Serbia in Light and Darkness | Page 5

can build the world up, but can destroy it too; the good man can only build it up.
A man's judgment lasts as long as a man's life, but God's judgment lasts as long as God.
It is better to dress the soul in silk and the body in rags than the reverse.
If life does not mean work, then life is worth nothing.
Work and virtue are sisters, as well as idleness and vice.
Work and prayer are two eyes on the same face. The man who works only, without praying, has one eye only; and the man who prays without working only has one eye too. The man who neither works nor prays has no eyes, and walks in darkness.
Neither be boastful of life nor fearful of death. Death is conditioned by life, and life by death.
You can kill me, but my son will live; you can kill my son, but my soul will live.
The Kingdom of God is coming as quietly as the moonlight, and it will come fully when men learn not to live in convulsions and not to die in convulsions.
There are only two nations upon the earth: that which weeps and that which laughs.
Now I would like to indicate slightly what The English Political Interests in Serbia are. Little as she may seem, democratic Serbia is still the greatest moral factor in the big Slav world. She is admired by other subjugated Slavs because she succeeded without anybody's help in freeing herself. She is envied by all other Slavs, from near and from far, as well as from other neighbouring nations, because of her nearly perfect democracy. Serbia is the only democratic state among the four independent Slav states (Russia, Montenegro, Bulgaria). And just in this terrible war it became clear to all the world that Serbia was the only democratic state in the Near East. Turkey is governed by an oligarchy, Bulgaria by a German despot, Greece by a wilful king whose patriotism is overshadowed by his nepotism, Roumania is ruled more by the wish of the landlords (boyars) and court than by the wish of the people. I will say nothing about the very profanation of democracy in the dark realm of the Hapsburgs.
Serbia not only means a democratic state, but a democratic nation; that is to say, that not only are the Serbian institutions (including the church also) democratic, but the spirit of the whole of the nation is democratic. After all, this democratic spirit of Serbia must be victorious in the Balkans as well as in the Slav world.
You know that England's glory has always been to stand as the champion of democracy. England's best interests in the Near East now more than ever imperatively require her to support democratic Serbia against her anti-democratic enemies. How different Serbia is from all her neighbours was clearly proved just by this war. She is alone in the Near East fighting on the side of the democratic England and France against Prussian militarism and autocracy. That does not happen accidentally, but because of the Serbian democratic spirit. This spirit is very attractive for all the Slavs who are under the Austro-Hungarian rule. Many of them are looking towards powerful Russia to liberate them (Poles, Bohemians, Ruthenes, Slovaks). Yet they do not wish only Freedom, but Freedom and Democracy together. Therefore they are looking with one eye towards Russian power and with another towards Serbian democracy. It is clear that the English victory over the Germans must have as the first consequence the liberation of all the slaves in Europe. In this case all the Southern Slav people in Austro-Hungary--Serbs, Croats and Slovenes--wish to be one unit with democratic Serbia, as it was formulated lately by the Southern-Slav Committee in London, and all the others--Poles, Bohemians, Ruthenes and Slovaks--wish to be like democratic Serbia. Consequently Serbia is a kernel, a nucleus of a greater Southern-Slav state, and at the same time the inspiring and revolutionising power for all the down-trodden Slavs. This kernel for five hundred years was the little, but never subjugated, Montenegro, but lately the Piedmontal role has been transferred to Serbia.
The English political interest in the future Greater Serbia, or Yougoslavija, is of the first importance. The Southern-Slav state will number about fourteen millions of inhabitants. This state will be the very gate of the East. Yet Serbia is not only the nucleus of the united Southern Slavdom, but the very nucleus of a Balkan Federation also, in which the Greco-Roumanian element should be a good balance to the Slav element in it. I repeat I like my little country just because it is so comparatively little. But by necessity it is to become much larger. By necessity the whole of the Serbian race is to be freed and united. By necessity the Southern-Slav state and