"Above all the common sounds of daily human life one hears in that
one land the rattle and clash of arms and the unending thudding
tread of marching feet," he said after one such visit. "Two
generations of men creatures bred and born and trained to live as
parts of a huge death dealing machine have resulted in a monstrous
construction. Each man is a part of it and each part's greatest
ambition is to respond to the shouted word of command as a
mechanical puppet responds to the touch of a spring. To each unit
of the millions, love of his own country means only hatred of all
others and the belief that no other should be allowed existence.
The sacred creed of each is that the immensity of Germany is such
that there can be no room on the earth for another than itself.
Blood and iron will clear the world of the inferior peoples. To
the masses that is their God's will. Their God is an understudy
of their Kaiser."
"You are not saying that as part of the trick of making a jest of
things?"
"I wish to God I were. The poor huge inhuman thing he has built
does not know that when he was a boy he did not play at war and
battles as other boys do, but as a creature obsessed. He has played
at soldiers with his people as his toys throughout all his morbid
life--and he has hungered and thirsted as he has done it."
A Bible lay upon the table and the Duchess drew it towards her.
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