The big room was very still. Outside, beneath a thin, cold drizzle, the
first tinge of green showed on the broad lawn. The crocuses were
beginning to thrust their spears through the sodden mold. One of the
long French windows stood ajar, and in the air that slipped through was
a clean, moist whiff of coming spring. It was the end of March.
In the leather armchair by the wide, flat desk sat a man. His chin was
on his chest; the lowered head and the droop of the broad, spare
shoulders showed the impact of some heavy burden. His clothes were
gray--a trim, neatly cut business suit; his hair was gray; his gray-blue
eyes were sombre. In the gathering dusk he seemed only a darker shadow
in the padded chair. His right hand--the long, firm, nervous hand of a
scholar--rested on the blotting pad. A silver pen had slipped from his
fingers as he sat in thought. On the desk lay some typed sheets which he
was revising.
Sitting there, his mind had been traversing the memories of the past two
and a half years. Every line of his lean, strong figure showed some
trace of the responsibilities he had borne. In the greatest crisis of
modern times he had steadfastly pursued an ideal, regardless of the
bitterness of criticism and the sting of ridicule. The difficulties had
been tremendous. Every kind of influence had been brought upon him to do
certain things, none of which he had done. A scholar, a dreamer, a
lifelong student of history, he had surprised his associates by the
clearness of his vision, the tenacity of his will. Never, perhaps, in
the history of the nation had a man been more brutally reviled than
he--save one! And his eyes turned to the wall where, over the chimney
piece, hung the portrait of one of his predecessors who had stood for
his ideals in a time of fiery trial. It was too dark now to see the
picture but he knew well the rugged, homely face, the tender,
pain-wrenched mouth.
This man had dreamed a dream. Climbing from the humble youth of a poor
student, nourished in classroom and library with the burning visions of
great teachers, he had hoped in this highest of positions to guide his
country in the difficult path of a higher patriotism. Philosopher,
idealist, keen student of men, he had been able to keep his eyes
steadfast on his goal despite the intolerable cloud of unjust criticism
that had rolled round him. Venomous and shameful attacks had hurt him,
but had never abated his purpose. In a world reeling and smoking with
the insane fury of war, one nation should stand unshaken for the message
of the spirit, for the glory of humanity; for the settlement of disputes
by other means than gunpowder and women's tears. That was his dream. To
that he had clung.
He shifted grimly in his chair, and took up the pen.
What a long, heart-rending strain it had been! His mind went back to the
golden August day when the telegram was laid on his desk announcing that
the old civilization of Europe had fallen into fragments. He remembered
the first meeting thereafter, when his associates, with grave, anxious
faces, debated the proper stand for them to take. He remembered how, in
the swinging relaxation of an afternoon of golf, he had thoughtfully
planned the wording of his first neutrality proclamation.
In those dim, far-off days, who had dreamed what would come? Who could
have believed that great nations would discard without compunction all
the carefully built-up conventions of international law? That murder in
the air, on land, on the sea, under the sea, would be rewarded by the
highest military honours? That a supposedly friendly nation would fill
another land with spies--even among the accredited envoys of diplomacy?
Sadly this man thought of the long painful fight he had made to keep one
nation at least out of the tragic, barbaric struggle. Giving due honour
to convinced militarist and sincere pacifist, his own course was still
different. That his country, disregarding the old fetishes of honour and
insult, should stand solidly for humanity; should endure all things,
suffer all things, for humanity's sake; should seek to bind up the
wounds and fill the starving mouths. That one nation--not because she
was weak, but because she was strong--should, with God's help, make a
firm stand for peace and show to all mankind that force can never
conquer force.
"A nation can be so right that it should be too proud to fight."
Magnificent words, true words, which one day would re-echo in history as
the utterance of a man years in advance of his time--but what rolling
thunders of vituperation they had cost him! _Too proud to fight_!... If
only it had been possible to carry through to the end this message from
Judea!
But, little by little, and with growing anguish, he had seen that the
nation must take another step. Little by little, as the inhuman frenzies
of warfare had grown in savagery, inflicting unspeakable horror on
non-combatants, women and children, he had realized that his cherished
dream must be laid aside. For the first time in human history a great
nation had dared to waive pride, honour, and--with bleeding heart--even
the lives of its own for the hope of humanity and civilization. With
face buried in his hands he reviewed the long catalogue of atrocities on
the seas. He could feel his cheeks grow hot against his palms. _Arabic_,
_Lusitania_, _Persia_, _Laconia_, _Falaba_, _Gulflight_, _Sussex_,
_California_--the names were etched in his brain in letters of grief.
And now, since the "barred-zone" decree ...
