She had a forty-four years' start of the rest of the world in preparing her programme. It is not in two years, or in three, that the rest of the world can overtake her. That advantage is going to carry her a long way. Some people still believe that advantage will exist to the end. I don't. Still, one of the overwhelming facts of this war is to me that: Germany held Belgium and northeast France at the end of 1914, and yet, all along the Allied fronts, with Germany fighting on invaded territory, they cried: "She is beaten!" So, indeed, her strategy was. At the end of 1915 she had two new allies, and held all of Servia, Montenegro, and Russian Poland, and still the Allies persisted: "She is licked, but she does not know it yet." It is one of the finest proofs of the world's faith in the triumph of the Right that so many believe this to be true.
You are going to come some day to the opinion I hold--that if we want universai peace we must first get rid of the race that does not want it or believe in it. Forbidden subject? I know. But when I resist temptation you find holes in my letters, and seem to imagine that I am taking no notice of things that happen. I notice fast enough, and I am so interested that I hope to see the condemnation, already passed in England, against Kaiser, Kronprinz and Company, for "wilful murder," executed, even if I cannot live to see Germany invaded.
This is what you get for saying, "You make no comment on the overrunning of Servia or the murder of Edith Cavell, or the failure of the Gallipoli adventure." After all, these are only details in the great undertaking. As we say of every disaster, "They will not affect the final result." It is getting to be a catch-word, but it is true.
Germany is absolutely right in considering Great Britain her greatest enemy. She knows today that, even if she could get to Paris or Petrograd, it would not help her. She would still have Britain to settle with. I wonder if the Kaiser has yet waked up to a realization of his one very great achievement--the reawakening of Greater Britain? He dreamed of dealing his mother's country a mortal blow.
The blow landed, but it healed instead of killing.
This war is infernal, diabolical--and farcical--if we look at the deeds that are done every day. Luckily we don't and mustn't, for we all know that there are things in the world a million times worse than death, and that there are future results to be aimed at which make death gloriously worth while. Those are the things we must look at.