilisation as it actually is but a sort of +abstract "Westernism" derived from books. For the revolutionaries were far +more Western than the Westerns. They had not merely swallowed wholesale +the latest and most extreme political and social fads, picked up from the +literature of England, France, and Germany, but they possessed a courage of +their convictions and a will to carry them out to the logical conclusion +which many "advanced thinkers" of the West lack. They were not modernists +or new theologians but atheists, not Fabians or social reformers but +revolutionary socialists armed with bombs, not radicals but republicans, +not divorce-law-reformers but "free lovers." A remarkable book was +published in 1910 called _Landmarks_. It was written by a number of +disillusioned revolutionaries, and gives a vivid picture of the effect +which the foregoing principles had upon the lives of those who upheld them. +Here is one extract: + +"In general, the whole manner of life of the _intelligentsia_ was terrible; +a long abomination of desolation, without any kind or sort of discipline, +without the slightest consecutiveness, even on the surface. The day passes +in doing nobody knows what, to-day in one manner, and to-morrow, as a +result of a sudden inspiration, entirely contrariwise--everyone lives his +life in idleness, slovenliness, and a measureless disorder--chaos and +squalor reign in his matrimonial and sexual relations--a naive absence of +conscientiousness distinguishes his work; in public affairs he shows an +irrepressible inclination towards despotism, and an utter absence of +consideration towards his fellow-creatures; and his attitude towards the +authorities of the State is marked at times by a proud defiance, and at +others (individually and not collectively) by compliance." + +As a set-off to this picture of moral chaos, it should be remembered that +these people when called upon to die for their revolutionary faith did so +with the greatest heroism. Nor is the picture true of all revolutionaries; +some of the noblest men it has ever been my good fortune to meet were +Russian revolutionaries. But these were the product of an earlier and +sterner school, the puritanical "Nihilism" of the 'eighties; and it is +impossible to deny the substantial truth of the above description as far as +the rank and file of the modern revolutionary school are concerned.[1] Such +people were divided by a whole universe from the peasants to whom they +offered themselves as leaders and saviours; and the schemes of regeneration +which they preached were not merely useless, because purely negative, but +were exotic plants which could never flourish on Russian soil. Thus the +revolution triumphed for about twelve months as a purely destructive force, +but when the necessity for construction arose its adherents found that they +were entirely ignorant of the elements of the problem before them. +This problem was the peasant, and the revolutionaries, though they had +worshipped the People (with a capital P) for years and had done their best +to convert them, had never made any attempt to understand them. And when +the peasant discovered what the revolutionary was like, he loathed and +detested him. "They hate us," a writer in _Landmarks_ confesses, "because +they fail to recognise that we are men. We are, in their eyes, monsters in +human shape, men without God in their soul; and they are right." + +[Footnote 1: It is confirmed by all impartial observers, see _e.g._ +Professor Pares' _Russia and Reform_, chap. ix., entitled "Lives of the +Intelligents."] + +There is a characteristic story told by Mr. Maurice Baring about a certain +revolutionary who one day arrived at a village to convert the inhabitants +to socialism. "He thought he would begin by disproving the existence of +God, because if he proved that there was no God, it would naturally follow +that there should be no Emperor and no policeman. So he took a holy picture +and said, 'There is no God, and I will prove it immediately. I will spit +upon this _eikon_ and break it in pieces, and if there is a God He will +send fire from heaven and kill me, and if there is no God nothing will +happen to me at all.' Then he took the _eikon_ and spat upon it and broke +it to bits, and he said to the peasants, 'You see, God has not killed me.' +'No,' said the peasants, 'God has not killed you, but we will'; and they +killed him." + +This story, whether true or not, is a parable, in which one may read the +whole meaning of the failure of the Russian revolution. It shows how an +attack upon what they hold sacred may rouse to acts of fury a people +who are admitted by all who know them to be the most tolerant, most +tender-hearted, and most humane in Europe. The notion that Russia is a +humane country may sound strange in English ears. Yet capital punishment, +which is still part of our legal system, was abolished in Russia as long +ago as 1753, except for cases of high treason. From 1855 to 1876 only one +man was executed in the whole of that vast empire; and from 1876 to 1903 +only 114. On the other hand between the years 1905 and 1908 the total of +executions reached the appalling figure of 3629. This is but to translate +into criminal statistics the story just quoted; for the years 1905-8 were +the years when martial law reigned in Russia, the years of revolution. +The Tsar, it is true, wore the black cap, and the hangman's rope was +manipulated by the bureaucracy, but the jury who brought in the verdict was +a jury of 145 million peasants. + +Such, in broad outline, is the history of the revolutionary movement which +is still so greatly misunderstood in England. It was not the uprising of an +oppressed nation, which successful for a brief while was finally crushed by +the brute force of reaction; it was a civil war between two sections of +a small educated class, in which the sympathies of the nation after +fluctuating for a time eventually came down heavily against the +revolutionaries. There is in truth every excuse for misunderstanding +amongst English people, especially if they belong to the party of progress +in English politics; for the obvious things about Russia are so deceptive. +All that one saw on the surface were, on the one hand, an irresponsible +bureaucracy using the knout, the secret agent, the _pogrom_, and Siberia +for the suppression of anything suspected of threatening existing +conditions; and, on the other, a band of devoted reformers and +revolutionaries risking all in the cause of political liberty, and dying, +the "Marseillaise" on their lips, with the fortitude of Christian martyrs. +But, beneath all this, something immensely bigger was in progress, +which can only be described as a conflict of two philosophies of life +diametrically opposed or, if you like, a life-and-death struggle between +two civilisations, so different that they can hardly understand each +other's language; it is a renewal of the Titanic contest, which was decided +in the West by the Renaissance and the Reformation, the contest between +the mediaeval and the modern world. To the modern mind no period is so +difficult to grasp as the Middle Ages; our dreams are of progress which is +another word for process, of success which implies perpetual change, in +either case of "getting on" somewhere, somehow, we know not where or how; +our very universe, from which we have carefully excluded the supernatural, +has become a development machine, a huge spinning-mill, and our religion, +if we have one, a matter of "progressive revelation." We look before and +after, forwards to some dim utopia, backwards to some ape-like ancestor who +links us with the animal world. Our outlook is horizontal, the mediaeval +outlook perpendicular. The mediaeval man looked upward and downward, to +heaven and hell, when he thought of the future, to sun and cloud, land +and crops, when he thought of the present. He lived in the presence of +perpetual miracle, the daily miracle of sunrise, sunset, and shower; and in +the constant faith in resurrection, whether of the corn which he sowed in +the furrow or of his body which his friends would reverently sow in that +deeper furrow, the grave. And his life was as simple and static as his +universe; the seasons determined his labours, the Church his holidays. +Books did not disturb his faith in the unseen world, for he was illiterate; +nor the lust of gold his contentment with his existence, for commerce was +still confined to a few towns. Russia to-day is in spirit what Europe was +in the Middle Ages.[1] The revolutionaries offered her Western civilisation +and Western philosophy, and she rejected the gift with horror. + +[Footnote 1: This, of course, by no means implies that she is _behind_ the +West, or that she is of necessity bound to pass through the same process of +development. The problem of modern Russia is not to imitate the West but +to discover some way of coming to terms with Western ideals without +surrendering her own.] + +Will she continue to maintain this attitude? "The Russian peasant," says +Mr. Maurice Baring, "as long as he tills the ground will never abandon his +religion or the observance of it.... Because the religion of the peasant is +the working hypothesis taught him by life; and by his observance of it he +follows what he conceives to be the dictates of common sense consecrated by +immemorial custom." The crucial point of this passage is the conditional +clause: "as long as he tills the ground." Of course, Russia, the granary of +Europe, must always be predominantly an agricultural country; yet she is at +the present moment threatened in many parts with an Industrial Revolution, +the ultimate effects of which may prove far more subversive than the +attempted revolution of 1905. For beneath her soil lie explosive materials +more deadly than any dynamite manufactured by _intelligentsia_. Her mineral +wealth, at present almost untouched, is incalculable in quantity and +amazing in variety. When her mines are opened up Russia will become, +according to the judgment of Dr. Kennard, editor of _The Russian +Year-Book,_ "without a doubt the richest Empire the world has ever seen." +Attracted by her vast mining possibilities, by her enormous virgin forests, +by her practically unlimited capacity for grain-production, the capital +of Europe is knocking at the doors of Russia. Factories are rising, mines +being started all over the country. Russia is about to be exploited by +European business enterprise, just as America and Africa have been. The +world has need of her raw materials, and is only interested in her people +as potential cheap labour. Thus within the last few years something +analogous to the proletariat and the bourgeoisie of Europe has come into +existence in Russia. We may catch a glimpse of what these new classes are +like from a recent book by Mr. Stephen Graham, called _Changing Russia_. He +writes: + +"The Russian bourgeois is of this sort; he wants to know the price of +everything. Of things which are independent of price he knows nothing, +or, if he knows of them, he sneers at them and hates them. Talk to him of +religion, and show that you believe the mystery of Christ; talk to him +of life, and show that you believe in love and happiness; talk to him of +woman, and show that you understand anything about her unsexually; talk +to him of work, and show that though you are poor you have no regard for +money--and the bourgeois is uneasy.... Instead of opera, the gramophone; +instead of the theatre, the kinematograph; instead of national literature, +the cheap translation; instead of national life, a miserable imitation of +modern English life.... It may be thought that there is little harm in the +commercialisation of the Russian, the secularising of his life; and that +after all the bourgeois population of England, France, and Germany is not +so bad as not to be on the way to something better. But that would be a +mistake; if once the Russian nation becomes thoroughly perverted, it will +be the most treacherous, most vile, most dangerous in Europe. For the +perverted Russian all is possible; it is indeed his favourite maxim, +borrowed, he thinks, from Nietzsche, that 'all is permitted,' and by 'all' +he means all abomination, all fearful and unheard-of bestiality, all +cruelty, all falsity, all debauch.... Selfish as it is possible to be, +crass, heavy, ugly, unfaithful in marriage, unclean, impure, incapable +apparently of understanding the good and the true in their neighbours and +in life--such is the Russian bourgeois." + +Mr. Graham's picture of the new proletariat in the Ural mines is an equally +horrible one: + +"Gold mining is a sort of rape and incest, a crime by which earth and man +are made viler. If I had doubted of its influence on man I needed but to +go to the Ural goldfields. A more drunken, murderous, brother-hating +population than that of this district I have not seen in all Russia. It was +a great sorrow to see such a delightful peasantry all in debauchery.... +The miner has no culture, no taste, not even a taste for property and +squiredom, so that when at a stroke he gains a hundred or a thousand +pounds, it is rather difficult to know how to spend it. His ideal of +happiness has been vodka, and all the bliss that money can obtain for him +lies in that.... Mias is a gold-mining village of twenty-five thousand +inhabitants. It has two churches, four electric theatres, fifteen vodka +shops, a score of beer-houses, and many dens where cards are played and +women bought and sold to the strains of the gramophone. It is situated in a +most lovely hollow among the hills, and, seen from the distance, it is one +of the most beautiful villages of North Russia; but seen from within, it is +a veritable inferno." + +Mr. Graham writes as a poet rather than as an economist or a sociologist, +but there is no doubt a grave danger to Russia in a sudden adoption of +industrial life. + +_Intelligentsia_, bourgeoisie, and proletariate are all products of the +same forces, all belong to the same family; they are westernised Russians; +they have passed from the fourteenth to the twentieth century at one +stride, and the violent transition has cut them completely adrift from +tradition and from all moral and religious standards; books, commerce, +and industry, the three boasted instruments of our civilisation, have +not civilised such Russians, they have _de-civilised_ them. But, as yet, +Russians of this character form only a tiny fraction of the nation; and +there are happily signs that the dangers of an exotic culture are being +realised even by the _intelligentsia_ themselves. Since the failure of the +revolution there has been a remarkable revival of interest among Russian +thinkers in the native institutions, habits, and even the religion of the +country; and it may be that in time there will emerge from this chaos of +ideals a culture and a civilisation which will "make the best of both +worlds" by adopting Western methods without surrendering an inch of the +nation's spiritual territory, above which floats the standard of religion, +simplicity, and brotherly love. The present war, terrible as it is, may do +something towards bringing this about, for the Russian people, faced by a +common danger and united in a common purpose, are now of one mind and one +heart, in a way that they have not been since a century ago Napoleon was +thundering at the gates of Moscow. + +And let this be said: if Russia should ever cease to be Russia, if she ever +loses those grand national characteristics which make her so different from +the West, and therefore so difficult for us Westerns to understand, the +world as a whole will be infinitely the poorer for that loss. We need +Russia even more than Russia needs us; for, while we have grasped the +trappings, she possesses the real spirit of democracy. Of the three +democratic ideals, proclaimed by France in 1789, the mystical trinity: +Liberty, Fraternity, Equality, how much has yet been realised by the +peoples of the West? And Russia is in the way of realising them all! +Fraternity and equality are, as we have seen, the distinctive features of +her national spirit and social structure, and, if her liberty is as yet +imperfect on the political side, it is far more complete than ours on the +side of moral tolerance and respect for the sanctity of human personality. +After all, the reason why Russia has not got complete political freedom is +because, as a nation, she has hitherto taken no interest in politics; for +the first time in 1905 she discovered the use of political action, and she +got out of it a solution of the agrarian distress and a representative +assembly; when she _wants_ more liberty in this direction, she will have no +difficulty in securing it. + + +Sec.4. _The Subject Nationalities_.--It may fairly be objected at this +point that while Russia may possess these excellent qualities, she has +consistently refused to allow liberty to other peoples, to the Jews, +for example, the Poles, and the Finns. It is necessary therefore to say +something on the matter of Russia's subject nationalities before bringing +these remarks to a conclusion. + +Out of the six or seven million Jews in the world, over five million live +within the boundaries of the Russian Empire. Russia is therefore the +motherland of the Children of Israel; though, perhaps, the phrase +step-motherland would express more truly the actual relationship, both +in its origin and its character. Russia has inherited her tremendous +responsibilities towards the Hebrew race from Poland, and her vexed "Jewish +question" is in part a just punishment for her complicity in the wicked +partitions of that country in the eighteenth century. The matter, however, +goes back much farther than the eighteenth century. In the Middle Ages +Poland was a more powerful state than Russia, and comprised territory +stretching from the Gulf of Riga to the Black Sea and from the Oder to the +Dnieper. She was also the one country in Europe which offered to the Jews +security from persecution and an opportunity of developing the commercial +instincts of the race without interference. The result was that Jews +settled in large numbers all over the King of Poland's possessions, and the +presence of Jews in any part of modern Russia is almost a sure sign that +that particular town or province has been Polish territory in former times. +The Russian Government has never, except for a short period, allowed the +Jews to live in Russia proper, and it is very rare to find Jews in north +or central Russia. Even in large cities like Petrograd and Moscow their +numbers are small, while it is interesting to note that the Finns have +copied the rest of Russia in this respect at least that they have always +resolutely refused to admit the Hebrew. Where Russia found Jews among the +new subjects which she acquired by her gradual encroachments upon Poland, +she had of course to let them remain, but she has confined them strictly to +these districts. The existence of this Jewish pale is one of the grievances +of the Jews of Russia, but it is not the heaviest. The liberal-minded +Alexander II. had shown himself lenient to them; but his assassination +in 1881 at the hands of terrorists and the accession of the reactionary +Alexander III. began a period of persecution which has continued until the +present day. + +Alexander III. was much influenced by his tutor, Pobiedonostsev, who for +the next thirty years was the most prominent exponent of the philosophy of +Slavophilism. This, which in its modern form may be traced back to 1835, +was in fact nothing else than a perverted glorification of the Russian +national characteristics which have been dwelt upon above. The Slavophils +declared not only that the Russians were a great and admirable nation, +which few who really know them will be disposed to deny, but that their +institutions--and in particular, of course, autocracy and bureaucracy--were +a perfect expression of the national genius which could hardly be improved +upon. Furthermore, it was maintained that, since all other countries but +Russia had taken a wrong turn and fallen into decadence and libertinism, it +was Russia's mission to bring the world back into the paths of rectitude +and virtue by extending the influence of her peculiar culture--and in +particular again, of course, its special manifestations, autocracy +and bureaucracy--as widely as possible. A variant of Slavophilism is +Panslavism, which works for the day when all members of one great Slav race +will be united in one nation, presumably under the Russian crown. Both +these movements are examples of that nationalism run mad to which reference +has been made in the second chapter.[1] But the Slavophils, who are of +course ardent supporters of the Orthodox Church, were faced at the outset +with a great difficulty; the western provinces of Russia, from the Arctic +to the Black Sea, contained masses of population which were neither Russian +nor Orthodox. The Finns in the north were Lutherans; the Poles in the +centre, though Slavs, were Roman Catholic in religion and anti-Russian in +sentiment; and the Jews in the centre and south were--Jews. The first +step, therefore, towards the Slavophil goal was the "Russification" of the +subject peoples of Russia. In theory "Russification" means conferring the +benefits of Russian customs, speech, and culture upon those who do not +already possess them; in practice it amounts to the suppression of local +liberties and traditions. + +[Footnote 1: See p. 57.] + +It is obvious that it is no easier to make a Jew into a Russian by force +than to change the skin of the proverbial Ethiopian; nor is it likely that +the Russian Government ever entertained the idea of making such an +attempt. If it had any definite plan at all, it was to render things so +uncomfortable to the unfortunate Hebrews that they would gradually leave +the country. Real persecution began at the accession of Alexander III. in +1881, when it spread into Russia, significantly enough, from Germany, where +a violent anti-Semite agitation had sprung up at the beginning of the year. +Riots directed against the Jews, and winked at if not encouraged by the +authorities, broke out in the towns of Southern Russia. Edicts followed +which excluded the Jews from all direct share in local government, refused +to allow more than a small percentage of Jews to attend the schools and +universities, forbade them to acquire property outside the towns, laid +special taxes upon their backs, and so on. This attitude of the Government +encouraged the populace of the towns to believe that they might attack the +Jews with impunity. The Jews are regarded in modern Russia in much the same +light as they were regarded by our forefathers in the Middle Ages. They are +hated, that is to say, on two counts: as unbelievers and as usurers. The +condition of affairs in a township where the population is half-Jewish, +half-Christian, and where the Christians are financially and commercially +in the hands of the Jews, and the Jews are politically and administratively +in the hands of the Christians, is obviously an extremely dangerous one. +Add to this the presence of a large hooligan section which is found in +almost every Russian town of any size, the open disfavour shown towards +the Jews by the Government, and the secret intrigues and incitement of the +police, and you get a train of circumstances which lead inevitably to those +violent anti-Semitic explosions, known as _pogroms_, which have stained the +pages of modern Russian history. The revolutionary movement has complicated +matters still further; for Jews are naturally to be found in the +revolutionary ranks, and the bureaucracy and its hooligan supporters have +tended to identify the Jewish race with the Revolutionary Party. Nothing +can excuse the treatment of the Jews in Russia during the last thirty-five +years, and the guilt lies almost entirely upon the Government, which, +instead of leading the people and educating them by initiating an +enlightened policy towards the Jews, a policy which might in fact have done +more than anything else to "Russify" the latter, has persistently aided and +abetted the worst elements of the population in their acts of violence. +It has reaped its reward in the rise of one of the most formidable of the +revolutionary parties in modern Russia, the so-called Jewish "Bund." The +Governor of Vilna, in a confidential report written in 1903, declared that +"this political movement is undoubtedly a result of the abnormal position +of the Jews, legal and economic, which has been created by our legislation. +A revision of the laws concerning the Jews is absolutely urgent, and every +postponement of it is pregnant with the most dangerous consequences." + +Yet when we condemn Russia for her _pogroms_ and her Jew-baitings, we must +not forget two facts: first, that these occurrences are the work, not of +the real Russian people, the peasantry which has been described above, but +of the dregs of the population which are to be found at the base of the +social structure in the towns of Russia as in towns nearer home; second, +that Russia is not the only country in the world that has these racial +problems to face. I once heard a Russian and an American discussing the +comparative demerits of their respective lands, and I am bound to say that +the former held his own very well. When, for example, the American said, +"What about the Jews?" the other answered, "Well, what about the negroes?" +and he parried the further question, "What about _pogroms_?" with another +of his own, "What about lynching?" The problems are not, of course, quite +on all fours, nor do two wrongs make a right, but a reminder that similar +problems exist in other parts of the world will perhaps be enough to show +that the Jewish question in Russia is neither unique nor at all easy to +solve. Let us, instead of visiting the sins of a few townships upon the +heads of the entire Russian nation, be thankful that we have no such +problems in our own islands. Recent riots outside the shops of German +pork-butchers in different parts of the country do not, it must be +confessed, lead one to hope that our people would behave much more calmly +and discreetly than the Whites of the Southern States or the Christians of +South-West Russia, were they placed in the same circumstances. + +The Polish question is at once simpler and its story less damaging to the +Russian Government than that of the Jews. The partitions, an account of +which has already been given,[1] were of course iniquitous, but, as we have +seen, Prussia must bear the chief blame for them. In any case, the Tsar +Alexander I. did his utmost for Poland at the Congress of Vienna in 1815. +He pleaded eloquently for a reunited Poland, and he almost won over Prussia +by making arrangements to compensate her for her Polish territory at the +expense of Saxony. But France, England, and Austria opposed his project, +and he was obliged to yield to the combined pressure of these powers. +Russia is, therefore, not more but less guilty of the present dismembered +state of Poland than her Western neighbours, among whom we must not forget +ourselves;[2] and she is to-day only attempting to carry out the promise +which she made, but was not allowed to fulfill, a century ago. Disappointed +as he was, Alexander I. made the best of a bad job by granting a liberal +constitution to that part of Poland which the Congress assigned to +Russia. Indeed he did everything possible, short of a grant of absolute +independence, which at that time would have been absurd, to conciliate +public opinion in the Grand-Duchy of Warsaw. Unfortunately the experiment +proved a complete failure, largely owing to the factious and self-seeking +Polish nobility who have always been the worst enemy of their country. +Alexander after a time lost patience, and in 1820 he felt compelled to +withdraw some of the liberties which he had conferred in 1815. After this +the breach between the Russian Government and the Polish people began to +widen, partly owing to stupid and clumsy actions on the side of Russia, +partly to the incurable lack of political common-sense on the side of the +upper classes in Poland, partly to the fact that the country could never +be anything but restless and unsatisfied while it remained divided. The +history of Russian Poland since the time of Alexander is the history of two +great failures to throw off the Russian yoke, the failure of 1830 and of +1863. These risings were marked by heroism, disunion, and incapacity on the +one side, and by relentless repression on the other. The upshot was that +Poland was deprived of her constitutional rights one by one, until finally +she became nothing more than so many provinces of Russia itself. To some +extent, however, the failure of 1863 proved a blessing in disguise. The +rising had been almost entirely confined to the nobility; Russia therefore +turned to the peasants of Poland, released them from all obligations to +work upon the estates of the large landowners, and handed over to them at +least half the land of the country as freehold property. The result of +this measure, and of the removal of the customs barrier between the two +countries in 1877, was twofold: the power of the factious nobility was +shattered for ever, and a marvellous development of industry took place in +Poland which has united her to Russia "with chains of self-interest +likely to prove a serious obstacle to the realisation of Polish hopes of +independence."[3] It is indeed doubtful whether at this date the +Poles cherish any such hopes. What they desire is national unity and +self-government rather than sovereign independence, and they know that they +are at least as likely to receive these from Russia as from Prussia. + +[Footnote 1: Pp. 24-27.] + +[Footnote 2: As a matter of fact our representative, Lord Castlereagh, was +Alexander's chief opponent at the Congress in the question of Poland. See +_Camb. Mod. Hist._ vol. x. p. 445.] + +[Footnote 1: _Camb. Mod. Hist._ vol. xi. p. 629.] + +While of late years the relations between Russia and Poland have steadily +improved, those between Russia and Finland, on the contrary, have grown +rapidly worse. Until 1809 Finland was a Grand-Duchy under the Swedish +crown, but in that year, owing to a war which had broken out between Russia +and Sweden, she passed into the control of the nearer and more powerful +State, after putting up a stubborn resistance to annexation which will +always figure as the most glorious episode in the annals of the country. +Alexander I., who was at that time Tsar, adopted the same policy towards +Finland as he did towards Poland. He refused to incorporate the new +province into the Russian State-system, he took the title of Grand-Duke +of Finland (thereby implying that she lay outside the Empire), and he +confirmed the ancient liberties of the Finns. Later on they even secured +greater liberty than they had possessed under Sweden by the grant of a +Finnish Diet, on the lines of the Swedish Diet in Stockholm, which should +have full control of all internal Finnish affairs. Finland, therefore, +gained much from the transfer; she possessed for the first time in her +history complete internal autonomy. This state of things lasted for +practically ninety years, during which period Finland made wonderful +progress both economic and intellectual, so that by the end of the +nineteenth century she was one of the happiest, most enlightened, and most +prosperous countries in Northern Europe. "As regards the condition of +Finland," Alexander I. had declared, "my intention has been to give +this people a political existence, so that they may not feel themselves +conquered by Russia, but united to her for their own clear advantage; +therefore, not only their civil but their political laws have been +maintained." This liberal policy was continued by the various Tsars +throughout the century, the reformer Alexander II. taking particular +interest in the development of the Grand-Duchy, which he evidently regarded +as a place where experiments in political liberty were being worked +out that might later be applied to the rest of Russia. The weakness of +Finland's position lay in the fact that her liberties really depended upon +the personal whim of the Grand-Duke: in theory her constitutional laws were +only alterable by the joint sanction of monarch and people; in practice the +small but courageous nation had no means of redress should the Tsar, +swayed by bureaucratic reaction, choose to go back upon the policy of his +ancestors. And in 1894 a Tsar mounted the throne, Nicholas II., who did so +choose. + +The word went forth for the "Russification" of Finland. After picking a +quarrel with the Diet on the military question, the Tsar on February 18, +1899, issued a manifesto suspending the Finnish Constitution and abolishing +the Diet. Finland became with a stroke of the pen a department of the +Russian Empire. A rigorous Press censorship was established, the hated +governor-general Bobrikoff filled the country with gendarmes and spies, +native officials were dismissed or driven to resign, an attempt was made +to introduce the Russian language into the schools, and, though the Finns +could only oppose a campaign of passive resistance to these wicked and +short-sighted measures, at the end of seven years the nation which had for +almost a century been the most contented portion of the Tsar's dominions +was seething with ill-feeling and disloyalty. The inevitable outcome was +the assassination of General Bobrikoff by a young student in June 1904; and +when the Russian universal strike took place in October 1905, the entire +Finnish nation joined in as one man. Finland regained her liberties for +a time, and immediately set to work putting her house in order by +substituting for her old mediaeval constitution a brand new one, based on +universal suffrage, male and female, and employing such up-to-date +devices as proportional representation. The only result of seven years' +"Russification" was the creation of a united democracy, with a strong +socialistic leaven, in place of a nation governed by an antiquated +aristocratic Diet, and divided into two hostile political camps on the +question whether Swedish or Finnish should be the language of the national +culture. But the fortunes of Finland were accidentally but inextricably +bound up with those of the party of reform in Russia, and when the +bureaucracy, after the downfall of the revolutionaries, found itself once +more firmly seated in the saddle, it returned to the attack on the Finnish +Constitution, not indeed with the open and brutal methods of Bobrikoff, but +by gradual and insidious means no less effective. And it must be admitted +that the Russian Duma, as "reformed" by Stolypin, so far from being of +any help to Finland in the struggle, has been made the instrument of the +destruction of her liberties. + +Finland is in a very unfortunate position. Geographically she is bound to +form part of the Russian Empire; even the extremest Russophobes in the +country have long ago given up hopes of re-union with Sweden; and yet the +frontier between Finland and Russia is one which divides two worlds, as all +who have made the journey from Helsingfors to Petrograd must have noticed. +In literature, art, education, politics, commerce, industry, and social +reform Finland is as much alive as any of the Scandinavian States from +whom she first derived her culture. In many ways indeed she is the most +progressive country in Europe, and it is her proud boast that she is +"Framtidsland," the land of the future. Lutheran in religion, non-Slavonic +in race, without army, court, or aristocracy, and consequently without +the traditions which these institutions carry with them, she presents the +greatest imaginable contrast to the Empire with which she is irrevocably +linked. Finland is Western of the Westerns, and keenly conscious of the +fact just because of this irrevocable link; Russia is--Russia! And yet, as +part of the Russian system, she must come to terms sooner or later with the +Empire; she cannot receive the protection of the Russian military forces, a +protection to the value of which, if reports be true, she is at the present +moment very much alive, and yet retain her claims to be what is virtually +an independent State. That these claims have been pitched on a high note +is no doubt largely the fault of the blundering and cruel policy of the +Russian bureaucracy. But it must be admitted that Finland has never tried +in the very least to understand her mighty neighbour; she has always sat, +as it were, with her back to Russia, looking westwards, and her statesmen +have not even taken the trouble to learn the Russian language. There has, +in fact, been something a little "priggish" in her superior attitude, in +her perpetually drawn comparison between Russian "barbarism" and Finnish +"culture." Though her capital, Helsingfors, is but twelve hours by rail +from Petrograd, Finland knows as little of the interior of Russia as people +do in England. + +The policy of the Russian Government, on the other hand, has been marked +by that inconsistency, political blindness, and arbitrariness which one +expects from an irresponsible bureaucracy. For ninety years Finland was +left alone to work out her own salvation, entirely apart from that of the +rest of the Empire; and then suddenly it was discovered that her coasts +were of the highest strategical importance, and that she was developing a +commercial and industrial system in dangerous competition with the tender +plant of commerce and industry in Russia itself. The Slavophils raised an +outcry, and the decree went out that the Russian whale should swallow this +active and prosperous little Jonah. The former policy was really as stupid, +though less cruel, than the latter. Had there been anything like that +steady political tradition and wide political experience in Russia which we +can draw upon in England, the Imperial Government would have from the first +endeavoured to draw Finland closer to the Empire, not by bands of steel and +iron but by the more delicate and more permanent ties of considerateness, +affection, and self-interest. It is political stupidity, based upon +ignorance and inexperience, and not inhumanity, which is the real +explanation of Russia's unfortunate relations with her subject peoples +during the past century. Moreover, the political machinery which has +hitherto served her own internal needs is the worst possible instrument for +dealing with provinces which possess a full measure of Western political +consciousness together with the traditions of political liberty. Russia, +therefore, requires representative institutions not merely for the +political education of her own people and as a check upon bureaucratic +tyranny and incompetency, but also in order that she may adopt some fair +and _consistent_ policy towards her subject nationalities. + +It may be optimistic, but I cannot help feeling that the present war will +do much for Russia, much for Finland, much for Poland. Russia is +fighting to defend a small nation against oppression, she is fighting +a life-and-death struggle with the military bureaucracy which we call +"Germany" for the moment, she is fighting on behalf of "liberty" and of the +"scraps of paper" upon which the freedom of States and individuals depends. +All this will leave a profound effect upon the national consciousness, and +may even bring home for the first time to the people at large the meaning +of political freedom. Russia is so vast, so loose in structure, so +undeveloped in those means of intercommunication such as roads, railways, +newspapers, etc., which make England like a small village-community in +comparison, that it takes the shock of a great war to draw the whole people +together. That it has done so, no one who has read the papers during the +last two months can doubt. War, as a historical fact, has always been +beneficial to Russia; the Crimean War led to the emancipation of the serfs, +the Japanese War led to the establishment of a Duma, and the present war +has already led to surprising results. The consumption of alcohol has been +abolished, concessions have been promised to a reunited Poland, and, +except against the unhappy Jews in the Polish war-area, there has been a +subsidence throughout the Empire of racial antagonism. It is the hope of +all who love Russia, and no one who really knows her can help loving her, +that these beginnings may be crowned not only with victory over Germany in +the field of battle but with victory over the German spirit in the world of +ideas, a victory of which the first-fruits would be the firm establishment +of representative government, a cleansing of the bureaucratic Augean +stables, and a settlement of the problem of subject nationalities upon +lines of justice and moderation. + +But whatever the outcome may be, let us in England be fair to Russia. +The road to fairness lies through understanding; and we have grossly +misunderstood Russia because we have not taken the trouble to acquaint +ourselves with the facts, the real facts as distinct from the newspaper +facts, of her situation. When those facts are realised, is it for us to +cast the first stone? Russia needs political reform, the tremendous task +of Peter the Great needs completing, the bureaucracy must be crowned +with representative institutions; but is Russia's need in the sphere of +political reform greater than ours in the sphere of social reform? + +Look at our vast miserable slums, our sprawling, ugly, aimless industrial +centres, inhabited by millions who have just enough education to be able to +buy their thinking ready-made through the halfpenny Press and just enough +leisure for a weekly attendance at the local football match and an annual +excursion to Blackpool or Ramsgate; who seldom, if ever, see the glorious +face of Nature and, when they do, gaze into it with blank unrecognising +eyes; whose whole life is one long round of monotony--monotonous toil, +monotonous amusements, monotonous clothes, monotonous bricks and +mortar;--until the very heaven itself, with its trailing cloud-armadas and +its eternal stars, is forgotten, and the whole universe becomes a cowl of +hodden grey, "where-under crawling cooped they live and die." And then look +at those other millions--the millions of Russia--look at the grand simple +life they lead in the fields, a life of toil indeed, but of toil sweet and +infinitely varied; Russia is their country, not merely because they live +there but because they--the peasants--now actually possess by far the +greater part of the arable land; God is their God, not because they have +heard of Him as some remote Being in the Sunday School, but because He +is very near to them--in their homes, in their sacraments, and in their +hearts; and so contentment of mind and soul is theirs, not because they +have climbed higher than their fellows, whether by the accumulation of +knowledge or wealth, but because they have discovered the secret of +existence, which is to want little, to live in close communion with nature, +and to die in close communion with God. + + + +BOOKS + + +MAURICE BARING. _The Mainsprings of Russia._ 1914. Nelson. 2s. net. + +This is an excellent introduction to the subject, recording as it does the +general impressions of an acute and sympathetic observer; it does not, of +course, pretend to be comprehensive, and says nothing, for example, of the +Jews, Poles, Finns, etc. + +BERNARD PARES. _Russia and Reform._ 1907. 10s. 6d. net. + +MILYOUKOV. _Russia and its Crisis._ 1905. 13s. 6d. net. + +MAURICE BARING. _The Russian People._ 1911. 15s. net. + +These three books may be consulted for the Revolution of 1905 and the +events which led up to it. Professor Milyoukov's book was actually +published before the Revolution, but its author was leader of the Cadet +party in the First Duma, and it is therefore something in the nature of +a liberal manifesto. Professor Pares' book, which is perhaps the most +penetrating and well-balanced of all and contains most valuable chapters +on the _Intelligentsia,_ does not, unfortunately, deal with the years of +reaction which followed the dissolution of the First Duma. Mr. Baring's +book may be recommended especially for the later chapters which deal with +the causes of the failure of the Revolution. All three contain a good deal +of sound historical matter. + +H.W. WILLIAMS. _Russia of the Russians._ 1914. 6s. net. + +ROTHAY REYNOLDS. _My Russian Year_. 1913. 10s. 6d. net. + +Two good books dealing with life in contemporary Russia. The first is the +best and most comprehensive treatment of the new Russia which has emerged +from the revolutionary period, and gives one not merely the political +but also the social and artistic aspect. The other book is lightly and +entertainingly written. + +STEPHEN GRAHAM. _Undiscovered Russia_. 1911. 12s. 6d. net. + +STEPHEN GRAHAM. _Changing Russia_. 1913. 7s. 6d. net. + +STEPHEN GRAHAM. _With the Russian Pilgrims to Jerusalem_. 1913. 7s. 6d. +net. + +Mr. Stephen Graham may be said to have discovered the Russian peasant for +English people, and his books give an extraordinarily vivid and sympathetic +picture of Russian peasant-life by one who knows it from the inside. They +afford also the best account of religion in Russia as a living force, while +those who wish to know more of the Orthodox Church as an institution may be +referred to chaps. xxvi. and xxvii. of Mr. Baring's _Russian People_; chap. +viii. of the same writer's _Mainsprings of Russia_; and chap. vi. of Sir +C. Eliot's (Odysseus) _Turkey in Europe_ (7s. 6d. net). The second of Mr. +Graham's books deals with the threatening industrial changes in Russia. The +third is a fine piece of literature as well as being the only account in +any language of one of the most characteristic figures in modern Russian +life--the peasant-pilgrim. + +SIR D.M. WALLACE. _Russia_. 2 vols. 1905. 24s. net. + +_Russia and the Balkan States._ Reprinted from the _Encyclopedia +Britannica._ 2s. 6d. net. + +Both these accounts, though written many years ago, have now been brought +up to date in view of present events. + +R. NISBET BAIN. _Slavonic Europe, 1447-1796_. 1908. 5s. 6d. net. + +F.H. SKRINE. _The Expansion of Russia, 1815-1900._ 1903. 4s. 6d. net. + +W.R. MORFILL. _Russia_. 1890. 5s. + +W.R. MORFILL. _Poland_. 1893. 5s. + +Are all useful for the history of Russia, and of her relations with Poland, +and Finland. Readers may also be referred to the _Cambridge Modern History_ +(vol. ix. chap. xvi.; vol. x. chaps. xiii., xiv.; vol. xi. chaps. ix., +xxii.; vol. xii. chaps. xii., xiii.). + +V O. KLUCHEFFSKY. _A History of Russia._ 3 vols. 1913. Dent. 7s. 6d. net +each. + +The standard economic and social history of Russia up to the reign of Peter +the Great. + +H.P. KENNARD. _The Russian Year-Book._ Eyre and Spottiswoode. 10s. 6d. net. + +Excellent for facts and figures. + +E. SEMENOFF. _The Russian Government and the Massacres._ 1907. 2s. 6d. net. + +An account of the _pogroms_ in Russia from the Jewish point of view. + +J.R. FISHER. _Finland and the Tsars, 1800-1899._ 1899. 12s. 6d. + +The best account in English of the history of Finland's relations with +Russia up to the beginning of the reactionary period. + +K.P. POBIEDONOSTSEV. _Reflections of a Russian Statesman._ 1898. 6s. For +Slavophilism. + +P. KHOPOTKIN. _Memoirs of a Revolutionist._ 1907. 6s. + +MAURICE BARING. _Russian Literature._ (Home University Library.) 1s. + +A. BRUeCKNER. _A Literary History of Russia._ 1908. 12s. 6d. net. + +MAURICE BARING. _Landmarks in Russian Literature._ 1910. 6s. net. + +The last-named are the best available books in English on Russian +literature. The works of the great Russian novelists are now accessible to +English readers. Nothing helps one to understand Russia so well as reading +the works of Tourgeniev, Tolstoi, and Dostoieffsky. The best translations +are those of Mrs. Garnett. The following are recommended to those who are +beginning the study of Russian literature and who are desirous of reading +novels which throw light on the springs of Russian life and thought:-- + +TOURGENIEV. _Fathers and Children._ Heinemann. 