He straightened in his chair. Like a garment the mood of anguish slipped
from him. He snapped on the green desk light and turned to his personal
typewriter. As he did so, from some old student day a phrase flashed
into his mind--the words of Martin Luther, the Thuringian peasant and
university professor, who four hundred years before had nailed his
theses on the church door at Wittenberg:
"_Gott helfe mir, ich kann nicht anders_."
They chimed a solemn refrain in his heart as he inserted a fresh sheet
of paper behind the roller and resumed his writing....
"_With a profound sense of the solemn and even tragical character of the
step I am taking and of the grave responsibilities which it
involves_.... _I advise that the Congress declare the recent course of
the Imperial German Government to be in fact nothing less than war
against the Government and people of the United States_...."
The typewriter clicked industriously. The face bent intently over the
keys was grave and quiet, but as the paper unrolled before him some of
his sadness seemed to pass away. A vision of his country, no longer
divided in petty schisms, engrossed in material pursuits, but massed in
one by the force and fury of a valiant ideal, came into his mind.
"It is for humanity," he whispered to himself. "_Ich kann nicht
anders_...."
"_We have no quarrel with the German people. We have no feeling toward
them but one of sympathy and friendship. It was not upon their impulse
that their government acted in entering this war. It was not with their
previous knowledge or approval_.... _Self-governed nations do not fill
their neighbour states with spies, or set the course of intrigue to
bring about some critical posture of affairs which will give them an
opportunity to strike and make conquest.... A steadfast concert for
peace can never be maintained except by a partnership of democratic
nations_....
"_Only free peoples can hold their purpose and their honour steady to
a common end and prefer the interests of mankind to any narrow
interest of their own_."
With the gathering of the dusk the rain had stopped. He rose from his
chair and walked to the window. The sky had cleared; in the west shone a
faint band of clear apple green in which burned one lucent star.
Distantly he could hear the murmur of the city like the pulsing
heartbeat of the nation. As often, in moments of tension, he seemed to
feel the whole vast stretch of the continent throbbing; the yearning
breast of the land trembling with energy; the great arch of sky,
spanning from coast to coast, quiver with power unused. The murmur of
little children in their cradles, the tender words of mothers, the
footbeat of men on the pavements of ten thousand cities, the flags
leaping in air from high buildings, ships putting out to sea with
gunners at their sterns--in one aching synthesis the vastness and
dearness and might of his land came to him. A mingled nation, indeed, of
various and clashing breeds; but oh, with what a tradition to uphold!
Words were forming in his mind as he watched the fading sky, and he
returned quietly to the typewriter:
"_We are glad to fight thus for the ultimate peace of the world and for
the liberation of its peoples, the German peoples included.... The world
must be made safe for democracy_."
_The world must be made safe for democracy_! As the wires leaped and the
little typewriter spoke under the pressure of his strong fingers, scenes
passed in his mind of the happy, happy Europe he had known in old wander
days, years before.
He could see the sun setting down dark aisles of the Black Forest; the
German peasants at work in the fields; the simple, cordial friendliness
of that lovely land. He remembered French villages beside slow-moving
rivers; white roads in a hot shimmer of sun; apple orchards of the
Moselle. And England--dear green England, fairest of all--the rich blue
line of the Chiltern Hills, and Buckinghamshire beech woods bronze and
yellow in the autumn. He remembered thatched cottages where he had
bicycled for tea, and the naïve rustic folk who had made him welcome.
What deviltry had taken all these peaceful people, gripped them and
maddened them, set them at one another's throats? Millions of children,
millions of mothers, millions of humble workers, happy in the richness
of life--where were they now? Life, innocent human life--the most
precious thing we know or dream of, freedom to work for a living and
win our own joys of home and love and food--what Black Death had
maddened the world with its damnable seeds of hate? Would life ever be
free and sweet again?
The detestable sultry horror of it all broke upon him anew in a tide of
anguish. No, the world could never be the same again in the lives of men
now living. But for the sake of the generations to come--he thought of
his own tiny grandchildren--for the love of God and the mercy of
mankind, let this madness be crushed. If his country must enter the war
let it be only for the love and service of humanity. "It is a fearful
thing," he thought, "but the right is more precious than peace."
Sad at heart he turned again to the typewriter, and the keys clicked off
the closing words:
"_To such a task we can dedicate our lives and our fortunes, everything
that we are and everything that we have, with the pride of those who
know that the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood
and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and
the peace which she has treasured_."
He leaned back in his chair, stiff and weary. His head ached hotly. With
elbows on the desk he covered his forehead and eyes with his hands. All
the agony, the bitterness, the burden of preceding days swept over him,
but behind it was a cool and cleansing current of peace. "_Ich kann
nicht anders_," he whispered.
Then, turning swiftly to the machine, he typed rapidly:
"_God helping her, she can do no other_."