In order to drive home such evident absurdities, they were, of course, obliged to carry on the poisoning of the spring of information to the utmost, they had to suppress the news of the vile deeds of guerrillas and “snipers” in Belgium and of the Russian ghouls in East Prussia, that were crying to heaven, and to send out into the world instead fables of German brutality.  Our national army, permeated with ethical seriousness and iron discipline, the scientist standing beside the farmer, the workman beside the artist, should be guilty of unnecessary severity, uncontrollable brutality, brutality against people unable to defend themselves?  Do you believe that, Americans?

The Charge of Vandalism.

The climax of absurdity, however, is reached when the Germans, who in their love and appreciation of art are not surpassed by any people in the world, are accused of having raged as vandals against works of art.  Even now these accusations, which the French Government itself had the pitiful courage to support, have proved totally groundless.  The City Hall at Louvain stands uninjured; while the populace fired at them, our soldiers had, risking their own lives, saved it from the flames.  An imperial art commission followed at the heels of our victorious troops in Belgium, in order to take charge of the guarding and administration of the treasures of art.  The cathedral at Rheims has received but slight damage, and would not have been damaged at all had its tower not been misused by the French as an observation station.  I should like to see the commander of an army who, for the sake of the safety of a historical monument, would forget the safety of the troops intrusted into his care!

Enough of it!  What I have stated is sufficient to show what low weapons our enemies are using behind the battlefield to sully Germany’s shield of honor.  It is enough for those who care to listen at all.  But, also, wherever the weak voice of one rebounds from ears stubbornly closed, the more powerful voice of truth eventually will force a more just verdict.

Justice—­that is all that we expect from America.  We respect its neutrality; we do not ask from it an ideal partisanship for our benefit.  If it does not have for us the sympathy which we have already extended to it and, after a century and a half of unclouded intercourse between the two nations, have anticipated there, then we cannot imbue it with that spirit by reasoning.  Furthermore, in the existence of nations sympathy is not the deciding factor, and every nation should be rebuked which out of regard for sympathy would in decisive matters act against its own interests.  But just for that very reason one more question must be raised.  In the present conflict, which momentarily almost splits the entire world into two camps, where do the interests of America lie?