2s. net. + +A study of Russian Nihilism in the 'eighties, which may be read and +compared with Kropotkin's _Memoirs_. + +TOLSTOI. _War and Peace._ Heinemann. 3s. 6d. net. _Anna Karenin._ +Heinemann. 3s. 6d. net. + +The first of these is perhaps the finest treatment of war in modern +literature, the subject being the Russian campaign of Napoleon in 1812. No +other book gives one a better idea of the way the Russians make war and of +the essential greatness of the Russian national spirit. + +DOSTOIEFFSKY. _The Brothers Karamazov._ Heinemann. 3s. 6d. net. + +This, which is one of the greatest novels ever written, depicts, at once +relentlessly and with infinite tenderness, the spiritual conflict which has +agitated Russian society for at least fifty years past. + +JOSEPH CONRAD. _Under Western Eyes._ 6s. + +A powerful study of modern revolutionary types. Conrad, of course, is not a +Russian novelist, but he is of Polish origin. + +GOGOL. _The Inspector-General._ Walter Scott. 1s. net. + +A comedy first produced in Petrograd in 1836. Gogol is one of Russia's +classics. This play is a humorous treatment of bureaucratic corruption and +inefficiency. + + + +CHAPTER VI + +FOREIGN POLICY + + +The present war has raised in the minds of many men a question which we as +a people will soon be called upon to answer. Was this war necessary? Or was +it caused by the ambitions and foolishness of statesmen? Might it not have +been averted if the peoples of Europe had had more control over the way in +which foreign policy was carried on? + +Out of these questions has arisen a demand for the "democratisation of +foreign policy"; that is, for greater popular control over diplomatic +negotiations. In view of this, it becomes necessary for every British +citizen to gain some idea of what foreign policy is and by what principles +it should be governed. + +It is the purpose of this chapter to give, first, some account of the +actual meaning of the words "foreign policy," and then, secondly, to +consider how foreign policy may best be controlled in the interests of the +whole population of the British Empire, and in the interests of the world +at large. + + +A. THE MEANING OF FOREIGN POLICY + +Sec.1. _The Foreign Office._--To the ordinary man foreign policy is an affair +of mystery, and it not unnaturally rouses his suspicions. He does not +realise, what is nevertheless the simple truth, that he himself is both the +material and the object of all foreign policy. + +The business of the Government of a country is to maintain and further the +interests of the individual citizen. That is the starting-point of all +political institutions. The business of the Foreign Office is a part of +this work of Government, and consists in the protection of the interests of +the individual citizen where those interests depend upon the goodwill of a +foreign Government. + +But just as in domestic politics the individual citizen is inclined to +suspect--too often with truth--that the Government does not give impartial +attention to the interests of all the citizens, but is preoccupied in +protecting the interests of powerful and privileged persons or groups, so +in foreign policy the individual citizen is particularly prone to believe +that the time of the Foreign Office is taken up in furthering the interests +of rich bondholders or powerful capitalists. Moreover, the charge is +sometimes heard that some of the most powerful of these capitalists are +engaged in the manufacture of armaments, and that the Foreign Office +aims at securing orders from foreign Governments for these firms, thus +encouraging the nations of the world to provide themselves with means of +destruction. + +Now, just as no sensible man will say that Governments do not often oppress +the people under their care, so no sensible man will contend that Foreign +Offices do not sometimes sin in the same way. But let us try to give an +accurate picture of the work on which the British Foreign Office spends its +time. + +The organisation of the Foreign Office consists of: + +(1) An office, situated in Downing Street, manned by a number of clerks, +under the direction of the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. + +(2) The Diplomatic Service--that is to say, from three to eight officials +residing in the capital of each foreign country. In the more important +countries these officials are called an Embassy, and are under the +direction of an Ambassador; in the smaller countries they are called a +Legation, and are under the direction of a Minister. These Ambassadors and +Ministers receive instructions from and report to the Secretary of State +for Foreign Affairs, and are the mouthpiece of the British Government in +all business which Great Britain transacts with foreign countries. + +(3) The Consular Service--that is to say, a large number of officials, +called Consuls, distributed over all the towns of the world where British +subjects have important trade connections or where there are a considerable +number of British subjects. These Consuls are under the direction of the +Foreign Office and of the Embassy or Legation in the country where they +reside, and their business is to assist British trade and protect British +subjects. + + +Sec.2. _The Work of the Foreign Office._--The work of this whole organisation +may be divided into four classes: + +(1) The protection of individual British subjects. This protection often +extends to the most petty matters. Through the offices of a Consul and +of an Embassy or Legation flows day by day a continual stream of British +subjects who are in small difficulties or have small grievances against the +officials of the country. One old lady has lost her luggage; a working man +is stranded without work and wants to get back to England; a commercial +traveller has got into trouble with the customs officials and asks for +redress. But the protection thus given is often concerned with very +important matters, and is constantly employed on behalf of the poorest and +the most helpless. For instance, our officials in the United States are +constantly occupied, in assisting British immigrant working men and women +who are suffering hardships under the stringent provisions of the United +States immigration laws. + +(2) The furthering of British trade. It is the duty of the whole Foreign +Office organisation, but especially of the Consuls, to give advice to the +representatives of commercial firms, to report openings for the sale of +British goods abroad, and generally to give assistance to British trade +in its competition with foreign trade. Enquiries will, for instance, be +received by a Consul at a Chinese port from a manufacturer of pottery or +harness or tin-tacks, asking what type of goods will be likely to find +a market in that locality. The Consul will then enquire and give such +information as his local knowledge enables him to supply. Or again, +a foreign country will sometimes make regulations which hinder the +importation of English products. English oats may, for instance, be +affected with a blight which Italy fears may infect her crops if she allows +their importation. It may then become the duty of the British Embassy at +Rome to make arrangements with the Italian Government in order that English +farmers may not suffer by losing the market for their produce. But one +important point must be remembered, because it is too often forgotten by +those who criticise the Foreign Office. There is one general restriction on +the activities of the Foreign Office in assisting British trade: no British +official is allowed to invite, or try to persuade, any foreign Government +to give orders to British firms, whether for war material or for any other +article. + +What we have already said applies to the relations between civilised +countries. But the relations between civilised countries on the one hand, +and uncivilised or semi-civilised countries on the other hand, are very +much more difficult in many ways. Difficulties especially arise with regard +to commerce. Many of the less-developed countries of the world, such +as some South American countries and China, cannot, like their richer +neighbours, undertake the development of their own resources. They lack +money, scientific training, business ability, and so on. They therefore +give what are called "concessions" to foreign companies or capitalists; +that is, the Government of the country leases some industry for a term of +years to the foreign company. The Mexican Government, for instance, has +leased its oil-wells to English, American, and Dutch companies, and the +Chinese Government has largely confided the construction and management of +its railroads to English, French, and German companies. + +Now, in many countries where this happens, the Government is not strong +enough or permanent enough to guarantee proper security of tenure to the +foreign company to which it grants a concession; very likely some official +is bribed to grant the concession to one company and then bribed by another +company to cancel it, or the Government is overthrown by a revolution +and its successor cancels the concessions it has granted. By this means, +British workmen may be thrown out of work and their employment may pass +to workmen in the United States or Germany. Consequently, foreign +Governments--the Governments of civilised countries--gradually begin to +intervene and give protection to their subjects who have concessions in +such countries, provided that they have obtained their concessions in a +respectable and proper manner. Competition between the different foreign +companies then grows up; their Governments gradually begin to support them +against each other in this competition, until at last it becomes necessary +for the different Governments, if bad feeling is to be avoided, to try to +arrive at some arrangement among themselves, fixing the way in which +the concessions granted by this or that semi-civilised country shall be +distributed among the subjects of the Great Powers. Something like this has +been recently happening in China. + +To a certain extent this line of action seems to be necessary in dealing +with backward countries, and it may be made mutually beneficial both to +those countries themselves and to the commerce of the Great Powers, but, +on the other hand, the whole policy is obviously liable to great abuse. +Consequently, every self-respecting Government knows that all matters +relating to concessions must be treated with the greatest caution and +forbearance, and that the interests of all concerned will be best served +in the long run by gradually helping backward countries along the path of +civilisation and strengthening their Governments so that they may be able +to assume complete control of their own finance and commercial enterprises. + +We have now described roughly the personal and the commercial work of the +Foreign Office. This work covers all the immediate interests of individual +British citizens in regard to foreign countries. If each British subject +is protected when abroad, and if the trade and industry of the country on +which the welfare and livelihood of every individual citizen ultimately +depends is fostered and safe-guarded, then the primary duties of the +British Government in relation to other Governments have been discharged. + +But this is not enough. If the interests of the individual citizen of Great +Britain are to be permanently secured in relation to foreign countries, we +must be assured that the policy of foreign Governments is civilised and +generally friendly to British subjects. There must be a general rule of law +throughout the world on which British subjects can count with assurance of +safety. And so the Foreign Office has a third and even more important class +of work: + +(3) The maintenance of permanent good relations with foreign countries. +These good relations are secured, not only by continually friendly +communication with foreign Governments over innumerable questions of +policy, but also by the conclusion of a network of treaties, some of them +designed to establish international co-operation in particular social or +economic questions such, for instance, as the existing treaty between Great +Britain and France providing for the mutual payment of compensation under +the Workmen's Compensation Laws of the two countries, and others concluded +with the object of defining the mutual policy of different countries in +general matters such as the regulation of trade. The newest and most +important class of treaties are those which, like the Hague Conventions and +the treaties guaranteeing the neutrality of Belgium and Luxemburg, attempt +to lay down general rules of law which all countries agree to observe. +In other words, the office of diplomacy is to secure _certainty_ in the +government of the world, so that every man may know what to expect in +dealing with his fellow-man of a different nationality. + +It is difficult to describe adequately the complexity of this diplomatic +work. The economic and social systems of the world have become so involved +and intertwined that there is hardly anything one country can do which does +not react in some way on the interests of the subjects of another country. + +In every European country, and in the United States, the Government is +being more and more called upon to regulate the delicate economic and +social machinery on which modern life depends. Each Government adopts an +attitude towards such problems which is determined partly by the thought +and the beliefs of its public men, and partly by the course of historical +development through which each country has passed. There thus arises +gradually in each country a more or less definite policy with which the +country becomes identified. Formerly the policy of most European countries +was mainly confined to questions arising in Europe itself, but in these +days of industrial expansion the real aims of their policy generally lie +outside Europe. + +There are vast regions of the world where civilised government does not +exist, or is only beginning to exist, but where the citizens of civilised +countries travel and carry on trade. No civilised country can prevent its +traders going where they please--indeed, the prosperity of every great +country now depends to some extent at least upon its traders finding +new markets for the sale of their goods--but if these traders go to an +uncivilised country like Central Africa or the interior of China or the +South Sea Islands the civilised country not only feels obliged to protect +them there, but it must also, by every claim of justice and humanity, +prevent them from ill-using the uncivilised and helpless natives. + +The horrors which accompany the unregulated activity of foreign traders in +a savage country may be seen from the _Life of John G. Paton,_ a missionary +in the New Hebrides Islands of the Southern Pacific. These islands, before +they came under the government of any civilised Power, were visited by +European and American traders, especially traders in sandalwood. "The +sandalwood traders," wrote Paton, "are as a class the most godless of +men.... By them the poor defenceless natives are oppressed and robbed on +every hand; and if they offer the slightest resistance they are ruthlessly +silenced by the musket or revolver.... The sale of intoxicants, opium, +fire-arms, and ammunition by the traders among the New Hebrideans, had +become a terrible and intolerable evil." It became necessary for the +civilised Powers to prohibit, by international regulation, the sale of +fire-arms and intoxicants in the islands. Such international regulations +are always very difficult to enforce, and finally the administration of the +islands was taken over by Great Britain and France, who now govern them +jointly. + +Hence the civilised countries of the world have gradually been led to +assume jurisdiction in uncivilised regions, and have converted many of them +into colonies or "protectorates" or "spheres of influence." By this process +the interests of the nations of Europe reach out into all the far corners +of the earth, and constant care and arrangement is needed to prevent those +interests clashing. Where the interests of the different Powers do clash in +an uncivilised or semi-civilised part of the world a general international +agreement is often necessary to put things straight; for instance, during +recent years the interests of Germany, France, and Spain--and to a less +degree those of many other countries--were continually clashing in Morocco, +till it became necessary in 1906 to conclude a general international treaty +called the Algeciras Act, whereby the relations of all the Powers with +regard to Morocco were defined in great detail. + + +Sec.3. _The Balance of Power._--It is this continual attempt to arrange +matters and to keep the different Powers clear of each other in order that +their interests may not clash, which is the real underlying cause to-day of +what is known as the "Balance of Power." The doctrine of the "Balance +of Power" grew up at the end of the seventeenth and beginning of the +eighteenth century when Europe was threatened by the policy of aggression +and conquest undertaken by Louis XIV. of France. From that day onward, +European statesmen have sought to establish a definite European system and +to limit the growth of the European States in such a way as to ensure that +no State should be so strong as to threaten its neighbours. + +The history of this attempt has been somewhat as follows. A coalition of +the States of Europe was formed against the aggressions of Louis XIV. +After a series of wars a peace was signed at Utrecht in 1713 defining the +boundaries of the European States in such a way as to establish equality +and a balance of power between them. For about ten years European statesmen +attempted to maintain the system thus set up by means of what has since +come to be known as the "Concert of Europe"--that is, by means of a series +of international congresses where opportunity was given for the settlement +of disputes between the different States. Soon, however, it became +impossible to satisfy the ambitions of the rulers and peoples of Europe by +this means, and the Concert of Europe broke up. Wars followed, during which +those statesmen, especially in England, who believed in the "Balance of +Power" sought to prevent any European nation from being overwhelmed by its +enemies. To this end, England supported Austria against the attacks of +Prussia, and then later supported Prussia against a coalition formed by the +rest of Europe to crush her. Unfortunately neither England nor France had +sufficient strength or courage to prevent the partition of Poland between +Prussia, Russia and Austria, which constituted a fatal violation of the +Balance of Power. Peace did not return to Europe till 1815, when the whole +continent had been driven to combine for the overthrow of Napoleon. At the +Congress of Vienna in that year the "Concert of Europe" was revived, and +for more than thirty years it practically succeeded by means of a series +of international congresses in maintaining a stable and balanced system in +Europe. + +But this "Concert of Europe" was the very thing against which the +democratic forces on the continent finally rebelled, for the "Concert" took +the form of the so-called "Holy Alliance" between the rulers of Europe, +whose object was to prevent popular movements from disturbing the neat and +orderly peace which they had created. The system created by the Congress of +Vienna began to break down in 1848. Since then the warlike nationalist and +democratic movements in Europe, followed by the tremendous economic growth +of the European nations, have made it almost impossible to secure any +stable balance of power, though a more or less successful attempt to +establish such a balance in the affairs of south-eastern Europe was made at +the Congress of Berlin in 1878. The two Hague Conferences of 1899 and 1907 +did little but reveal the mutual fears and suspicions of the European +nations, though many statesmen, especially English and American, laboured +sincerely to make the Hague Conventions the guarantee of a lasting peace. +But it must be observed that the "Balance of Power," which was originally a +distinctly European conception, has now become a world-wide conception. In +order to secure a balance of power between the European States it is no +longer sufficient to settle European frontiers; it is necessary to settle +and, as it were, dovetail into each other the economic interests of the +European countries in Africa, Asia, and the Southern Pacific. It is also +necessary to define the relations of European countries to the States in +North and South America. + +What is the conclusion to be drawn from this history? The idea of the +Balance of Power is unsatisfactory. You cannot really "balance" living +forces. Nations are not dead masses which can be weighed against each +other, but living growths which expand according to obscure natural laws. +Human laws can never stop natural growth; growth can only be stopped by +death, and so the Balance of Power seems to necessitate continual conflict. +And so, at least twice in the last two centuries, the attempt to maintain a +stable European system by a peaceful "Concert of Europe" has broken down. +Once, in the Holy Alliance, that Concert itself became an intolerable +tyranny. Many men to-day hope to secure peace by re-establishing the +Concert of Europe on a democratic basis, but it may well be doubted whether +any such system can be permanent, unless there be a radical reform in the +mind and character not only of European statesmen but of the European +peoples. We shall discuss this later, but meanwhile we may say this at +least. A balance of power is an imperfect conception. It is a rough and +ready--almost barbarous--policy. The best that can be said for it is that +no alternative policy has been devised, or at least none has succeeded. +Every one of us who has a spark of idealism believes that the day will come +when it shall give place to some more perfect system. But at the present +day not only international politics but also home politics are governed +by this idea of a balance of power. No democracy has yet been able to +establish itself in any country except by virtue of a continual conflict +between class and class, between interest and interest, between capital and +labour, and international conflicts are but the reflection of the domestic +conflicts within each State; both are continual unsuccessful attempts to +reach a stable equilibrium, and they can only be ended by a true fusion of +hearts and wills. + + +Sec.4. _The Estimation of National Forces._--It has been necessary to +undertake this long discussion in order to give a more or less clear idea +of the work done by diplomacy in maintaining a stable international system. +Arising out of this we have now to consider the fourth class of work--and +the most difficult--which the Foreign Office has to perform. For want of a +better name we may call it-- + +(4) The estimation of national forces. Nations are not mere agglomerations +of individuals; they have each their own character, their own feelings, +and their own life. Science has done little to determine the laws of +their growth, but, as we have seen, each nation does grow, reaches out +slowly--almost insensibly--in this or that direction, and gathers to itself +new interests which in their turn give new impulse to its growth. Perhaps +the best simile that we can use for the foreign policy of the world is that +of a rather tangled garden, where creepers are continually growing and +taking root in new soil and where life is therefore always threatening +and being threatened by new life. The point is that we are dealing with +_life_--with its growth and decay; not with the movements of pieces on a +chequer-board. + +Now, the Foreign Office largely exists in order to watch this growth and, +like a gardener, to train and lead it in directions where it can +expand without danger. But for this work intimate knowledge is +necessary--knowledge not so much of the personal character or policy of +those who govern the different nations, but knowledge of the character, +the economic needs, the beliefs, the feelings, and the aspirations of the +half-dumb millions who form and ultimately determine the life of each +nation. The diplomatist must study every political and social movement +which goes on in a nation; he must estimate the effect which the national +system of education is having on the mind of the nation; he must form an +idea of the lessons which the Government of his own country should learn +from the government of other countries, whether it be, for instance, +lessons in constitutional government or in municipal sanitation; and he +must above all be able to warn his Government of the dangers to his own +country which the growth of foreign countries seems to entail, in order +that peaceful measures may be taken in time to prevent a collision. + +This, then, is a rough account of the actual work of diplomacy. It is not a +full account. There are many wrong things done which deserve criticism, but +which we have not had space to mention. There is also much self-sacrificing +and thankless work done by diplomatists and consuls in distant parts of the +world--much seeming drudgery which can hope for no reward--many honourable +services rendered to the public of which the public never hears. But the +above account will suffice to give a rough idea of the organisation with +which we are dealing, and we may now pass on to consider the question of +how this organisation should be managed and controlled. + + +B. THE DEMOCRATISATION OF FOREIGN POLICY + +This phrase is rapidly becoming a political catchword. As such it requires +to be approached with the utmost caution. Before going further it is +necessary to test the assumptions underlying it and to inquire how far they +really correspond to the facts. + + +Sec.1. _Democracy and Peace._--First of all, the main assumption made by +Englishmen who advocate the democratisation of foreign policy is that +international peace would thereby be assured. True, the extension of the +democratic principle is to many men an end in itself, quite apart from the +question whether it tends to peace. But great masses of men are not moved +to make political demands merely by theoretical considerations; it is the +pressure of definite and imminent evils which arouses them to action. In +the case of England the demand for greater democratic control in the sphere +of foreign policy arose in large measure from the sudden realisation, in +the late summer of 1911, at the time of the so-called Agadir crisis, that +war between this country and Germany was a possibility with which English +statesmen and the English people had to reckon. We had felt the breath +of war actually on our cheek, and a large section of English sentiment +revolted from it. A demand was raised for a democratic policy of peace. +Three years later, on August 3, 1914, when Parliament met to decide the +happiness or sufferings of the quarter of the human race comprised in the +British Empire, the same demand was voiced in a series of speeches which +accurately expressed the belief that peace was the policy of the people, +while war was the secret aim of their rulers. Mr. T. Edmund Harvey, M.P., +spoke as follows: + +"I am convinced that this war, for the great masses of the countries of +Europe, and not for our own country alone, is no people's war. It is a war +that has been made ... by men in high places, by diplomatists working in +secret, by bureaucrats who are out of touch with the peoples of the world, +who are the remnant of an older evil civilisation which is disappearing by +gradual and peaceful methods." + +Mr. Ponsonby, M.P., spoke in the same sense: + +"I trust that, even though it may be late, the Foreign Secretary will use +every endeavour to the very last moment, disregarding the tone of messages +and the manner of Ambassadors, but looking to the great central interests +of humanity and civilisation to keep this country in a state of peace." + +Democracy means peace;--can we accept this assumption? Contrasts are +sometimes illuminating, and it may be well to turn from the Parliamentary +debate of August 3 to an article written sixty-two years ago in an English +review by the greatest democrat of his time. In April 1852 Mazzini +published in the _Westminster Review_ an appeal to England to intervene on +the Continent in favour of the revolutionary movements in progress there +since 1848. The following is an extract from that article: + +"The menace of the foreigner weighs upon the smaller States; the last +sparks of European liberty are extinguished under the dictatorial veto of +the retrograde powers. England--the country of Elizabeth and Cromwell--has +not a word to say in favour of the principle to which she owes her +existence. If England persist in maintaining this neutral, passive, selfish +part, she will have to expiate it. A European transformation is inevitable. +When it shall take place, when the struggle shall burst forth at twenty +places at once, when the old combat between fact and right is decided, +the peoples will remember that England had stood by, an inert, immovable, +sceptical witness of their sufferings and efforts.... England will find +herself some day a third-rate power, and to this she is being brought by a +want of foresight in her statesmen. The nation must rouse herself and shake +off the torpor of her Government." + +Mr. Ponsonby appealing in the name of the people to Sir Edward Grey to +stand aloof from European war; Mazzini appealing in the name of the people +to the respectable, peaceable, middle classes of England to forsake +Cobden's pacifist doctrines and throw England's sword into the scale of +European revolution--it is a strange contrast which serves to remind us +that the word "democracy," so lightly bandied about by political parties, +has many different meanings and has stood for many different policies. It +may be roughly said that it stood for internationalism in 1792, when France +claimed as her mission the liberation of all nations under the tricolor; +it stood for nationalism in 1848 in the mouth of Mazzini, Kossuth and the +German constitutional party; to-day it again stands for internationalism +in the more advanced countries of Europe, but are we justified as yet in +calling this more than a phase in the development of democratic doctrine? +It is a very difficult question, which it would be presumptuous to try to +answer offhand; all we have tried to show here is that, on the whole, the +assumption as to the peaceful tendencies of a democratic foreign policy is +a doubtful one, on which we must to some extent reserve our judgment. + + +Sec.2. _Foreign Policy and Popular Forces._--The above considerations will +help us to appreciate at its true value the second main assumption which +lies behind the demand for increased democratic control of foreign +policy--namely, the assumption that the stuff of international politics +is at present spun from the designs of individual statesmen, and has no +relation to the needs of the peoples they govern. Stated thus, this idea +will not bear examination for a moment. The doctrine of the "economic +interpretation of history," which has received perhaps its most emphatic +expression in the teaching of Marxian socialists, is now in one form or +another accepted by all thinking men. But "economics" is after all a rough +name for the sum of the ordinary needs and efforts of every single human +being, and the economic interpretation of history means that the history of +the world is in the long run determined by the cumulative force of these +humble needs and efforts. This and this alone is the real stuff of +international politics. Statesmen may attempt to found systems, but the +only real force in international as in domestic politics is the education +of the individual man's desires. It is indeed open to any critic to say +that our present capitalist economic system is responsible for war because +it dams up and diverts from their true channels the needs and the efforts +of the mass of mankind. But to this an Englishman may fairly answer that +the free trade system under which our capitalist organisation has reached +its greatest development was built up by the Manchester School with the +sincere and avowed object of introducing universal peace. Cobden avowed +this object clearly: + +"I see," he said, "in free trade that which shall act on the moral world +as the law of gravitation in the universe, drawing men together, thrusting +aside the antagonism of race and creed and language and uniting us in the +bonds of eternal peace... I believe that the desire and motive for large +and mighty empires, for gigantic armies and mighty navies ... will die +away." + +Yet, in spite of these aspirations, great wars have come to England, +not once, but at least three times, since these words were spoken, and +armaments are immeasurably larger than ever before. + +Let us understand one thing clearly in connection with the present war. Mr. +Ponsonby, in the words already quoted, implored Sir E. Grey to "look to the +great central interests of humanity and civilisation," and to preserve the +neutrality of England in those interests. But at the moment at which he +spoke the eyes of English statesmen were looking at one thing alone. It was +not a question of what French statesmen expected them to do. The British +Government had explained quite clearly to French statesmen that they must +not expect armed support from England. This fact had been made clear to the +French Foreign Office long before in a series of conversations between the +statesmen, and it had been embodied in a letter from Sir E. Grey to the +French Ambassador. But when the shadow of war actually fell on France these +conversations and this letter faded into the background. It was no longer a +question of what the French President expected from the King of England. It +was a question of what Jacques Roturier, artisan in the streets of Paris, +knowing that the Germans were on the frontier and might be dropping their +shells into Paris in a fortnight, expected from John Smith, shopkeeper in +the East India Dock Road, London, safe behind the English Channel from all +the horrors of war. That was, not rhetorically but in all soberness of +fact, the real "international obligation" on August 3, 1914; for though +treaties are made by statesmen they are in the long run interpreted, not +by statesmen, but by the public opinion which becomes slowly centred on +them--by the hopes and fears of millions of working men and women who have +never read the terms of the treaty but to whom it has become the symbol of +a friendship on which they can draw in case of need. The magistrate may +write the marriage lines, but the marriage becomes what the husband and +wife make it--a thing far deeper and more binding than any legal contract. + +In the light of these considerations, we can establish one point of supreme +importance in dealing with foreign policy--namely, that the causes of war +are very different from the immediate occasions of war. When the British +Government, at the outbreak of the present war, published a White Paper +containing the diplomatic correspondence between July 20 and August 4, +1914, they were publishing evidence as to the immediate occasion of +war--namely the Austrian ultimatum of July 23 to Serbia which brought on +the war. In the twelve days which intervened between the delivery of that +ultimatum and the declaration of war between England and Germany, the +negotiations on which hung the immediate fate of Europe were, it is true, +conducted by a few leading statesmen. But it is of little use to argue +whether or not these negotiations were conducted ill or well, for they were +not the real _cause_ of the war. The cause of the war must be sought in the +slow development of forces which can be traced back for years, and even for +centuries. It was comparatively futile for Parliament to discuss whether +this or that despatch or telegram was wise or unwise; the real questions to +be asked were--What produced the crowds in Vienna surging round the Serbian +Legation at the end of June, and round the Russian Embassy at the end of +July; what produced the slow, patient sympathy for the Balkan peoples and +hatred for Austria in the heart of millions of Russian peasants; what +produced the Servian nationalist movement; above all, what produced that +strange sentiment throughout Germany which could honestly regard the +invasion of Belgium as justifiable? To answer those questions we have to +estimate the force of the most heterogeneous factors in history:--for +instance, on the one hand, the slow break-up of the Turkish Empire, +extending over more than two centuries, which has allowed the cauldron of +the Slavonic Balkan peoples to boil up through the thin crust of foreign +domination; and on the other hand, the gradual development of the whole +system of German State education, and the character of the German +newspapers, which have turned the eyes of German public opinion in upon +itself and have excluded from public teaching and from the formation of +thought every breath of fresh air from the outside world, until at last +German public sentiment, through extreme and incessant self-contemplation, +has lost the calmness and simplicity which were once the strength of the +German character. No man can allot the responsibility for these things, +spreading as they do over generations; but assuredly the responsibility +does not rest with the half-dozen Ministers for Foreign Affairs who were in +power in July 1914. + +If we are right in what we have said above, then the phrase "the +democratization of foreign policy" takes on a new meaning. It does not +mean merely the introduction into foreign policy of any set of democratic +institutions; it means the realisation by both statesmen and people that +foreign policy is already in its essence a fundamentally democratic thing, +and that the success or failure of any line of action depends not upon the +desires of politicians but upon the mighty forces which move and determine +the life of peoples. + +At present the statesmen do not realise this sufficiently, and hence comes +much futile and aimless talking and writing among politicians who fancy +that what they say or write to each other in their studies can determine +the course of the world. In order to enable diplomatists to discharge all +the duties we have already enumerated under the heading of "the estimation +of national forces," they need to have a better training and a fuller +knowledge of the life and social movements both of their own country and +of foreign countries. The Royal Commission on the Civil Service was still +considering, when war broke out, how this could be accomplished. It is too +long a question to enter on here, but it may safely be said that the more +the problem is examined the more does it appear to be, like the wider +problem of the whole body of 200,000 civil servants in the United Kingdom, +a question of national education, and not a mere matter of Government +regulations and democratic institutions. What is required, in the Foreign +Office, as in the whole British civil service, has been well expressed by +Mr. Graham Wallas in his book _Human Nature in Politics_: + + +"However able our officials are and however varied their origin, the danger +of the narrowness and rigidity which has hitherto so generally resulted +from official life would still remain and must be guarded against by every +kind of encouragement to free intellectual development." + + +Sec.3. _Foreign Policy and Education_.--But if statesmen do not sufficiently +realise the strength of existing popular forces in foreign policy, it is +equally true that the people themselves do not realise it. The people of +every country are inclined to think that they can alter the destiny of +nations by ousting one foreign minister from power and setting up another; +they think that speeches and the resolutions passed by congresses can +change fundamental economic facts. They think that mere expressions of +mutual goodwill can take the place of knowledge, and they forget that no +nation can shake itself free in a moment from the historical development +which has formed it, just as no man can wholly shake himself free from +the character which he has inherited from his ancestors. Indeed all our +phrases--our whole attitude of mind--shows how little we, as a people, +realise popular forces. We commonly speak, for instance, of Russia as if +nothing in that vast country had any influence on foreign affairs except +the opinions of a few bureaucrats in Petrograd. Our sympathy for +or hostility to Russia is determined by our opinion of the Russian +bureaucracy, and we never spare a thought for the hopes and fears and the +dumb but ardent beliefs of millions of Russian peasants. We are apt to +dismiss them from our minds as ignorant and superstitious villagers +tyrannised over by the Tsar, without troubling to enquire narrowly into the +real facts of Russian life. We thus make precisely the same mistake that +diplomatists too often make. We forget that the masses of peasants who flow +every year on pilgrimage to the shrines of their religion constitute a more +vital fact in the history of the world than the deliberations of the Duma +or the decisions of police magistrates. + +Here we have a lesson to learn from Germany, for German statesmen, +strangely enough, have taken immense trouble to make their policy a +democratic one. The whole German nation is behind them because for +years and years they have taught the nation through the schools, the +universities, and the press, their own reading of history and their own +idea of what true civilisation is. They have adapted their teaching to the +fundamental characteristics and to the history of the German people. They +have taken pains to ally the interests alike of capital and labour to their +policy, and to fuse the whole nation by a uniform national education and by +a series of paternal social reforms imposed from above. The real strength +and danger of Germany is not what her statesmen or soldiers _do_, but what +Germans themselves _believe_. We are fighting not an army but a false idea; +and nothing will defeat a false idea but the knowledge of the truth. + +When this war is over, whatever its outcome may be, we must try to +introduce a new era into the history of the world. But our fathers and our +fathers' fathers have tried to do this same thing, and we shall not succeed +if we go about the work in a spirit of self-sufficiency and hasty pride. +Only knowledge of the truth will enable us to succeed. Knowledge of the +truth is not an easy thing; it is a question of laborious thought, mental +discipline, the humility which is content to learn and the moral courage +which can face the truth when it is learnt. How are we to gain these +things? + +First of all, by schools, universities, classes--all the machinery of our +national and private education. + +Then, by the same means as popular government employs in other matters--by +discussion, by debates in Parliament, by criticism of the Government. Now, +these means are not employed at present partly because it is feared that +criticism of the Government in matters of foreign policy will weaken its +hands in dealing with foreign nations. This is a just fear if criticism +merely springs from the critics' personal likings or prejudices, but +no such evil effects need be feared if the criticism springs from deep +thought, from knowledge of the facts and from the patience and wisdom +which thought and knowledge bring. But partly also effective discussion +of foreign politics does not exist because we are more interested in home +politics. We really have, if we cared to use it, as much democratic control +over the Foreign Office under our constitution as over any Government +Department, for the Foreign Office, like every other Department, is under +the control of a member of Parliament, elected by the people. But we +are more interested in social reform, in labour legislation, and in +constitutional reform than in foreign politics; and so it is on questions +of home policy that we make and unmake Governments, and when we discuss +whether a Conservative or a Liberal Government ought to be in power, we +never think what effect the change would have on foreign policy. If the +democracy is to take a real part in foreign politics, it must recognise +that great responsibilities mean great sacrifices. We must be content to +think a little less of our internal social reform, and give more of our +attention to the very difficult questions which arise beyond the Channel +and beyond the Atlantic Ocean. We must live constantly in the consciousness +that the world to-day is one community, and that in everything we do as +a people we bear a responsibility not to ourselves alone but to the +population of the British Empire as a whole and to the family of nations. + +But when we have really set ourselves to understand and discharge the +responsibilities of foreign policy, how shall we, the people of this +country, make our opinions effective? How can we be sure that the Foreign +Office will carry out a policy corresponding to the considered convictions +which we as a people have formed? + +As already stated, we have in our hands the same means of Parliamentary +control over foreign policy as over internal policy. Parliament can +overthrow a Government whose policy it disapproves, and it can refuse to +grant supplies for the carrying out of such a policy. Short of this, the +people can express through Parliament its views as to the way in which +foreign policy should be conducted, and generally Ministers will bow, in +this as in other matters, to the clearly expressed views of Parliament. We +have, in fact, recently seen a striking example of this. When after the +international crisis of 1911 the country clearly expressed the opinion that +no secret engagements should be entered into with any Power which would +force Great Britain to go to war in support of that Power, the Prime +Minister stated, and has repeated his statement emphatically on several +subsequent occasions, that the Government of this country neither had +entered, nor would enter, into any such secret engagements, and that any +treaty entailing warlike obligations on this country would be laid before +Parliament. This has now become a fixed and recognised fact in British +policy, and it is not too much to say that, like other constitutional +changes under the British system of government, it is rapidly becoming a +part of the unwritten constitution of the country. + +But many people would like to go beyond this, and lay down that no treaty +between Great Britain and another country shall be valid until it has been +voted by Parliament. Many countries have provisions of this kind in their +constitutions; for instance, the constitution of the United States provides +that all treaties must be ratified by a two-thirds majority of the Senate, +and the French constitution contains the following provision: + +"The President of the Republic negotiates and ratifies treaties. He brings +them to the knowledge of the Chamber so soon as the interests and the +safety of the State permit. + +"Treaties of peace and of commerce, treaties which impose a claim on the +finances of the State, those which relate to the personal status and +property rights of French subjects abroad, do not become valid until they +have been voted by the two Chambers. No cession, exchange, or increase of +territory can take place except by virtue of a law." + +Such constitutional provisions may be good in their way, and it may be +that we should copy them. But the question is one of secondary importance. +Whether treaties must actually be ratified by Parliament, or merely laid +before Parliament for an expression of its opinion, as is commonly done in +this country, the Parliament and people of Great Britain will have control +over foreign policy just in the measure that they take a keen interest in +it. If they take a keen interest no statesman dependent for his position +on the votes of the electorate will dare to embody in a treaty a policy of +which they disapprove; while if they do not take an adequate interest, +no amount of constitutional provisions will enable them to exercise an +intelligent control over the actions of statesmen. + +The same may be said of another expedient adopted in many countries; +namely, the appointment by Parliament of Committees on Foreign Affairs, +with power to call for papers and examine Ministers on their policy. +Democratic government both in foreign and internal affairs has hitherto +rested on the idea that Parliament should have adequate control over the +principles on which policy is conducted, but must to a large extent leave +the details of administration to the executive departments which are +controlled by the Ministers of the Crown. Parliament, whether through +committees or otherwise, will never be able to follow or control all +diplomatic negotiations, any more than it can control all the details +of the administration necessary to carry out a complicated law like the +Insurance Act; and Committees of Parliament, however useful, will have +no influence unless the people of the country so recognise their +responsibilities in foreign politics that they will demand from the men +whom they elect to Parliament a judgment and a knowledge of foreign +affairs, at least as sound and well based as they now require in the case +of internal affairs. + +It will be seen that this imposes a very difficult task on the British +electorate. How are they to weigh foreign affairs and internal affairs +against each other? What are they to do if they approve the internal policy +of a Government, but disapprove of its foreign policy, or _vice versa_? Are +we, for instance, to sacrifice what we believe to be our duty in foreign +affairs in order that we may keep in power a Government which is carrying +out what we believe to be a sound policy of internal social reform? It +is here, it would seem, that some reform is really needed. There is one +solution: namely, to separate the control of domestic affairs on the one +hand and foreign affairs on the other, placing domestic affairs in the +hands of a Parliament and and a Cabinet who will stand or fall by their +internal policy alone, and entrusting foreign affairs to an Imperial +Parliament and an Imperial Cabinet formed of representatives not of Great +Britain alone but of the whole British Empire. This is an idea which merits +the most careful consideration by the people of the United Kingdom, for it +may well be doubted whether any real popular control of foreign policy is +possible until some such division of functions takes place. One word in +conclusion. If it is true that domestic policy and foreign policy are +separate functions of Government, it is also true that the domestic policy +of a country in the long run determines its foreign policy. International +peace can never be attained between nations torn with internal dissensions; +international justice will remain a dream so long as political parties and +schools of thought dispute over the meaning of justice in domestic +affairs. A true ideal of peace must embrace the class struggle as well as +international war. If we desire a "Concert of Europe" which shall be based +on true freedom and not on tyranny, it behoves us to realise our ideal +first in England, and to raise our country itself above the political and +social conflicts and hatreds which have formed so large and so sordid a +part of our domestic history for the last decade. + + + +BIBLIOGRAPHY + + +It is difficult to give a list of books illustrating foreign policy in +general. The lists given in other chapters sufficiently illustrate the +various problems with which foreign policy to-day has to deal. + +The diplomacy of a century ago is well illustrated by the _Diaries and +Correspondence of the Earl of Malmesbury_. 