The Breckenridge news. (Cloverport, Ky.) 1876-1955, 1918-05-29
ThePeSsiniSn
of the Loyal
BY ROBERT kDGER BOWEN
Of the YigiIantes
~ lElsF4ltf4F44 HEst4f4.it4 44A4 !


There Is need to utter word Of
warning and protest to those loyal
ones among us who. by some per-
verse quality Of sincerity, some in
horcnt tendency to pessimism, are
| constantly sounding the note that
/ Germany delights TO hear. The recent
great thrust Of the German armies
| has given these croakers fresh stlmu-
lus. In their hearts, though they
know it not, though they deny It
| Indignantly when so accused, they
have accepted defeat-they are al
ready whipped.
Could Germany ask for more than
the spreading of this unwarranted at
titude of mind? It is the subtlest, the
most poisonous of all forms of the
multifarious German propaganda-the
killing of faith and hope and deter
mination to win. "Thcy shall not
passw said the French at Vcrdun.
These souls say: "Thoy have passed!
See how the British have fallen back :"
These are not "qutters" in other
mat ,rs. They are not in any sense
| consciously pro-German even in this
matter. They are. however. obsesscd
by the everlasting drip of the German
idea of German efficiency. The thing
to them has become an impondprable,
| foreseen conclusion. It blinds them
to any vision beyond the actual facts
of Gormany's military attainmcnts.
1t blinds them to the military attain
ments Of the allies. The spirit of In
vinclbllity-the invincible spirit is not
theirs.
This spirit we need. There is no
doubt of that. The man or the ma
ton that goes all the way, that goes
any part of the way to meet defeat
is already beaten Though this spirit
of pessimism cannot even be consid-
cred as rift in the Lutte of the ma
TONS unity Of faith and purpose, vet.
inasmuch as It exists to any extent, It
is to be dCplorCd. For the feeling
will be found always to link itself
with other sentiments insidiously fu-
vorable to Germany. There always nc
companies it that stubborn, narrow
prejudice, so shamofully unworthy Of
rs, against England, existing against
all the evidences Of fact and reason
and gratitude-tho nasty slur that
Fngland dndecs her share of the
fighting, that the English are not
FIGHTERS, that ENGLAND leaves It TO
France to save the day-so far as 1t
IS saved!
There is something peculiarly Ia
mcntable in this distorted viewpoint.
Disastrous though IL would be to
undcrrate Germany's prodigious power
Of evil might, it would be fatal to be-
iicve it infallible and invincible.
Whence comes this proneness to
trumpet Germany's success and put
the soft pedal on our allies achieve
mcnts? In every instance it is to be
traced to some Of the intermnable
forms of German propaganda. 1t is,
as has already been said, itself the
QuinteSsence of German propaganda,
blown like a fine pollen through the
air when its true nature is the least
suspected, spread as is often a con-
tagious disease by those unconscious
of being the medium.
Against the resolute, inleXibls de-
termination to win, backing the
righteous cause i'm which we are en-
listed, Germany will go down in the
ruin Of the monstrous evil that she
has become. But she will not If these
voices, too many even at the fewest,
who proclaim that Germany has al
ready won the war, swell in number
and volume. That, indeed, Is the very
surest way to give the victory to Ger
many, because it Is the surest way to
undermine and dislntegrate the bull
warks Of faith and hope. Against an
unfaltering "They shall not win!" all
the power of Germany's strength will
not avail.
And Germany knows it!