to extend these parleys into a general conference with regard to terms of peace and settlement.  The Russian representatives presented not only a perfectly definite statement of the principles upon which they would be willing to conclude peace but also an equally definite program of the concrete application of those principles.  The representatives of the Central Powers, on their part, presented an outline of settlement which, if much less definite, seemed susceptible of liberal interpretation until their specific program of practical terms was added.  That program proposed no concessions at all either to the sovereignty of Russia or to the preferences of the populations with whose fortunes it dealt, but meant, in a word, that the Central Empires were to keep every foot of territory their armed forces had occupied,—­every province, every city, every point of vantage,—­as a permanent addition to their territories and their power.  It is a reasonable conjecture that the general principles of settlement which they at first suggested originated with the more liberal statesmen of Germany and Austria, the men who have begun to feel the force of their own peoples’ thought and purpose, while the concrete terms of actual settlement came from the military leaders who have no thought but to keep what they have got.  The negotiations have been broken off.  The Russian representatives were sincere and in earnest.  They cannot entertain such proposals of conquest and domination.

The whole incident is full of significance.  It is also full of perplexity.  With whom are the Russian representatives dealing?  For whom are the representatives of the Central Empires speaking?  Are they speaking for the majorities of their respective parliaments or for the minority parties, that military and imperialistic minority which has so far dominated their whole policy and controlled the affairs of Turkey and of the Balkan states which have felt obliged to become their associates in this war?  The Russian representatives have insisted, very justly, very wisely, and in the true spirit of modern democracy, that the conferences they have been holding with the Teutonic and Turkish statesmen should be held within open, not closed, doors, and all the world has been audience, as was desired.  To whom have we been listening, then?  To those who speak the spirit and intention of the Resolutions of the German Reichstag of the ninth of July last, the spirit and intention of the liberal leaders and parties of Germany, or to those who resist and defy that spirit and intention and insist upon conquest and subjugation?  Or are we listening, in fact, to both, unreconciled and in open and hopeless contradiction?  These are very serious and pregnant questions.  Upon the answer to them depends the peace of the world.