4 vols. 1844. (Out of print.) +For the diplomacy of the middle of the nineteenth century, when the present +national forces of Europe were being created, the following biographies are +useful: + +_Life of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe_, by Lane-Poole. 2 vols. 1888. + +_Life of Lord Granville_, by Lord Fitzmaurice. 2 vols. 1905. + +_Life of Lord Clarendon_, by Sir Herbert Maxwell. 2 vols. 1913. + +_Life of Lord Lyons_, by Lord Newton. 2 vols. 1898. + +_Life of Cavour_, by Roscoe Thayer. 2 vols. 1911. + +_Bismarck's Reflections_. + +There are many studies of the diplomatic problems of the present day, but +as they deal with history in the making they are to be read for the general +survey they give of forces at work rather than as authoritative statements. +A very comprehensive survey of all the complexities of international +politics will be found in Fullerton's _Problems of Power_ (1913). 7s. 6d. +net. + +The actual workings of diplomacy may best be seen in the "White Books" of +diplomatic correspondence, periodically published by the Foreign Office, +such, for instance, as the successive volumes of _Correspondence Respecting +the Affairs of Persia_. Perhaps the best idea of the actual labour of +foreign relations can be gained by consulting such compilations as +Hertslet's _Commercial Treaties_--23 vols. 1827-1905--which are a record of +work actually completed. + +On the staffing of the Foreign Office and the Diplomatic Service, see the +fifth Report of the Royal Commission on the Civil Service (Cd. 7748), just +published (5-1/2 d.). + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE ISSUES OF THE WAR + +"March ahead of the ideas of your age, and it will follow you: go +with them, and you can feel at ease: remain behind them, and you are +lost."--NAPOLEON III. + + +Sec.1. _Is there an Idea behind the War?_--The object of the preceding +chapters has been to provide the historic background without which it is +impossible to understand either the motives of our opponents or the events +which led up to their quarrel. It is now necessary to attempt a survey of +the issues raised by the war, both as concerns Europe as a whole and the +individual nations which form its component parts. This is a task of no +small difficulty, for just as it is true to say that no war in the previous +history of mankind has ever been waged on so huge a scale as this, so it is +also true to say that the issues raised by it are vaster and more varied +than those of any previous European conflict. It is as though by the +pressure of an electric button some giant sluice had been opened, +unchaining forces over which mortal men can hardly hope to recover control +and whose action it is wellnigh impossible to foresee. + +Yet complex as is the problem before us, it is essential that we should +face it bravely. There is grave danger lest, just as we have been "rushed +into" this war (through no fault of ours, as the diplomatic correspondence +abundantly proves), so we may at a given moment be "rushed out" of it, +without having reached any very clear idea as to what issues are involved, +and how far our vital interests have been affected. + +The essence of the problem before us is to discover whether there is an +Idea behind this war--whether on our own side or on that of the enemy. A +dangerous question, this!--a question posed again and again by the jingoes +and the fanatics of history, and invariably answered according to the +dictates of their own convenience. And yet a question which we dare not +shirk, a question which a Carlyle, a Ruskin, a William Morris would not +have hesitated to formulate. Does Britain stand for an Idea? Is it true +that we are fighting in the main for the cause of Liberty and Democracy, +for progress in Europe and the world at large? And if this be really true +to-day, how can we best ensure that it shall still be true at the close +of this long war, if, as we hope and pray, victory crowns the arms of +the Allies? It was an Idea that nerved Britain for the struggle against +Napoleon. It was an Idea that inspired Germany in the great uprising of +1813 against Napoleon. It was an Idea that brought the Balkan League +into being and carried its armies in triumph to Salonica and Adrianople. +Freedom, Unity, Liberation, such were the forms which that Idea took: the +determination of a free people to resist an upstart despot's designs +of world-dominion; the enthusiasm of a divided nation for the dream of +national unity; the longing of races which had but recently won their own +freedom, to emancipate their kinsmen from an alien and oppressive yoke. +In each of these struggles error and even crimes were committed by the +victors, and yet it is a thousand times true to assert that the victorious +Idea represented in each case the triumph of civilisation. To-day the +position is equally clear. In opposing Germany's claim to override +international treaty obligations to suit the convenience of her military +strategists, in associating ourselves with Belgium and Serbia in their +vindication of the rights of the smaller nations, we are not merely +resisting a fresh bid for world-dominion on the part of a single power, but +are challenging the theory that Might is superior to Right in the political +world. + + +Sec.2. _The Aims of British Statesmanship._--Mr. Asquith on September 19 +defined as follows the three main aims of British statesmanship in entering +upon war: "(1) To vindicate the sanctity of treaty obligations and what is +properly called the public law of Europe, (2) to assert and to enforce +the independence of free States, relatively small and weak, against the +encroachments and the violence of the strong, and (3) to withstand, as +we believe in the best interests not only of our own Empire, but of +civilisation at large, the arrogant claim of a single Power to dominate the +development of the destinies of Europe." In speaking thus, Mr. Asquith had +no intention of placing Britain upon a moral pedestal or of suggesting that +we have ever enjoyed a monopoly of political right dealing. Every nation +has blots upon its scutcheon; and the cynic may point to the Irish Union, +the destruction of the Danish fleet, the Cyprus Convention, as proofs that +we have richly earned the name of "Perfidious Albion." Let us forego the +patriotic retort which would fling in Prussia's teeth such incidents as the +conquest of Silesia, the partition of Poland, the Ems telegram, the seizure +of Kiaochau. But let us, while admitting our shortcomings in the past, nail +our colours to the mast and insist that this war shall never degenerate +into one of mere revenge or aggrandisement, that the fate of the nations of +Europe shall be decided, so far as possible, in accordance with their own +aspirations rather than the territorial ambitions of dynasties or racial +cliques. + +Is it, then, possible, when considering the lines of settlement, to lay +down any general principles? The Europe which we have known has gone +beyond recall; the new Europe which is coming to birth will be scarcely +recognisable to those who have known its predecessor. Its political, +racial, social, economic outlook will be radically changed. Let us then +meet fate halfway and admit boldly that we _want_ a new Europe. But let us +bear in mind the fiery process by which a huge bell is forged and the fate +which befell the impatient apprentice who opened the furnace doors too +soon. The Prussian leaders, to whom war is an ideal and a programme, are +entitled, if fortune should desert them, to manoeuvre for a "draw"; for +they would console themselves with the hope of winning a subsequent match. +But to us, who regard war as a hateful necessity, from which we do not +shrink, but which we did everything in our power to avert--to us there +can be no thought of relinquishing our task, until there is a reasonable +prospect of a really lasting settlement. We should need no prompting from +our statesmen to realise that this must be "a fight to a finish." There +must be no reversion to the _status quo_, that accursed device of a +worn-out diplomacy, with its inevitable seeds of new quarrels and yet +another Armageddon. + +Public Law, Nationality, and a general reduction of armaments (as +distinguished from complete disarmament) are the three foundation stones +of the new era, as already envisaged in the public utterances of those who +have some right to speak for the Triple Entente. Let us then endeavour to +apply these principles to the various problems raised by the war. It is +obvious that their application depends upon the victory of the Allies. If +we are defeated, public law will have lost its value, for the Germans will +have asserted their right to violate its fundamental provisions. The idea +of Nationality will have received its death-blow; for not only will the +independence of several of the smaller nations have been destroyed, +but Germany will have reasserted her right to dominate her own minor +nationalities, and to drain the life-blood of the 26 million Slavs of +Austria-Hungary in a conflict with their own Slavonic kinsmen. Finally, +all hope of reduced armaments will have been exploded, since the theory of +Blood and Iron will have attained its fullest expression in the virtual +domination of a single power on land and sea. Regrets or misgivings we may +have, but the time for their utterance has long since passed. The British +nation must have no illusions; defeat means the downfall of the Empire, and +the reduction of Britain to the position of a second-rate power. Either we +shall emerge victorious, or for all practical purposes we shall not emerge +at all. Even if _we_ shrink from a "fight to a finish," our enemies can be +relied upon to persist to the bitter end. It is for this reason only, and +not because I underestimate for a moment the vast resources, the splendid +organisation, the military valour of Germany, that I restrict myself in +the following pages to a consideration of the possible effects of victory +rather than of defeat. It would be the height of folly to anticipate +victory before it is achieved; but it is essential that we should be +prepared for all possible contingencies, and this involves a careful survey +of the various factors in an extraordinarily complicated situation. + + +Sec.3. _Britain and Germany._--In the forefront of the discussion stands our +quarrel with Germany. What are to be our future relations with Germany +after the war? If there is anything in the assertion that we are fighting +for the cause of liberty and progress, it can only mean that we are +fighting a system rather than a nation--Prussian militarism and +bureaucracy, but not German civilisation. We have to go still further and +consider the motive powers behind that iron system. Sitting in our little +island, we are apt to forget what it means to possess a purely artificial +frontier of 400 miles, and to see just beyond it a neighbour numbering +171,000,000 inhabitants, in an earlier stage of civilisation and capable of +being set in motion by causes which no longer operate in the western world. + +If the final settlement is to be just and lasting, the demands of the +victors must be adjusted to the minimum, not the maximum, of their own +vital interests. For Britain the central problem must inevitably be: What +is to be the position of the German Navy if we are successful in this war? +Is anything even remotely resembling disarmament to be attained unless that +Navy is rendered innocuous? Is it conceivable that even if Britain accepted +the _status quo_, a victorious Russia could ever tolerate a situation which +secured to Germany the naval supremacy of the Baltic, and the possibility +of bottling Russian sea-trade? Even the opening months of the war have +shown what ought always to have been obvious, that sea-power differs from +land-power in one vital respect: military supremacy can be shared between +several powerful States, but naval supremacy is one and indivisible. In +this war we shall either maintain and reassert our command of the sea, or +we shall lose it: share it with Germany we shall not, because we cannot. + +Again, what is to be the fate of German shipping and German colonies? Can +we not curtail Germany's war navy, while respecting her mercantile marine? +Is it either expedient or necessary to exact the uttermost farthing in the +colonial sphere in the event of victory? It is obvious that just as Germany +offered to respect French territory in Europe at the expense of the French +colonial empire, so the Allies, if victorious, might divide the German +colonies between them. By so doing, however, we shall provide, in the eyes +of the German nation, a complete justification of William II.'s naval +policy. One of the most widespread arguments among educated Germans +(including those friendly to this country) has always been that German +colonies and shipping are at the mercy of a stronger sea-power, and that +therefore Germany only holds her sea-trade on sufferance. If, as a result +of the war, we take from her all that we can, we shall ingrain this +point of view in every German. We should thus tend to perpetuate the old +situation, with its intolerable competition of armaments, unless indeed +we could reduce Germany to complete bankruptcy--a thing which is almost +inconceivable to those who know her resources and which would deprive us of +one of our most valuable customers. + +On the other hand, we must of course remember that any extra-European +territorial changes depend not merely upon the attitude of Britain and her +Allies, but upon the wishes of the Dominions. Even in the event of victory, +it is still not London alone that will decide the fate of New Guinea, of +Samoa, or of German South-West Africa. The last word will probably be +spoken by Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, and it is improbable +that any one of the three will consent to the restoration of territory +which they have occupied. It is only in the case of German colonies which +border upon British Crown colonies _(e.g._ Togoland, Cameroon, or East +Africa) that the decision will rest entirely with the European governments. +At this stage it would be absurd to suggest even the bare outlines of a +settlement; but it is well to emphasize the fact that it involves not only +the United Kingdom but the Dominions, and that on its solution depends the +future development of the British Empire. In other words, the war can only +result in the downfall of the Empire or in the achievement of Imperial +Federation and a further democratisation of the central government. + + +Sec.4. _Nationality and the German Empire._--Finally, there is a still graver +question. Is Germany, if defeated, to lose territory _in Europe_? and if +so, would it be either possible or expedient to compensate her in other +directions for such a loss? The application of the principle of +Nationality to the German Empire would affect its territory in three +directions--Alsace-Lorraine, Schleswig-Holstein, and Posen. Let us very +briefly consider these three problems. + +[Illustration: THE FRANCO-GERMAN FRONTIER _Boundary of France 1815-1871_ +and _Boundary of France 1871-1914_] + +(1) The population of the two provinces of Alsace and Lorraine is mainly +German by race and language, but none the less it had become by 1870 almost +entirely French in feeling, as the result of its long union with France. +The Germans, in reannexing the provinces after the war, were actuated +almost equally by reasons of sentiment and strategy. They welcomed the +recovery of a section of their race which had been wrested from them by the +brutal aggression of Louis XIV. and the dynastic policy of his successor; +they also desired to secure their western frontier against the possible +attacks of France, which, under the Third Empire, was still most +emphatically an aggressive power. In drawing the new frontier they included +for purely strategic reasons a small portion of western Lorraine, round the +fortress of Metz, which was admittedly as French as Champagne or Picardy. +From 1871 till 1911, Alsace-Lorraine was governed as a direct appanage of +the Imperial Crown; in the latter year it received a constitution, +but nothing even remotely resembling self-government. Contrary to the +expectation of most Germans, the two provinces have not become German in +sentiment; indeed the unconciliatory methods of Prussia have steadily +increased their estrangement, despite their share in the commercial +prosperity of the Empire. Those who know intimately the undercurrents of +feeling in Alsace-Lorraine are unanimous in asserting that if before last +July an impartial plebiscite, without fear of the consequences, could have +been taken among the inhabitants, an overwhelming majority would have voted +for reunion with France. But having once been the battleground of the two +nations and living in permanent dread of a repetition of the tragedy, the +leaders of political thought in Alsace and Lorraine favoured a less drastic +solution. They knew that Germany would not relinquish her hold nor France +renounce her aspirations without another armed struggle; but they believed +that the grant of real autonomy within the Empire, such as would place them +on an equal footing with Wuertemberg or Baden, would render their position +tolerable, and by removing the chief source of friction between France +and Germany, create the groundwork for more cordial and lasting relations +between Germany and the two Western Powers.[1] Now that the nightmare of +war has once more fallen upon them, the situation has radically changed, +and there can be no question that in the event of a French victory the +provinces would elect to return to France. The fact that several of their +leading politicians have fled to France and identified themselves with the +French cause, is symptomatic, though doubtless not conclusive. That the +government of the Republic, if victorious, will make the retrocession of +Alsace-Lorraine its prime condition of peace, is as certain as anything can +be certain in the seething pot to which triumphant militarism has reduced +unhappy Europe. It may, then, seem merely pedantic to refer to an +alternative solution; and yet there is unquestionably a great deal to be +said in favour of forming the two provinces into an independent State, or +better still, uniting them in federal union with Luxemburg and Belgium. +Thus would be realised that "Middle Kingdom" which so many efforts have +been made to create, from the days of Charlemagne onwards. Henceforward +the fate of Alsace-Lorraine would be neither French nor German; they would +become a neutral clearing-house for the two cultures which have both come +to be so inextricably bound up with the life and traditions of the border +race. At the same time the most fertile source of friction between France +and Germany would be removed, and the two countries would no longer glare +at each other across a frontier bristling with fortifications. + +[Footnote 1: This ideal was being actively pursued by many thoughtful +people on both sides of the frontier. Only last June I was discussing it at +some length with a prominent Alsatian deputy and various other friends in +Berlin.] + +(2) The problem of Schleswig-Holstein presents far less difficulty, if +treated on a basis of nationality. Much has been written about the enormity +of Prussia's treatment of Denmark in 1848 and 1863; but the plain truth +is that the great majority of the population of the two duchies was as +enthusiastic in favour of union with their German kinsmen farther south, as +the population of Alsace-Lorraine was reluctant to be torn from France. The +whole of Holstein and much the greater part of Schleswig always was, and +is, pure German by race. Unfortunately Prussia, in annexing territory +which is as German as Kent is English, also acquired a portion of North +Schleswig, which is as unquestionably Danish, alike by blood and by +sentiment. Hence a complete revision of frontiers on a racial basis would +certainly involve the cession to Denmark of the extreme eastern portions of +Schleswig, as far as and including the port of Flensburg. + +To-day, however, this question is complicated by strategic considerations, +due to the creation of the Kiel Canal as an almost impregnable naval base. +The suggestion has already been seriously put forward, that Denmark should +be allowed, in the event of Germany's defeat, to extend her territory +as far as the north bank of the Canal, which would thus become an +international highway for peaceful commerce, possibly under a general +guarantee of neutrality. Whether such a present might not prove a very +grave embarrassment to Denmark, and whether the guarantee would be more +effectual than the treaty which secured Belgian independence, are questions +which depend mainly upon the mood of the peoples of Europe after they are +tired of shedding each other's blood. But it is well to realise that +the question of the Kiel Canal is one which may very possibly lead to a +prolongation of the war, and which, as I have already hinted, Russia will +not allow to rest, even if Britain should hesitate to complete the work. + +(3) The third point at which, on a basis of racial redistribution, a +defeated Germany must inevitably suffer territorial loss, is the Polish +district on her eastern frontier. The present kingdom of Prussia includes +3,328,750 Poles among its subjects, mainly in the former duchy of Posen, +but also in Silesia and along the southern edge of West and East Prussia +(known as Mazurians and Kasubians). The pronouncedly anti-Polish policy +pursued by the German Government for over twenty years past has aroused +deep and insurmountable hatred against Prussia in the heart of the Poles, +who even in the days when Berlin was relatively conciliatory towards them +had never relinquished their passionate belief in the resurrection of their +country. Above all, the attempt to denationalise the eastern marches by +expropriation, colonisation of Germans, and other still cruder methods, +has not only been in the main unsuccessful, but it has roused the Poles +to formidable counter-efforts in the sphere of finance and agrarian +co-operation. This coincided with remarkable changes in Russian Poland, +which has rapidly become the chief industrial centre of the Russian Empire. +Economic causes have toned down the bitterness which Russia's cruel +repression of Polish aspirations had inspired, and to-day Prussia is +unquestionably regarded by every Pole as a far more deadly enemy than even +the Russian autocracy, the more so as the conviction has steadily gained +ground that the Polish policy of Petrograd has been unduly subject to the +directions of Berlin. While, then, the Poles look upon the promises from +either of these two capitals with pardonable suspicion and reserve, it +is certain that to-day such hopes as they may entertain from foreign aid +centre more and more upon Russia. + +Any attempt to reconstruct the kingdom of Poland, whether as an independent +State or, as seems more practicable, as an autonomous unit within the +Empire of the Tsar, would inevitably deprive Prussia of the greater part of +the Duchy of Posen (except the three or four western "Kreise" or districts, +in which the German element predominates), a strip of eastern Silesia +from the upper reaches of the Vistula northwards, and a further strip of +territory in East Prussia, extending from near the fortress of Thorn along +the Mazurian lakes (in fact, the scene of the opening battles of the +present war). Polish extremists, however, not content with these +indubitably Polish districts, are already laying claim to the lower reaches +of the Vistula and to Danzig as the port of the historical Poland; and +there is a further tendency in certain Russian circles to regard the whole +province of East Prussia as part of the natural spoils of war. And yet it +is obvious that the annexation of Danzig,[1] one of the bulwarks of the old +Hanseatic League, and of Koenigsberg, the cradle of the Prussian Crown +and of modern German philosophy, would be a flagrant violation of that +principle of Nationality which the Allies have inscribed upon their banner. +The province of which Koenigsberg is the capital is to-day, whatever it may +have been in the twelfth century, as German as any portion of the German +Empire. Moreover, it is the stronghold of Junkerdom, that arrogant but +virile squirearchy which still forms the backbone of the old Prussian +system; and while it is doubtless the desire to undermine this caste +by robbing it of hearth and home that prompts such drastic schemes of +conquest, it cannot be too clearly realised that we should not only be +guilty of a monstrous injustice in lending our support, but should +be sowing the seeds of a new and even thornier problem than that of +Alsace-Lorraine. It would, moreover, be a superfluous injustice, since it +is perfectly possible to create on broad racial lines a new frontier at +least as natural as that which divides Russia and Germany to-day. + +[Footnote 1: Strictly speaking, Danzig, though under Polish suzerainty till +1772, has always been a German town enjoying complete autonomy. It shares +the fame of Hamburg and Luebeck as one of the greatest of the mediaeval +Hansa towns.] + +Such are the changes which an application of the principle of Nationality +involves. Let us then be under no illusions; they are changes such as can +only be extracted from a Germany which has virtually ceased to exist as a +military power--a contingency which is still remote to-day, and which can +only be attained by enormous sacrifices in blood and resources. It is only +by readjustment and compensation in other directions that the German nation +could be induced even to consider a revision of frontier, and from the +nature of things such compensation can only have one meaning--the break-up +of Austria-Hungary. + + +Sec.5. _The Future of Austria-Hungary._--For many years this break-up has been +foretold by political pessimists inside and outside the Habsburg dominions, +and by many interested agitators both in Central and in Western Europe. The +present writer, on the other hand, has always regarded Austria-Hungary as +an organism full of infinite possibilities of progress and culture, a State +modelled upon that diversity of type which Lord Acton held to be the +surest guarantee of liberty. Those who affected to treat it as moribund +under-estimated both the underlying geographical bases of its existence and +its great natural resources; they emphasised what separates rather than +what unites. In short, they saw the rivalry between the two mottoes "Divide +et Impera" and "Viribus Unitis," and laid undue stress upon the former. +Just because they realised the extraordinarily complicated nature of the +racial problems involved, they tended to overlook the steady advance +made in recent years by Austria in the conceptions of political and +constitutional freedom. But at every turn Hungary has been Austria's evil +genius: the influence of the Magyar oligarchy has given a reactionary +flavour alike to internal and to foreign policy, has hampered every reform, +and poisoned the relations of the State with its southern neighbours. + +[Illustration: AUSTRIA-HUNGARY: POLITICAL DIVISIONS] + +For a short time the aggressive Balkan policy of Count Aehrenthal, as +exemplified in the annexation of Bosnia and the diplomatic duel with +Russia, was hailed as worthy of the Bismarckian tradition; but it soon +became clear that he was far from being the genius whose advent the +Monarchy was so anxiously awaiting. In recent years, then, despite many +hopeful signs, and despite increasing activity in almost every sphere of +life, a kind of progressive paralysis has taken hold upon the body-politic. +Three main causes may be noted--the lack of any great men capable of +counteracting the Emperor's lack of initiative, which was always very +marked, but has been accentuated by advancing old age; the superficial and +malicious outlook of the capital and the classes which control it; the +alliance between the Magyar oligarchy and the Jewish press and Haute +Finance, working in a pronouncedly anti-Slav direction. The wheels +still went round, but the machine of State made less and less progress: +stagnation and aimlessness were everywhere apparent. On all sides it was +recognised that the existing system had become unworkable, and that a +catastrophe could only be averted by speedy reforms. To many far-seeing +patriots the last hope of salvation for the State seemed to lie with the +late Heir-Apparent, not perhaps as the ideal Prince, but as a man of +courage and force of character, possessing the necessary energy to carry +through drastic political changes. His removal was a crushing blow to all +who still hoped against hope in the regeneration of the Monarchy. His place +was filled by a young man, lacking both experience and prestige; never was +there less sign of the heaven-born genius who alone could save a desperate +situation. + +In the life of nations and States, as in that of individuals, there +sometimes comes a moment when it is possible to make the "Great Refusal" +of which Dante sang; and "History teaches that those who decline, or +prove unworthy of, the leading role which is offered to them, are trodden +mercilessly underfoot." In closing the German edition of my book with these +words, I expressed the conviction that "for a State such as Austria there +could only be one choice"; but unhappily her statesmen have preferred the +fatal alternative.[1] "The historic mission of the House of Habsburg is the +vindication of equal rights and liberties for all races committed to its +charge. The abandonment of this mission would endanger the very existence +of a Great Power upon the Middle Danube."[2] Austria has proved untrue to +this mission, and the inexorable forces of history seem at this moment to +be working her destruction. Nations, like individuals, sometimes commit +suicide; and those who have most earnestly warned them against such a crime +are left as mourners in the funeral procession. + +[Footnote 1: In July 1911 I dedicated _The Southern Slav Question_ to "that +Austrian statesman who shall have the courage and the genius necessary to +solve the Southern Slav Question." In April 1913, in publishing a German +edition, I added the words, "At the twelfth hour this dedication is +repeated." In November 1914 it is unhappily only too evident that that hour +has already struck.] + +[Footnote 2: See _Racial Problems in Hungary_, concluding sentence.] + +The war-fever which seized upon the populace of Vienna and Budapest last +July typified the feelings of the three dominant races in the Monarchy, the +Germans, the Magyars, and the Jews; but it is no criterion for the attitude +of large masses of the population. In fact, the war has accentuated the +centrifugal tendencies which were so marked a feature of recent years, and +which the introduction of Universal Suffrage and the annexation of Bosnia +arrested but failed to eradicate; a stringent censorship may conceal, but +cannot alter, this fact. Disaffection is rife in portions of the army and +affects its powers of resistance, while the financial and economic crisis +grows from week to week. Cynics have tried to define the mutual relations +of Germany and Austria-Hungary by comparing the former to a strong man +carrying a corpse upon his shoulders, and the course of the war during +the first three months would seem to confirm this view. So far as +Austria-Hungary is concerned, its two outstanding features have been the +signal failure of the "punitive expedition" against Serbia and the debacle +of Auffenberg's army in Galicia. Friendly observers were prepared for a +break-down in the higher command and were aware that many Slav regiments +could not be relied upon, but they had expected more from the German and +Magyar sections of the army and from the very efficient officers' corps, as +a stiffening element. It is now known that despite the aggressive policy +of its chiefs, the Austro-Hungarian army was far from ready, and that its +commissariat and sanitary arrangements utterly broke down. + +The evident failure to profit by the experience of two general +mobilisations within the previous six years is in itself a proof that there +is "something rotten in the state," and it is already obvious that only a +complete and crushing victory of Germany can extricate Austria-Hungary from +the war without loss of prestige and actual territory. Unless the Russians +can be not merely defeated but driven out, it is absolutely certain that +they will retain the province of Galicia, or at least the eastern portion, +with its Ruthene or Ukrainian population; unless the Serbian army can be +overwhelmed, Bosnia and at least some portion of Dalmatia will fall into +the hands of Serbia. This would be an eminently unsatisfactory solution +or rather it would be no solution at all, for it would solve neither the +Polish, the Ukraine, nor the Southern Slav questions. I merely refer to it +as a possible outcome of one form of stalemate; it is hardly necessary to +add that from every point of view stalemate is the result which is most +to be dreaded, since it inevitably involves fresh wars in the immediate +future. Whatever happens, the effete Dual System in its present form is +doomed, for while an Austrian defeat means dissolution, an Austrian victory +means the absorption of Serbia and Montenegro, and in either case the +balance between Austria and Hungary will be fatally disturbed and a new +constitutional arrangement rendered inevitable. It is thus a tragic paradox +that while the attempt to bolster up the Dual System was undoubtedly one of +the great underlying causes of the war, its first effect is likely to be +the collapse of that very system. + +The Dual System once abolished, it might seem reasonable to aim at a +reconstruction of Austria-Hungary on a modified federal basis. But this was +essentially a peace-ideal. The war, far from kindling a common patriotism +which in Austria-Hungary was so conspicuous by its absence, has placed a +gulf of blood between race and race, and rendered their continued existence +under the same roof not only difficult but undesirable. Even in the event +of only relative failure on the part of Austria-Hungary a much more radical +solution may be expected, while the effect of her complete defeat would be +to place the solution of the whole "Austrian problem" in the hands of the +Entente Powers and of her own disaffected populations. In that case there +are two probable alternatives, one more radical than the other. Both depend +to a large extent upon the development of the military situation and upon +as yet incalculable economic influences, but it is possible to indicate +their broad outlines. Indeed, this is the best means of illustrating the +conflicting fears and aspirations which the great conflict has still +further intensified in the racial whirlpool of Central Europe. Let us +consider the less drastic of the two first. + +Austria, as distinguished from Hungary, consists of seventeen provinces, +of which Galicia is the largest and most populous; yet there are many +Austrians who have long regarded its possession as anything but an unmixed +blessing for the Monarchy as a whole, and would scarcely regret its loss. +It has always occupied a peculiar autonomous position of its own; its +political, social, and economic conditions are at least a century behind +those of the neighbouring provinces, and have given rise to many gross +scandals. It has been a hot-bed of agrarian unrest, electoral corruption, +and international espionage. Instead of paying its own way, it has been +financially a heavy drag upon the State, while racially it provides, in the +Polish-Ruthene conflict, an object-lesson on the disagreeable fact that +an oppressed race can become an oppressor when occasion arises. But the +argument which weighs most with the Germans of Austria is that the Poles +of Galicia have for a whole generation held in their hands the political +balance in the Austrian Parliament, and that the disappearance of +the Polish and Ruthene deputies would destroy the Slav majority and +correspondingly strengthen the Germans. The Magyars in their turn would no +doubt view with some alarm the extension of the Russian frontier to the +line of the Carpathians; but the change would bring to them certain obvious +compensations, since it would greatly increase the relative importance of +Hungary inside what was left of the Habsburg Monarchy. In short, it is +by no means impossible that if the Russians succeed in holding Galicia, +Austria-Hungary may show a sudden alacrity to buy peace by disgorging a +province which has never wholly fitted into her geographical or political +system. + +It is obvious that the fate of the small province of Bukovina is bound up +with that of Galicia; and in such circumstances as we have just indicated, +it would doubtless be divided between Russia and Roumania on broad +ethnographical lines, the northern districts being Ruthene, the southern +Roumanian. This, however, must depend upon the attitude of the kingdom of +Roumania, to which reference will be made later. + +There is one other direction in which Austria could afford to surrender +territory, without serious loss save that of prestige. The southern portion +of Tirol--the so-called Trentino, the district round the town of Trent--is +purely Italian by race, and its union with the kingdom of Italy has long +been the chief point in the programme of the Italian Irredentists or +extreme Nationalists. It is a poor and mountainous country, which belongs +geographically to its southern rather than to its northern neighbour. The +pronouncedly Italian sympathies of its inhabitants have complicated the +problem of government and have been a permanent source of friction between +Austria and Italy. The elaborate fortifications along the existing frontier +would have to be sacrificed, but the new racial frontier could soon be made +equally satisfactory from a strategic point of view. It should then be +borne in mind that at a later stage of the war an attempt may be made by +Austria to buy off Italy with the offer of the Trentino. Whether the latter +would seriously consider such an offer, if made, will doubtless depend +upon future events, but it is clear that Italy, if her diplomatists are +sufficiently adroit, has a fair prospect of acquiring the Trentino, +whichever side wins, and consequently that a much more tempting bait will +be required in order to induce her to abandon her neutrality. These two +losses, the one already probable, the other hypothetical, would still leave +Austria in the unquestioned position of a Great Power. The problem of her +future relations with her Balkan neighbours raises an infinitely more +complicated issue. Let us consider the Southern Slav and Roumanian +questions, first separately, and then in their bearing upon each other. + + +Sec.6. _The Southern Slav Question_.