November 6, 1915. 
LAND AND WATER 
THE GERMAN MIND 
Bv JOHN BUCHAN. 
THERE is no sentence in Burke more often 
quoted than that in which he forbids 
us to draw an indictment against a 
nation. The warning is opportune in 
times of war, when belligerent? exhaust 
their ingenuity in unfavourable generalisations 
about their opponents. No sweeping condemna- 
tion will cover all aspects of a national life, 
and you cannot deduce from a generality an 
accurate judgment of an individual or of a section 
of the society criticised. Again, national faults 
are different in kind from the personal failings with 
which we are familiar. A country publicly disloyal 
to its bond may boast a majority of strictly 
honourable private citizens. But Burke's dictum 
must not be pressed too far. A nation can have 
national vices, it can sin as a community, and the 
historian is justified now and then in fastening 
guilt upon that corporate existence which we call 
a people. 
Ver^' notably a people may go mad. This 
does not mean that every individual loses his v. its, 
but that the governing and dominant elements in 
a nation fall into a pathological state and see 
strange visions. A malign spirit broods over the 
waters. Something which cannot be put into 
exact words flits at the back of men's minds. 
Perspective goes, exaltation fires the fancy, the 
old decencies of common sense are repudiated, 
men speak with tongues which are not their own. 
We are justified in saying that France went mad 
in the days of the Terror, though there were 
some millions of sober citizens who repudiated her 
follies. That viewless thing which we call national 
spirit had become tainted with insanity. Such 
communal mania is far more dangerous than the 
obsessions of individuals, for it is harder to diag- 
nose, to locate, and to restrain. 
The position in Germany, judging by her 
press and the speeches and writongs of her public 
men, has become curious and interesting. While 
she is still amazingly united in her belligerent 
purpose, two distinct attitudes have revealed 
themselves among her leaders. We may call the 
parties thus created the politique^ and the fanatics. 
The first claim the Imperial Chancellor, the 
Foreign Office, and probably most of the civilian 
Ministers ; perhaps the Kaiser ; certainl}^ many of 
the Army Chiefs, and some of the ablest military 
and naval critics hke Major Moraht and Captain 
Persius. They recognise that a war of straight- 
forward conquest is no longer possible. They hope 
for a draw, a peace in which the conditions shall 
favour Germany. Accordingly they labour to 
prepare the public mind of the world for it, and 
have relinquished most of the inflated superman 
business which was rampant among them at the 
outset. They are no longer contemptuous in 
speech' of their opponents. They have become 
complimentary, as towards brave men fighting 
imder a misconception. They talk much of the 
purity and reasonableness of German aims, of her 
desire for an honourable peace, and they en- 
deavour to curb the ardent spirits who have already 
begun to divide up hostile territories. Above all, 
they are assiduous in their efforts to explain awaj' 
the events which led to war and to get rid of the 
most damning counts against German policy. These 
explanations are only aimed in a small degree a*" 
their own people, for Germany has been long ago 
convinced on the subject. They are addressed to 
neutral countries, especially America, and to what 
German statesmen fondly hope are wavering and 
uncertain elements among the population of their 
enemies. 
IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR'S SPEECH. 
A striking example is to be found in the speech 
which the Imperial Chancellor made in the Reich- 
stag on August 19th. Herr von Bethmann Holl- 
weg has never been among the fire-eaters and has 
lost popularity in consequence. In that speech 
he laboured to fasten the guilt of war on British 
Ministers, who, he said, had already violated 
Belgian neutrality by a secret agreement, and had 
refused Germany's offer of a pacific alliance, pre- 
ferring an offensive pact with France. He tried 
to prove that Germany in the crisis of July, 1914, 
had striven for peace and had not scorned the 
proposal for a conference. He talked much of the 
future of Poland when emancipated from Russian 
tyranny. He declared that Germany must win 
tiie freedom of the seas, " not as England did, to 
rule over them, but that they should serve equally 
all people." Germany, he said, would be the shield 
of defence in the future for small nations. And 
he concluded with a hope that the day would come 
when the belligerent nations would exact a terrible 
retribution from the leaders who had so gravely 
misled them. " We do not hate the peoples who 
have been driven into war by their Governments. 
We shall hold on through the war till these peoples 
demand peace from the really guilty, till the road 
becomes free for the new liberated Europe, free 
of French intrigues, Muscovite desire of conquest, 
and English guardianship." 
There is no need to discuss the arguments of a 
speech which was convincingly disposed of by 
Sir Edward Grey a weeTc later. The interesting 
point is the Hght it sheds on the role which Ger- 
many now desires to play in the world's eyes. 
She stands for reason, public honour, intemational 
decency and peace, says the Imperial Chancellor. 
She has been terribly sinned against, but like a 
good Christian she will forgive her enemies. There 
is scarcely a trace of the high-handed superman in 
his arguments. He labours to justify Germany's 
doings by the old-fashioned canons of right and 
wrong. He is a politique, desirous of preparing 
the way for an advantageous settlement. That 
is intelligible enough, but the conclusion is inconse- 
quent. It asks for German supremacy, neither 
more nor less. She is to be mistress, and other 
nations are to have the measure of freedom which 
she chooses to give them. In Sir 1^'dward Grey's 
words : " Germany supreme, Germany alone 
would be free ; free to break international treaties, 
free to crush when it pleased her^ free to refu.=e 
all mediation ; free to go to war when it suited 
her ; free, when she did go -to war, to break again 
all rules of civihsation and humanity on land and 
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