The War and the Churches | Page 8

sentiment in every
school and village. A definite demand was made throughout Germany
for more colonies and a longer coast-line on the North Sea; and it was
in relation to this ambition that England, France, and Russia were
represented--and justly represented--as Germany's opponents. England,
in particular, was described as the great dragon which watched at the
gates of Germany and grimly forbade its "development." It is in this
sense that the bulk of the German people maintain that their action is
defensive.
In passing, let me emphasise this peculiar economic difference between
the four nations. Russia had a vast territory in which her people might
develop. France had no surplus population, and had a large colonial
field for such of her children as desired adventure abroad or would
escape the competition at home. England had, in Canada and
Australasia and South Africa, a magnificent estate for her surplus
population. None of these Powers had an economic ground for
aggression. Germany was undoubtedly in a far less fortunate position,

and had an overflowing population. Six hundred thousand men and
women (mostly men) had to leave the fatherland every year, and, as the
colonies were small and unsatisfactory, they were scattered and lost
among the nations of the earth. The proper attitude toward Germany is,
not to gratify the cunning of her leaders by superficially admitting that
she was not aggressive, but to understand clearly the very solid grounds
of her desire for expansion.
Into the whole case against Germany, however, I cannot enter here.
Familiar from their chief historical writers with the supposed law of the
expansion of powerful nations, convinced by their economists that the
country would soon burst with population and be choked by their own
industrial products unless they expanded, knowing well that such
expansion meant war to the death against France and England (who
would suffer by their expansion), the German people consented to the
war. Their official documents absolutely belie the notion that they were
meeting an aggressive England. But the Christians of Germany were
utterly false to their principles in supporting such a war. I do not mean
merely that they set aside the precept, or counsel to turn the other cheek
to the smiter, for no one now expects either nation or individual to act
on that maxim. They were false to the ordinary principles of Christian
morals or of humanity. Even if one were desperately to suppose that,
learned divines like Harnack were unable to assign the real
responsibility for the war, or that the whole of Germany is kept in a
kind of hot-house of falsehood, it would be impossible to defend them.
The Churches of Germany have complacently watched for twenty-three
years the tendency which William II gave to their schools; they have
passed no censure on the fifteen years of Imperialist propaganda which
have steadily prepared the nation for an aggressive war; and they have
raised no voice against the appalling decision that, in order to attain
Germany's purposes, every rule of morals and humanity should be set
aside. They have servilely accepted every flimsy pretext for outrage,
and have followed, instead of leading, their passion-blinded people. It
was the same in Austria-Hungary. Austrian and Hungarian prelates
have passed in silence the fearful travesties of justice by which, in
recent years, their statesmen sought to compass the judicial murder of
scores of Slavs; they raised no voice when, at the grave risk of a

European war, Austria dishonestly annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina;
they gave their tacit or open consent when Austria, refusing mediation,
declared war on Serbia and inaugurated the titanic struggle; and they
have passed no condemnation on the infamies which the Magyar troops
perpetrated in Serbia.
I am concerned mainly with the action or inaction of the Churches in
this country, but it is entirely relevant to set out a brief statement of
these facts about Germany and Austria-Hungary. The Christian religion
was on trial in those countries as well as here. It failed so lamentably,
not because there is more Christianity here than in Germany and
Austria, not because the national character was inferior to the English
and less apt to receive Christian teaching, but because the temptation
was greater. Until this war occurred, no responsible traveller ever
ventured to say that the German or Austrian character was inferior to
the British. It is not. But the economic difficulties of Germany and the
political difficulties (with the Slavs) of Austria-Hungary laid a heavier
trial on those nations, and their Christianity entirely failed. Catholic and
Protestant alike--for the two nations contain fifty million Catholics to
sixty million Protestants--were swept onward in the tide of national
passion, or feared to oppose it.
One might have expected that at least the supreme head of the Roman
Church would, from his detached throne