--The Southern Slav question, as +has already been argued in an earlier chapter, can only be treated +satisfactorily as an organic whole; and it may be taken for granted that +Austria-Hungary, in the event of victory, will annex the two independent +Serb kingdoms, and unite the whole Serbo-Croat race under Habsburg rule. +The task of governing them, when once she has overcome their resistance, +will be one of extraordinary difficulty, and will involve a complete +revision of her own standards of government and administration. Her record +and that of Hungary in the Slavonic South does not inspire one with +confidence as to the result. Moreover, it is not too much to assert that +the destruction of Serb independence--a task which the present writer +unhesitatingly regards as beyond the powers of Austria--will in no way +solve the Southern Slav problem, but merely transfer its centre of +gravity. The task of Southern Slav liberation would pass to Bulgaria, and +Austria-Hungary would be involved in an ever-widening field of hostilities. +Hence, even if Serbia's independence were not now inextricably bound up +with the success of the British arms, it would still be essential that +every effort should be made to heal what has long been an open sore upon +the face of Europe. People in this country are only too apt to ignore the +question altogether, or at best to say, "Oh yes, of course, if the Allies +win, the Serbs will get Bosnia." Those who talk thus have not grasped the +elements of the great problem, of which Bosnia, like Serbia itself, is only +one section. The idea that to transfer Bosnia alone from Austro-Hungarian +to Serbian hands would settle anything whatever, fatally ignores alike the +laws of geography and those considerations of national sentiment +which dominate politics in South-Eastern Europe. In every respect +Bosnia-Herzegovina and Dalmatia complement each other. So long as there +were no railways in the Balkans and Bosnia stagnated under Turkish rule, so +long as the national consciousness of the Serbo-Croats slumbered or ran in +purely provincial channels, the separation between coast and hinterland +was possible, though even then unnatural. But with the advent of modern +economic ideas the situation radically changed. It was above all the +possession of the Dalmatian seaboard that tempted Austria to occupy Bosnia, +and so conversely the acquisition of Bosnia by Serbia would at once +compel the latter, willy-nilly (quite apart from all racial affinities or +sentiments), to aspire to Dalmatia as well. + +Geographically, it is inconceivable that to-day Dalmatia should be in +different hands from Bosnia-Herzegovina. Herzegovina does actually touch +the sea at two places--for a few miles at the swampy mouth of the Narenta +below Metkovie, and for a mile at Castelnuovo-Zelenika, inside the Bocche +di Cattaro. It is obvious that to allow Serbia these two outlets, while +leaving their surroundings to another State, would create immediate and +intolerable friction; whereas to assign the southern half of Dalmatia to +Bosnia, but to leave the northern half in other hands, would be keenly +resented by the Dalmatians themselves, as an outrage alike upon their +national and their local traditions. + +When we consider the population of Dalmatia we must apply the rival tests +of history and of race. On the grounds of historical sentiment Italy might +claim Dalmatia; for its chief towns (Zara, Sebenico, Trau, Spalato, Lesina, +Curzola)[1] were Venetian colonies, and not only they but even the Republic +of Ragusa, which always maintained an independent existence, were saturated +with Italian culture and ideals. But on ethnical grounds Dalmatia is now +overwhelmingly Slavonic. In 1900 only 3.1 per cent of its population--in +other words, about 15,000 out of a total of 584,000--were Italians, the +remaining 97 per cent being Serbo-Croats. The census of 1910 is even more +unfavourable to the Italians, probably unduly so. It is, of course, true +that the Italian element, though numerically negligible, represents a +higher percentage of the educated and cultured class; but while this would +entitle Italy to demand guarantees for the maintenance of existing Italian +schools and institutions, it cannot conceivably be employed as an argument +in favour of an Italian occupation. Not only would it bring her inevitably +into collision with the Southern Slavs who already are, and are likely to +remain, a military power of no mean order; it would lead her on into the +false and hopeless path of attempting to assimilate a hostile population +by the aid of an insignificant minority which only exists in half a dozen +towns, and in all the rest of the province is simply non-existent. The +price paid would be the eternal enmity of all Slavs, the jeopardising of +Italian interests in the Balkans, the sacrifice of many of the +benefits which the new Trans-Balkan railway route +(Odessa-Bucarest-Kladovo-Sarajevo-Spalato) would naturally bring to Italy, +a challenge to one of the finest maritime races in Europe--the Croats of +Dalmatia, Croatia and Istria--a challenge which would sooner or later +involve the creation of a Southern Slav navy against Italy. So far as +Britain is concerned, to separate Dalmatia from Bosnia is not only to +prevent even the beginnings of a solution of the Southern Slav question, +but to obscure the naval situation in the Mediterranean, to alienate Russia +in a matter in which we have everything to gain and nothing to lose by +accommodating her. But even when Bosnia and Dalmatia have been united to +Serbia and Montenegro, the Southern Slav problem will still be far from +solution. Dalmatia is alike in constitutional theory and in political +fantasy, though not in sober fact, an integral portion of the Triune +Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia-Dalmatia, and it is unthinkable that +Serbo-Croat opinion could ever consent to the liberation of the one without +the other. No solution has any chance of permanence which ignores Agram as +the centre of Croat political and religious life, of education, art and +historic memories. The Dalmatian Croats, as the most virile and stubborn +element in the race, have always formed the vanguard of political thought, +but it is to Agram that they have always turned for the necessary backing, +and it is the peasantry of Croatia who have always borne the brunt of every +attempt at repression. Latterly the Dalmatians have been the soul of +the student movement, which plays so vital a part in recent political +development. + +[Footnote 1: In the West they are only known under their Italian names, but +at home they are known as Zadar, Sibenik, Trogir, Split, Hvar, Korcula, +and Dubrovnik (Ragusa).] + +Croatia-Slavonia is a vital part of the problem, indeed from a national +point of view perhaps more vital than Bosnia and Dalmatia. But even this is +not enough. No settlement will be complete which ignores the Slovenes of +eastern Istria, Carniola, and southern Carinthia and Styria: they must +share the fate of their Croat and Serb kinsmen. + +So far, then, as the Southern Slavs are concerned, the triumph of the +Allies ought to mean the creation of a new State on the Eastern Adriatic, +the expansion of gallant Serbia into Jugoslavia (Jug is the Slav word for +south), and the achievement of Unity by the three kindred races, Serbs, +Croats, and Slovenes. On the north it would be comparatively easy to draw +a new frontier corresponding to the main requirements of ethnography, +geography, and strategy. With only very slight deviations, this would +follow the racial line between Slovenes and Germans from the present +Italian frontier as far as the little town of Radkersburg in Styria; +thence, the course of the rivers Mur and Drave as far as the latter's +junction with the Danube. It is only in the Banat--that portion of the +great Hungarian plain which faces Belgrade across the Danube--that an +artificial frontier will be inevitable, if the Serb districts of Hungary +are to be included in the new State and if the Serb capital is to be +rendered immune from the dangers of future bombardment. The weak spot in +so drastic a solution is the inclusion of the Slovene districts, which--in +view of their geographical position, cutting off the German provinces of +Austria from the sea--is unthinkable, save in the event of a complete +collapse of the Monarchy. All depends upon the number of leaves which are +pulled off the artichoke. If only a few of the outer rows are taken, +a situation may arise in which it would be necessary to sacrifice the +Slovenes and to rest satisfied with the acquisition of Bosnia, Dalmatia, +and Croatia--in other words, with the frontier which at present divides +Croatia from Austria and from Hungary proper. But this, it must be +remembered, would leave the work of Southern Slav Unity incomplete, and is +only to be regarded as a _pis aller._ + +The Slovene section of the Southern Slav problem is further complicated by +the attitude of Italy, who cannot be indifferent to the fate of Trieste and +Pola. On historic grounds Italy cannot lay claim to Trieste, which has been +a possession of the House of Habsburg since 1386 (400 years longer than +Dalmatia). But if as before we apply the principle of nationality, it is +indisputable that Trieste is an Italian town, though the whole surrounding +country up to the very suburbs is purely Slovene. On the other hand, the +commercial interests of Trieste are entirely bound up with its hinterland, +by which is meant not only the Alpine provinces, but Upper and Lower +Austria and Bohemia on the one hand and even south Germany (Bavaria) on +the other. Any settlement, then, must be a compromise between national and +economic interests. As an ancient centre of Italian culture, Trieste +would welcome the flag of the Regno upon its municipality, as the surest +guarantee that the town would remain Italian in character to all time. But +any attempt to include Trieste within the tariff system of the kingdom of +Italy would produce fatal results, and the obvious solution is to proclaim +the city as a free commercial port. Of course, from a purely Southern +Slav point of view, the fate of the town of Trieste (as distinct from the +district) ought to be a matter of complete indifference, though of course +the extremists claim it. It is, however, well to bear in mind that the +inclusion of Trieste in Italy's tariff system would mean the speedy +economic ruin of a great and flourishing commercial centre. Commercially, +then, Trieste is unthinkable save either as the port of Austria or as a +_porto franco_ under Italian suzerainty. So far as Istria is concerned, +there would be no insurmountable difficulty in drawing a satisfactory +frontier on ethnographical lines; the western portions, including +Capodistria, Rovigno, and Pola, are overwhelmingly Italian, while the +interior of the little province and the eastern shore (with Abbazia, +Lovrana, etc.) is as overwhelmingly Slavonic (Croat and Slovene mixed). +Any redistribution of territory on the basis of nationality must therefore +inevitably assign western Istria to Italy, and no reasonable Southern Slav +would raise any valid objection. Once more the essential fact to consider +is that the acquisition of Trieste and Pola by Italy presupposes the +disappearance of Austria-Hungary; otherwise it is not even remotely +possible. Hence it is no exaggeration to assert that the fate of Trieste +is one of the central issues in the whole European settlement. Once +make Trieste a free port, under the Italian flag, and _ipso facto_ the +Austro-Hungarian navy ceases to exist, and with it all need for Italian +naval activity in the Adriatic. In other words, such a settlement would +lead to an almost idyllic reduction of naval armaments in the Adriatic, +since both Italy and the new Jugoslavia could afford to restrict +themselves to a minimum of coast defence. It is obvious, however, that the +dismantlement of Pola--to-day an almost impregnable fortress--would be an +essential condition to neighbourly relations between the two, the more so +since under such altered circumstances an Italian naval base at Pola could +only have one objective. + +There is an unfortunate tendency in Italy to misread the whole situation +on the eastern Adriatic, to ignore the transformation which the revival +of Southern Slav consciousness has wrought in lands which once owned the +supremacy of Venice. A short-sighted distrust of the Slav blinds many +Italians to the double fact that he has come to stay, and that his +friendship is to be had for the asking. The commercial future of Dalmatia, +Bosnia, and Serbia is intimately bound up with Italy, and Italy herself +will be the chief loser if she closes her eyes to so patent a truth. + +The fate of Trieste and Istria is a triangular issue between Teuton, Slav, +and Latin. The Italian, if his claims are too ambitious or exacting, may +succeed in preventing the Slav from obtaining his share of the spoils, but +only by leaving them all in the hands of a still more dangerous rival, in +other words, by a crude policy of dog-in-the-manger. + +One thing is certain in all this interplay of forces--that it is too late +in the day to suppress Southern Slav national consciousness, and that there +can never be durable peace and contentment on the eastern Adriatic until +the unity of the race has been achieved. It would be premature to discuss +the exact forms which the new State would assume; but when the time +comes it will be found that the people of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Dalmatia, +Croatia-Slavonia, Istria and Carniola, will acclaim their liberation at the +hands of free Serbia and Montenegro. Their watchword, however, will be not +conquest from without, but free and voluntary union from within--a union +which will preserve their existing political institutions and culture as a +worthy contribution to the common Southern Slav fund. The natural solution +is a federal union under which the sovereign would be crowned not only as +King of Serbia but with the crown of Zvonomir as King of the Triune Kingdom +of Croatia-Slavonia-Dalmatia, thus reviving historic traditions dating from +the tenth century and never abandoned or forgotten. The Croatian Parliament +would continue in Agrani, parallel with the Serb Parliament in Belgrade, +but both would be represented in a central federal Parliament. The only +question is whether the existing provincial divisions should be allowed to +survive, the Diets of Bosnia, Dalmatia, Istria, and Carniola thus forming +conjointly with the Serbian, Montenegrin, and Croatian Parliaments +the units on which the new constitution is based, or whether complete +unification should be attempted. The latter would be the ideal arrangement, +but in view of the great divergence of local customs and institutions it +would probably be premature, and it might therefore be wiser to preserve +the smaller units until they were ripe for fusion, rather than to +compromise by creating a dual State of Serbia and Croatia. + + +Sec.7. _The Roumanian Question._--I have dwelt at some length upon the +Southern Slav problem, because it is as complicated as it is unfamiliar +to public opinion in this country. It has been the _causa causans_ of the +present struggle, and if neglected or mismanaged at the final settlement, +may again plunge Europe into trouble at some future date. Parallel with +any solution of the Southern Slav question must come the solution of the +Roumanian question, which represents the other half of Austria-Hungary's +Balkan policy. The Kingdom of Roumania is, alike in territory, population, +and resources, the leading power in the Balkan peninsula, but over five +million Roumanians, including the very cream of the race, still live under +foreign domination. Of these at least 3,500,000 are in Austria-Hungary, the +great majority under the grossly oppressive rule of the Magyars; and the +redemption of Transylvania and the neighbouring counties of Hungary has +always been the ideal of all patriotic Roumanians, even of those who looked +to a distant future for its realisation. Russia's short-sighted policy in +1878, in annexing the Roumanian province of Bessarabia as a reward for +their valiant support at Plevna, drove the Roumanians into the arms of +Austria-Hungary, and for a whole generation not even the perpetual irritant +of Magyar tyranny in Transylvania could avail to shake the _entente_ +between Vienna and Bucarest, strengthened as it was by the personal +friendship of the Emperor Francis Joseph and King Charles. But the spell +was broken by Austria's attitude during the Balkan War. The imperious force +of circumstances brought the interests of Roumania and Serbia into line; +for it was obvious that any blow aimed against Serbia's independent +existence must threaten Roumania also, just as any weakening of the +Serbo-Croat element in the Monarchy must react unfavourably on that of +the Roumanians and other nationalities of Hungary. The growth of national +feeling within the two neighbour races has proceeded for some time past on +parallel lines, and even before the war there were manifest signs that +the Roumanians of Hungary, whose economic and cultural progress since the +beginning of the century has been very rapid, were at length nearing the +end of their patience. The bomb outrage at Debreczen last February--an +event which is without parallel in Roumanian history--was the first +muttering of the gathering storm. Roumania occupies a position of extreme +delicacy. Her natural tendency would be to espouse the cause of the Allies, +since they obviously have more to offer her than their rivals. But the +somewhat equivocal attitude of her statesmen has been determined not merely +by an astute desire to win the spoils of war without making the necessary +sacrifice--a policy which is apt to overreach itself--but also by a very +pardonable anxiety as to the attitude of Bulgaria and Turkey. Roumania has +hitherto been the foremost upholder of the Treaty of Bucarest, and it is +only in the event of drastic territorial changes farther west that she is +likely to consent to its being torn up. She has made no secret of the fact +that she would not tolerate naked aggression against the Greeks, whether +from the Turkish or Bulgarian side. In view of the political record of King +Ferdinand of Bulgaria and his present Prime Minister, the Roumanians may +perhaps be excused for adopting an attitude of vigilant reserve; for their +statesmen suspect that Bulgaria is only waiting until the Roumanian army +has crossed the Carpathians in order to reoccupy the southern Dobrudja. +Certain it is that Roumania, while declining all temptations to join the +central powers, has also rejected the Russian invitation to occupy the +Bukovina, and has actually approached Hungary with a view to securing the +restoration of Transylvanian autonomy. The Magyars on their part have tried +to buy off Roumania by introducing the Roumanian language of instruction in +many of the State schools of Transylvania--a wholly inadequate concession +which would none the less have been inconceivable four short months ago. +Unfortunately the realisation of Roumanian unity inevitably involves the +inclusion in the new State of considerable Magyar and Saxon minorities, +amounting in all to not less than 600,000 inhabitants. There are no means +of overcoming the hard facts of geography, but it is essential that +Roumania, while incorporating Magyar and Saxon islets in the Roumanian +racial sea, should guarantee the existing institutions of the two races, +and the fullest possible linguistic freedom in church,[1] school, and +press. The Saxons in particular have preserved their identity for over +seven centuries in this little corner of the Carpathians, and have +contributed far more than their share to the cause of culture and progress +in Hungary. It would be a crying irony of fate if they were allowed to +perish in the twentieth century at the hands of those who have pledged +themselves to vindicate the rights of smaller nationalities. + +[Footnote 1: The Szekel (Magyar) districts of Transylvania are mainly +Calvinist, the Saxons Lutheran to a man, while the Roumanians are divided +between the Orthodox and the Roumanian Uniate Churches. Transylvania is +also the centre of an interesting sect of Unitarians, who are for the most +part Magyar by race.] + +It must not be forgotten that the dream of Roumanian Unity can only be +fully realised if Russia restores at least a portion of Bessarabia, which +contains not less than a million and a quarter Roumanians. A victorious +Russia might well afford such a concession; for it would involve no +strategic dangers and would, especially if conveyed in the graceful form of +a wedding dowry, triumphantly efface the last traces of Russophobe feeling +that still linger in Roumania. But it would be absurd to expect such +magnanimity on the part of Russia unless Roumania's action is prompt and +vigorous. The abstract theory of nationality must be reinforced by the more +practical argument of sterling services rendered to a common cause. + + +Sec.8. _Can the Dual Monarchy be replaced?_--The result of applying the +principle of nationality to the Southern Slavs and Roumanians would thus +be to create two powerful national States at the expense of the Habsburg +Monarchy; and here it is well to repeat that such drastic territorial +changes are only possible if the military power of Austria suffers +an almost complete eclipse. But even the loss of Galicia, Bukovina, +Transylvania, the Trentino, and the Serbo-Croat provinces would still leave +Austria-Hungary a State of very considerable area, with a population of 32 +millions. There is no reason why such a State should not continue to exist, +provided that it retained the necessary access to the sea at Trieste and +Pola, and this would involve the exclusion of the Slovenes from the +new Jugo-Slav State. Under such circumstances it would be possible to +reconstruct the State on a federal basis, with five main racial units, +the Germans, the Czechs and Slovaks, the Magyars, the Slovenes, and the +Italians. Certain unimportant racial minorities would still be left, but +these could unquestionably be dealt with by a law of guarantees, similar to +those which have played so conspicuous a part in the theory, but sometimes +also in the practice, of the Dual Monarchy. So many severe amputations +might, however, prove too much for the vitality of the patient; and in any +case we may assume that either Austria-Hungary will be able to prevent the +operation, or that the Allies, if they can once bring matters thus far, +will insist upon completing the process by a drastic post-mortem inquiry. +Any sympathetic qualms are likely to be outweighed by the consideration +that a State of this hybrid nature would tend to be more than ever a vassal +of Germany. Moreover, there can be no doubt that one of the surest means of +bringing Germany to her knees is by crushing her most formidable ally, and +thus tapping some of the sources of her own military and economic strength. +It is safe to assume that this consideration plays an important part in the +military plans of Russia; and for many reasons--political, strategic, and +economic--a Russian occupation of Bohemia must be regarded as the essential +prelude to a decisive victory of the Allies. The war has thrown the +Dual Monarchy into the melting-pot; but it is not enough to accept the +possibility of its disappearance from the map, it is also necessary to +consider what new organisms would take its place. A complete partition +would, as we have seen, remove the last obstacle to a unified Southern +Slav State. The dreams of Italia Irredenta and Greater Roumania would +be realised. Western Galicia and a part of Silesia would be united to +autonomous Poland as reconstituted by the Russian Tsar. Eastern Galicia, +Northern Bukovina, and the Ruthene districts of Hungary as far as Ungvar +and Munkacs, would be incorporated in the Russian Empire, though it is +to be hoped that an early result of this change would be the grant of a +certain modified autonomy, or at least of special linguistic and religious +privileges, to the Ukraine population, thus united after centuries of +partition in a single body politic. + + +Sec.9. _Bohemia and Hungary._--But the most striking result of the partition +would be the revival of the famous mediaeval kingdoms of Bohemia and +Hungary as independent States. Thus would be realised the dream of two +races, the Czechs and Magyars, whose national revival forms one of the +most romantic incidents of the nineteenth century. But it is difficult to +imagine a greater contrast than their respective development. In Bohemia +the Czechs, after losing their religious and civic liberty and enduring for +two centuries the domination of the Germans, raised themselves once more +in the course of two generations, by sheer force of character and tireless +industry, to a position of equality, and reorganised their national life on +an essentially democratic basis. In Hungary the Magyars, thanks to their +central position, their superior political sense, and their possession of +a powerful aristocracy, succeeded in concentrating all government and +administration in their own hands and reducing the other races of the +country, who have always formed a majority of the population, to a state of +veritable political helotry. And just as their evolution has been on very +different lines, so must be their future fate. In Bohemia all is activity +and political progress, in Hungary the sterility of a corrupt and +reactionary system, staking the future upon the hollow credit of +a long-vanished past. The Czechs are beyond all question the most +progressive, the most highly civilised, the most democratic of all Slavonic +nations. The stubborn spirit of John Hus is still alive among them to-day, +and their recent achievements in music, art, and industry are in every way +worthy of the nation which has produced Comenius and Dvorak and first +lit the torch of Reformation in Europe. The ancient city of Prague contains +all the elements of culture necessary for the regeneration of Bohemia, and +the mineral riches and industrial resources of the country are infinitely +greater than those of many European States which have successfully led a +separate national existence. + +But the liberation of the Czechs would not be complete unless their close +kinsmen the Slovaks were included in the new Bohemian State; and every +reason alike of politics, race, and geography tells overwhelmingly in +favour of such an arrangement. The Slovaks, who would to the last man +welcome the change, have long suffered from the gross tyranny of Magyar +rule. Their schools and institutions have been ruthlessly suppressed or +reduced in numbers, their press muzzled, their political development +arrested, their culture and traditions--far more truly autochthonous than +those of the conquering Magyar invaders--have been discouraged and hampered +at every turn. The Slovaks are a race whose artistic and musical gifts, +whose innate sense of colour and poetry have won the sympathy and +admiration of all who know them; and their systematic oppression at the +hands of the Magyar oligarchy is one of the greatest infamies of the last +fifty years. In this war Britain has proclaimed herself the champion of +the small nations, and none are more deserving of her sympathy than the +Slovaks. Unless our statesmen renounce that principle of nationality which +they have so loudly proclaimed, the Slovaks cannot be abandoned to their +fate; for they form an essential part of the Bohemian problem. Without +them the new kingdom could not stand alone, isolated as it would be among +hostile or indifferent neighbours. In every way the Slovak districts form +the natural continuation of Bohemia and are the necessary link between it +and Russia, upon whose moral support the new State must rely in the first +critical years of its existence. + +The main difficulty would be the fate of racial minorities; for minorities +there still must be, no matter how the frontiers may be drawn. At first +sight the natural solution would be to pare down Bohemia by assigning +to the neighbouring provinces of Germany the German fringe which almost +completely surrounds the Czech kernel. So far as the south-west and +north-east districts of Bohemia (near Budweis and along the German Silesian +border) are concerned, the historic boundaries might fairly be revised on +ethnographic lines, and in the same way the line of demarcation between +Bohemia and Hungary could in the main be made to follow the racial boundary +between Slovak and Magyar and later between Slovak and Ruthene. But in the +north of Bohemia there are insurmountable objections to any revision of the +historic frontier of the kingdom; for not merely is its industrial life +concentrated to a very considerable degree in the German districts, but +this fact is responsible for the existence of important Czech industrial +minorities, which it would be difficult to sacrifice. So far as there is to +be any sacrifice, it must be made by the losers rather than by the winners +in this war. But it ought to be possible, under the rule of some +carefully selected western prince as ruler of Bohemia, to devise proper +administrative guarantees for the linguistic rights of minorities in every +mixed district of Bohemia, whether it be Czech or German. The case of +Hungary is different. That the Allies, if victorious, should perpetuate the +racial hegemony of the Magyars, and with it many of the abuses which have +contributed towards the present war, is as unthinkable as that they should +once more bolster up the Turkish regime. If the Habsburg Monarchy should +break up, Hungary is fully entitled to her independence. She will become a +national Magyar State, but in a sense very different from that which her +Jingo politicians have intended--not by assimilating the non-Magyar races +of the country, but by losing to the other national States by which she +will be surrounded all but the purely Magyar districts of the central +plains. Hungary will then be more fully than before a Danubian State; her +rich alluvial lands will be developed, and a check will be put upon the +unnecessary streams of Magyar emigration which the present political and +economic situation favours. The chief gainer by the change will be the +Magyar peasantry, who have in their own way been exploited by the ruling +oligarchy as cruelly as their non-Magyar neighbours. One result of the war +will be to discredit the policy and methods of this oligarchy and to hasten +the break-up of the vast latifundia of the great magnates and the Church, +and those other drastic land reforms without which Hungary cannot hope to +attain her full economic value as the granary of central Europe. Hitherto +the government of the day has secured a parliamentary majority by +corrupting and terrorising the non-Magyar constituencies of the periphery +and thus out-voting the radical Magyar stalwarts of the great plain; and +with the loss of the Slovak, Ruthene and Roumanian districts this system +would automatically collapse. The result might be a genuine strengthening +of democratic elements and the dawn of a new era for the Magyar race. + + +Sec.10. _Germany and Austria._--One final problem connected with +Austria-Hungary remains. What is to be the fate of the German provinces of +Austria? If the map of Europe is to be recast on a basis of nationality, we +obviously cannot withhold from the great German nation that right to racial +unity which we accord to the Czechs, the Poles and many minor races. The +seven German provinces--Upper and Lower Austria, Styria, Carinthia, Tirol, +Salzburg and Vorarlberg--reconstituted perhaps as a kingdom of Austria +under the House of Habsburg and augmented by the German population of +western Hungary, would then become an additional federal unit in the German +Empire. Such an event, it cannot be too often repeated, is inconceivable +except as the result of a complete defeat of the central powers, but if on +that assumption Germany loses Alsace-Lorraine and Posen, the loss would be +made good by the incorporation of German Austria. The result of this +in figures would be the subtraction of six million inhabitants and the +addition of eight million others--a transaction which need not unduly alarm +the British Jingo, and at the same time might render defeat less galling to +the German patriot. + +Whether this fulfillment of the Pan-German aspiration would meet with +unqualified enthusiasm on either side of the present frontier, is a +question on which it is not altogether easy to answer. The idea of +admitting eight million additional Catholic subjects into Germany would +certainly arouse misgivings in Prussia, both among the stricter Protestants +and among the far more active section of "intellectuals" who merely regard +Protestantism as a political asset in the struggle against Latin and +Slavonic influences. From a political point of view their admission would +unquestionably transform the whole parliamentary situation and force the +Imperial Government to revise its whole attitude; for the Austrian voters +would greatly strengthen the two parties to whose existence Prussia has +never become reconciled--the Clerical Centre and the Social Democratic +Left,--while contributing little or nothing to the parties of the +Conservative Junkers or the middle-class "Liberals." In other words, the +new element might prove to be an effective leaven which would permeate the +whole lump. All the arguments which induced Bismarck to expel Austria +from Germany in 1868 would still be upheld by the advocates of +"Preussen-Deutschland" (see p. 65), and the Prussian hegemony; but after an +unsuccessful war and territorial losses the chance of making these good +by the achievement of national unity would probably sweep away the +dissentients, who would no longer represent a triumphant system, but a +beaten and discredited caste. The old idea of the "seventy-million Empire," +which appealed so strongly to the Liberals of Frankfurt in 1848, should +prove irresistible under these circumstances. The influence of Austrian +Germans, already so marked in literature, art, music, and above all in +political theory, might make itself felt in other spheres also. + +Meanwhile, in view of the wild talk in which certain sections of the Press +are already indulging, it cannot be too strongly emphasised that only the +Germans can reform their political institutions, and that any attempt at +external interference will not merely fail lamentably, but produce the very +opposite effect from that which is intended. If the German Emperor insists +upon confusing the relative positions of the Deity and some of his +self-styled vicegerents upon earth, only the German people can restore him +to a sense of proportion and modesty. All believers in human progress hope +that after this war the monstrous theories of divine right propounded +by the House of Hohenzollern will be relegated to the lumber-room of a +vanished past. But the sooner references to St. Helena as a residence for +deposed emperors are dismissed as arrant nonsense, the better. The future +of German dynasties, as of German Unity, rests with the German people +itself; and those who challenge this statement repudiate _ipso facto_ +the two principles of Nationality and International Law, which we have +officially adopted as our programme for the future. + +The fate of the German provinces of Austria is one of the central problems +raised by this war, since it is the link between the fate of two Empires. +The present writer most emphatically disclaims all idea of prophecy; but +he feels that the time has come for outlining some of the possible +alternatives which confront the statesmen of "the new Europe." So far as +Austria-Hungary is concerned, it is clear that the splendid dream of "a +monarchical Switzerland," as conceived by many serious political thinkers, +has already died a violent death; but it would be quite premature to +dogmatise on the future grouping of the races of the Dual Monarchy at a +moment when its ultimate fate has still to be decided on the field of +battle. + + +Sec.11. _Italian Aspirations._--We have already alluded to Italy's position, +in connection with the Southern Slav question, and have pointed out that a +settlement which follows even approximately the lines of nationality would +assign the Trentino, the town of Trieste (as a free port), and a strip +of Western Istria to Italy, but the remainder of the coast from Cape +Promontore to the Bojana river to the new "Jugoslavia." There are, however, +other directions in which Italy may claim compensation for her friendly +attitude towards the Triple Entente. She has already occupied the rocky +islet of Saseno, opposite Valona, and in the event of the collapse of +Austria-Hungary, she may demand the whole bay of Valona, as the strategic +key to the Adriatic, and even a general protectorate of the embryo Albanian +State. The establishment of a miniature Gibraltar on the eastern side of +the Straits of Otranto is a step which neither France nor Britain would +oppose, if Italy should insist upon it; but it may be questioned whether +she would not thereby be laying up stores of trouble for a distant future, +altogether incommensurate with any possible advantages which might accrue. +Indeed, Italy would probably be well advised to abandon all idea of an +Albanian adventure (which, originally conceived as a counterstroke to +Austrian aggression, would lose its point if Austria disappeared from the +scene), to leave the Greeks a free hand in south Epirus, to cede to them +Rhodes and the other islands occupied during the Tripolitan War, and then +to secure, during the partition of Turkey, the reversion of Cilicia and the +Gulf of Alexandretta. It is in any case clear that the Powers of the Triple +Entente will raise no objections to such action on the part of Italy, and +are resolved to show every consideration to a power whose great and vital +interests in the Mediterranean in no way conflict with their own. + + +Sec.12. _The Balkan Situation: Bulgaria and Greece._--The creation of a +Greater Roumania and of a new Southern Slav State would transform the whole +Balkan situation, and therefore obviously involves material concessions to +Bulgaria and Greece. + +(A) If Roumania succeeds in redeeming her kinsmen across the northern +frontiers, she cannot be so ungenerous as to insist upon retaining +territory whose population is overwhelmingly Bulgarian, and the least which +might be expected from her would be the retrocession to Bulgaria of her +bloodless acquisition during the second Balkan War. This means a reversion +to the boundary defined under Russian arbitration at Petrograd in January +1913--except outside the fortress of Silistria, where strategic reasons +demand its rectification. + +It is in the relations of Bulgaria and Serbia, however, that the key to the +Balkan situation is to be found. The Serbo-Bulgarian treaty of February +1912, which formed the groundwork of the Balkan alliance, had limited +Serbia's sphere of influence to northern Macedonia and referred to the +arbitration of the Russian Tsar any disputes arising from conquests to the +south of a certain specified line. Serbia was tacitly given a free hand +in her attempt to reach the sea in Northern Albania. The action of +Austria-Hungary in vetoing her access to the Adriatic forced Serbia to turn +her eyes from west to south and to seek her economic outlet to the sea +down the valley of the Vardar to Salonica and the Aegean. The cession of +Monastir, Ochrida, and the Vardar Valley to Bulgaria would have rendered +this impossible, for it would not merely have driven a wedge between Serbia +and Greece, but would have placed two customs frontiers, the Bulgarian and +the Greek, between Serbia and the sea, instead of only one, the Turkish, as +hitherto. Shut in upon all sides, with all hope of expansion blocked by the +powerful Dual Monarchy to north and west and by a big Bulgaria to east and +south, Serbia would have found herself in a worse position than before the +war. The Bulgarians, intoxicated by their victories over the Turks and +seduced by the promptings of the Austrian tempter, turned a deaf ear to the +arguments of their Serbian allies, and insisted upon their pound of flesh. +They failed to realise that the most effective way of inducing the Serbs to +evacuate Macedonia was to give them adequate backing in their demand for an +Adriatic port. Every fresh intrigue of Sofia with Vienna confirmed Belgrade +in its view of the vital necessity for retaining the Vardar Valley. The +hoary argument that "circumstances alter cases," appeared anew in the garb +of the Bismarckian theory that all treaties are subject to the provision +"_rebus sic stantibus_"--a theory which many great international lawyers +have unhesitatingly endorsed. In this form it appealed as irresistibly to +the Serbs as did the rival shibboleth of "The treaty, the whole treaty, +and nothing but the treaty" to the Bulgarians. It is impossible to absolve +either side from blame; for the Serbs, in formally denouncing a treaty into +which they had voluntarily entered, were doing exactly what they had so +bitterly resented in Austria-Hungary's treatment of Bosnia, while the +Bulgarians, in flouting the Tsar whom they had named as arbiter and in +attempting to uphold the treaty by brute force and treachery, abandoned the +ground of law, and placed themselves openly in the wrong. + +The events of the great war have already modified the problem. The one +unanswerable argument of the Serbs in declining to surrender Macedonia +was the plea that they would then have nothing to offer Bulgaria for her +neutrality or her support when their own inevitable day of reckoning with +Austria should arrive. In short, Veles, Monastir and Ochrida were widely +regarded as a pledge to be held until Bosnia and Dalmatia could be +redeemed, but then to be handed over to the Bulgarians. It is true that the +Serbo-Bulgar War of 1913 and the passions which it aroused have converted +this feeling into one of reluctance to sacrifice what was bought at such a +fearful price. But the moment has now arrived to translate an instinct into +a reality. If Southern Slav Unity is to be achieved, a binding promise, +under the guarantee of the Entente Powers, must be given to Bulgaria, that, +in proportion as the work of Serbo-Croat unification is achieved, the +Macedonian frontier will be revised in favour of Bulgaria. It is possible +that Bulgaria may prefer a different formula, according to which the Tsar +with the approval of his Western Allies should arbitrate upon the original +Serbo-Bulgar treaty. Any such concession to Bulgarian sentiment ought not +to be resented in Serbia, in view of the great issues involved. It is +obvious that Serbia cannot hope to achieve her national unity unless +Bulgaria abstains from hostile action, or to consolidate her new position +when won unless she can win Bulgaria's active friendship. The latter by her +intervention could at any moment turn the scales against Turkey or against +Serbia, and it is thus essential that the Allies should treat her now with +a generosity proportionate to the callous neglect with which Europe left +her to her fate in September 1913. + +The tendency to look down upon the Balkan States from the fancied heights +of a superior "culture" has never been so marked in France or Britain as +in Germany, where the Press is now engaged in comparing their own cultural +exploits in Belgium with the lack of culture displayed by the "bandits" and +"assassins" of Serbia, and where a man of such scientific distinction as +Werner Sombart can describe the heroic kingdom of Montenegro as "nothing +but a bad joke in the history of the world!"[1] But even here the habit +of condescension lingers, and amidst the threatened collapse of Western +civilisation it is well to remember the essential distinction between +primitive and savage. The Balkan nations have grown to manhood while +we slept, and must henceforth be regarded as equals in the European +commonwealth. + +[Footnote 1: _Berliner Tageblatt,_ cited by _Observer_, November 8, 1914.] + +(B) Such territorial changes as have been outlined above would vitally +affect the position of Greece, who is also fully entitled to claim +compensation for any serious disturbance of the balance of power. The first +and most obvious form which compensation would take is the final occupation +of southern Epirus; no objections will be raised to this by the Entente +Powers, and it is probable that Italy has already made her own bargain with +the Cabinet of Athens on this very point. It is to be hoped that Italy may +also consent to hand over Rhodes and the neighbouring islands to Greece, in +return for a free hand in Southern Asia Minor in the event of the Turkish +Empire breaking up. By far the thorniest problem is provided by the future +ownership of Kavala, which the Treaty of Bucarest assigned to Greece in +August 1913, but which from an economic point of view is Bulgaria's port on +the Aegean, and as vital a necessity for her future development as it is a +superfluous luxury to Greece. The statesmen of Petrograd were not blind to +these considerations, but the scale was turned at Bucarest by the active +intervention of the German Emperor, who, under the plea of seconding his +brother-in-law, King Constantine, skilfully provided a permanent bone of +contention between Bulgaria and Greece. His action may not unfairly be +compared to that of the Hungarian Premier, Count Tisza, in fomenting the +quarrel between Serbia and Bulgaria two months earlier. + +Serbia's cession of Central Macedonia to Bulgaria could not fail to be +distasteful to the Greeks, for it would automatically render their tenure +of Kavala highly precarious. It is to be hoped, however, that they may be +brought to realise that its surrender and the consequent improvement of +Greco-Bulgarian relations are in the highest interests of Greece and the +whole Hellenic race. Here again, the break-up of the Turkish Empire may +enable the Greeks to compensate themselves on the shores of Asia Minor. But +the real key to the problem of Kavala, and thus indirectly to the revival +of the Balkan League and all the far-reaching effects which that would have +upon the fate of Europe, lies in the hands of Britain. It could instantly +be solved by the cession of Cyprus to Greece, on condition that Kavala and +the valley of the Strymon were restored to Bulgaria. Neither strategically +nor economically is Cyprus of any value to Britain; thirty-five years ago +it was taken over by Disraeli "as a sort of fee for opposing Russia," a +foolish habit which we had abandoned long before the present war with +Turkey. Its population is predominantly Greek, and the Hellenic national +movement is steadily gaining ground. Anything that we might gain by its +retention is more than counterbalanced by its value as an instrument of +barter. + + +Sec.13. _The Future of Turkey._--The entry of Turkey into the great war +marks a further stage in the winnowing process from which we hope that a +regenerated Europe will emerge. Two of the main causes of the war are the +Turk and the Magyar, whose effete and tyrannous systems have each in its +own manner and degree long kept South-Eastern Europe in a ferment of unrest +and reaction. It is a matter of profound regret that two infinitely more +virile and progressive races, the German and the Jew, should be fighting +their battles for them, and indeed bolstering up causes which would +otherwise speedily collapse by reason of their own inward rottenness. It is +the Triple Alliance which has made it possible for the iniquitous racial +hegemony of the Magyars to survive in Hungary; it is the joint policy of +Vienna, Budapest, and Berlin which has hampered the progress of the Balkan +States, and above all the development of every Slavonic nation; and in this +their most valuable allies have been the Jewish Press and the Jewish _haute +finance_ of Germany, Austria and Hungary. Just as we hope and believe that +one result of this war will be the emancipation of Germany and German +"culture" from the corroding influences of militarist doctrine, so there +are good grounds for hoping that it will also give a new and healthy +impetus to Jewish national policy, grant freer play to their many splendid +qualities, and enable them to shake off the false shame which has led +men who ought to be proud of their Jewish race to assume so many alien +disguises and to accuse of anti-Semitism those who refuse to be deceived +by mere appearances. It is high time that the Jews should realise that few +things do more to foster anti-Semite feeling than this very tendency to +sail under false colours and conceal their true identity. The Zionist +and the orthodox Jewish nationalist have long ago won the respect and +admiration of the world. No race has ever defied assimilation so stubbornly +and so successfully, and the modern tendency of individual Jews to +repudiate what is one of their chief glories suggests an almost comic +resolve to fight against the course of nature. + +These cryptic tendencies of pseudo-national as opposed to national Judaism +have played a great part in the Young Turkish movement and the destruction +which it is bringing upon Turkey. The Committee of Union and Progress at +first enjoyed the moral and financial support of many men, both Christians +and Jews, to whom its methods and secret currents were a sealed book. For +a time the Young Turks, like the Magyars farther west, deceived foreign +opinion by claptrap phrases from the repertory of modern democracy. But +"murder will out," and the Committee--despite the tiny group of able, and +in certain cases honourable, men who control its destinies--has gradually +been revealed in its true colours, as a parasitic growth upon the body +politic, preserving the worst faults of the old regime and blending with it +much of the decadence which lies like froth along the backwaters of Western +civilisation. + +Since 1908, then, the fate of Turkey has passed from the control of the +Turk and is being decided by an alien clique of infidels, renegades, +political freemasons[1] and Jews, in whose hands the Caliph is a helpless +tool, and to whom the teachings of Christ and of Mohammed are mere worn-out +superstitions. In fact, the Committee is in its essence non-Turkish +and non-Moslem. In the name of a secret society, based openly upon the +subversive ideas of the wilder French Jacobins, and not shrinking from +assassination as a convenient political weapon, a Jehad or Holy War is to +be preached against the British Empire, and the most sacred interests of +Islam are to be exploited in the interests of Germany. What bitter irony is +in the fact that William II., who risked universal war to avenge the murder +of his friend, the Archduke Francis Ferdinand, should now find himself +closely allied with Enver Pasha, the military adventurer who barely two +years ago foully assassinated his own commander-in-chief, Nazim Pasha, and +who therefore represents everything that is anathema to the Prussian +War Lord with his exaggerated ideas of military discipline and personal +loyalty! + +[Footnote 1: Not to be confused for a moment with the very different form +of freemasonry which prevails in this country.] + +The die has been cast, and even those who most regret Turkey's action +cannot shut their eyes to the fact that it inevitably raises the whole +question of Constantinople and the Dardanelles. If Germany should emerge +victorious, Turkey is likely to fall under a more or less veiled German +protectorate. In the event of the victory of the Allies, Turkey may +continue to exist as an Asiatic power, but there is little doubt that +she will be eliminated from Europe. The only real question is, Who is to +replace her? Bulgaria will, it is to be hoped, recover Adrianople and the +Enos-Midia line, of which she was so cruelly robbed last year. The fact +that the Turks on their re-entry systematically wiped out the entire +Bulgarian population of northern Thrace does not weaken, but enormously +strengthens, the case for its restoration. But to offer Constantinople to +Bulgaria would be a fatal gift. She has absolutely no historic claim to +the great city of the Caesars (Tsarigrad, as it is rightly known to every +Slav); nor is there even any considerable Bulgarian population which could +rally round the new government. The administrative task is obviously far +beyond the powers of a small peasant state, most of whose present leaders +were born under a foreign yoke. Nor is Greece a serious candidate for the +vacant post. The Greeks, of course, unlike the Bulgarians, have a definite +claim, based on the traditions of the Byzantine Empire, and there is a +large Greek population in the city--at present close upon 350,000, though +their numbers are likely to be materially reduced before this war is over. +But in their case also Constantinople would be a fatal gift. The resources +even of the enlarged Hellenic kingdom would inevitably prove unequal to the +task. Moreover, it must not be forgotten that a Greek occupation would be +opposed on many grounds by the entire commercial community of every other +nation in Europe. + +In some ways the ideal arrangement would be that Roumania should assume the +administration of the city, as trustee for a reconstituted Balkan League, +with proper guarantees for the commercial rights of all the Powers. But it +is to be feared that such a solution would please