394 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



ourselves. If we win the victory, it will be due not to the 

 nation as a whole, but to the individuals who have fought for us. 

 On the other hand, Germany can at least boast that what she 

 has done she has done at the personal risk of nearly all her 

 people. Her fault has been great, but she has carried herself 

 bravely in spite of it. And fortunately we too can boast that, 

 though our fault has been great, we have done much to 

 retrieve it. 



Neither aggressive militarism nor party-politics are found to 

 the same extent throughout the world as in Germany and 

 Britain, and any one who is capable of independent thought 

 must be convinced that they are both pathological manifesta- 

 tions — bad habits of nations like alcoholism and sloth among: 

 individuals. Neither is essential, either for autocratic or for 

 popular government. They exist among our two allied races 

 owing to a certain hebetude which attaches to us as peoples ; 

 and the average German and British minds tend to differ in the 

 following way. The German is industrious in reasoning as in 

 all things, and, being fond of it, is apt to reach his conclusions 

 prematurely, before he has acquired enough facts to reason 

 upon. On the other hand, the Briton is perhaps not too 

 laborious, and hates above all the arduous process of impartial 

 analysis, unless compelled to it by his own business ; but this 

 very dislike of thought allows his mind to lie fallow to the 

 reception of many more data, so that when he is forced to come 

 to a conclusion it is more likely to be a right one. Generally, 

 however, he is intellectually so lazy as to prefer to mould his 

 opinions upon those of others ; and this explains his love for 

 parties, sects, dogmas, and fads. Out of pride, both like to 

 adhere to their conclusions when once formed ; and militarism 

 flatters the vanity of the newman not infrequently found east 

 of the Rhine, while party-politics flatters the love which all 

 Britons have for games. Indeed, our party-politics is a gigantic 

 sport like our football, cricket, and boatraces ; and the whole 

 nation watches with interest while the politicians play it before 

 them, using organised falsification for a battledore and the 

 feather-brained voter as a shuttlecock. But our tendencies are 

 generally more injurious to our own institutions, our administra- 

 tion, and ourselves, than to other nations — though, as several 

 French writers have maintained, they have largely been respon- 

 sible for the present disaster. 



