South Bend news-times. (South Bend, Ind.) 1913-1938, 1916-05-24
Mr.. ChestertOn Explains Why Prussian
Kultur Will Not Fit Democracy
world are not SO long as an JnaI.


All these German appeals seem to ignore one
fact: that to look cunning is to be clumsy II
the journalists of Berlin wished really to BAN.
boozle democracies like the American, the
French, or even the Scotch, they ought to have
begun long ago. AS it is. every one knows per
fectly we'll that Berlin is not in favor OF
democracy. either in practice or Ito do IL
justice) in theory.
There is a nationally tenable case for de
stroying democracy; and Prussia has promptly
and punctually used every single opportunity
to destroy It. Nor viii the German apologist
be any more successful with the five or six
other abrupt and belated enthusiasms which
have appeared in them. for the first time and
only in the new experience of doubt and defeat.
Nobody will believe that the beaten DULLES Of
the Kulturkampf are distraught about the in
visible perils OF the Pope; or that the gaolers
of Cardinal Mercier are the emancipators OF
Catholicism.
Nobody will believe that Prussians have any
feelings about Irishmen, except an abstract
envy of the chances of treating them as they
have treated their co-religiOnis:s, the Poles.
Nobody believe that any Irishman would
put up with any Prussian for twenty minutes,
If he could get a Malay a Red Indian instead.
Nobody can believe that the despoilers of Den
mark and France were Mortified when English
troops rode into johannesburg, or that Colonial
flibustering on a small scale seemed shocking
to the chief historical opponents of Continental
flibustering large scale. Nobody can be-
leve that the only friend of Abdul the Damned,
the only ally of the Bashi Bazouks, is panied
at our employment OF Eastern troops; except
in the sense in which he is, doubtless, panied
at our employment of any troops.
Nobody can believe he believes in Islam
when he thinks of Constantinople, and In
Romanism when he thinks of Rome; or that
his appeal to both OF them can be anything
but a desperate bid for safety BY the way,
fancy once suggested in an avowedly ridicu-
lous romance has actually been carried out
In sober German reality: the combination in
one symbol of the Crescent and the Cross. /
suggested that II should be called the
Crescent" But do not much mind what IL
IS called nor have ! the least objection to the
German professors broadening their minds till
they are broad and dry and empty as the
deserts of Arabia. l do not mind their emblem
including the crescent; 1t is the cross they
have no right to include.
There is nothing dangerous In any OF these
things. The only way in which the barbarian
cunning can possibly succeed In weakening
Christendom is somewhat as follows: The
military operations are very large and very
long; the average mind has a great difficulty
In containing all of them. II is as II four OF
five mathematical dons from Cambridge were
not only working out a geometrical problem
that nobody else could follow but were work
ing IL out with circle as large as Yorkshire
and tangent longer than the Pennine Chain
In these circumstances there descends on a
multitude or minds quite irrational but quite
human feeling TO which charlatans and hire
lings give all sorts of fanciful forms, but which
IN its real nature simply amounts TO the senti
ment. 20 Lord. this will never end!"
II is quite irrational. for. they admittedly
do not understand the proposition, IL may end
any minute. The Germans seek 70 turn IL into
a confused conception that Germany is I'LL
conquerabe. II they may extort the admission
that we cannot beat them, they will be COZ
tent 10 agree that they cannot beat US: and
they will call II compromise 10 cling only TO
half OF their ill-gotten gains. The test case is
the port of Antwerp. II is Of all things the
thing they are not to have; the one thing which
in European morality they should not have;
the one thing which in British policy they must
not have. 1t is also, % course, the one thing
they want 70 have. But even the maddest Of
them cannot even dream OF having II, unless
they can al civilian minds with vague notion
that full vengeance and redemption are now
impossible. They could not dream even Of
this IL they were not supported in their
counses OF despair by some OF the professional
pessimists-
Even in treason there s honesty and dis
honesty. The comparatively honest traitor IL
he who hopes, and sometimes says. that the
enemy must prevail. Incorporate individuals
have said IL here and there in England; and,
being comparatively harmless. have been sent
TO prison. But there are some people who
have not even the courage OF pessimism, and
dare not tell Us that the German must win.
But they do tell US (for sll practical purposes)
that the English must fail; and this Is quite
as much OF a lie. and more useful to the
enemy.