nobody, perhaps not even +Roumania herself. A league of the five Balkan kings, with Roumania as +_primus inter pares_, is the dream of a remote future, and until it can be +realised, Constantinople cannot assume its natural position as capital of +the Balkan peninsula. + + +Sec.14. _Russia and Constantinople._--In short, as matters stand to-day, there +is only one power which can replace the Turks as master of Constantinople, +and that power is Russia. The Russians could not of course incorporate the +city in their empire for reasons of geography; and this fundamental fact +destroys at a blow the numerous objections which might have told against +the occupation, if Constantinople had been contiguous to the Russian +dominions. It would obviously be necessary to establish a special +autonomous administration under a Russian governor. It is by no means +impossible that Russia would be satisfied with the expulsion of the Turks +and the internationalisation of Constantinople as a free port under a +Christian prince or a commission of the Powers. But, though admirable +in theory, such a solution would give rise to endless complications and +disputes. Unless the Western Powers can trust Russia sufficiently to leave +her in full possession, they must make up their minds to bolstering up the +impossible Turk for a further period of years. Such a surrender to the +unreasoning and ignorant prejudices of a previous generation would be a +sure prelude to the collapse of our alliance with Russia, which it is the +vital interest of all British patriots to uphold at all costs. Happily, +"the fear of Russia," as of a strange and unknown colossus, is dying out, +vague fancies inevitably yielding to the hard logic of facts. The Disraeli +policy in the Near East must give place once and for all to the broader +conceptions of Gladstone, tempered by the cautious statesmanship of +Salisbury. The greatest of the Christian Powers must be allowed to replace +the cross upon the dome of Saint Sofia. The religious appeal of such a +change is clear enough, nor need there be any anxiety on economic grounds. +There is nothing to prevent Constantinople from becoming a free port under +the Russian flag, and filling a similar place to that which the free port +of Trieste would occupy under the flag of United Italy. Indeed it may be +confidently assumed that the change would give an extraordinary impetus to +trade in the whole eastern Mediterranean. The recent history of Batum and +Baku is a faint indication of what might be expected. + +The fate of the Dardanelles cannot be separated from that of the capital; +both must be in the same hands. At the same time a reasonable compensation +for their cession to Russia would be the dismantlement of their forts. In +any case, whatever their fate may be, it is clear that an end must be put +to the galling restrictions upon Russia's Black Sea fleet. The essential +point to bear in mind is that if the war goes well with the Allies, and +if Russia expresses a definite desire to occupy Constantinople and the +straits, resistance on our part would be alike difficult, pointless, and +undesirable. Those who oppose have no arguments, so long as the special +international needs and conditions of the city are properly recognised and +guaranteed. With true Oriental fatalism, the Turk has always regarded his +ultimate disappearance from Europe as a certainty; the superstition which +led the inhabitants of Stamboul to prefer burial across the straits in Asia +has its parallel in the alarm aroused in the bazaars by the Young Turks' +decision to exterminate the pariah dogs which have for centuries supplied +the place of scavengers in the streets of the capital. To-day the prophecy +which made their removal the prelude to the departure of their masters +seems on the point of fulfillment, and all who believe in the retributive +justice of history will re-echo Mr. Asquith's hope that the fall of Ottoman +rule will remove "the blight which for generations has withered some of the +fairest regions of the world." + + +Sec.15. _Asiatic Turkey._--What then will be the subsequent fate of the Turks +if they are once driven "bag and baggage" across the straits. The Sultan +will doubtless transfer his capital to Brussa, or even to Konieh. But can +the Khalifate survive such a loss of prestige on the part of the Ottoman +dynasty? It would be altogether premature to discuss in anything +approaching detail the vast issues of the fate of Turkey's Asiatic +dominions, but it is necessary to indicate that even after settling the +fate of the straits we shall still be confronted by issues of appalling +magnitude. It is the conjunction of the spiritual and temporal power in +a single person which has given the Khalifate its importance, and its +expulsion from the Golden Horn would transform its whole political status. +Above all, it is necessary to reckon with the Arab nationalist movement +which is already a reality and a factor of permanent importance. Here, too, +the principle of nationality must be applied, though in a very different +sense, for national feeling is of course at a much earlier stage of +development among the Arabs than in Central Europe. Hitherto they have +accepted the Khalifate of the House of Othman, though without enthusiasm; +but recent events are likely to bring to a head the resentment with which +they view the spectacle of the Khalif as the helpless tool of a clique +which in no way represents Islam. Will they repudiate him and restore the +Khalifate to some more authentic descendant of the Prophet? Is there to +be an independent Arab power? Will it be practicable to create a central +authority amid the virtual anarchy of so vast and primitive a country? Or +will Britain, as the chief Mahommedan power, be obliged to assume a loose +protectorate over Arabia and Mesopotamia? If so, will she share this with +the French in Syria, and will Lebanon be able to preserve its autonomy? +Only the course of events can provide an answer to such questions; only one +fixed point emerges from the surrounding uncertainty--the firm pledge of +the British Government that the Holy Places of Islam shall be respected. + +Even this does not exhaust the possibilities of the immediate future. Is +Palestine to become a Jewish land? In recent years there has been a +steady emigration of Moslem and Christian and an equally marked Jewish +immigration, and among other factors in the movement the potentialities of +Jewish nationalism in the United States deserve especial notice. America +is full of nationalities which, while accepting with enthusiasm their new +American citizenship, none the less look to some centre in the Old World as +the source and inspiration of their national culture and traditions. The +most typical instance is the feeling of the American Jew for Palestine, +which may well become a focus for his _declasse_ kinsmen in other parts of +the world. The Jews quite realise that they can have no exclusive claim to +the possession of such a religious centre as Jerusalem, and it is clear +that whatever happens to the Holy Land as a whole, the city itself must +be subject to an impartial administration, which would be neither Jewish, +Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant nor Moslem in any exclusive sense, but would +secure free play to the religious and educational aspirations of them all. +Herzl himself, the founder of modern Zionism, dreamt of Jerusalem as the +shrine of all religions and never looked forward to the day when it would +be a purely Jewish city. + +Lastly, what is to be the fate of Asia Minor? There can be no question that +the Russians must be allowed to occupy and retain the whole of Turkish +Armenia. They will thus be conferring a benefit upon humanity and ending +one of the most grinding and barbarous tyrannies that the modern world has +ever seen; the progress made by the Armenians under Russian rule during the +past twenty years is a happy augury for the future of this race when once +united in common allegiance to the Tsar, under a wise system of local +autonomy. But will the Ottoman Empire be able to survive when shorn of its +European possessions, of its Armenian and Arab populations? Will not Italy +demand her share of the spoils, and side by side with the French in Syria, +assume in friendly rivalry the protectorate of Cilicia from a point east of +Adalia as far as the gulf of Alexandretta? Will it be possible to arrest +the process of disintegration even at this stage? Will not Greece attempt +to annex Smyrna and at least a portion of its hinterland, or has she not +at least as good a title as any other competitor? Here, again, it would +be absurd to attempt any answer for the present, but we must at least +be prepared for the possibility of a transformation as rapid and as +overwhelming in Asiatic Turkey as that which freed the Balkans from the +Turkish nightmare two short years ago. In Asia, as in Europe, the war is +the prelude to a new era, and Britain is faced with the alternative +of weakly abandoning her Imperial mission or assuming still greater +responsibilities. "The Turkish Empire has committed suicide, and dug with +its own hand its grave," and to Britain will fall more fully than ever +before the leadership of the Mahommedan world. The loyalty and devotion of +the Moslem community in India can best be repaid by the most scrupulous and +sympathetic attention to the interests of Islam throughout the world. + + +Sec.16. _Russia and Poland._--It is no mere accident that Germany, +Austria-Hungary, and Turkey should be ranged on the same side in the great +European struggle; for they represent, each in its own way, those false +conceptions of nationality which have so long envenomed the public life +of Europe, and which, for want of better words, have been described as +Germanisation, Magyarisation, and Turkification. It would, however, be +flagrantly untrue to suggest that those three States enjoyed a monopoly of +racial intolerance; for the ideas on nationality which dominated official +Russia under the old absolutist regime and which so rapidly regained the +upper hand under Stolypin and the triumphant bureaucracy, struck at the +very root of tolerance and political liberty. But recent years have +revealed a subtle change of attitude. The policy of Russification had not +been abandoned; indeed in Finland and the Ukraine it survived in its most +odious form. But it was none the less possible to detect a growing note +of interrogation even among the bureaucracy, and still more an increasing +movement of impatient protest on the part of thinking Russians. Without in +any way ignoring what has happened in Persia, we have every right to point +to the essential fact that Russia has of her own accord raised the question +of nationality and thus set in motion vast forces which are already shaking +Europe to its foundations. In proclaiming as one of her foremost aims the +restoration of Polish Unity, Russia did not, it is true, commit herself to +any concrete project of autonomy. But whether her action represents genuine +feeling on the part of the Tsar and his advisers, as M. Gabriel Hanotaux +so positively asserts, or whether it was originally a mere manoeuvre to +prevent the Polish question being raised against her, it is at least +certain that Russia has entered upon a new path from which it will be +very difficult if not impossible to recede. The Russian Poles, under the +leadership of M. Dmowski, have rallied loyally round the Tsar; and there +are many signs that the long-deferred Russo-Polish _rapprochement_ is at +length on the point of fulfillment. Here economic interests play their +part, for in recent years the district between Warsaw and Lodz has become +one of the chief industrial centres of the Russian Empire, and its +annexation to Austria or to Prussia would place a tariff wall between it +and the South Russian markets upon which it chiefly depends. The Poles +of Galicia, having enjoyed the utmost liberty under Austrian rule, have +naturally been almost immune from the discontent so noticeable among their +kinsmen in Russia and Prussia, and have indeed for a generation past formed +the backbone of all parliamentary majorities in the Austrian Reichsrat. +But even among them the first faint signs of Russophil feeling have +been noticeable in the last two years. This is partially due to the +encouragement given by the Austrian Government to the Ruthenes in Galicia, +but also to the disintegrating effect of universal suffrage upon the Polish +political parties, the growth of democratic tendencies at the expense of +the Austrophil nobility, and the consequent increased influence of the +Poles of Warsaw. Though the Polish parties in Galicia issued declarations +of loyalty to Austria at the beginning of the war, and though their +_franc-tireurs_ are fighting in the Austrian ranks, there is a growing +perception of the fact that the only serious prospect of attaining Polish +Unity lies in a Russian victory. Austria, they argue, might, if successful, +unite the Russian and Austrian sections (at the expense of the former's +economic future!), but never the Prussian; and Prussia, out of loyalty to +her ally, could at best add _Russian_ Poland to her own territory: Russia +alone can hope, in the event of a victory, to unite all three fragments in +a single whole. However profoundly they may differ on points of detail, +all Poles agree that the first essential is the attainment of that unity +without which they may at any moment become, as now, the battleground of +three great Empires, and which provides the key with which they themselves +can unlock the portals of their future destiny. Should their dream be +fulfilled, the valley of the Vistula, restored to geographical unity, may +soon play an important part in the political and economic life of Europe. + +Russia, then, is faced by one of the greatest choices in history. An +opportunity will present itself after this war, for solving her own racial +question which has in the past presented scarcely less grave embarrassment +than the parallel problem of Austria-Hungary, and which, if left unsolved, +may at no distant date endanger the unity and welfare of the Empire. The +grant of Polish autonomy, the restoration of the Finnish constitution, the +recognition of the special position of the Ukraine or Ruthene language and +cultural traditions, the relaxation of linguistic restrictions among the +lesser races of the Empire, and the adoption of a humaner attitude towards +the Jews of the Pale--these are steps which follow logically from the +proclamation of the Grand Duke Nicholas, and indeed from the alliance with +the Western Powers. Incidentally much will depend upon the attitude adopted +by the Russian Government towards its new Catholic subjects. Its relations +with the Vatican will require to be placed upon an entirely new footing, +and due respect must be accorded to the Uniate Catholic Church of the four +million Ruthenes of Galicia. In this respect the Concordat signed a few +weeks before the outbreak of war between Serbia and the Vatican should form +a very valuable precedent for the whole future relations of the Catholic +and Orthodox Churches, relations which are likely to assume increasing +importance in the not too far distant future. And here it is worth while to +emphasise, for the benefit of those who still regard Russia with misgiving +or dislike, the indisputable fact that it is just the most democratic and +enlightened of the smaller Slavonic States, and the most intellectual and +enlightened politicians and thinkers in those States, who have always +looked with the greatest confidence and enthusiasm to Russia, and who +to-day are most unanimous in welcoming her as the herald of a new era of +humanity and progress. + + +Sec.17. _General Aims._--It would lead us much too far afield to consider +the possible effects of the war upon colonial development and upon the +political and commercial development of the Far East. Here again, the +central fact to remember is that we may, indeed, that we must, defeat +Germany or perish in the attempt, but that a nation of 65 million +inhabitants cannot be effaced or permanently reduced to impotence. After +the war the two nations will have to live peaceably side by side once more, +and repair so far as possible the wreckage to which this gigantic struggle +has reduced their political, social, and commercial intercourse. Any peace +settlement will be good only so far as it avoids placing obstacles in the +path of so difficult an achievement. It will be the first duty of our +statesmen to watch over the alliance between Russia and the Western Powers, +sealed as it is by the fiery ordeal of war, and to neutralise the occult +influences which are even now working to undermine it, to the advantage of +interests which are anything but British. But it will also be their duty to +create a situation which, while safeguarding the Empire's vital interests, +shall not render improved relations with the central European Powers +impossible from the very outset. It is one thing to abandon our allies +and friends, it is quite another thing to perpetuate a feud which, though +converted by circumstances into a struggle between two unanimous nations, +was in the first instance the work of mischievous if powerful minorities. + +The final settlement will inevitably bring many disappointments and +errors in its train. We can best guard against such a result by preparing +ourselves for all eventualities and giving the most careful consideration +to each of the many problems at issue. Our obvious aim must be a settlement +which shows some reasonable prospect of permanence, and this can best be +achieved if we respect so far as possible the wishes of the populations +concerned. The principle of Nationality is not a talisman which will +open all gates, for in some parts of Europe the different races are so +inextricably intermingled as to defy all efforts to create ethnographic +boundaries. This does not, however, affect the central fact that +Nationality is the best salve for existing wounds, and that its application +will enormously reduce the infected area. But if the peoples are to make +their wishes felt there must be a regeneration of diplomatic methods +throughout Europe. Attempts will be made to revive the pernicious +principles of the Congress of Vienna, by which a few autocrats and +aristocrats carved out the fate of millions according to their dynastic +appetites or fancies, and thus tied a whole series of unnecessary knots for +subsequent wars to sever. A healthy and informed public opinion--especially +in the West--must watch over the doings of those who represent it at the +fateful Congress, according loyal support to their declared policy, but +promptly checking the reactionary tendencies which are certain to reveal +themselves. It is still unhappily possible for the arrogant impatience of +a single ruler or the persistent intrigue and misrepresentation of an +ambassador to embroil the European situation. Unless the nations in council +can devise some practical checks upon irresponsible meddling, the flower of +their manhood will have massacred each other in vain. The antecedents of +Sir Edward Grey, and more especially his attitude during the crisis which +led to war, justify us in the hope that his entire influence will be +employed in the right direction when the decisive moment arrives, and that +he will insist upon such crucial questions as the reduction of armaments, +the substitution of "citizen" for "conscript" armies, the control of +armament firms and their occult influence, the effective extension of +arbitration and the elimination of impossible time-limits, being discussed +in all seriousness, and not merely dismissed with a few ironic platitudes +and expressions of hypocritical goodwill. We must not be unduly discouraged +if some of these ideals prove impossible of realisation, for it would be +childish to suppose that when the great war is over the nations will at +once convert their swords into ploughshares and proclaim for the first time +in history the sway of Right over Might. But it is obvious that in a world +which has long ceased to be merely European, the European Powers cannot +long continue with impunity such internecine strife, and that unless some +real shape and substance can be given to the Concert of Europe--so long and +so justly a byword among all thinking men--our continent (and with it these +islands) will inevitably forfeit the leadership which has hitherto been +theirs and surrender the direction of the world's affairs into the hands of +the extra-European powers. It will be remembered that Sir Edward Grey, in +a last despairing effort to preserve peace,[1] broached the idea of "some +more definite rapprochement between the Powers," and though admittedly +"hitherto too Utopian to form the subject of definite proposals," it may +be hoped that the enormous difficulty of the task will not deter him from +pleading before the future Congress the outraged cause of international +goodwill. + +[Footnote 1: White Paper, No. 101.] + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC ASPECTS OF THE WAR + +"And the economic ravages of war are also much greater with civilised +nations than with barbarians. A war nowadays may have stern, fearful +consequences, especially through the destruction of the ingenious credit +system."--TREITSCHKE. + +"Those who have fallen have consecrated deaths. They have taken their part +in the making of a new Europe, a new world. I can see signs of its coming +in the glare of the battlefield. The people will gain more by this struggle +in all lands than they comprehend at the present moment.... A great flood +of luxury and of sloth which had submerged the land is receding, and a new +Britain is appearing. We can see for the first time the fundamental things +that matter in life and that have been obscured from our vision by the +tropical growth of prosperity."--MR.D. LLOYD GEORGE. + + +It is obvious that a great war must profoundly disturb every side of the +national life of the peoples taking part in it, and that these disturbances +must react upon neutral States. The exact character and extent of these +changes, however, are by no means easy to understand, and the present +chapter does not pretend to offer an exhaustive treatment of them. It is +impossible to appreciate the full significance of the immediate social and +economic reactions of the war, whilst an attempt to state the ultimate +effects of the war leads us along the slippery paths of prophecy. +Nevertheless, we are not likely to grasp the importance of the various +phenomena which have followed so closely upon the heels of the declaration +of war, nor to adapt ourselves to the new situation which will arise out +of the war, unless we give our attention to the things which are happening +around us. + +Unfortunately we can gain little guidance from the past. The South African +War inevitably disturbed the normal course of our industrial life, but it +involved us in conflict with a nation of relatively little general economic +importance; and so, costly and prolonged though it was, it bears no +comparison in its magnitude and in the character of its main issues to the +present war in Europe. The Crimean War of sixty years ago, though waged +between four European nations--Great Britain, France, Turkey, and +Russia--cost Great Britain much less in money than the Boer War; the issues +so far as this country was concerned were not so momentous; and industry +and commerce, though important, were not then nearly so highly developed +and complicated as they are now. The Napoleonic wars, though comparable to +the present war in fundamental importance, lasted for a generation, which +the war of to-day can hardly do; the effects of the wars with Napoleon were +complicated by the Industrial Revolution; the industrial system and the +commercial fabric erected on it were then only in process of formation and +the power of the people was small. + +These differences enable us to see the new factors which have come into +play during the past century. The present war is being fought +under conditions which were non-existent during the struggle with +Napoleon--conditions which on the one hand add to the waste and loss and +misery of war, but on the other give rise to the hope that many of its evil +consequences may be averted. Firstly, industry and commerce are world-wide; +the remotest countries are bound together by economic ties; invisible +cords link the Belgian iron worker with the London docker and the Clyde +shipwright, the Californian fruit grower with the Malay tin miner and the +German dye worker. The economic effects of modern warfare, therefore, +reverberate throughout the whole world, and widespread dislocation ensues. +In the next place, the gigantic scale on which war between great powers is +conducted, though it tends to shorten the duration of wars, increases the +intensity of the shock to human society. + +But besides these new material conditions, modern warfare is carried on +under the eyes of more enlightened peoples than in the past. The struggle +which is now being pursued is the first great war watched by a conscious or +at any rate partly conscious democracy. It is the first modern war waged +(except in our own case) by national armies constituting practically the +entire fit male population. The masses of the people have in most civilised +countries some measure of political power. And though to the elector +diplomacy and the conduct of foreign affairs are a closed book, war once +declared is war by the people; and their voice must be heard in matters +connected with it and arising out of it. Then, further, in the past the +aftermath of war was in many ways as horrible as war itself, whilst the +period during war witnessed an enormous amount of privation and suffering +among non-combatants almost as ghastly as that of the battlefield. This was +due not so much to inaction resulting from callousness as to unwise action +and ignorance. During the past century political science and economic +inquiry have made vast strides, and consequently the injurious social +effects of warfare may be minimised, though not averted; and a considerable +body of public opinion, far more enlightened than during any previous +European war, is almost certain to exercise some pressure in the direction +of wise and far-reaching action both during the war and after it is ended. +These considerations must be borne in mind in discussing both the present +position and possible future developments. + +It is clear that four great European Powers and some smaller ones cannot +engage in war without shaking the fabric of European civilisation to its +foundations. The tramp of fifteen million armed men is the greatest social +and economic fact of the present day, and indeed of the present generation. +These millions of combatants have to be clothed, fed, armed, transported, +and tended in health and in sickness; they are non-producers for the time, +consuming in large quantities the staple commodities of life, and calling +in addition for all the paraphernalia of war; sooner or later, they will +desire to return to the plough and the mine, the factory and the railroad. +These two facts alone are of tremendous importance. But besides this, +the activity of those who stay at home is called into play in a thousand +different ways, and economic and social life leave their well-trodden paths +in answer to the imperious call of national necessity. Social institutions +of all kinds are inevitably led into new fields of thought and action, and +States are driven to untried experiments in communal activity. The usual +channels of thought dry up, the flood of new ideas and of old ideas +throbbing with a new life rushes on unconfined, here in the shallows, there +in the deeps, presently to overflow into the old channels, cleansing their +beds and giving them a new direction, and linking up in fruitful union but +remotely connected streams. When fighting ceases and there comes the calm +of peace, society will tend to revert to its normal functions, based on +peace; but the society of yesterday can never return. Social life cannot be +the same as it was before, not merely because those activities called forth +by the war may persist in some form, but because of the growth of new ideas +under the stimulus of the war. The struggle will almost certainly set in +progress trains of thought not only connected with questions of war and +peace, but with the wider questions of human destiny. + +Coming to a closer view of the question, we must distinguish between the +immediate effects of the war which are already in evidence and the ultimate +effects which will but begin to unfold themselves after the return of +peace. Some of the latter results will grow out of the immediate effects; +others will be more directly due to the events following on the conclusion +of the war. It will also be advisable to distinguish between the economic +reactions of the war, and the broader social consequences. At such an +early stage it would be presumptuous and tempting Providence to attempt to +forecast the future in any detail or to try to trace the play and interplay +of the various forces going towards the making of the future. This chapter +will be concerned with broad tentative generalisations on quite simple +lines. + +One of the things which struck the intelligent working man during the early +days of the war was the rapidity with which the State acted in the face of +the crisis. In next to no time large measures of State control and +action were put successfully into operation and those who had advocated +co-operative action in the past with but indifferent success were amazed +at the swiftness with which the nation can act in the hour of need. The +drastic action of the State cannot be better illustrated than by the steps +which were taken to meet the sudden commercial deadlock which the war +precipitated. A discussion of these financial measures will at the same +time enable us to understand how, through credit, war strikes at the +industry and trade of the modern world. + + +A. STATE ACTION IN INDUSTRY AND COMMERCE + +The Austrian ultimatum to Servia was followed by the paralysis of the +world's international system of finance. Before the end of July many +important stock exchanges were closed, and by the 31st the London Stock +Exchange for the first time in its history was also compelled to close. The +remittance market collapsed and with it the fabric of international trade. +Widespread bankruptcy and ruin seemed imminent; so serious did the state of +affairs become that moratoria were declared not only in several European +countries but in parts of America, and in many continental countries specie +payments were suspended. In a word, the possibility of war had thrown the +delicately poised credit system of the commercial world out of gear; the +declaration of war had brought it to a standstill. Into an explanation of +its working it is not possible to enter; it is sufficient for our immediate +purpose to realise that the foreign exchange machinery by which the supply +of commodities from other countries becomes practicable on a large scale +was for a time altogether unworkable. London as the financial centre of the +world has immense sums owing to it and in its turn owes large sums. The +ultimate effect of the collapse of credit, which depends on confidence, was +that London could neither receive nor make payment. The big finance houses, +who had "accepted" bills of exchange and rendered themselves liable to meet +the payments for the things they represented, on the understanding that the +means to pay them were to be promptly despatched, found that these means +were not forthcoming; their own resources were far from sufficient to meet +these payments. Utter ruin stared them in the face. At home also a run on +the banks seemed probable, which would have meant ruin to large numbers of +people. In this grave crisis the State acted with commendable promptness. +The bank holiday was extended; State notes for 10s. and L1 were issued; a +moratorium was declared, legalising the postponement of the due payment of +debts, with certain exceptions; the Bank of England under a guarantee from +the Government that the latter would meet the loss, began discounting, +or buying for cash, approved bills of exchange accepted before war was +declared, many of which are hardly likely to be met by the people liable +for payment. These steps were taken swiftly and boldly and allayed the +panic. But more was needed; such measures were not in themselves sufficient +to put the machinery of foreign exchange into operation again and the +suspension of this method of settling international indebtedness was having +serious effects. To carry on international trade, and to supply ourselves +with the produce on which the very existence of the community depends, +without the machinery, is a thousand times more difficult than to conduct +our home trade by means of direct barter. Without going into technical +details, it may be said that the purchase of bills by the Bank of England, +whilst relieving the last holder from loss, did not extinguish the +liability of persons whose names had appeared on the bills as acceptors, +endorsers and drawers. This was true of traders and commercial people not +only in this country but also in other parts of the world. In the face of +these liabilities, in most cases unexpected, it was hardly likely that +they would increase their liabilities under new bills. Consequently the +remittances coming to London shrank to next to nothing. As bills of +exchange--or their equivalent--are the means by which both importers +and exporters get paid for their goods, the difficulty of getting paid +naturally began to have a serious effect on trade. As the figures of +foreign trade during August show, cargoes were being held up. It was clear, +therefore, that if this country were to continue to receive supplies of +corn and meat, of cotton and wool, of hides and timber, something further +must be done. The question the Government had to decide was what steps +could be taken to safeguard the food of the people, and to avoid a crushing +volume of unemployment through the lack of the raw materials of industry. +The produce was there; what was needed was to start the flow of the +particular kind of currency--"credit money"--which would expedite exchange. +The course taken by the State was to advance money to the large bill +bankers or "accepting houses" in London to allow of the due payment of the +enormous number of bills falling due in the three months succeeding the +outbreak of war. The audacity of the step will be understood when it is +realised that probably something like L300,000,000 of bills fall due over a +period of three months.[1] The necessary money was lent without security, +the Government promising not to demand repayment until twelve months after +the end of the war. A proportion of this advance will be in the nature of +a loss, though how much it is quite impossible to say. By this measure, +in the event of the bills not being met by those who have promised to pay +them--the acceptors--the liability which would ordinarily have fallen upon +the drawers and endorsers through whose hands the bills had passed has been +removed. The State has advanced to the commercial community a huge sum of +money, risking the total loss of some part of it, in order to set in motion +the machinery of international exchange. Further steps, however, were +taken. The general moratorium expired on November 4. Useful as it had +been, it still left many traders in financial difficulties because of +the impossibility of collecting debts owing to them in enemy and other +countries. The Government, therefore, appointed a committee representing +the Treasury, the Bank of England, the Joint Stock Banks, and the +Association of Chambers of Commerce of the United Kingdom to authorise +advances in approved cases to British traders carrying on an export +business in respect of debts outstanding in foreign countries and colonies, +including unpaid foreign and colonial accepted bills which cannot be +collected for the time being. It is safe to say that no Government ever +took such gigantic measures to meet a great crisis.[2] The Prime Minister, +speaking at the Guildhall on November 9, 1914, summarised as follows the +effects of the steps taken: "The foreign exchanges are working in the case +of most countries quite satisfactorily, and the gold reserves at the Bank +of England, which were 40 millions on July 22, and which had fallen on +August 7 to 27 millions, now stand at the unprecedented figure of 69-1/2 +millions. The central gold reserve of the country after three months of the +war amounts to L80,000,000, almost exactly twice the amount at which it +stood at the beginning of the crisis. The bank rate, which rose, as you +know, to 10 per cent, has now come down to 5, a figure, I think, not in +excess of that at which it stood this time last year. Food prices have been +kept at a fairly normal level, and though trade has been curtailed in some +directions, unemployment has been rather below than above the average." + +[Footnote 1: Mr. J.M. Keynes (_Economic Journal,_ Sept. 1914) estimates the +aggregate value of outstanding bills in London at L350,000,000.] + +[Footnote 2: In addition to these various financial measures, the State has +lent Belgium L10,000,000 and the Union of South Africa L7,000,000, whilst +it has also guaranteed L5,000,000 of the new Egyptian cotton loan.] + +But this is by no means the only example of State action. The Government +has established temporarily a State-aided system of marine insurance, by +undertaking 80 per cent of the war risk, in order to encourage overseas +trade. It has given substantial aid to the joint-stock banks "for the sole +purpose that they might be fit to aid in every way possible the country's +trade and finance."[1] It made arrangements for the direct purchase of +forage and vegetables, etc., from farmers.[2] It took over the control of +the railways. When, owing to panic, there was a rush for the purchase of +food-stuffs, which was used to force up prices unduly, the Government +intervened to prevent exorbitant charges. Particularly interesting is the +action of the State regarding sugar, two-thirds of our supply of which +comes from Germany and Austria. In the days immediately following the +declaration of war wholesale prices were trebled. The Government, +therefore, decided to take upon itself the task of ensuring an adequate +supply of sugar, and a Royal Commission was appointed. The leading refiners +were approached and an arrangement was made with the whole body of refiners +that they should stand aside from the market for raw sugars, leaving it +free for the operations of the Government. The Royal Commission pledged the +refiners to buy their sugar from the Commission, _i.e._ from the State; +sugar was to be offered to them at a fixed price, and the refiners were to +sell the refined product to the dealers also at a fixed price sufficient to +yield the refiners a fair profit on manufacture. As a result of the corner, +a big rise in the price of sugar, which is not only an important domestic +commodity but the raw material of several industries, was averted. This +merits the description given of it in _The Nation_--"a really dashing +experiment in State Socialism." [3] On the other hand, it has done nothing +to increase the world's supply of sugar, but has merely commandeered a +part of the existing stock. The aid of the State has been invoked in other +directions. Already the Government has assisted experimental cultivation of +beet in this country. The suggestion has been made that the State should +build two beet-sugar factories, which would cost about L200,000 each; in +this way it is suggested that our home supply of sugar would in the future +be assured, and that agriculture would benefit considerably.[4] + +[Footnote 1: _Round Table_, Sept. 1914, p. 705.] + +[Footnote 2: This was done through the Board of Agriculture for the War +Office. On the other hand, in the purchase of clothing, boots, blankets, +etc., the War Office approached the producers directly instead of through +the Board of Trade.] + +[Footnote 3: It was reported in the Press on October 8, 1914, that the Home +Secretary had purchased 900,000 tons of sugar at about L20 per ton, the +transaction involving an outlay of about L18,000,000.] + +[Footnote 4: See an article by Mr. Robertson Scott in _The Nineteenth +Century_, October 1914.] + +Sir Charles Macara has put forward a scheme of State aid for the cotton +industry. Owing to the war, a third of the total cotton crop (usually taken +by the continental countries) was thrown on the market. Prices naturally +fell, and there was a danger that the cotton planters might not be able to +pay the debts they had contracted to enable them to grow their crops, in +which case there would be a likelihood of the land being used for other +saleable commodities, and the efforts which have been made in the past to +increase the cotton crop would be nullified. In the meantime, the surplus +cotton on the market created an uncertainty regarding prices, and buying +came to a standstill, with the result that the position of the industry as +a whole became very critical. The suggestion of Sir Charles Macara is +that the Governments of this country and the United States, acting in +conjunction, should take the temporarily unsaleable surplus of raw cotton +off the market and store it for use in years when the crop is short. In +other words, it is proposed to establish a permanent national cotton +reserve. It is estimated that the cost of the scheme would mean an outlay +of sixty to seventy millions sterling. If the plan were put into operation, +however, it is claimed that it would restore confidence, prevent the +wholesale stoppage of mills, and at the same time establish a cotton +reserve to counteract the fluctuations of crops in the future.[1] These +matters need but to be stated as examples of the remarkable adaptability +of the State and the possibility of drastic action under the pressure of +imperative needs.[2] + +[Footnote 1: It should be pointed out that the serious condition of the +cotton industry is not due to the war. The overstocking of the Eastern and +Indian markets during the trade boom of 1913, together with the financial +crisis in India last year, has reduced the demand for cotton goods. The +war has merely emphasised a depression which had already fallen on the +industry. Sir Charles Macara's scheme, whilst it may be desirable on other +grounds, cannot compensate for the shrinkage in the demand for Lancashire +products. The Government, it is interesting to note, have commissioned +certain firms in Alexandria "to buy cotton extensively from small +proprietors at a reasonable rate, on Government account, to be stored until +the arrival of more prosperous times." (Press Association Telegram, _Daily +Press,_ Nov. 2, 1914).] + +[Footnote 2: The voluntary gifts of different parts of the Empire should +not be overlooked. Besides these other steps have been taken. The +Australian Government, for example, in order to induce farmers to extend +the area of cultivation, has guaranteed "a fixed minimum price of 4s." for +all wheat grown on the newly cultivated land. (Reuter's Correspondent, +_Daily Press_, Oct. 27, 1914).] + +The course of events has shown the temporary collapse of economic +individualism in the face of the European crisis. The economic system, +which works during times of peace, could not meet successfully the crushing +effects of a European war. It lacked not only adequate resources but the +necessary power of corporate action and co-ordination. Immediate State +action seemed to be the only way to avert disaster. In a month, Britain +came nearer than ever before to being a co-operative commonwealth. It has +been realised that industry and commerce are not primarily intended as a +field for exploitation and profit, but are essential national services in +as true a sense as the army and navy. The complexity of the modern economic +world and the large individual gains which have been made in it have +obscured the fact that the economic structure exists to serve the needs of +the community. It was recognised by the Government, at any rate to some +extent, that the success of our armies in the field would be nullified if, +in the economic sphere, the production of commodities and services were +seriously diminished and if their interchange were hampered in a large +degree. People have felt that the spinner, the miner, the weaver, the +machinist, are all by following their occupations performing a valuable +service to the community. How far this attitude of mind will persist after +the war, when normal conditions in industry and commerce gradually return, +remains to be seen. + + +B. IMMEDIATE SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC EFFECTS OF THE WAR + +1. _Foreign Trade_.--The effects of the war on industry and commerce will +be complicated and far reaching. The British and German Empires together +transact about two-fifths of the international trade of the world, the +British Empire doing over a quarter and Germany almost exactly an eighth. +Between them they own over half the merchant shipping of the world. A war +in which they are both engaged, therefore, must have serious consequences +not only to these countries themselves but to the countries with whom they +carry on business relations, and through them, in a lesser degree, to all +other commercial countries. But this is not all: France has a foreign trade +amounting to L615,000,000 a year; Belgium's is valued at L326,000,000, +Russia's at L275,000,000, and Austria-Hungary's at L256,000,000. Besides +a gigantic foreign trade there is a domestic trade, which is on a larger +scale than the external trade of these countries. Let us consider in more +detail the case of Germany. Half her foreign trade is transacted with the +nations now engaged in the great war. The trade of Britain, Russia, and +France with the German Empire is now at a standstill, except possibly for +a very small amount transacted via neutral countries; her trade with +Austria-Hungary must seriously decline. Moreover, her imports from neutral +countries and her exports to them have dwindled very considerably, and must +remain small as long as British naval supremacy continues. More than one +half of Germany's total imports are raw materials for manufactures, about +two-thirds of her exports being manufactured goods. Assuming that she +continues o conduct foreign trade through Norway and Sweden, Denmark, +Holland, Switzerland, and Austria-Hungary, the volume will be small, and +even if her whole trade with neutral countries could be maintained she +would still be without the trade of her enemies. For example, in 1913 this +country sold goods to the value of L40,000,000 to Germany and purchased +from her goods to the value of L80,000,000.[1] + +[Footnote 1: The following list indicates some of the chief articles of +trade between the two countries: + +German Imports into the United | British Exports to Germany, 1912 +Kingdom, 1912. | + | + L million. | L million. +Sugar 6.2 | Cottons and yarn 8.3 +Cottons and yarn 5.9 | Woollens and yarn 6.6 +Iron and steel and | Coal, coke, etc. 4.4 +manufactures 5.7 | Herrings 2.4 +Woollens and yarn 2.6 | Ironwork 2.1 +Machinery 2.4 | Machinery 2.1 +Glass and Manufactures 1.1 | + +It is not true, as Dr. R.G. Usher says, that Germany is "literally +self-sufficing" (_Pan Germanism_, p. 65).] + +In Great Britain, economic activity has been developed on the assumption +of continued peace. In Germany, however, though there were those who +would "base all economic policy on an imaginary permanent peace,"[1] the +Government has had in view the possibility of war. "Every conscientious +Government," writes von Buelow, "seeks to avoid [war] so long as the honour +and vital interests of the nation permit of so doing. But every State +department should be organised as if war were going to break out tomorrow. +This applies to economic policy as well."