Their Crimes - Various
[30] Who, except the specialist in mental diseases, can deal with this
proclamation of the Kaiser to his Army of the East?: "Remember that you
are the chosen people! The Spirit of the Lord has descended upon me as
Emperor of the Germans! I am the instrument of the Most High. I am His
sword. Woe and death unto those who resist my will! Woe and death unto
those who believe not in my mission!"
THE GERMAN APPEAL
APPEAL TO THE CIVILISED WORLD
Now that we have reached the close of this book of horrors, let us
impanel the 93 Germans of light and learning, and confront them with the
words of their own manifesto:
"As representatives of German Science and Art, we the undersigned,
declare that:--
"It is not true that Germany provoked this War....
"It is not true that we have criminally violated the neutrality of
Belgium....
"It is not true that our soldiers have made any attack on the life or
property of a single Belgian citizen without being forced to it by sheer
necessity....
"It is not true that our troops brutally destroyed Louvain....
"It is not true that we have conducted warfare in defiance of
International Law. Our soldiers commit neither undisciplined acts nor
cruelties....
" ... In this struggle we shall continue to the end to act as a
civilised nation, to whom the heritage of a Goethe, a Beethoven or a
Kant is as sacred as our own hearth and home. We answer for that in our
own name and on our honour."[31]
And since irony is more powerful than abuse, let us set down here,
without a word of comment, a few German utterances:--
The Kaiser: "We are the salt of the earth. God created us to civilise
the world."
The Cardinal-Archbishop of Cologne: "It is with God that our soldiers
set out for this war that has been inflicted upon us, and in which we
are fighting for the sacred treasures of Christianity, and for its own
particular gift, Kultur."
Dryander, a Protestant Minister, and preacher to the Royal Court at
Berlin: "On our side we are fighting with a self-control, a conscience,
and a gentleness unexampled perhaps in the history of the world."
Professor Lasson: "Our characteristics are humanity, gentleness,
conscience--the Christian virtues. In a world of evil, we stand for
love, and God is with us."
And, finally, this older and memorable saying of their great philosopher
Hegel: "The destiny of the German race is to supply the sustaining
pillars of Christian teaching."
FOOTNOTES:
[31] Speaking of honour, it is as well to recall here the reply made by
a German officer to the schoolmaster at Chanteheux. The schoolmaster
quite simply pledged his word of honour that no inhabitant had fired:
"You French pig," the brute shouted, "don't talk of honour--you have
none."
APPEAL BY BELGIAN WORKMEN
800,000 copies of this pamphlet had already been sent out when the world
rang with the tragic appeal of the Belgian workmen to their brother
workers in other lands. This appeal ought to be fixed on the door of
every factory and workshop. Every worker, every citizen, should study
it. We regret that we cannot reprint it here in full, but the following
extracts will at least give an idea of this new crime committed by
Germany:--
"Workers,--In the name of the international bonds that
unite all workmen, the working classes of
Belgium--threatened, without exception, with slavery,
deportation, and forced labour for the enemy's
gain--send to the working classes in other lands a
supreme appeal.
"Germany, as you know, attacked and terrorised Belgium
in 1914 for having defended her right to neutrality and
her faith and honour.
"Germany has been martyrizing Belgium. She has from that
moment onwards turned the land into a prison: the
frontiers are armed against Belgians like a battle
front.. All our constitutional liberties have been
abolished. There is no longer safety anywhere; the
life of our citizens is at the mercy of the
policeman,--arbitrary, limitless, pitiless ... Belgian
industrial idleness has been the creation of the
Germans, maintained by them for their own profit.[32]
To these 500,000 unemployed they have for the last month
been saying: 'Either you will sign a contract to work
for Germany, or you will be reduced to slavery.' In
either case, it means exile, deportation, forced labour
in the interests of the enemy, and against the interests
of our country: formidable punishments, the cruellest
ever invented by tyranny for the punishment of
crimes--and what _are_ the crimes alleged?... On the
western front, Belgian workmen--your brothers and
ours--are being forced to dig trenches, to build
aviation camps, to fortify the German lines, and when
the victims, in spite of everything, are firm in their
refusal to take part in work forbidden by International
Law, they are starved and beaten into illness, wounded,
and sometimes even _killed_.
"In Germany, they are turned on to work in mines, and at
lime-kilns, quite regardless of their age, profession,
or trade. Youths of seventeen, old men of seventy, are
deported in haphazard masses. _Is not this a revival of
ancient Slavery with all its horrors_?... Do you know,
brothers, what the Germans throw to their victims by way
of pay? 30 pfennigs (3d.) a day!
"Workers: _Never forget that the soldiers-who are_
_acting as the torturers or our Belgian workmen are
themselves German workers!_
"In the depths of our distress, we count on you. It is
for you to act! For ourselves, even if brute force
succeeds for the moment in reducing our bodies to
servitude, we shall never give our consent.
"A final word: Whatever tortures we may undergo, we do
not wish for Peace except with the independence of our
country and the triumph of justice.
"THE WORKMEN OF BELGIUM."
FOOTNOTES:
[32] By levying on Belgium a war contribution which already exceeds
L40,000,000--by transporting to Germany food, merchandise and various
products to the value of more than L200,000,000--by seizing and
despatching to their own country the greater portion of our raw
material, machines and accessories--by issuing threatening edicts to
prevent localities from using the unemployed on their own important
works of public utility.
CONCLUSION
What is our object?
Is it to incite our soldiers to commit, if chance arises, atrocities
like theirs? We repudiate with horror a thought such as that.
_Defensive_ reprisals (asphyxiating gas, liquid fire, etc.) are
sometimes indispensable. Reprisals for _revenge_ would be unworthy of
us. But--without speaking of personal punishments, demanded by outraged
conscience, and essential in order that the two indivisible principles
of right and of responsibility may still exist in the world--we must
make it absolutely impossible for the Wild Beast to break out again. And
how, when the settling time draws near, and, in spite of weariness, a
new effort is needed to realise conditions of peace with guarantees for
the future--how could the Allied Nations accept the sacrifices still
demanded of them, if they remained in ignorance?
It is not enough for these crimes to be known by Governments and by a
few hundred people with leisure and inclination to read collections of
great volumes. They must be known by everybody, by the entire people, by
the People, who--in our proud and free countries--control, support,
direct their Governments and are the sole masters of their own destiny.
Our peoples ought to know the crimes committed in the name of "Kultur,"
in order, at all costs, to take the precautions necessary to prevent for
ever their return. That is our first object. The second is this: to all
our martyrs we have a sacred duty--that of remembrance. There, where
they fell, we shall doubtless carve their names in stone or bronze. But
what of a time further away? When, after the long sufferings of this
war, freed humanity takes up again its works of peace, we shall see the
Germans reappear in every land, at every cross-road--men of commerce,
industry, finance, science, men of the people and of society--in every
place where those of all countries, all races and all colours meet and
rub elbows. And what is our attitude to be? Our answer is this: So long
as the nation in whose name and by whose hands these atrocities have
been committed has not herself solemnly cast from her the scoundrels who
dragged her into such decadence, we shall consider that it would betray
our martyrs for us even to rub shoulders with their executioners, and
that until the day arrives--if it ever does arrive--of a striking moral
repentance, to _forget_ would be to _condone_.
L. MIRMAN, Prefect of Meurthe-et-Moselle.
G. SIMON, G. KELLER, Mayor of Nancy. Mayor of Luneville.