564 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE AWAKENING OF AUSTRIA 565 blood; awful and immeasurable is the guilt that taints those who wrote the Serbian note, which was hailed as a salvation.
At last! a real word well spoken, it was said. And not only by Christian Conservative groups, but by nearly all the liberals, in fact by the whole Bourgeoisie. And the more capitalistic, the more pot bellied they were, the more they figured: War, that will be good business.
And they may not have been entirely mistaken, even though we cannot judge the day before evening, and do not know what the things are worth that they have gathered in, through the accelerated bank note activity (laughter. Even here no recriminations! But it is impossible to speak without thinking of the year 1914 without hoping that the day will arrive and it is steadily approaching when we can settle accounts with all those who held the reins of government in their nds, and with open eyes, in joy and even ecstasy, drove the people into this awful sea of blood, who led an entire generation of the humanity of Europe to the field of slaughter.
What do we look like to day physically, all layers and classes except for a few foot pads? We do not know how many generations it will take to make good the damage. It is no consolation to us to know that our opponents are no better off than ourselves. That a great noble people like the French have been so ruined, so exsanguinated by this Moloch, must make the heart of everyone bleed who knows what the French nation is.
of sanity, justice, and peace. This is a clear sign of democratization in Germany.
What is taking place there is not to be compared with the childish experiments that have been tried in Austria for a year or more to create coalition and combination ministries, in which people of different parties participate, without ever being asked whether they wish to do so. They are merely to be in the same ministry in order to sign their names together to the laws and ordinances. In Germany they have passed beyond this stage of child play. When we, in this country, have spoken of Germany, of the German people and German politics in a spirit if presumption and conceit, it is an extravagance for which we may make allowance in such excited times.
The German people are not beyond the range of such attacks, but in this case they simply do not strike home. But it is a misfortune that people should take advantage of the first opportunity to commit wrong themselves. The more their feelings were hurt by Prussian conceit, and by the tone of those here at home, who believed in carrying through everything with the aid of Prussian bayonets, the more they should realize how improper and harmful it is to perpetuate this same sort of conduct. We cannot make progress in this way.
Neither can we get anywhere by making charges of high treason. Some of the gentlemen of the German National Association have given this matter much attention. But Mommsen has said: History knows no high treason.
The thing must end. How? In Germany necessity has made strange bed fellows. The most remarkable event, if we except the Russian Revolution, is the formation in Germany of a ministry with a prince at the head, but with the admixture of a half dozen Social Democrats. The German Social Democrats, in doing this, have made an enormous sacrifice.
They had no desire to enter the ministry, but believed it their duty to assist to swing the rudder in a different direction, so that in the moment of distress they might steer in the direction All forms of treason are to be despised, save only high treason. For that is a thing which is done not in the interest of the individual himself, it is the revolt of a person or people in obedience to their conviction. It must not be made a profession by anyone. And if none can make a living out of treason, it is still more difficult to do so out of the treason of others. Yet this was attempted here for a long period. Simply to make capital out of the fact that others are bad Austrians does not qualify anyone to lead Austria or to do construc