[2] It is with this idea in mind +that the German Government has striven to maintain the importance of +agriculture. "Economic policy must foster peaceful development; but it must +keep in view the possibility of war, and, for this reason above all, must +be agrarian in the best sense of the word."[3] It is held that in the +event of war the home market in Germany would be an important factor in +maintaining intact the fabric of industry. "The home market," we are told, +"is ... of very great importance. It would be called upon to replace the +foreign market if in time of war our national frontiers should be wholly +or partly closed. But in the home market agriculture is by far the most +important customer of industry; only if agriculture is able to buy, if +it earns enough itself to enable others to earn too, will it be able, in +critical times, to consume a part of the products which cannot be disposed +of abroad. The old proverb, "If the peasant has money then every one else +has too," is literally true, as soon as industry is forced, to a greater +extent than is necessary in times of peace, to find its customers at +home."[4] "As in time of war industry is dependent on the buying power of +agriculture, the productive power of agriculture is a vital question for +the nation."[5] + +[Footnote 1: _Imperial Germany_, by Prince Bernhard von Buelow, p. 221.] + +[Footnote 2: _Ibid._ p. 220. See also Bernhardi, _Germany and the Next +War_, pp. 157-159 and 260 _et seq._] + +[Footnote 3: _Imperial Germany_, pp. 220-221.] + +[Footnote 4: _Imperial Germany_, p. 219.] + +[Footnote 5: _Ibid_. p. 221.] + +The importance of agriculture in Germany is undoubtedly great; it may be, +as Buelow says, that "the value of its produce is equal to that of the +produce of industry, or even surpasses it."[1] But if the demand for it +were to shrink because the industrial population lost their work through +a shortage of raw materials or in any other way, agriculture would also +suffer. The population at present engaged in agriculture will in times of +peace buy up to the practical limits of its purchasing power, and is hardly +likely, especially in the early stages of a war, to "consume a part of the +products which cannot be disposed of abroad," except in so far as they buy +German goods (the production of which the declaration of the war may have +seriously impeded), instead of commodities produced abroad. But it is +questionable whether they will be able to maintain their aggregate +purchasing power. Prince Buelow ignores the fact that production for the +home market will be hampered by the possible non-arrival of foreign raw +materials in war time; yet Germany imported raw cotton to the value of over +L29,000,000 in 1913. Her foreign purchases of hides and skins amounted to +over L22,500,000 and of wool to L10,000,000. With even a partial suspension +of imports of these and similar commodities, industries dependent on +foreign products must be severely hit; unemployment must increase and the +purchasing power of the urban workers diminish. The agricultural community +must suffer also, and in all likelihood will not be able to take their +normal share of goods off the market. It is true, of course, that Germany +buys large quantities of food-stuffs from abroad, and that home produce +will be required to take their place; but they cannot be grown immediately; +in the interval, industrial disorganisation must result, and before +agriculture can begin to profit by the lack of foreign supplies the harm +will have been done. Moreover, agriculture must be impeded, as, owing to +the size of the German Empire, the transport of troops must seriously +interfere with the conveyance of goods to the larger centres of population. +It would seem, therefore, that the policy of developing German agriculture +at the same time that her dependence on foreign commerce is increasing is +not an effective reply to the British Navy. The position in Germany then is +that she must for the present be satisfied with a much smaller amount of +imported food-stuffs and of the raw materials of industry; and that in any +case, even if the industrial machine could be kept at work, there will be +practically no outlet for goods abroad. Commercially isolated, she must, +therefore, suffer an industrial and commercial collapse. On the other hand, +the total volume of unemployment, which would have been enormous during +the first weeks of the war, has of course been considerably reduced by the +withdrawal of great masses of men to join the colours, and by the stimulus +which the war has given to industries supplying the needs of the German +armies. Then also Rotterdam, through which Germany does a great deal of +its trade, remains open, whilst a fraction of her foreign trade is being +carried on through Denmark, Scandinavia, and Switzerland. Nevertheless, the +amount of economic distress within a very few weeks after the outbreak of +war, especially in the large towns, was considerable even on the showing of +German newspapers.[2] The amount of distress was increased and intensified +by steadily rising prices. As the rise has taken place not only in +commodities of which there is a shortage, but in others such as sugar, it +may be concluded that it is due largely to the inflation of the currency, +owing to the adoption of the fatally easy expedient of issuing large masses +of paper money. + +[Footnote 1: _Ibid_. p. 217.] + +[Footnote 2: "Let us imagine," says Bernhardi, "the endless misery which +a protracted stoppage or definite destruction of our oversea trade would +bring upon the whole nation, and in particular on the masses of the +industrial classes who live on our export trade" _(Germany and the Next +War,_ p. 232). + +According to _The Times_ (Sept. 18, 1914) the German nautical newspaper +_Hansa_ on Sept. 12 admitted that England had captured many millions of +marks worth of German shipping, and that "the cessation of business will +cost our shipowners many millions more." "It will hold up the development +of our shipping trade for years." The _Neue Freie Presse_ of Vienna on +Sept. 11 admitted that the activity of the exporters in Germany had been +crippled. According to _The Times_ (Oct. 7), the German Socialist paper +_Vorwaerts_, stated that "the state of want has reached an alarming extent, +even though we are now only at the beginning of the catastrophe which has +befallen the people of Europe." "Masses of unemployment grow every month."] + +Austria-Hungary, which is not an advanced industrial country, will not +suffer quite so keenly, though even here the German newspapers admit that +trade has come almost to a standstill.[1] In the western theatre of war the +fighting has centred largely round the Franco-Belgian Coalfield, on or near +which stand on both sides of the frontier many industrial towns. Lille, +Nancy, Epinal, Belfort, Reims, Amiens, and Valenciennes on one side, and +Liege and Charleroi on the other, are all of economic importance. Even +apart from the actual destruction due to the war which in some of these +towns has been serious, the mere presence of the contending armies will +have a more or less paralysing effect on industrial and commercial life in +both France and Belgium.[2] The position in Belgium, however, is much more +serious than in France. It may best be described in the words of Professor +Sarolea, written after a visit of five weeks to his native country. "Other +belligerent nations may suffer from unemployment. In Belgium alone there +has been created a whole nation of unemployed. In other countries trade +and industry are dislocated. In Belgium they have come to a complete +standstill. Out of a population of eight millions, seven millions are under +the heel of the invader. Railwaymen are starving, for railways have ceased +to work. Office clerks are starving, for banks and offices are closed. +Public officials are starving, for no salaries can be paid.... Journalists +and printers are starving, for newspapers and books have ceased to appear. +Mill hands and coal miners and ironworkers are starving, for mills and +coal mines and iron works are closed."[3] Bad as this is, the condition of +affairs is somewhat relieved so far as France and Belgium are concerned by +the fact that the seas are open to them, but even then we must add these +areas to Germany and Austria-Hungary as regions where industry and trade +are at the best severely hampered, regions all of which are important +factors in the markets of Europe, and whose commercial paralysis will +re-echo through the whole commercial world. + +[Footnote 1: "The shortage of raw materials, notably cotton, wool, jute, +and petroleum, is greatly restricting production in many branches of +manufacture in Austria-Hungary. According to official estimates, the +supplies of some of the most necessary raw products are barely sufficient +for two more months. Factories are closing down, and the number of +unemployed is steadily increasing" (Reuter's telegram from Venice, Oct. 21, +1914).] + +[Footnote 2: For example, the probable number of French factories in a +position to produce sugar in 1914-15, will be 82 or 83 as against 206 +during the year 1913-14 _(Times_, Nov. 3, 1914).] + +[Footnote 3: Letter to the Press dated Sept. 12, 1914. Mr. J.H. Whitehouse, +M.P., who visited Belgium says, "The whole life of the nation has been +arrested."] + +The most fortunately situated combatants in Europe are Russia and Great +Britain. The former, covering half the area of Europe, has almost limitless +resources, and is much more easily capable of being self-supporting than +any of the other Great Powers engaged in the war. This country still +has the seas open to it.[1] The State subsidy to marine insurance has +encouraged overseas trade, and the re-establishment of the remittance +market has removed an obstacle to the flow of exports and imports. Still, +it is true that the financial world cannot recover all at once. "It is like +a man whose nervous system has been shattered by a great shock. Tonics and +stimulants may save him from complete collapse, but real recovery is a +matter of months and even years."[2] Further, the work hitherto done and +the services performed for Germany and Austria are now no longer called +for; our allies in the west of Europe are suffering acutely from the +immediate economic effects of the war and the large destruction of capital; +our neutral customers have not escaped scot-free. It would seem, therefore, +that in spite of the British command of the seas, production must +necessarily be seriously curtailed and that, therefore, the volume +of unemployment must be very considerable. On the other hand, though +production in France, Belgium and Russia may diminish in many directions, +what goods they do produce for export will find no market in Germany and +Austria-Hungary and a proportion of them will find their way to this +country. Such commodities will not only be valuable as food and raw +material for industry, but will set up a flow of British goods in payment +for them. Further, the production of commodities needed for the prosecution +of the war, will increase the volume of employment. Goods of all kinds are +required not only for the British armies but for the Allies generally. The +manner and extent to which these factors have influenced unemployment will +be considered presently. + +[Footnote 1: According to an Admiralty statement, corrected up to Sept. 23, +1914, 12 British ships had been sunk by German cruisers, 8 had been sunk +by mines, whilst a few fishing boats had been destroyed. British ships +detained and captured by Germany numbered 86, with a total tonnage of +229,000. On the other hand, 387 German vessels had been detained or +captured, the total tonnage being 1,140,000. According to _The Times_ (Oct. +9, 1914), up to date 1.6 per cent of the tonnage registered in the United +Kingdom had been lost. The figures for Germany and Austria were 18 and 13 +per cent respectively. The Committee which prepared the State War Insurance +Scheme estimated that the loss during the first six months of the war might +be about 10 per cent of all British steamers employed in foreign trade.] + +[Footnote 2: _Round Table_, Sept. 1914, p. 704.] + +Now the demand for the goods hitherto supplied by Germany to her foreign +customers, though abated, will still continue. As we have seen, she cannot +for the present supply them. By whom will she be superseded?[1] The +Government of this country early in the war took steps to co-operate with +British traders in an attempt to obtain some share of this trade, and the +United States also strove to make the fullest use of the opportunity. In +this country goods previously imported from Germany will, if still needed, +either be bought from the next cheapest importer or produced at home. +Commodities which we have in the past produced for German consumption are +not now required from us. If they continue to be made, it must be for other +countries. In other words, whether the volume of British foreign trade +remains the same or not, a proportion of it will be diverted into new +channels during the progress of the war. In a less degree, the trade of +other states will be deflected from its accustomed channels. Beyond this, +special influences will be felt in the case of certain new countries, as +for example Canada. "Canada's annual balance of trade is probably about +L60,000,000 against her: L30,000,000 being the excess of her trade imports +over her trade exports and the remaining L30,000,000 representing her +annual payment on money borrowed. She has balanced her account hitherto by +borrowing very large sums of money. Now she will be unable to do that any +longer. Nor will she at present, at any rate, obtain the immigrants on +which she is counting to enable her to pay her interest. She cannot redeem +the balance due by the export of gold. The burden would be too great in any +case, and moreover she has suspended specie payments. A part of the balance +due may be covered by the higher value of her exports, such as wheat. The +remainder she can only meet either by increasing her exports or by +reducing her imports. The latter she has already begun to do."[2] This new +readjustment may be accompanied by great economic loss; in any case the +dislocation will be harmful for the time, not only to the new countries, +but to the countries with whom they trade. It is clear that foreign trade +generally will during the war gradually be readjusted to the new conditions +of the times. To what extent the various streams of the world's trade will +be directed into new channels it is impossible to say; the readjustment +will be partly temporary, and partly permanent.[3] This redistribution of +production, if it leads to production under less favourable conditions than +before, will tend to raise prices, and thereby probably diminish the +power to buy other commodities. If it leads to the substitution of a well +organised and well paid industry by an industry of a less skilled kind, +there will be in effect a net lowering of wages. The widespread effects of +the war on industry and commerce must, therefore, have a profound effect on +the whole of the economic world. + +[Footnote 1: Towards the end of August, the tin-plate and steel-sheet trade +in this country which had suffered badly on the outbreak of war revived, +and "several mills were reopened, owing to the obtaining of orders which +formerly went to Germany" (_Board of Trade Labour Gazette_, Sept. 1914, p. +330).] + +[Footnote 2: _Round Table_, Sept. 1914, pp. 708-9.] + +[Footnote 3: This, of course, does not mean that Great Britain will +"capture" German trade and increase its foreign commerce by the amount of +its value.] + +2. _Unemployment and Short Time_.--We are now able to understand how the +war has affected the individual workman. As we have seen, the panic caused +by the outbreak of war and the collapse of the remittance market meant +in many industries the holding up of production and the stoppage of the +workman's wages. If it had not been possible to restart the machinery of +exchange, starvation would have walked through the land, and the industries +dependent on foreign raw material would have closed down altogether. As it +was, the inevitable dislocation increased the amount of unemployment.[1] +Whereas the trade union percentage[2] of unemployment amongst their members +was only 2.8 at the end of July, it had reached 7.1 by the end of August. +This figure, however, is considerably below the percentage of unemployed +during many periods of trade depression; the average for the whole of 1908 +was 7.8 and for 1909, 7.7, whilst during the month of March 1912 it rose to +11.3 as a result of the coal strike. + + +[Footnote 1: Note that unemployment prior to the war was showing a tendency +to increase.] + +[Footnote 2: It should be observed that these figures relate only to about +a million trade unionists, no non-unionists being included. Further, they +ignore short time.] + +The volume of unemployment during August varied considerably from trade to +trade. In the cotton industry, which, however, appeared to be in for a bad +time anyhow, 17.7 per cent of the trade union members were returned as +unemployed during August 1914, whilst in coal mining the percentage was +1.3. As compared with the previous month of July, there was a general +decline in all industries except shipbuilding, which benefited by increased +activity on Government work. The contraction in the volume of employment +was specially marked in the case of tin-plate works and in the textile, +furnishing and woodworking, and pottery trades. Again, in the trades where +the Government scheme of compulsory unemployment insurance applies, the +volume of unemployment at the end of July was 3.6 per cent, but at the end +of August it had reached 6.2 per cent or double the volume recorded in +August 1913.[1] Beyond this, there was during the month of August, an +enormous amount of short time; in several industries for which particulars +are available, thousands of workpeople were working half-time or less.[2] +The rise which took place in the price of certain food-stuffs especially +during the first part of August intensified the evil by reducing "real" +wages. + +[Footnote 1: The gradual increase during the month may be observed from the +weekly returns:--Aug. 7, 4.0 per cent; Aug. 14, 5.1 per cent; Aug. 21, 5.8 +per cent; Aug. 28, 6.2 per cent.] + +[Footnote 2: The Board of Trade receives monthly reports from employers and +others in different industries. These returns, though they do not cover +the whole of the industries, are sufficiently reliable to indicate the +widespread character of short time. During August 1914, in slate quarries +and china clay works, "there was a good deal of short time and some +unemployment in consequence of the war"; in tin-plate and sheet-steel +works, "short time was very general. In some cases discharges were obviated +by the sharing of work at the mills remaining open. The decrease in +employment is to be attributed to the effects of the war, and in particular +to the general restriction of the European market"; some branches of the +engineering trade, particularly agricultural and textile machinery, and the +motor car and cycle trades, were "disorganised by the war; many discharges +took place and a large amount of short time was worked." In the +miscellaneous metal trades, except in the manufacture of articles required +for military and naval purposes, "much short time was reported." In the +cotton industry, "the trade as a whole was working less than three days a +week, and large numbers of workpeople were entirely unemployed." In the +woollen trade, "about 60 per cent of the workpeople covered by the returns +received were on short time, including over 20 per cent who were working +half-time or less." The returns showed a decrease of "21.5 per cent in the +amount of wages paid compared with a month ago." In the worsted industry, +"about 65 per cent of the workpeople covered by the returns were working +short time during the month, including over 30 per cent who were working +only half time or less." The returns showed a decrease "of 26.5 per cent +in the amount of wages paid compared with a month ago." In the linen trade +"short time was reported generally." In the hosiery industry, "short time +was reported by firms employing over 40 per cent of the operatives covered +by the returns." In the silk trade "a great deal of short time was worked +in all the districts." In the levers and curtains branches of the lace +industry "the majority of the operatives ... were only working half time, +and large numbers were altogether unemployed." In the carpet trade "short +time was general, most districts working only half the usual hours." In the +furnishing trades "short time was worked in almost every district." "Short +time was very generally reported" in printing. In the glass trades "short +time was reported in several districts." In the potteries "most of the +firms" were running short time (see the _Board of Trade Labour Gazette_, +Sept. 1914).] + +During the month of September, however, employment revived.[1] Besides +Government work in shipbuilding yards, certain branches of the woollen +industry were working at full pressure on the production of blankets and +cloth for uniforms; the leather and boot and shoe industries on some sides +received an impetus from the large orders placed for army boots; hosiery +and knitted goods were required in large quantities. Speaking generally, +industries whose products were required for the army and navy were strained +to the extent of their resources. But each industry supplies a large +variety of goods of many different grades, and machinery and works +equipment cannot always be easily converted to the production of other +classes of commodities; so that even in the woollen and boot trades, for +example, the whole industries were not uniformly busy. The many industries, +however, to which the war brought no orders, enjoyed but a slight recovery, +and in some cases none at all. As the month of September proceeded, +the newspapers triumphantly referred to the fall in the percentage of +unemployment. The truth is that the decline was by no means general or +uniform, but was brought about, not so much by the gradual revival of +normal activity, but by the rush of Government orders. For instance, the +cotton industry remained in the trough of a deep depression, and the +furniture and piano making trades profited little. Further, no account was +taken of the prevalence of short time, though over a large field it was +widespread especially amongst women. What the real position of the labour +market was after we had been at war two months, cannot be precisely +determined, but it was certainly more serious than the Board of Trade +percentage would seem to indicate.[2] + +[Footnote 1: The percentage of unemployment at the beginning of October in +the trades compulsorily insured against unemployment was 5.1, as compared +with 6.3 at the beginning of the previous month.] + +[Footnote 2: "Certain confidential statistical enquiries on a large scale +are said to support the inference to be drawn from the figures published +by the Board of Trade, that at least 10 per cent of the fifteen million +wage-earners in the United Kingdom are not at work at all, whilst quite as +large a proportion are on short time. But out of more than a million men +whose services the employers have thus temporarily dispensed with, some +nine hundred thousand are being clothed, or are going to be clothed, in +khaki, and given Government pay. Thus the actual unemployment among men is, +except in (certain) black patches, only sporadic and scarcely more than +we are accustomed to. Very different is the situation of the women +wage-earners. Of these apparently half a million are now unemployed, and +twice as many are working only short time. Though the industrial situation +is considerably better than would have been predicted for the end of the +second month of a world war, it was, in fact, worse than it has been at +any time during the past quarter of a century" _(New Statesman,_ Oct. 3, +1914).] + +The month of October saw a further recovery and a more normal state of +affairs. The percentage of unemployment in insured trades continued to +decline;[1] but whilst the number of men on the Labour Exchange registers +fell (from 28,664 on October 2 to 24,690 on October 30), the number of +women registered remained almost stationary. At the end of three months +from the beginning of the war the condition of men's employment was about +normal; but women were suffering from excessive unemployment, whilst +short time was still common in many industries in which women are largely +employed. + +[Footnote 1: The percentages are as follows: Oct. 2, 5.11; Oct. 9, 4.80; +Oct. 16, 4.46; Oct. 23, 4.29; Oct. 30, 4.16.] + +The large volume of unemployment, which it had been anticipated would +accompany a great war, was avoided, partly because of prompt State action +in maintaining the fabric of commerce and finance, and therefore the supply +of raw materials, and partly because of the large demand for commodities +for the Army and Navy--a war demand vastly in excess of that in any +previous war. In other words, State intervention and the Navy have +placed Great Britain in a much superior economic position to that of her +adversaries. + +3. _Trade Unions, Co-operative Societies and Distress_.--Before the +outbreak of the war there were signs that the wave of industrial activity +which reached a high point in 1913 was receding, and that unemployment was +beginning to increase; but the trade unions did not anticipate that the +ordinary ebb and flow of trade was to be disturbed by a great war. Within a +very short time after the declaration of war, the trade unions experienced +a heavy drain on their funds in respect of unemployment benefit. It is, +of course, obvious that the accumulated funds of trade unions were never +intended as a subsidy to the community during a time of war, which is what, +in point of fact, they became. It is true that the unions made efforts +to conserve their resources in various ways, not least by advising their +younger members without dependants to join the army; it is true also that +most of them profited under Section 106 of the National Insurance Act +by the State refund of one-sixth of their payments to their unemployed +members; but these measures--and others--were inadequate to maintain the +unions in a sound financial condition, and many unions trembled on the +verge of bankruptcy.[1] Such a condition of affairs was viewed with +apprehension not only by the trade union movement, but by the State, with +the result that at the beginning of October the Government subsidy of +one-sixth was under certain conditions increased.[2] But even with this +assistance, many unions will undoubtedly experience considerable difficulty +in avoiding financial disaster. Speaking generally, the trade union +movement as a whole will emerge from the war in straitened circumstances. +Some unions may have collapsed, and amongst others the movement in +favour of amalgamation may have received an impetus owing to financial +embarrassments. + +[Footnote 1: Speaking generally, it cannot be said that the trade unions +faced the crisis with either wisdom or courage. Their attitude, on the +whole, was one of utter bewilderment. The lack of the power of adaptability +to new circumstances, together with the fact that sufficient pressure was +not brought to bear upon the Government in the first weeks of the war, +accounts for the unfortunate position in which the trade unions found +themselves.] + +[Footnote 2: The scheme applies only to unions suffering from abnormal +unemployment. There are also conditions that they "should not pay +unemployment benefit above a maximum rate of 17s. per week, including any +sum paid by way of State unemployment benefit," and that they "should agree +while in receipt of the emergency grant to impose levies over and above the +ordinary contributions upon those members who remain fully employed." +The amount of the emergency grant in addition to the refund of one-sixth +already payable will be either one-third or one-sixth of the expenditure +on out-of-work pay, depending on the amount of the trade union levy. Under +special conditions the grant is to be retrospective. It is, therefore, +possible for trade unions to be subsidised so far as unemployment benefit +is concerned, to the extent of one-half their payments. But this scheme +does nothing to assist trade unions (of which there are many) which get no +unemployment benefit.] + +The decrease in earnings accompanying short time, and their total stoppage +in the case of unemployment, mean amongst the workers a restriction of +purchasing power. The shrinkage in the total wages bill, especially in +Lancashire, must lead to a diminution in the income of small traders and +the co-operative societies. Where trade is very bad the societies will be +severely hit; smaller purchases will mean smaller profits, which, where +there is no large reserve to fall back upon, will in turn mean the +declaration of a smaller dividend. The "divi" received by the workers will +be less, and the purchases which the thrifty housewife of the north usually +makes with it in the way of clothing and replacement of household articles +will be less also; where the "divi" has been left in the society, it will +in a large number of cases be used to supplement the scanty wages earned on +short time, or to provide the necessaries of life where the breadwinner +is altogether unemployed. In places where times become very bad, the +co-operative societies during the war, and for some time after, will suffer +because of the conversion of the cash orders which ordinarily go to the +"co-op" into credit orders at the shop round the corner. On the whole, +however, the co-operative societies will probably come better out of the +war than many classes of small shop-keepers. The small tailors, drapers, +earthenware dealers, etc., and others who sell all but indispensable +commodities, will see a shrinkage in their sales, especially if prices +rise. The co-operative societies will also lose in this respect, but they +will lose less on the whole, owing to the fact that a good deal of their +capital is used in the sale of food-stuffs, the consumption of which will +be restricted last. But admitting this, they cannot expect to escape +unscathed, and the blow they suffer will be felt on other sides of their +activity, such as their educational work, the income for which usually +fluctuates with the prosperity of the societies. + +The diminution of the purchasing power of the working people because of the +restriction of the national wages bill, however, may be minimised by common +action. The National Relief Fund and the Women's Employment Fund are +intended really for this purpose. The establishment of women's training +workshops and of maintenance grants on condition of attendance at schools +and classes are steps in the same direction. The Government has increased +the disgracefully low payments made to dependants of soldiers on active +service, and its scale of pensions for widows of soldiers and sailors and +for those totally or partially disabled in the performance of military or +naval duties. Arrangements have been made for the payment of allowances of +half wages up to a maximum of L1 a week to dependants of sailors employed +on insured British merchant ships captured or detained by the enemy. More +important from the point of view of industry as a whole are the steps which +have been taken to minimise the effects of a diminution in the volume of +employment by the development of new openings. The Government through the +Board of Trade took the lead in the attempt to secure a share of the trade +hitherto done by Germany and Austria. Special efforts were made to develop +the manufacture of toys, and other industrial experiments were begun by +the Central Committee on Women's Employment. The Government appointed +a Chemical Products Supply Committee with a view to stimulating the +production of dyes and drugs at home. These proposals are in the main an +attempt to divert the trade of foreign countries, especially Germany, into +British channels. The second line of action is fuller provision of home +needs which cannot be satisfied by foreign producers, but are essentially +domestic. Such needs are housing, public parks, roads, etc. Between August +4 and September 21, 1914, the Local Government Board received over 600 +applications from local authorities for powers to borrow money amounting +in all to over L2,500,000. About a fifth of this amount it was intended to +expend on housing. During this period the Board sanctioned loans amounting +in the aggregate to more than L3,500,000, as compared with rather under +L2,000,000 in the same period in 1913. The Road Board arranged to put in +hand the construction of certain new highways arranged for before the +beginning of the war. In addition, in the first seven weeks of the war, the +Board arranged to make grants amounting to about L450,000 in aid of new +road construction and road improvements in many different parts of the +country, which will involve a total expenditure of about a million +sterling. The Development Commission began to consider schemes for the +construction of light railways, for the improvement of the navigation of +rivers, etc., in order that work of this kind should be ready to be put +into operation when the necessity arose. The Board of Agriculture has urged +that where practicable the acreage under wheat should be increased. This +suggestion is, of course, valuable, but will not greatly affect the +industrial situation. Even if the schemes sanctioned by the Local +Government Board and those adopted by the Road Board were put into +operation immediately, which is almost impossible, they would not make a +very appreciable difference to the total wages bill of the country. But +perhaps it is thought by the Government that the state of employment is not +sufficiently grave to warrant a greater expenditure at the present time. In +spite of the insistence on forestalling destitution, there is still +among local authorities much confusion of charity and relief work with +anticipation of future needs calling for employment through the ordinary +channels of trade. On the whole the Government has not met the domestic +problems of the war with the unanimity and boldness which has characterised +its actions in the actual prosecution of the war and in dealing with the +financial crisis. + +4. _The New Spirit._--The broader social effects which showed themselves in +the early days of the war are illustrated by the remarkable growth of State +Socialism. The nation became a community, united in a single purpose; +breaches which many imagined to be permanent, cleavages which were thought +to be fundamental, no longer existed. None was for a party; all were for +the State. The three political parties formed a Parliamentary Recruiting +Committee, and altogether impossible teams of people appeared on public +platforms with a common aim; Mr. Ben Tillett, in words that might have +fallen from the lips of a Tory ex-Cabinet minister, declared that "every +resource at our command must be utilised for the purpose of preserving our +country and nation"; the anti-militarist trade union movement earnestly +appealed to those of its members who were ex-non-commissioned officers +to re-enlist; the Queen and Miss Mary MacArthur were members of the same +committee. This unanimity, which has pushed into the background for the +present causes of difference, has led the vast majority of people to submit +cheerfully to the will of the State. The unity of to-day must necessarily +make its influence felt even when the reason of its existence has passed +away. In the meantime it is assisting in the growth of a new spirit which +the war itself has fostered. The social outlook of the people and their +attitude towards the larger problems of life is changing, and patriotism +has taken a deeper meaning. + +So far we have devoted our attention to some of the immediate effects of +the war. But on the return of peace there will be new influences at work, +the immediate and ultimate effects of which will powerfully affect the +course of future development. The European War will mark an era in +international politics. It may also stand as a landmark in the history of +the social and economic life of Western Europe. It is not unlikely that in +this respect it will surpass in its importance all the wars of the past. +The reasons are to be found in the magnitude and costliness of the war, the +highly developed character and the inter-relatedness of foreign commerce, +the possibility of new industrial forces coming into play, and the +influence of the war on the political and social ideas of the European +peoples. It may be that in this country the war will let loose economic +forces destined to modify industrial organisation very profoundly; and +that social forces, especially on the Continent, will be liberated to work +towards fuller political freedom. These things lie in the veiled future, +and prophecy is dangerous. We may, however, turn to consider some of the +probable effects the war will leave behind it. + + + +C. AFTER THE WAR + + +1. _General Effects_.--When the war comes to an end, an immediate revival +of commercial relations between the combatant States and a general revival +of foreign trade cannot be reasonably expected. After the Napoleonic Wars, +English manufacturers, assuming the eagerness of continental peoples to buy +their goods, were met with the obvious fact that impoverished nations are +not good customers. When peaceful relations are resumed in Europe, we shall +recognise very vividly the extent to which industry and commerce on the +Continent have been closed down. Even assuming that British production +continues, Germany, Belgium and Austria will have little to send us +in exchange. The closing of the overseas markets of Germany, and the +consequent shrinkage in production, the disruption of normal industrial +life by the withdrawal of millions of men to join the colours, and the +abnormal character of existing trade, due to the needs of the armies in +the field, are not conditions favourable to the easy resumption of normal +commercial relations. The dislocation of the mechanism of industry and +commerce in Europe, on a much larger scale than ever before--a mechanism +which has with growing international relations and interdependence become +more complicated and more sensitive in recent years--cannot be immediately +remedied by a stroke of the pen or the fiat of an emperor. The credit +system upon which modern industry and commerce are built depends upon +mutual confidence. This confidence will not be restored among the combatant +nations immediately on the cessation of war; it will require time to grow. +Further, Europe during the war has been spending its substance and must +emerge much poorer. This applies not only to combatant States, but to +neutral countries, some of which have floated loans to meet the abnormal +expenditure thrown upon them by prolonged mobilisation. The capital and +credit of a large number of people will have suffered great loss or have +vanished into thin air. Houses, shops, and buildings of all kinds, produce +manufactured and unmanufactured, bridges, ships, railway stations and stock +of enormous value will have been destroyed. The community will have +been impoverished, not only by the expenditure of great armies and the +destruction of wealth, but by the utilisation for immediate consumption of +wealth which would have been used as new capital, and by the withdrawal of +probably close upon fifteen million men from production during the period +of the war. Even if we assume that the world has lost the production of +only twelve million men[1], the loss is enormous. If each man were capable +of producing, on the average, wealth to the value of L100 per year, the +loss of production per year during the continuance of the war would be +about L1,200,000,000. The effect of these factors will be heightened by +the fact that the millions of men whose needs during the war have been +satisfied by their non-combatant fellow-countrymen will be thrown upon +their own resources. And though Europe will still need to be fed and clad +and housed, the effectual demand of the population for the goods and +services it needs, a demand which it is able to satisfy because of its +possession of exchangeable wealth, will be smaller than before the war. +The demand will be more or less stifled until the credit system is +re-established and mutual confidence restored, and until industry and +commerce have adjusted themselves to the new situation. The volume of +employment in this country during the war will have been swollen by +temporary demands for war supplies which will cease when the war ends; +foreign trade will be uncertain; a larger number of soldiers will be thrown +on the labour market than ever before. It would seem, therefore, that in +the absence of special steps, the volume of unemployment at the close of +the war will be a good deal greater than during the progress of the war[2]. + +[Footnote 1: The number must be larger than this, as the mobilisation of +the armies of neutral states should be taken into account.] + +[Footnote 2: It is thought by some that the war will be followed by a short +boom, when Europe will make good the necessities of industry and +civilised life, but it is at least doubtful whether there will be a rapid +reproduction of these commodities, owing to the conditions, already +described, which will obtain at the close of the war. In any case, however, +it will be merely a flash in the pan, and there will follow the gloom of a +deep depression, unless there is clear-sighted State action.] + +It is just conceivable, though one hopes not probable, that the economic +effects of the war will be complicated by the imposition of war +indemnities. The indemnity is really a means of obtaining booty from a +vanquished State, and has been looked upon as a justifiable means of +further humiliating an already beaten enemy. It has been pointed out[1], +however, that the advantages derived from an indemnity are not an unmixed +gain. The indemnity recoils on the heads of those who impose it. It is +unnecessary here to enter into a consideration of the detailed effects +of huge payments by defeated nations; though it may be remarked that the +ramifications of such payments are so intricate and often so incapable of +measurement, whilst other economic influences are at work at the same +time, that it is impossible to draw an accurate conclusion as to the net +advantage or disadvantage of indemnities to the State which levies them. +But the point to be borne in mind is that the addition of a great debt to +the already large burden of an unsuccessful war reacts upon all countries +with which the defeated state enters into business relations. The losses +due to this cause will not necessarily be counterbalanced by gains from +increased trade with the country receiving the indemnity; and even if they +were, the latter trade might be of a different character. In any case, +countries not parties to the indemnity will be affected by it in some way +or other; war indemnities, like wars, do not pass by neutral countries and +leave them untouched. + +[Footnote 1: See Norman Angell, _The Great Illusion_, Part I. chap. vi.] + +It is important to remember that, though modern warfare is much more costly +and more exhausting than in the past, there is another side to the matter. +Society has also gained remarkably in its powers of recuperation. The +blight of war is not as terrible as might be expected. The accumulated +knowledge, the vastly increased productivity of industry, and the high +organising ability, which have made the modern industrial and commercial +world, will not be obliterated by the war. And though there will be +difficulties in the way of their full operation when peace returns, they +will aid powerfully in shortening the period of recovery. The forces which +have transformed mediaeval into modern cities in a few short years will +still exist. Though they can hardly be expected to overcome all the many +factors likely to restrain economic activity, they may be relied on to +stimulate the revival of normal economic life. Indeed, the knowledge of +science and the faculty of organisation are likely to be applied more +extensively than in the past to productive processes. + +After the war, when the States of Europe begin to tread the paths of peace +again, one of the first things to be done will be to repair as far as +possible the damage done by the war. Take Belgium as an extreme example; +leaving aside the irreparable destruction of historic buildings and +priceless treasures, there are many million pounds' worth of houses and +farm buildings, shops, warehouses, factories, public buildings, ships, +railway stations, and bridges to be replaced. This work will take +precedence over other kinds of production. Sugar, motor cars, glass, etc., +will still be manufactured, but chiefly in order to buy the requisite raw +materials and finished goods for the replacement of the wealth destroyed by +the ravages of the war. Speaking generally, Belgium will probably consume +less food than ordinarily, wear less clothes, and consume less luxuries. +Savings, which would normally have been devoted to new industrial +developments, will be needed to make good the losses in existing industrial +establishments. It is clear, therefore, that the economic growth of Belgium +will be retarded in a great degree.[1] The same holds good of Germany, +though probably not to the same extent unless the theatre of war is +extended to cover a considerable part of the Empire. In the case of our own +country, provided it remains free from invasion, there will not be such a +large replacement of lost wealth and capital destroyed by the war, except +in the case of shipping; but in common with other States there will be the +war to pay for, and certain obligations to meet regarding the maimed and +the relatives of the slain. Taxation will be heavy, and therefore, on this +ground alone the accumulation of new capital will be retarded. Industrial +organisation, having been re-arranged and modified to meet the requirements +of the war period, will not resume its old form without a good deal of +creaking and jolting. And even if it could, it will not be able to face +the new conditions arising out of the war at all rapidly. There is every +prospect, therefore, of a time of great difficulty after the war is over, +before the normal course of industrial and commercial activity is fully +resumed. In all likelihood, we shall find that the relative importance +of our various industries will have altered to some extent, and that the +nature of our trade will have been modified also. Then also the relative +positions of our home and foreign trade may shift; in other words, if +the war lasts sufficiently long for new industries to develop and become +efficient, they may survive the competition of foreign goods after the +war; in which case, the goods which have hitherto been produced to buy the +foreign goods will not now be required for foreign trade. It may be that +on the return of peace, some European States, in order to give their +industries an opportunity to recover from the effects of the war, will +inaugurate new tariffs; there is, indeed, a strong possibility that on +these grounds, and because of the dependence of the United Kingdom on the +products of Germany, the Tariff Reform Movement here may be electrified +into life. + +[Footnote 1: If Germany be required to compensate Belgium for the damage +done, these effects will in large part disappear; though the burden +would still remain. The difference would be that it would be more widely +distributed.] + +2. _Possible Industrial Developments_.--But industrial changes will not be +confined to the direction and form which economic activity will take. As +has been suggested above, there may be far-reaching changes in the methods +of production. It has been said that "there is only one way by which the +wealth of the world will be quickly replaced after the war and that is +by work. The country whose workers show the greatest capacity for +productiveness will be the country which will most rapidly recuperate."[1] +The question goes deeper than the replacement of wealth. The position after +the war will be that production will be retarded because of the diminution +in the rate of accumulation of new capital since the beginning of the war; +there will be a certain amount of leeway to make up. Consequently, there +will be every incentive towards the greatest possible efficiency in +production. It is here that the workers are likely to be affected. Has +labour reached its maximum efficiency? It has been shown by the application +of what is called "scientific management," that the output of labour can be +increased to a remarkable extent. For instance, instead of shovelling 16 +tons a day, a man can shovel 59 tons; a man loading pig-iron increased his +total load per day from 12-1/2 to 47-1/2 tons; the day's tale of bricks +laid has been raised from 1000 to 2700. The list could be extended to cover +operatives working at machines. In the endeavour to screw up industry to a +maximum of production, it is not likely that the expedients of "scientific +management" will long remain untried. Already the system is making +considerable headway in the United States, and it is not altogether unknown +in this country. It is not possible to enter into a full explanation of the +methods of "scientific management." Briefly, by a process of scientific +selection it puts each worker in the job for which he is best fitted, and +teaches him exactly how to use the most efficient tools with which he +would be provided. The method of teaching may be illustrated from Mr. F.W. +Taylor's own example: "Schmidt started to work, and all day long and at +regular intervals, was told by the man who stood over him with a watch, +'Now, pick up a pig and walk. Now sit down and rest. Now walk--now rest,' +etc. He worked when he was told to work, and rested when he was told to +rest, and at half-past five in the afternoon had his 47-1/2 tons loaded on +the car."[2] By elaborate experiments the exact shape and size of a shovel +is determined; by long observation useless and awkward movements of a +workman are eliminated or replaced by the correct movements giving the +maximum return for the minimum of effort. In this way, and by a bonus +on wages, a largely increased output is obtained. It is clear that the +adoption of such methods gives the "scientific manager" great power; it +also seems inevitable that the workman should degenerate into an automaton; +it is obvious that in the hands of employers ignorant of the principles +underlying it, and seeing merely a new and highly profitable method of +exploitation, it will be open to serious abuse, as experience has already +shown in America. + +[Footnote 1: _Round Table_, Sept. 1914, p. 708.] + +[Footnote 2: _Scientific Management_, by F.W. Taylor, p. 47.] + +So far the tremendous significance of "scientific management" has not +been fully recognised. Properly understood, it is the complement to the +industrial revolution, which by the more extensive use of machinery, etc., +increased the efficiency of capital. The present movement aims at a similar +increase in the efficiency of labour as an agent of production. The new +revolution in industry has as yet merely begun, because employers, in spite +of the motive of self-interest, are conservative; but it will receive an +enormous impetus from the conditions arising out of the war. Like the +introduction of machinery and factory industry a century and a half ago and +onward, it may be accompanied by widespread evils and cruel exploitation. +Indeed, there is every likelihood that the methods will be distorted and +misused. By their careful application there is no doubt that the output of +the labourer can be increased without the expenditure of greater effort +than before, but even then there would be the tendency towards becoming +de-humanised. This, however, might be overcome by shorter hours and higher +wages, which would raise the standard of comfort and widen the worker's +interests. Unwisely used, "scientific management" will become an instrument +for shackling the worker, and increasing at a great rate the wealth of the +capitalist. It will be freely admitted that anything that will increase the +productivity of the labourer, and therefore the wealth of the community, is +advantageous, provided there is an equitable distribution of the product, +and that the effects on the working members of the State are not socially +injurious. But the hidden evils that may manifest themselves are very real, +and it is important that not only the workers, but the State should be +prepared to save the good and prevent the evil. There will, however, be +large numbers of employers of labour who will not avail themselves of the +new-fangled methods, and who will endeavour to increase production by the +old policy of "driving." And even without driving, wage-earning labour +under present conditions may be carried on under circumstances unfavourable +to industrial efficiency, and for hours inimical to the welfare of the +community and actually injurious to industrial productivity. In the future +the State will be more closely concerned with industry and commerce than +hitherto; there will probably be a more clearly defined State policy aimed +at the encouragement of production. Its view will be wider than that of the +individual employer, and we may expect therefore, providing there is no +serious reaction after the strain of the war, that the State will impose +working conditions which will favour maximum production in the long run. It +will be to the interest of the community to maximise the efficiency of the +industrial system; and enlightened statesmanship will overhaul our existing +code of industrial laws to achieve this object as far as possible, as well +as to guard the community against the evils inherent in a misapplication of +the principles of "scientific management."[1] + +[Footnote 1: See an article on "Next Steps in Factory and Workshop Reform," +by Arthur Greenwood, in the _Political Quarterly_ for September 1914.] + +After the war, unemployment is likely to increase. The work of new +production will be put into operation only gradually; there will be every +inducement to economise the use of labour as far as possible; wages during +the depression will most probably fall; there will be disaffection in the +ranks of the trade unionists; the possible consolidation of industries into +the hands of fewer employers will increase the strength of the masters; the +funds of the trade unions will be depleted by the heavy strain on their +resources, and subject to a further drain after the war. The outlook of the +trade union movement is, therefore, far from bright. It will be generally +agreed that the bankruptcy or serious impoverishment of the unions of this +country would be nothing less than a national disaster; but unless action +of some kind is taken, they will become greatly weakened and almost +impotent, and one great bulwark against unjust encroachments upon the +rights of labour will be removed. + +It is not improbable, however, that the community will indirectly assist +the trade unions by the steps taken to mitigate the evils which the war +will leave in its train. The army instead of being immediately disbanded +may be gradually dismissed over a period of, say, five years; the widows +and dependants of soldiers and sailors, and those who have returned maimed +and crippled from the war, may be adequately provided for, and, together +with children of twelve and thirteen, kept off the labour market; the +larger schemes of the Development Commission may be put into operation; the +legal minimum wage may be extended to all low-paid trades. In these and +other ways the community may deal comprehensively with the problems it +has to face. The difficulties of the aftermath period will call for both +clear-sighted action and public spirit; and if it is to be bridged over +successfully, the transition from a war to a peace footing must be gradual; +the community must continue its state of mobilisation in order to meet the +enemy within the gates. Provided the united wisdom of the nation is thrown +into the task, the evil after-effects of the war may be, if not altogether +avoided, restricted within narrow limits. At the bottom, therefore, the +future course of events depends upon the temper and spirit of the people at +the close of the war. + +3. _Social Effects and the New Outlook_.--The European conflict will +probably exercise a strong sobering influence upon the minds of the people. +The gravity of the crisis, whatever victories may crown our arms, will +be reflected in the gravity of the people. A new dignity, a greater +self-respect, a deeper earnestness may arise among the mass of the people, +to which the conduct of our soldiers in the field will contribute. High +qualities of leadership win their admiration; but for them they claim no +credit. The army is officered for the most part by people of a higher +social standing, whose qualities they will willingly admit; but the social +gulf debars them from gaining inspiration from their achievements. In the +case of the rank and file, largely drawn from their own class, the effect +is different. The Tommy is flesh of their flesh and blood of their blood. +The qualities he displays reflect credit upon his class. The working man +is not unmindful of the high opinion in which the British private has been +held by a line of continental soldiers from Napoleon to Bernhardi. The +exploits of his fellows in the field have given the lie to stories of +deterioration; and working people are experiencing a sense of pride in +their class which may have no inconsiderable effect on their attitude +regarding social developments in the future. + +Already the national temper has not submitted without protest to the +disgraceful sweating of our troops merely because their patriotism has led +them to sacrifice their lives, which are beyond all money payment. But the +feeling in favour of the war and the spirit of trust in the Government has, +up to the present, overridden serious criticism. The result has been that +the Government has often remained inactive when action was needed and has +acted unwisely and ignorantly at times; for example, in the case of the +Local Government Board circular, stating that the Army Council are prepared +to issue allowances through the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association +or the Local Representation Committees. It has been said that "the whole +system is an outrage on democratic principles. The State sweats its +servants and then compels them to take the niggardly wages it allows them +from a charitable society[1]." This type of action may pass muster during a +time of stress, but whether the spirit of the people will accept it after +the war is over and there are the dependants of the slain to be maintained +and the permanently crippled to be provided for is a different matter. Not +merely justice, but the new pride of the people will rebel against it. +These are but phases of the larger social problem. There is the question of +poverty in all its ramifications. For the moment, economic injustices and +social evils have fallen into the back of people's minds, and the new +and abnormal causes of destitution are calling forth special measures +of assistance. After the war, the ever-present deep-seated poverty will +reassert its presence, and in the hearts of many people the question will +arise as to whether the community which courageously and whole-heartedly +fought the enemy without the gates will turn with equal courage and +determination when the time comes to fight the enemy within the gates. The +experiences of the war time, the willingness to embark on great projects +in face of a national crisis, will not be forgotten, but will inspire in +social reformers the hope that the country may also face the internal +national peril in a similar spirit. The national--as opposed to the +individual--poverty which the war will cause may itself be a force making +for good. As Mr. Lloyd George well said, "A great flood of luxury and +of sloth which had submerged the land is receding and a new Britain is +appearing. We can see for the first time the fundamental things that matter +in life, and that have been obscured from our vision by the tropical growth +of prosperity."[2] There seems a prospect of an era of social growth and +regeneration following the war. In other European countries there may be +equally important developments. It may well be that in the event of German +defeat the democratic movements of that country will gain a great impetus +from the blow given to the Prussian hegemony. In Russia there is an +expectation of a new freedom. At the first meeting of the Duma after the +opening of hostilities the Labour Party declared its opinion that "through +the agony of the battlefield the brotherhood of the Russian people will be +strengthened and a common desire created to free the land from its terrible +internal troubles." + +[Footnote 1: _The Nation,_ Sept. 19, 1914.] + +[Footnote 2: Speech at the Queen's Hall, London, Sept. 19, 1914.] + +It must be admitted, on the other hand, that there is a possibility of a +period of reaction and torpor after the strain of the war; the country will +be seriously impoverished, and there will be a heavy burden of taxation in +spite of some probable relief from the burden of armaments. Still, social +evils and injustices will be more obvious than ever. There will be many new +national and imperial problems clamouring to be faced. The intellectual +ferment which has had its source in the war will remain at work to widen +the mental outlook and deepen the social consciousness. On the whole, it +will probably be true to say that, though circumstances may postpone it, +there will sooner or later arise a great movement pledged to cleanse our +national life of those features which bar the way to human freedom and +happiness. + +It also seems undeniable that the deep interest taken by large numbers of +people in the war will rouse them to a sense of the importance of problems +of government and of foreign policy. The working men's committees on +foreign affairs of half a century ago, which have left no trace behind +them, may be revived in a new form, and the differentiation of economic and +social questions from political and foreign problems may be obliterated. +The importance of the gradually widening area of vision among the more +thoughtful section of the people can hardly be exaggerated. In no respect +is the broadening of outlook more discernible than in the sphere of +imperial affairs. Hitherto the Empire to the working man has been regarded +as almost mythical. In so far as it did exist, it was conceived as a happy +hunting ground for the capitalist exploiter. The spontaneous assistance +given to the mother country by the colonies and dependencies has convinced +him of the reality of the Empire, and vaguely inspired him with a vision of +its possibilities as a federation of free commonwealths. In other words, +the British Empire, contrasted with that of Germany, is gradually being +recognised as standing for Democracy, however imperfect its achievements +may be up to the present. Consequently, the return of peace will see a +deeper interest in imperial questions; indeed, it is not too much to say +that there will be an imperial renaissance, born of a new patriotism, "clad +in glittering white." The change of heart which is taking place in the +people of this country, through the opening of the flood-gates of feeling +and thought by the unsuspecting warrior in shining armour, may bring a new +age comparable in its influence on civilisation with the great epochs of +the past. To-day is seed-time. But the harvest will not be gathered without +sweat and toil. The times are pregnant with great possibilities, but their +realisation depends upon the united wisdom of the people. + + + +BOOKS + + +In order to understand the machinery of international trade, reference +should be made to Hartiey Withers' _Money Changing_ (5s.), or Clare's +_A.B.C. of the Foreign Exchanges_ (3s.); an outline of the subject will +be found in any good general text-book on Economics. On the financial +situation, see articles on "Lombard Street in War" and "The War and +Financial Exhaustion" (_Round Table,_ September and December 1914); "War +and the Financial System, August 1914," by J.M. Keynes (_Economic Journal_, +September 1914); and articles in the _New Statesman_ on "Why a Moratorium?" +(August 15,1914), and "The Restoration of the Remittance Market" (August +29, 1914). Norman Angell's _The Great Illusion_ (2s. 6d.) should be +consulted for an examination of the relations between war and trade. +The most accessible book dealing with the foreign trade of the European +countries is the _Statesman's Year-Book_, published annually at 10s. 6d. +The chapters reprinted from the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_ are also useful. +A valuable article on "The Economic Relations of the British and German +Empires," by E. Crammond, appeared in the _Journal of the Royal Statistical +Society_, July 1914. The same writer published an article on "The Economic +Aspects of the War" in _The Quarterly Review_ for October 1914 (6s.). A +grasp of the economic development of Germany may be obtained from W.H. +Dawson's _Evolution of Modern Germany_ (5s.) and the same writer's +_Industrial Germany_ (Nation's Library, 1s.). Mr. F.W. Taylor's _Scientific +Management_ (5s.) and Miss J. Goldmark's _Fatigue and Efficiency_ (8s.) +explain scientific management. A short account is also given in Layton's +_Capital and Labour_ (Nation's Library, 1s.). + +The course of unemployment in this country may be traced from the returns +published each month in the _Board of Trade Labour Gazette_ (monthly, 1d.). +Proposals for dealing with possible and existing distress during the war +are to be found in a pamphlet on _The War and the Workers,_ by Sidney Webb +(Fabian Society, 1d.). For the possible use of trade unions as a channel +for the distribution of public assistance, see an article in _The Nation_ +for September 5, 1914, and Mr. G.D.H. Cole's article on "How to help the +Cotton Operative" in _The Nation_ for November 7, 1914. The same paper +published two suggestive articles on "Relief or Maintenance?" (September 19 +and October 3). The situation which has arisen in the woollen and worsted +industries owing to the large demand for cloth for the troops is dealt with +in an article on "The Government and Khaki," by Arthur Greenwood in _The +Nation_ for November 28, 1914. Reference may be made to the official White +Paper on Distress; other official documents of note are the following: + +"Separation allowances to the Wives and Children of Seamen, + Marines, and Reservists." Cd. 7619. 1914. 1/2d. +"Increased Rates of Separation Allowance for the Wives and + Children of Soldiers." Cd. 7255. 1914. 1/2d. +"Return of Papers relating to the Assistance rendered by the + Treasury to Banks and Discount Houses since the Outbreak of + War on August 4, 1914, and to the Questions of the Advisability + of continuing or ending the Moratorium and of the Nature of + the Banking Facilities now available." H.C. 457 of 1914. 1d. +"Report, dated April 30, 1914, of a Sub-Committee of the Committee + of Imperial Defence on the Insurance of British Shipping in + Time of War, to devise a scheme to ensure that, in case of war, + British Steamships should not be generally laid up, and that + Oversea Commerce should not be interrupted by reason of + inability to cover war risks of Ships and Cargoes by Insurance, + and which would also secure that the insurance rates should not + be so high as to cause an excessive rise in prices." Cd. 7560. + 1914. 2 1/2d. + +The Government has issued a _Manual of Emergency Legislation_ (3s. +6d.) containing the statutes, proclamations, orders in council, rules, +regulations, and notifications used in consequence of the war; the +appendices contain other documents (the Declarations of Paris and of +London, the Hague Convention, etc.). + + + +CHAPTER IX + +GERMAN CULTURE AND THE BRITISH COMMONWEALTH + +"Peace cannot become a law of human society, except by passing through the +struggle which will ground life and association on foundations of justice +and liberty, on the wreck of every power which exists not for a principle +but for a dynastic interest."--MAZZINI in 1867. + +"The greatest triumph of our time, a triumph in a region loftier than that +of electricity or steam, will be the enthronement of this idea of Public +Right as the governing idea of European policy; as the common and precious +inheritance of all lands, but superior to the passing opinion of any. The +foremost among the nations will be that one which, by its conduct, shall +gradually engender in the minds of the others a fixed belief that it is +just."--GLADSTONE. + + +Sec.1. _The Two Issues._--The War of 1914 is not simply a war between the +Dual Alliance and the Triple Entente: it is, for Great Britain and +Germany especially, a war of ideas--a conflict between two different and +irreconcilable conceptions of government, society, and progress. An attempt +will be made in this chapter to make clear what these conceptions are, and +to discuss the issue between them as impartially as possible, from the +point of view, not of either of the combatant Powers, but of human +civilisation as a whole. + +There are really two great controversies being fought out between Great +Britain and Germany: one about the ends of national policy, and another +about the means to be adopted towards those or any other ends. The latter +is the issue raised by the German Chancellor's plea--not so unfamiliar +on the lips of our own countrymen as we are now tempted to believe--that +"Necessity knows no law." It is the issue of Law and "scraps of paper" +against Force, against what some apologists have called "the Philosophy of +Violence," but which, in its latest form, the French Ambassador has more +aptly christened "the Pedantry of Barbarism." That issue has lately been +brought home, in its full reality, to the British public from the course of +events in Belgium and elsewhere, and need not here be elaborated. Further +words would be wasted. A Power which recognises no obligation but force, +and no law but the sword, which marks the path of its advance by organised +terrorism and devastation, is the public enemy of the civilised world. + +But it is a remarkable and significant fact that the policy in which this +ruthless theory is embodied commands the enthusiastic and united support of +the German nation. How can this be explained? + +It must be remembered in the first place that the German public does +not see the facts of the situation as we do. On the question of Belgian +neutrality and the events which precipitated the British ultimatum, what +we know to be a false version of the facts is current in Germany, as is +evident from the published statements of the leaders of German thought and +opinion, and it may be many years before its currency is displaced. + +This difficulty should serve to remind us how defective the machinery of +civilisation still is. One of the chief functions of law is, not merely to +settle disputes and to enforce its decisions, but to ascertain the true +facts on which alone a settlement can be based. The fact that no tribunal +exists for ascertaining the true facts in disputes between sovereign +governments shows how far mankind still is from an established "rule of +law" in international affairs. Not only is the Hague powerless to give and, +still more, to enforce its decision on the questions at issue between the +European Powers. It has not even the machinery for ascertaining the facts +of the case and bringing them to the notice of neutral governments and +peoples in the name of civilisation as a whole. + +But apart from divergent beliefs as to the facts, it is remarkable that +thinking Germany should be in sympathy with the spirit and tone of German +policy, which led, as it appears to us, by an inexorable logic to the +violation of Belgian neutrality and the collision with Great Britain. + +But the fact, we are told, admits of easy explanation. Thinking Germany has +fallen a victim to the teachings of Treitschke and Nietzsche--Treitschke +with his Macchiavellian doctrine that "Power is the end-all and be-all of a +State," Nietzsche with his contempt for pity and the gentler virtues, his +admiration for "valour," and his disdain for Christianity. + +This explanation is too simple to fit the facts. It may satisfy those who +know no more of Treitschke's brilliant and careful work than the extracts +culled from his occasional writings by General von Bernhardi and the late +Professor Cramb. It may gratify those who, with so many young German +students, forget that Nietzsche, like many other prophets, wrote in +allegory, and that when he spoke of valour he was thinking, not of "shining +armour," but of spiritual conflicts. But careful enquirers, who would +disdain to condemn Macaulay on passages selected by undiscriminating +admirers from his _Essays_, or Carlyle for his frank admiration of Thor +and Odin and the virtues of Valhalla, will ask for a more satisfying +explanation. Even if all that were said about Treitschke and Nietzsche were +true, it would still remain an unsolved question why they and their ideas +should have taken intellectual Germany by storm. But it is not true. What +is true, and what is far more serious, both for Great Britain and for +Europe, is that men like Harnack, Eucken, and Wilamowitz, who would +repudiate all intellectual kinship with Macchiavelli and Nietzsche--men who +are leaders of European thought, and with whom and whose ideas we shall +have to go on living in Europe--publicly support and encourage the policy +and standpoint of a Government which, according to British ideas, has +acted with criminal wickedness and folly, and so totally misunderstood +the conduct and attitude of Great Britain as honestly to regard us as +hypocritically treacherous to the highest interests of civilisation. + +That is the real problem; and it is a far more complex and difficult one +than if we had to do with a people which had consciously abandoned the +Christian virtues or consciously embarked on a conspiracy against Belgium +or Great Britain. The utter failure of even the most eminent Germans to +grasp British politics, British institutions, and the British point of +view points to a fundamental misunderstanding, a fundamental divergence +of outlook, between the political ideals of the two countries. It is the +conflict between these ideals which forms the second great issue between +Germany and Great Britain; and on its outcome depends the future of human +civilisation. + + +Sec.2. _Culture_.--What is the German ideal? What do German thinkers regard +as Germany's contribution to human progress? The answer comes back with a +monotonous reiteration which has already sickened us of the word. It is +_Kultur_, or, as we translate it, culture. Germany's contribution to +progress consists in the spread of her culture. + +_Kultur_ is a difficult word to interpret. It means "culture" and a +great deal more besides. Its primary meaning, like that of "culture," is +intellectual and aesthetic: when a German speaks of "Kultur" he is thinking +of such things as language, literature, philosophy, education, art, +science, and the like. Children in German schools are taught a subject +called _Kulturgeschichte_ (culture-history), and under that heading they +are told about German literature, German philosophy and religion, German +painting, German music and so on. + +So far, the English and the German uses of the word roughly correspond. We +should probably be surprised if we heard it said that Shakespeare had made +a contribution to English "culture": but, on consideration, we should admit +that he had, though we should not have chosen that way of speaking about +him. But there is a further meaning in the word _Kultur_, which explains +why it is so often on German lips. It means, not only the product of the +intellect or imagination, but the product of the disciplined intellect and +the disciplined imagination. _Kultur_ has in it an element of order, of +organisation, of civilisation. That is why the Germans regard the study of +the "culture" of a country as part of the study of its history. English +school children are beginning to be taught social and industrial history in +addition to the kings and queens and battles and constitutions which used +to form the staple of history lessons. They are being taught, that is, to +see the history of their country, and of its civilisation, in the light +of the life and livelihood of its common people. The German outlook is +different. They look at their history in the light of the achievements of +its great minds, which are regarded as being at once the proof and the +justification of its civilisation. To the question, "What right have you to +call yourselves a civilised country?" an Englishman would reply, "Look at +the sort of people we are, and at the things we have done," and would point +perhaps to the extracts from the letters of private soldiers printed in the +newspapers, or to the story of the growth of the British Empire; a German +would reply (as Germans are indeed replying now), "Look at our achievements +in scholarship and science, at our universities, at our systems of +education, at our literature, our music, and our painting; at our great men +of thought and imagination: at Luther, Duerer, Goethe, Beethoven, Kant." + +_Kultur_ then means more than "culture": it means _culture considered as +the most important element in civilisation._ It implies the disciplined +education which alone, in the German view, makes the difference between +the savage and the civilised man. It implies the heritage of intellectual +possessions which, thanks to ordered institutions, a nation is able to hand +down from generation to generation. + +We are now beginning to see where the British and German attitudes towards +society and civilisation diverge. Broadly, we may say that the first +difference is that Germany thinks of civilisation in terms of intellect +while we think of it in terms of character. Germany asks, "What do you +know?" "What have you learnt?" and regards our prisoners as uncivilised +because they cannot speak German, and Great Britain as a traitor to +civilisation because she is allied with Russia, a people of ignorant +peasants. We ask, "What have you done?" "What can you do?" and tend +to undervalue the importance of systematic knowledge and intellectual +application. + +But we have found no reason as yet for a conflict of ideals. Many English +writers, such as Matthew Arnold, have emphasised the importance of culture +as against character; yet Matthew Arnold's views were widely different from +those of the German professors of to-day. If their sense of the importance +of culture stopped short at this point, we should have much to learn from +Germany, as indeed we have, and no reason to oppose her. What is there then +in the German admiration for culture which involves her in a conflict with +British ideals? + + +Sec.3. _Culture as a State Product._--The conflict arises out of the alliance +between German culture and the German Government. What British public +opinion resents, in the German attitude, is not culture in itself, about +which it is little concerned, but what we feel to be its unnatural +alliance with military power. It seems to us wicked and hypocritical for a +government which proclaims the doctrine of the "mailed fist" and, like the +ancient Spartans, glories in the perfecting of the machinery of war, to be +at the same time protesting its devotion to culture, and posing as a patron +of the peaceful arts. It is the Kaiser's speeches and the behaviour of the +German Government which have put all of us out of heart with German talk +about culture. + +This brings us to a fundamental point of difference between the two +peoples. The close association between culture and militarism, between the +best minds of the nation and the mind of the Government, does not seem +unnatural to a modern German at all. On the contrary, it seems the most +natural thing in the world. It is the bedrock of the German system of +national education. Culture to a German is not only a national possession; +it is also, to a degree difficult for us to appreciate, a State product. +It is a national possession deliberately handed on by the State from +generation to generation, hall-marked and guaranteed, as it were, for the +use of its citizens. When we use the word "culture" we speak of it as an +attribute of individual men and women. Germans, on the other hand, think +of it as belonging to nations as a whole, in virtue of their system of +national education. That is why they are so sure that all Germans possess +culture. They have all had it at school. And it is all the same brand of +culture, because no other is taught. It is the culture with which the +Government wishes its citizens to be equipped. That is why all Germans +tend, not only to know the same facts (and a great many facts too), but +to have a similar outlook on life and similar opinions about Goethe, +Shakespeare and the German Navy. Culture, like military service, is a part +of the State machinery. + +Here we come upon the connecting link between culture and militarism. Both +are parts of the great German system of State education. "Side by side with +the influences of German education," wrote Dr. Sadler in 1901,[1] "are +to be traced the influences of German military service. The two sets +of influence interact on one another and intermingle. German education +impregnates the German army with science. The German army predisposes +German education to ideas of organisation and discipline. Military and +educational discipline go hand in hand.... Both are preserved and fortified +by law and custom, and by administrative arrangements skilfully devised +to attain that end. But behind all the forms of organisation (which would +quickly crumble away unless upheld by and expressing some spiritual force), +behind both military and educational discipline, lies the fundamental +principle adopted by Scharnhorst's Committee on Military organisation in +Prussia in 1807: 'All the inhabitants of the State are its defenders by +birth.'" + +[Footnote 1: _Board of Education Special Reports,_ vol. ix. p. 43.] + +At last we have reached the root of the matter. It is not German culture +which is the source and centre of the ideas to which Great Britain is +opposed: nor yet is it German militarism. Our real opponent is the system +of training and education, out of which both German culture and German +militarism spring. It is the organisation of German public life, and the +"spiritual force" of which that organisation is the outward and visible +expression. + + +Sec.4. _German and British Ideals of Education._--Let us look at the German +ideal more closely, for it is worthy of careful study. It is perhaps best +expressed in words written in 1830 by Coleridge, who, like other well-known +Englishmen of his day (and our own) was much under the influence of German +ideas. Coleridge, in words quoted by Dr. Sadler, defines the purpose of +national education as "to form and train up the people of the country to +obedient, free, useful, and organisable subjects, citizens and patriots, +living to the benefit of the State and prepared to die in its defence." In +accordance with this conception Prussia was the first of the larger States +in Europe to adopt a universal compulsory system of State education, and +the first also to establish a universal system of military service for its +young men. The rest of Europe perforce followed suit. Nearly every State in +Europe has or professes to have a universal system of education, and every +State except England has a system of universal military service. The Europe +of schools and camps which we have known during the last half century is +the most striking of all the victories of German "culture." + +Discipline, efficiency, duty, obedience, public service; these are +qualities that excite admiration everywhere--in the classroom, in the camp, +and in the wider field of life. There is something almost monumentally +impressive to the outsider in the German alliance of School and Army in the +service of the State. Since the days of Sparta and Rome, there has been no +such wonderful governmental disciplinary machine. It is not surprising that +"German organisation" and "German methods" should have stimulated interest +and emulation throughout the civilised world. Discipline seems to many to +be just the one quality of which our drifting world is in need. "If this +war had been postponed a hundred or even fifty years," writes a philosophic +English observer in a private letter, "Prussia would have become our Rome, +worshipping Shakespeare and Byron as Pompey or Tiberius worshipped Greek +literature, and disciplining us. Hasn't it ever struck you what a close +parallel there is between Germany and Rome?" (Here follows a list of +bad qualities which is better omitted.) ... "The good side of it is the +discipline; and the modern world, not having any power external to itself +which it acknowledges, and no men (in masses) having yet succeeded in being +a law to themselves, needs discipline above everything. I don't see where +you will get it under these conditions unless you find some one with an +abstract love of discipline for itself. And where will you find him except +in Prussia? After all, it is a testimony to her that, unlovely as she is, +she gives the law to Germany, and that the South German, though he dislikes +her, accepts the law as good for him." And to show that he appreciates the +full consequences of his words he adds: "If I had to live under Ramsay +MacDonald (provided that he acted as he talks), or under Lieutenant von +Foerstner" (the hero of Zabern), "odious as the latter is, for my soul's +good I would choose him: for I think that in the end, I should be less +likely to be irretrievably ruined." + +Here is the Prussian point of view, expressed by a thoughtful Englishman +with a wide experience of education, and a deep concern for the moral +welfare of the nation. What have we, on the British side, to set up against +his arguments? + +In the first place we must draw attention to the writer's candour in +admitting that a nation cannot adopt Prussianism piecemeal. It must take +it as a whole, its lieutenants included, or not at all. Lieutenant von +Foerstner is as typical a product of the Prussian system as the London +policeman is of our own; and if we adopt Prussian or Spartan methods, +we must run the risk of being ruled by him. "No other nation," says Dr. +Sadler, "by imitating a little bit of German organisation can hope thus +to achieve a true reproduction of the spirit of German institutions. The +fabric of its organisation practically forms one whole. That is its merit +and its danger. It must be taken all in all or else left unimitated. And +it is not a mere matter of external organisation.... National institutions +must grow out of the needs and character (and not least out of the +weakness) of the nation which possesses them." + +But, taking the system as a whole, there are, it seems to me, three great +flaws in it--flaws so serious and vital as to make the word "education" as +applied to it almost a misnomer. The Prussian system is unsatisfactory, +firstly, because it confuses external discipline with self-control; +secondly, because it confuses regimentation with corporate spirit; thirdly, +because it conceives the nation's duty in terms of "culture" rather than of +character. + +Let us take these three points in detail. + +The first object of national education is--not anything national at all, +but simply education. It is the training of individual young people. It is +the gradual leading-out (e-ducation), unfolding, expanding, of their +mental and bodily powers, the helping of them to become, not soldiers, or +missionaries of culture, or pioneers of Empire, or even British citizens, +but simply human personalities. "The purpose of the Public Elementary +School," say the opening words of our English code, "is to form and +strengthen the character and to develop the intelligence of the children +entrusted to it." In the performance of this task external discipline is no +doubt necessary. Obedience and consideration for others are not learnt in +a day. But the object of external discipline is to form habits of +self-control which will enable their possessor to become an independent and +self-respecting human being--and incidentally, a good citizen. "If I had +to _live under_ Ramsay MacDonald, or the Prussian Lieutenant," says our +writer, "I would choose the latter, for my soul's good." But our British +system of education does not proceed on the assumption that its pupils +are destined to "live under" any one. Our ideal is that of the free man, +trained in the exercise of his powers and in the command and control of his +faculties, who, like Wordsworth's "Happy Warrior" (a poem which embodies +the best British educational tradition): + + ... Through the heat of conflict, keeps the law + In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw. + +Neglect for the claims of human personality both amongst pupils and +teachers is the chief danger of a State system of education. The State +is always tempted to put its own claims first and those of its citizens +second--to regard the citizen as existing for the State, instead of the +State for its citizens. It is one of the ironies of history that no man was +more alive to this danger than Wilhelm von Humboldt, the gifted creator of +the Prussian system of education. As the motto of one of his writings he +adopted the words, "_Against the governmental mania, the most fatal disease +of modern governments_," and when, contrary to his own early principles, +he undertook the organisation of Prussian education he insisted that +"headmasters should be left as free a hand as possible in all matters of +teaching and organisation." But the Prussian system was too strong for him +and his successors, and his excellent principles now survive as no more +than pious opinions. The fact is that in an undemocratic and feudal State +such as Germany then was, and still largely is, respect for the personality +of the individual is confined to the upper ranks of society. + +"I do not know how it is in foreign countries," says one of Goethe's +heroes,[1] "but in Germany it is only the nobleman who can secure a certain +amount of universal or, if I may say so, _personal_ education. An ordinary +citizen can learn to earn his living and, at the most, train his intellect; +but, do what he will, he loses his personality.... He is not asked, 'What +are you?' but only, 'What have you? what attainments, what knowledge, what +capacities, what fortune?' ... The nobleman is to act and to achieve. +The common citizen is to carry out orders. He is to develop individual +faculties, in order to become useful, and it is a fundamental assumption +that there is no harmony in his being, nor indeed is any permissible, +because, in order to make himself serviceable in one way, he is forced +to neglect everything else. The blame for this distinction is not to be +attributed to the adaptability of the nobleman or the weakness of the +common citizen. It is due to the constitution of society itself." Much has +changed in Germany since Goethe wrote these words, but they still ring +true. And they have not been entirely without their echo in Great Britain +itself.[2] + +[Footnote 1: Wilhelm Meister's _Lehrjahre_, Book v. chapter iii.] + +[Footnote 2: The contrast which has been drawn in the preceding pages, as +working-class readers in particular will understand, is between the _aims_, +not the achievements, of German and British education. The German aims are +far more perfectly achieved in practice than the British. Neither the law +nor the administration of British education can be acquitted of "neglect +for the claims of human personality." The opening words of the English +code, quoted on p. 359 above, are, alas! not a statement of fact but +an aspiration. We have hardly yet begun in England to realise the +possibilities of educational development along the lines of the British +ideal, both as regards young people and adults. If we learn the lesson +of the present crisis aright, the war, so far from being a set-back +to educational progress, should provide a new stimulus for effort and +development.] + +But man cannot live for himself alone. He is a corporate being; and, +personality or no personality, he has to fit into a world of fellow-men +with similar human claims. The second charge against the German system is +that it ignores the value of human fellowship. It regards the citizens of a +country as "useful and organisable subjects" rather than as fellow-members +of a democracy, bound together by all the various social ties of +comradeship and intercourse. + +The Prussian system, with its elaborate control and direction from above, +dislikes the free play of human groupings, and discourages all spontaneous +or unauthorised associations. Schoolboy "societies," for instance, are in +Germany an evil to be deplored and extirpated, not, as with us, a symptom +of health and vigour, to be sympathetically watched and encouraged. +Instead, there is a direct inculcation of patriotism, a strenuous and +methodical training of each unit for his place in the great State machine. +We do not so read human nature. Our British tendency is to develop habits +of service and responsibility through a devotion to smaller and more +intimate associations, to build on a foundation of lesser loyalties and +duties. We do not conceive it to be the function of the school to _teach_ +patriotism or to _teach_ fellowship. Rather we hold that good education +_is_ fellowship, _is_ citizenship, in the deepest meaning of those words; +that to discover and to exercise the responsibilities of membership in a +smaller body is the best training for a larger citizenship. A school, a +ship, a club, a Trade Union, any free association of Englishmen, is all +England in miniature. "To be attached to the subdivision, to love the +little platoon we belong to in society," said Burke long ago, "is the first +principle, the germ, as it were, of public affections. It is the first +link in the series by which we proceed towards a love to our country +and mankind.... We begin our public affections in our families. No cold +relation is a zealous citizen. We pass on to our neighbourhoods, to our +habitual provincial connections. These are inns and resting-places... so +many images of the great country, in which the heart found something which +it could fill."[1] + +[Footnote 1: _Reflections on the French Revolution_, pp. 292, 494 (of vol. +iii. of _Collected Works_, ed. 1899).] + +There is one fairly safe test for a system of education: What do its +victims think of it? "In Prussia," says Dr. Sadler, "a schoolboy seems to +regard his school as he might regard a railway station--a convenient and +necessary establishment, generally ugly to look at, but also, for its +purpose efficient." The illustration is an apt one: for a Prussian school +is too often, like a railway station, simply a point of departure, +something to be got away from as soon as possible. "In England a boy who +is at a good secondary school cares for it as an officer cares for his +regiment or as a sailor cares for his ship," or, we may add, as a Boy Scout +cares for his Troop.[1] + +[Footnote 1: _Special Reports_, ix. p. 113. Dr. Sadler's article deals with +secondary schools only. Unfortunately, no one can claim that the idea of +fellowship is as prominent in English elementary schools, or even in all +secondary schools, as the quotation might suggest.] + +Democracy and discipline, fellowship and freedom, are in fact not +incompatible at all. They are complementary: and each can only be at +its best when it is sustained by the other. Only a disciplined and +self-controlled people can be free to rule itself, and only a free people +can know the full meaning and happiness of fellowship. + + +Sec.5. _German and British Ideals of Civilisation._--Lastly, the German system +regards national "culture" rather than national character as the chief +element in civilisation and the justification of its claim to a dominant +place in the world. This view is so strange to those who are used to +present-day British institutions that it is hard to make clear what it +means. Civilisation is a word which, with us, is often misused and often +misunderstood. Sometimes we lightly identify it with motor cars and +gramophones and other Western contrivances with which individual traders +and travellers dazzle and bewilder the untutored savage. Yet we are seldom +tempted to identify it, like the Germans, with anything narrowly national; +and in our serious moments we recognise that it is too universal a force to +be the appanage of either nations or individuals. For to us, when we ask +ourselves its real meaning, civilisation stands for neither language nor +culture nor anything intellectual at all. It stands for something moral and +social and political. It means, in the first place, the establishment and +enforcement of the Rule of Law, as against anarchy on the one hand and +tyranny on the other; and, secondly, on the basis of order and justice, +the task of making men fit for free institutions, the work of guiding and +training them to recognise the obligations of citizenship, to subordinate +their own personal interests or inclinations to the common welfare, the +"commonwealth." That is what is meant when it is claimed that Great Britain +has done a "civilising" work both in India and in backward Africa. The +Germans reproach and despise us, we are told,[1] for our failure to spread +"English culture" in India. That has not been the purpose of British rule, +and Englishmen have been foolish in so far as they have presumed to attempt +it: England has to learn from Indian culture as India from ours. But to +have laid for India the foundations on which alone a stable society could +rest, to have given her peace from foes without and security within, to +have taught her, by example, the kinship of Power and Responsibility, to +have awakened the social conscience and claimed the public services of +Indians in the village, the district, the province, the nation, towards the +community of which they feel themselves to be members, to have found India +a continent, a chaos of tribes and castes, and to have helped her to +become a nation--that is not a task of English culture: it is a task of +civilisation. + +[Footnote 1: For evidence of this see Cramb's _Germany and England_, p. +25.] + +Law, Justice, Responsibility, Liberty, Citizenship--the words are +abstractions, philosophers' phrases, destitute, it might seem, of living +meaning and reality. There is no such thing as English Justice, English +Liberty, English Responsibility. The qualities that go to the making of +free and ordered institutions are not national but universal. They are no +monopoly of Great Britain. They are free to be the attributes of any race +or any nation. They belong to civilised humanity as a whole. They are part +of the higher life of the human race. + +As such the Germans, if they recognised them at all, probably regarded +them. They could not see in them the binding power to keep a great +community of nations together. They could not realise that Justice and +Responsibility, if they rightly typify the character of British rule, +must also typify the character of British rulers; and that community of +character expressed in their institutions and worked into the fibre +of their life may be a stronger bond between nations than any mere +considerations of interest. Educated Indians would find it hard to explain +exactly why, on the outbreak of the war, they found themselves eager to +help to defend British rule. But it seems clear that what stirred them most +was not any consideration of English as against German culture, or any +merely material calculations, but a sudden realisation of the character of +that new India which the union between Great Britain and India, between +Western civilisation and Eastern culture, is bringing into being, and a +sense of the indispensable need for the continuance of that partnership.[1] + +[Footnote 1: The reader will again understand that it is British aims +rather than British achievements which are spoken of. That British rule +is indispensable to Indian civilisation is indeed a literal fact to which +Indian opinion bears testimony; and it is the conduct and character of +generations of British administrators which have helped to bring this sense +of partnership about. But individual Englishmen in India are often far +from understanding, or realising in practice, the purpose of British rule. +Similarly, the growth of a sense of Indian nationality, particularly in the +last few years, is a striking and important fact. But it would be unwise to +underestimate the gigantic difficulties with which this growing national +consciousness has to contend. The greatest of these is the prevalence +of caste-divisions, rendering impossible the free fellowship and social +intercourse which alone can be the foundation of a sense of common +citizenship. Apart from this there are, according to the census, +forty-three races in India, and twenty-three languages in ordinary use.] + +It is just this intimate union between different nations for the +furtherance of the tasks of civilisation which it seems so difficult +for the German mind to understand. "Culture," with all its intimate +associations, its appeal to language, to national history and traditions, +and to instinctive patriotism, is so much simpler and warmer a conception: +it seems so much easier to fight for Germany than to fight for Justice in +the abstract, or for Justice embodied in the British Commonwealth. That is +why even serious German thinkers, blinded by the idea of culture, expected +the break-up of the British Empire. They could imagine Indians giving their +lives for India, Boers for a Dutch South Africa, Irishmen for Ireland +or Ulstermen for Ulster; but the deeper moral appeal which has thrilled +through the whole Empire, down to its remotest island dependency, lay +beyond their ken. + +Let us look a little more closely at the German idea of national culture +rather than national character as the chief element in civilisation. We +shall see that it is directly contrary to the ideals which inspire +and sustain the British Commonwealth, and practically prohibits that +association of races and peoples at varying levels of social progress which +is its peculiar task. + +"Culture," in the German idea, is the justification of a nation's +existence. Nationality has no other claim. Goethe, Luther, Kant, and +Beethoven are Germany's title-deeds. A nation without a culture has no +right to a "place in the sun." "History," says Wilamowitz in a lecture +delivered in 1898, "knows nothing of any right to exist on the part of a +people or a language without a culture. If a people becomes dependent on a +foreign culture" (_i.e._ in the German idea, on a foreign civilisation) "it +matters little if its lower classes speak a different language: they, too +... must eventually go over to the dominant language.... Wisely to further +this necessary organic process is a blessing to all parties; violent +haste will only curb it and cause reactions. Importunate insistence on +Nationality has never anywhere brought true vitality into being, and often +destroyed vitality; but the superior Culture which, sure of its inner +strength, throws her doors wide open, can win men's hearts."[1] In the +light of a passage like this, from the most distinguished representative of +German humanism, it is easier to grasp the failure of educated Germany to +understand the sequel of the South African War, or the aspirations of the +Slav peoples, or to stigmatise the folly of their statesmen in Poland, +Denmark, Alsace-Lorraine, and Belgium. "Importunate insistence on +Nationality"--the words come home to us now with a new meaning when we +learn that in Belgium, now perforce "dependent on a foreign culture," +babies are registered under German names and newspapers printed in "the +dominant language," and that already "forty newspaper vendors in Brussels +have been sentenced to long terms of hard labour in German prisons for +selling English, French, and Belgian newspapers."[2] "Our fearless German +warriors," writes the leading German dramatist, Gerhart Hauptmann,[3] +"are _well aware of the reasons for which they have taken the field_. No +illiterates will be found among them. Many of them, besides shouldering +their muskets, carry their Goethe's _Faust_, some work of Schopenhauer, a +Bible, or a Homer in their knapsacks." Such is a serious German writer's +idea of the way in which civilisation is diffused! + +[Footnote 1: _Speeches and Lectures_, pp. 147-148 (1913 edition).] + +[Footnote 2: Daily Papers, October 12, 1914 (Exchange Telegram from +Rotterdam).] + +[Footnote 3: Letter quoted in the _Westminster Gazette._] + +With such a philosophy of human progress as this, German thinkers and +statesmen look out into the future and behold nothing but conflict--eternal +conflict between rival national "cultures," each seeking to impose its +domination. "In the struggle between Nationalities," writes Prince +Buelow,[1] in defence of his Polish policy, putting into a cruder form the +philosophy of Wilamowitz, "one nation is the hammer and the other the +anvil; one is the victor and the other the vanquished. It is a law of life +and development in history that where two national civilisations meet they +fight for supremacy." + +[Footnote 1: _Imperial Germany_, p. 245 (1st ed.).] + +Here we have the necessary and logical result of the philosophy of culture. +In the struggle between cultures no collaboration, no compromise even, is +possible. German is German: Flemish is Flemish: Polish is Polish: French is +French. Who is to decide which is the "more civilised," which is the fitter +to survive? Force alone can settle the issue. A Luther and Goethe may be +the puppets pitted in a contest of culture against Maeterlinck and Victor +Hugo. But it is Krupp and Zeppelin and the War-Lord that pull the strings. +As Wilamowitz reminds us, it was the Roman legions, not Virgil and Horace, +that stamped out the Celtic languages and romanised Western Europe. It is +the German army, two thousand years later, that is to germanise it. It is +an old, old theory; Prussia did not invent it, nor even Rome. "You know as +well as we do," said the Athenians in 416 B.C. to the representatives of +a small people of that day,[1] "that right, as the world goes, is only in +question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the +weak suffer what they must"; and they went on, like the Kaiser, to claim +the favour of the gods, "neither our pretensions nor our conduct being +in any way contrary to what men believe of the gods, or practise amongst +themselves." There is, in fact, to be no Law between Nations but the Rule +of the Stronger. + +[Footnote 1: _Thucydides_, Book v. 89 and 105.] + + +Sec.6. _The Principle of the Commonwealth_.--Such seems to many the meaning +of the present European situation--a stern conflict between nations and +cultures, to be decided by force of arms. The bridges between the nations +seem broken down, and no one can tell when they will be repaired. The hopes +that had gathered round international movements, the cosmopolitan dreams +of common action between the peoples across the barriers of States and +Governments, seem to have vanished into limbo; and the enthusiastic +dreamers of yesterday are the disillusioned soldiers and spectators of +to-day. Nationality, that strange, inarticulate, unanalysable force that +can call all men to her tents in the hour of crisis and danger, seems to +have overthrown the international forces of to-day, the Socialists, the +Pacifists, and, strongest of all, the Capitalists, as it overthrew Napoleon +and his dreams of Empire a hundred years ago. What Law is there but force +that can decide the issue between nation and nation? And, in the absence +of a Law, what becomes of all our hopes for international action, for the +future of civilisation and the higher life of the human race? + +But in truth the disillusionment is as premature as the hopes that preceded +it. We are still far off from the World-State and the World-Law which +formed the misty ideal of cosmopolitan thinkers. But only those who are +blind to the true course of human progress can fail to see that the day of +the Nation-State is even now drawing to a close in the West. There is in +fact at present working in the world a higher Law and a better patriotism +than that of single nations and cultures, a Law and a patriotism that +override and transcend the claims of Nationality in a greater, a more +compelling, and a more universal appeal. The great States or Powers of +to-day, Great Britain, the United States, France, and (if they had eyes +to sec it) Russia, Germany and Austria-Hungary, are not Nation-States but +composite States--States compacted of many nationalities united together by +a common citizenship and a common law. Great Britain, the United States, +the German Empire, and Austria-Hungary bear in their very names the +reminder of the diverse elements of which they are composed; but France +with her great African Empire, and Russia with her multitudinous +populations, from Poland to the Pacific, from Finland to the Caucasus, are +equally composite. In each of these great States nations have been united +under a common law; and where the wisdom of the central government has not +"broken the bruised reed or quenched the smoking flax" of national life, +the nations have been not only willing but anxious to join in the work +of their State. Nations, like men, were made not to compete but to work +together; and it is so easy, so simple, to win their good-hearted devotion. +It takes all sorts of men, says the old proverb, to make a world. It takes +all sorts of nations to make a modern State. "The combination of different +nations in one State is as necessary a condition of civilised life as the +combination of men in society. ... It is in the cauldron of the State that +the fusion takes place by which the vigour, the knowledge, and the capacity +of one portion of mankind may be communicated to another.... If we take the +establishment of liberty for the realisation of moral duties to be the end +of civil society, we must conclude that those States are substantially the +most perfect which, like the British and Austrian Empires, include various +distinct nationalities without oppressing them." So wrote Lord Acton, +the great Catholic historian, fifty years ago, when the watchwords of +Nationality were on all men's lips, adding, in words that were prophetic of +the failure of the Austrian and the progress of the British Commonwealth +of Nations: "The coexistence of several nations under the same State _is a +test_ as well as the best security _of its freedom_. It is also one of the +chief instruments of civilisation; and, as such, it is in the natural and +providential order, and indicates a state of greater advancement than the +national unity which is the ideal of modern liberalism."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Essay on Nationality, in _The History of Freedom and other +Essays_, pp. 290, 298.] + +Of the Great Powers which between them control the destinies of +civilisation Great Britain is at once the freest, the largest, and the +most various. If the State is a "cauldron" for mingling "the vigour, the +knowledge, and the capacity" of the portions of mankind--or if, to use an +apter metaphor, it is a body whose perfection consists in the very variety +of the functions of its several members--there has never been on the earth +a political organism like the British Empire. Its 433 million inhabitants, +from Great Britain to Polynesia, from India and Egypt to Central Africa, +are drawn from every division of the human race. Cut a section through +mankind, and in every layer there will be British citizens, living under +the jurisdiction of British law. Here is something to hearten those who +have looked in vain to the Hague. While international law has been +brought to a standstill through the absence of a common will and a common +executive, Great Britain has thrown a girdle of law around the globe. + + +Sec.7. _The Future of Civilisation_.--What hopes dare we cherish, in this hour +of conflict, for the future of civilisation? + +The great, the supreme task of human politics and statesmanship is to +extend the sphere of Law. Let others labour to make men cultured or +virtuous or happy. These are the tasks of the teacher, the priest, and the +common man. The statesman's task is simpler. It is to enfold them in a +jurisdiction which will enable them to live the life of their souls' +choice. The State, said the Greek philosophers, is the foundation of the +good life; but its crown rises far above mere citizenship. "There where the +State ends," cries Nietzsche,[1] echoing Aristotle and the great tradition +of civilised political thought, "there _men begin_. There, where the State +ends, look thither, my brothers! Do you not see the rainbow and the bridge +to the Overman?" Ever since organised society began, the standards of the +individual, the ideals of priest and teacher, the doctrines of religion and +morality, have outstripped the practice of statesmanship. For the polestar +of the statesman has not been love, but law. His not the task of exhorting +men to love one another, but the simpler duty of enforcing the law, "Thou +shalt not kill." And in that simple, strenuous, necessary task statesmen +and political thinkers have watched the slow extension of the power of Law, +from the family to the tribe, from the tribe to the city, from the city to +the nation, from the nation to the Commonwealth. When will Law take its +next extension? When will warfare, which is murder between individuals and +"rebellion" between groups of citizens, be equally preventable between +nations by the common law of the world? + +[Footnote 1: _Also sprach Zarathustra_, Speech xi. (end).] + +The answer is simple. When the world has a common will, and has created a +common government to express and enforce that will. + +In the sphere of science and invention, of industry and economics, as +Norman Angell and others have taught us, the world is already one Great +Society. For the merchant, the banker, and the stockbroker political +frontiers have been broken down. Trade and industry respond to the +reactions of a single, world-wide, nervous system. Shocks and panics pass +as freely as airmen over borders and custom-houses. And not "big business" +only, but the humblest citizen, in his search for a livelihood, finds +himself caught in the meshes of the same world-wide network. "The widow +who takes in washing," says Graham Wallas,[1] in his deep and searching +analysis of our contemporary life, "fails or succeeds according to her +skill in choosing starch or soda or a wringing machine under the influence +of half a dozen competing world-schemes of advertisement.... The English +factory girl who is urged to join her Union, the tired old Scotch +gatekeeper with a few pounds to invest, the Galician peasant when the +emigration agent calls, the artisan in a French provincial town whose +industry is threatened by a new invention, all know that unless they find +their way among world-wide facts, which only reach them through misleading +words, they will be crushed." The Industrial Revolution of the past +century, steam-power and electricity, the railway and the telegraph, have +knit mankind together, and made the world one place. + +[Footnote 1: _The Great Society_ (1914), p. 4.] + +But this new Great Society is as yet formless and inarticulate. It is not +only devoid of common leadership and a common government; it lacks even the +beginnings of a common will, a common emotion, and a common consciousness. +Of the Great Society, consciously or unconsciously, we must all perforce be +members; but of the Great State, the great World-Commonwealth, we do not +yet discern the rudiments. The economic organisation of the world has +outstripped the development of its citizenship and government: the economic +man, with his farsighted vision and scientific control of the resources +of the world, must sit by and see the work of his hands laid in ashes by +contending governments and peoples. No man can say how many generations +must pass before the platitudes of the market and the exchange pass into +the current language of politics. + + +Sec.8. _The Two Roads of Advance: Inter-State Action and Common +Citizenship_.--In the great work which lies before the statesmen and +peoples of the world for the extension of law and common citizenship and +the prevention of war there are two parallel lines of advance. + +One road lies through the development of what is known as International, +but should more properly be called _Inter-State Law_, through the revival, +on a firmer and broader foundation, of the Concert of Europe conceived by +the Congress of Vienna just a hundred years ago--itself a revival, on +a secular basis, of the great mediaeval ideal of an international +Christendom, held together by Christian Law and Christian ideals. That +ideal faded away for ever at the Reformation, which grouped Europe into +independent sovereign States ruled by men responsible to no one outside +their own borders. It will never be revived on an ecclesiastical basis. Can +we hope for its revival on a basis of modern democracy, modern nationality, +and modern educated public opinion? Can Inter-State Law, hitherto a mere +shadow of the majestic name it bears, almost a matter of convention and +etiquette, with no permanent tribunal to interpret it, and no government +to enforce it, be enthroned with the necessary powers to maintain justice +between the peoples and governments of the world? + +Such a Law the statesmen of Great Britain and Russia sought to impose on +Europe in 1815, to maintain a state of affairs which history has shown to +have been intolerable to the European peoples. There are those who hope +that the task can be resumed, on a better basis, at the next Congress. +"Shall we try again," writes Professor Gilbert Murray,[1] "to achieve +Castlereagh's and Alexander's ideal of a permanent Concert, pledged to make +collective war upon the peace-breaker? Surely we must. We must, at all +costs and in spite of all difficulties, because the alternative means +such unspeakable failure. We must learn to agree, we civilised nations of +Europe, or else we must perish. I believe that the chief council of wisdom +here is to be sure to go far enough. We need a permanent Concert, perhaps a +permanent Common Council, in which every awkward problem can be dealt with +before it has time to grow dangerous, and in which outvoted minorities must +accustom themselves to giving way." + +[Footnote 1: _Hibbert Journal,_ Oct. 1914, p. 77.] + +Other utterances by public men, such as Mr. Roosevelt and our own Prime +Minister, might be cited in the same sense; but Professor Murray's has been +chosen because he has had the courage to grasp the nettle. In his words the +true position is quite clearly set forth. If Inter-State Law is to become +a reality we must "be sure to go far enough." There is no half-way house +between Law and no Law, between Government and no Government, between +Responsibility and no Responsibility. If the new Concert is to be effective +it must be able to compel the submission of all "awkward problems" and +causes of quarrel to its permanent Tribunal at the Hague or elsewhere; and +it must be able to enforce the decision of its tribunal, employing for +the purpose, if necessary, the armed forces of the signatory Powers as an +international police. "Out-voted minorities must accustom themselves to +giving way." It is a bland and easy phrase; but it involves the whole +question of world-government. "Men must accustom themselves not to demand +an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth," the earliest law-givers might +have said, when the State first intervened between individuals to make +itself responsible for public order. Peace between the Powers, as between +individuals, is, no doubt, a habit to which cantankerous Powers "must +accustom themselves." But they will be sure to do so if there is a Law, +armed with the force to be their schoolmaster towards peaceable habits. In +other words, they will do so because they have surrendered one of the most +vital elements in the independent life of a State--the right of conducting +its own policy--to the jurisdiction of a higher Power. An Inter-State +Concert, with a Judiciary of its own and an Army and Navy under its own +orders, is, in fact, not an Inter-State Concert at all; it is a new State: +it is, in fact, the World-State. There is no middle course between Law and +no Law: and the essence of Statehood, as we have seen, is a Common Law. + +Will this new State have the other attributes of Government--a Common +Legislature and a Common Executive--as well as a Common Judiciary? Let us +go back to Professor Murray's words. He speaks of "outvoted minorities." +Let us suppose the refractory country to be Great Britain, outvoted on some +question relating to sea-power. Of whom will the outvoted minority consist? +Of the British members on the "Common Council" of the Concert. But the +question at once arises, what are the credentials of these British members? +Whom do they represent? To whom are they responsible? If they are the +representatives of the British people and responsible to the democracy +which sent them, how can they be expected to "accustom themselves to giving +way"--perhaps to a majority composed of the representatives of undemocratic +governments? Their responsibility is, not to the Concert, but to their +own Government and people. They are not the minority members of a +democratically-elected Council of their own fellow-citizens. They are the +minority members of a heterogeneous Council towards which they owe no +allegiance and recognise no binding responsibility. There is no half-way +house between Citizenship and no Citizenship, between Responsibility and +no Responsibility. No man and no community can serve two masters. When the +point of conflict arises men and nations have to make the choice where +their duty lies. Not the representatives of Great Britain on the +International Concert, but the people of Great Britain themselves would +have to decide whether their real allegiance, as citizens, was due to the +World-State or to their own Commonwealth: they would find themselves at the +same awful parting of the ways which confronted the people of the Southern +States in 1861. When at the outbreak of the Civil War General Lee was +offered by Lincoln the Commandership of the Northern armies and refused +it, to become the Commander-in-Chief on the side of the South, he did so +because "he believed," as he told Congress after the war, "that the act of +Virginia in withdrawing herself from the United States carried him along +with it as a citizen of Virginia, and that _her_ laws and acts were binding +on him." In other words, unless the proposed Common Council is to be made +something more than a Council of the delegates of sovereign States (as the +Southern States believed themselves to be till 1861), a deadlock sooner or +later is almost inevitable, and the terrible and difficult question--so +familiar to Americans and recently to ourselves on the smaller stage of +Ulster--of the right of secession and the coercion of minorities +will arise. But if the Common Council is framed in accordance with a +Constitution which binds its representatives to accept its decisions and +obey its government, then the World-State, with a World-Executive, will +already have come into being. There will be no more war, but only Rebellion +and Treason. + +Such is the real meaning of proposals to give a binding sanction to the +decisions of an Inter-State Concert. Anything short of this--treaties and +arbitration-agreements based upon inter-State arrangements without any +executive to enforce them--may give relief for a time and pave the way +for further progress, but can in itself provide no permanent security, no +satisfactory justification for the neglect of defensive measures by the +various sovereign governments on behalf of their peoples. Mr. Bryan, for +the United States, has within the last eighteen months concluded twenty-six +general arbitration treaties with different Governments, and may yet +succeed in his ambition of signing treaties with all the remainder. Yet no +one imagines that, when the immunity of the United States from attack is +guaranteed by the promise of every Government in the world, America will +rely for her defence upon those promises alone. + +In discussing proposals for a European Council, then, we must be quite +sure to face all that it means. But let us not reject Professor Murray's +suggestion off-hand because of its inherent difficulties: for that men +should be discussing such schemes at all marks a significant advance in our +political thought. Only let us be quite clear as to what they presuppose. +They presuppose the supremacy, in the collective mind of civilised mankind, +of Law over Force, a definite supremacy of what may be called the civilian +as against the military ideal, not in a majority of States, but in every +State powerful enough to defy coercion. They presuppose a world map +definitely settled on lines satisfactory to the national aspirations of the +peoples. They presuppose a _status quo_ which is not simply maintained, +like that after 1815, because it is a legal fact and its disturbance would +be inconvenient to the existing rulers, but because it is inherently +equitable.[1] They presuppose a similar democratic basis of citizenship +and representation among the component States. They presuppose, lastly, +an educated public opinion incomparably less selfish, less ignorant, less +unsteady, less materialistic, and less narrowly national than has been +prevalent hitherto. Let us work and hope for these things: let us use our +best efforts to remove misunderstandings and promote a sense of common +responsibilities and common trusteeship for civilisation between the +peoples of all the various sovereign States; but meanwhile let us work +also, with better hopes of immediate if less ambitious successes, along the +other parallel road of advance. + +[Footnote 1: The same applies to proposals for ensuring permanent peace in +the industrial sphere. Neither capital nor labour will abide by "scraps +of paper" if they do not feel the _status quo (i.e._ the conditions under +which wage-contracts are made) to be equitable and inherently just.] + +The other road may seem, in this hour of dreams and disaster, of extremes +of hope and disillusionment, a long and tedious track: it is the old slow +high road of civilisation, not the short cut across the fields. It looks +forward to abiding results, not through the mechanical co-operation of +governments, but through the growth of an organic citizenship, through the +education of the nations themselves to a sense of common duty and a common +life. It looks forward, not to the definite establishment, in our day, of +the World-State, but only to the definite refutation of the wicked +theory of the mutual incompatibility of nations. It looks forward to the +expression in the outward order of the world's government of what we may +call "the Principle of the Commonwealth," of Lord Acton's great principle +of the State composed of free nations, of the State as a living body which +lives through the organic union and free activity of its several national +members. And it finds its immediate field of action in the deepening and +extension of the obligations of citizenship among the peoples of the great, +free, just, peace-loving, supra-national Commonwealths whose patriotism has +been built up, not by precept and doctrine, but on a firm foundation of +older loyalties. + +The principle of the Commonwealth is not a European principle: it is a +world-principle. It does not proceed upon the expectation of a United +States of Europe; for all the Great Powers of Europe except Austria-Hungary +(and some of the smaller, such as Holland, Belgium, and Portugal) are +extra-European Powers also. Indeed if we contract our view, with Gladstone +and Bismarck and the statesmen of the last generation, to European issues +alone, we shall be ignoring the chief political problem of our age--the +contact of races and nations with wide varieties of social experience and +at different levels of civilisation. It is this great and insistent problem +(call it the problem of East and West, or the problem of the colour-line) +in all its difficult ramifications, political, social, and, above all, +economic, which makes the development of the principle of the Commonwealth +the most pressing political need of our age. For the problems arising out +of the contact of races and nations can never be adjusted either by the +wise action of individuals or by conflict and warfare; they can only be +solved by fair and deliberate statesmanship within the bosom of a single +State, through the recognition by both parties of a higher claim than their +own sectional interest--the claim of a common citizenship and the interest +of civilisation.[1] It is here, in the union and collaboration of diverse +races and peoples, that the principle of the Commonwealth finds its +peculiar field of operation. Without this principle, and without its +expression, however imperfect, in the British Empire, the world would be in +chaos to-day. + +[Footnote 1: The most recent example of this is the settlement of the very +difficult dispute between India and South Africa.] + +We cannot predict the political development of the various Great Powers who +between them control the destinies of civilisation. We cannot estimate +the degree or the manner in which France, freed at last from nearer +preoccupations, will seek to embody in her vast dominion the great +civilising principles for which her republic stands. We cannot foretell +the issue of the conflict of ideas which has swayed to and fro in Russia +between the British and the Prussian method of dealing with the problem of +nationality. Germany, Italy, Japan--here, too, we are faced by enigmas. +One other great Commonwealth remains besides the British. Upon the United +States already lies the responsibility, voluntarily assumed and, except +during a time of internal crisis,[1] successfully discharged, of securing +peace from external foes for scores of millions of inhabitants of the +American continent. Yet with the progress of events her responsibilities +must yearly enlarge: for both the immigrant nationalities within and the +world-problems without her borders seem to summon her to a deeper education +and to wider obligations. + +[Footnote 1: French occupation of Mexico, 1862, during the American Civil +War, when the Monroe Doctrine was temporarily in abeyance.] + +But upon the vast, ramifying, and inchoate Commonwealth of Great Britain +lies the heaviest responsibility. It is a task unequally shared between +those of her citizens who are capable of discharging it. Her task within +the Commonwealth is to maintain the common character and ideals and to +adjust the mutual relations of one quarter of the human race. Her task +without is to throw her weight into the scales of peace, and to uphold and +develop the standard and validity of inter-State agreements. It is a task +which requires, even at this time of crisis, when, by the common sentiment +of her citizens, the real nature and purpose of the Commonwealth have +become clear to us, the active thoughts of all political students. For to +bring home to all within her borders who bear rule and responsibility, from +the village headman in India and Nigeria, the Basutu chief and the +South Sea potentate, to the public opinion of Great Britain and the +self-governing Dominions, the nature of the British Commonwealth, and the +character of its citizenship and ideals, and to study how those ideals +may be better expressed in its working institutions and executive +government--that is a task to which the present crisis beckons the minds +of British citizens, a task which Britain owes not only to herself but to +mankind. + +_Note_.--A friendly critic who saw this chapter in MS. remarked: "I think +the author has been very successful in ignoring some of the shady methods +by which the British Empire has been extended." The criticism is not +strictly relevant to the subject of the chapter, but as it may occur to +other readers it may be well to deal with it in a brief note. I would +answer: + +(1) The "shady methods" of which he speaks were not the result of British +Imperialism, or of a desire for conquest on the part of the British +State. They were the result, melancholy but inevitable, of the contact of +individuals and races at different levels of development. This contact +between the stronger and the weaker (which can be illustrated from what is +said about the sandalwood traders in the New Hebrides on p. 215 above) was +the direct result of the explorations of the sixteenth century, which threw +the seas of the world open to Western pioneers and traders. The extension +of the authority of Western _governments_ (Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, +French, and British), and the collisions between them, followed inevitably +on the activities of their citizens, as has been pointed out on p. 216 +above. All the Western governments have made mistakes in dealing with this +unfamiliar situation; but the wise course for democratic public opinion, +instead of railing at "Imperialism," would seem to be to familiarise itself +with its problems and control its injurious tendencies. + +(2) In any case, the mistakes of the past do not entitle us to wash our +hands of responsibilities in the present. This war has shown that the +non-self-governing parts of the Commonwealth are not, as our enemies +supposed, a weakness to Great Britain in time of trouble, but a strength. +In other words, whatever may have happened in the past, Great Britain +has now won the consent of the ruled to the fact--not necessarily to the +methods--of British rule. To use what is doubtless unduly constitutional +language, we are now faced in India and elsewhere, not with a Revolutionary +Movement, but with an Opposition. That is a great incentive to further +development. + + + +BOOKS + + +THE PHILOSOPHY OF VIOLENCE + +BERNHARDI, _Germany and the Next War_ (2s.), has become familiar. But this +is only one _application_ of a doctrine which has found expression in many +spheres, as, for example, in the writings of the French Syndicalists, who +claim to be copying the _methods_ of Capitalism, and the _principles_ of +Bergson's philosophy--with what justification must be left to the reader +to determine. See G. SOREL, _Reflexions sur la Violence_ (Paris, Marcel +Riviere, 1910, 5 francs), and Sorel's other writings. "Bernhardi-ism" is, +in fact, not a German product: it has been before the public for some years +under the name of "militancy," in connection with various causes, though +it has never been put into execution on so tremendous a scale as by the +Prussian Government. Nor is its philosophical basis to be found only, if at +all, in Nietzsche. + + +KULTUR + +The insistence on "Culture" as the main factor in the life and development +of peoples is to be found in practically every German history, and in a +great many non-German writers. It has received an additional vogue from +the development of the study of _Sociology_, which naturally seeks out, in +tracing the development of societies in the past, the elements which lend +themselves to measurement and description, and these are inevitably, from +the nature of the evidence, rather "cultural" than moral. It would be +invidious to mention instances. + + +EDUCATION + +For Dr. SADLER'S articles see p. 119, above. See also PAULSEN, _German +Education: Past and Present._ 1908. 5s. net. + + +THE PRINCIPLE OF THE COMMONWEALTH + +The best philosophical book on the relations of advanced and backward races +is _The Basis of Ascendancy: a Discussion of certain Principles of Public +Policy involved in the Development of the Southern States,_ by EDGAR +GARDNER MURPHY (a clergyman living at Montgomery, Alabama) (1909, 6s. net). +Though written with reference to the peculiar American problem, the book +has a far wider significance. There is no good book which covers the ground +either on India or the British Empire. E.R. BEVAN'S little volume on +_Indian Nationalism_ (2s. 6d. net) may be mentioned. An article on _India +and the Empire_ in the _Round Table_ for September 1912 is also worth +mention (and worth reprinting). + + +THE GREAT SOCIETY + +WALLAS, _The Great Society_ (1914, 7s. 6d. net), and NORMAN ANGELL, _The +Great Illusion_ (1910, 2s. 6d. net), are the standard works--the former as +a psychologist and a philosopher, the latter as a pamphleteer with a very +acute vision within a limited field. + + +INTERNATIONAL LAW + +See LINDSAY, _The War against War_ (Oxford pamphlets, 2d.), a model of +clear argument, so far as it goes. Also ALISON PHILLIPS, _The Confederation +of Europe: A Study of the European Alliance, 1813-1823, as an Experiment +in the International Organisation of Peace,_ (1914, 7s. 6d. net), the +best book on the Congress of Vienna and the problems connected with it, +especially on the subject of an International Tribunal and Universal Peace. +The Prime Minister's speeches will be familiar. See also Mr. Roosevelt's +pamphlet on the United States and the Hague Convention (Newnes, 2d.). + + +MONROE DOCTRINE + +See an article by L.S. ROWE in the _Political Quarterly,_ October 1914. + + +INDEX + + +Accepting houses +Acton, Lord +Adalia +Adrianople +Adriatic, Serb access to +Aegean +Aehrenthal, Count +Agadir crisis +Agram +Agriculture, German +Albania +Albion, perfidious +Alexander I., Tsar +Alexander II. +Alexander III. +Alexander, King of Serbia +Alexandretta +Alsace-Lorraine +American Jews +Angell, Mr. Norman +Antivari +Arab movement +Armaments +Army, Austro-Hungarian +Arnold, Matthew +Asia Minor +Asquith, Mr. +Athenians +Auffenberg, General +Australia +Austria, genesis of +Austrian Note to Serbia +Austrian Question +Azev + +Baden +Balance of Power +Balkan League + situation + wars +Ballads, Serb +Ballplatz +Banat of Temesvar +Bank of England +Baring, Maurice +Bebel, August +Belgium +Belgrade +Berchtold, Count +Berlin, Congress of +Bernhardi, General +Bessarabia +Bethmann-Hollveg +Bismarck +Bobrikoff, General +Bohemia +Bojana river +Bosnia +Bosnian annexation +Brandenburg +Britain, aims of +Britain and Germany +Brunswick +Brussa +Bucarest, Treaty of +Budapest +Bukovina +Bulgaria +Buelow, Prince +Bund, Jewish +Byzantium + +Cabrinovic +Canadian trade +Carbonari +Carinthia +Carlyle +Carniola +Castlereagh +Catherine II. +Catholic Church +Cattaro +Cavour +Centre party +Cetinje +Charlemagne +Charles Albert +Charles V. +Charles the Bold +Charles, King of Roumania +Cilicia +Civil War, American +Coalition, Serbo-Croat +Cobden +Coleridge +Colonies, German +Comenius +Committee of Union and Progress +Commonwealth, a European +Concert of Europe +Conscription +Constantine, King +Constantinople +Constitution, German +Consular service +Cotton industry +Cramb, Professor +Credit +Crimean War +Croatia +Culture +Cuvaj +Cyprus +Czechs + +Dalmatia +Danzig +Dardanelles +Debreczen +Delegations +Democracy +Denmark +Diplomatic Service +Disraeli +Dmowski, M. +Dobrudja +Dostoieffsky +Downing Street +Draga, Queen +Dual System +Duma +Dvorak + +Economic policy +Education +Enver Pasha +Epirus +Eucken, Rudolf +Eugene, Prince +Europe, map of + +Federalism in Austria +Fenelon +Ferdinand, King of Bulgaria +Fichte +_Finance, Haute_ +Finland +Flemings +Flensburg +Florence +Foreign Office +Foreign Policy +Forgach, Count +Foerstner, Lieutenant von +Francis Ferdinand, Archduke + assassination, +Francis Joseph +Frankfurt, Diet of +Frederick III. +Frederick the Great +_Fremdenblatt_, article +French Revolution + Constitution +Friedjung Trial + +Galicia +Garibaldi +German Confederation +Germanisation +German Navy +Germans in Austria +Goethe +Gogol +Gold reserve +Gore, Bishop +Graham, Stephen +Greece +Grey, Sir Edward +Grosswardein + +Habsburg, House of +Haeckel +Hague Congress + Conventions +Hanotaux, Gabriel +Hanover +Hanseatic League +Harnack +Harvey, T.E. +Hauptmann, Gerhart +Heine +Hermannstadt +Herzl, Theodor +Hohenzollern, House of +Holland +Holy Alliance + Synod +Humboldt, Wilhelm von +Hungarian Constitution + electoral system +Hungary, kingdom of +Hurban, Svetozar +Hus, John + +Ibsen +Industry and war +Inter-State Law +Ionian Islands +Ipek +Ireland +Irredentism, Italian +Islam +Istria, +Italian culture in Dalmatia +Italy +Ivan the Terrible +Izvolsky + +Jena, battle of +Jerusalem +Jews +Joseph II. +Jugoslavia +Junkers + +Kara George +Karageorgevitch dynasty +Karlowitz +Kavala +Kennard, Dr. +Khalifate +Kiel Canal +Konieh +Koeniggraetz +Koenigsberg +Konrad von Hoetzendorf +Kosovo, battle of +Kossuth +Kosziusko + +_Landmarks_ +Lebanon +Legitimacy +Leipzig, battle of +Leopold I., Emperor +Leopold II +Leopold I. of Belgium +Lessing +Lloyd George, Mr. +Lodz +Louis XIV. +Luxemburg + +Macara, Sir Charles +Macedonia +Magyarisation +Magyars +Maria Theresa +Marienburg +Marx, Karl +Masaryk, Professor +Maximilian I +Mazurian lakes +Mazzini +Metkovic +Metternich +Metz +Michael, Prince +Milan, King +Militarism +Military Frontiers +Mill, _On Liberty_ +Milosh Obrenovitch +Mohacs +Moltke +Monastir +Montenegro +Moscow +Murray, Gilbert + +Napoleon +Napoleon III. +Napoleonic Wars +Nationalities, Hungarian Law of +Nationality, idea of + false conceptions of +Nazim Pasha +Nemanja dynasty +Neusatz (Novi Sad) +New Guinea +Nicholas II. +Nicholas, Grand Duke +Nietzsche +Nihilism +Norway +Novara + +Obrenovitch dynasty +Orthodox Church + +Palermo +Palestine +Pan-Germans +Panslavism +Peter the Great +Peter, King of Serbia +Petrograd +Piedmont +Pig War +Pius IX. +Plevna +Pobiedonostsev +Pola +Poland +Poles, Austrian + Prussian +Police state +Polish Partition +Ponsonby, Mr. A. +Posen +Prague +Princip, murderer +Protestantism in Germany +Prussia +Prussian education +Pushkin + +Radicalism +Radkersburg +Ragusa +Ramsay MacDonald, Mr. +Reichstag, German +Relief Fund, National +Revolution, French + of 1848 + Russian +Reynolds, Rothay +Rhodes +Rolland, Romain +Roosevelt, President +Roumania +Roumanians of Hungary +Rousseau +Russia and Prussia +Russian Church +Russification +Russo-Japanese War +Ruthenes + +Sadler, Dr. +Salonica +Samoa +Sarajevo +Sarolea, Dr. +Savoy, House of +Saxons in Transylvania +Schleswig-Holstein +School strikes +Schurz, Carl +Scotland +Scott +Serbia +Serbo-Croat unity +Serb Patriarchate +Sicilies, Two +Silesia +Silistria +Slav and Teuton +Slavophilism +Slavs of Austria +Slovak Academy +Slovaks +Slovenes +Smyrna +Social effects of war +Socialism, State +Socialists, German +Sombart, Professor +Southern Slavs +State aid +Stephen Dushan +Stock Exchange +Stolypin +Sugar Commission +Sweden +Swinburne +Switzerland +Sybel +Syria +Szekels + +Teutonic Knights +Tirol +Tisza, Count +Tomanovic, Dr. +Trade effects of war +Traders, South Sea +Trade Unions and war +Transylvania +Treitschke +Trentino +Trieste +Triple Alliance + Entente +Tripoli +Tschirschky +Turkification +Turks + +Ukraine +Ulster +Unemployment +Ungvar +Uniate Church +Universal Suffrage + +Valona +Vardar valley +Vatican +Venice +Victor Emanuel II. +Vienna + Congress of +Violence, Philosophy of +Virginia +Vistula +Voltaire + +Wallas, Graham +Walloons +Warsaw, Grand-Duchy of +Weimar +Wells, H.G. +Westphalia +Wied, William of +Wilamowitz-Moellendorff +William I. +William II. +William I. of Holland +W.E.A. +World-Policy, German +Wordsworth +Wuertemberg + +Young Turks + +Zabern +Zionism +Zollverein +Zvonomir + +THE END + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The War and Democracy +by R.W. 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