No right-thinking person has nowadays any doubt as to the profound
injustice of the Treaty of Versailles and of all the treaties which
derive from it. But this fact is of small importance, inasmuch as it
is not justice or injustice which regulates the relations between
nations, but their interests and sentiments. In the past we have seen
Christian peoples, transplanted in America, maintain the necessity of
slavery, and we have seen, and continue to see every day, methods of
reasoning which, when used by the defeated enemy were declared to be
fallacious and wrong, become in turn, when varied only in form, the
ideas and the customary life of the conquerors in the War--ideas which
then assume the quality of liberal expressions of democracy.
If appeals to the noblest human sentiments are not made in vain (and
no effort of goodness or generosity is ever sterile), the conviction
which is gradually forming itself, even in the least receptive minds,
that the treaties of peace are inapplicable, as harmful to the
conquerors as to the conquered, gains in force. For the treaties are
at one and the same time a menace for the conquerors and a paralysis
of all activity on the part of the conquered, since once the economic
unity of Continental Europe is broken the resultant depression becomes
inevitable.
If many errors have been committed, many errors were inevitable. What
we must try to do now is to limit the consequences of these mistakes
in a changed spirit. To reconstruct where we see only ruins is the
most evident necessity. We must also try to diffuse among the nations
which have won the War together and suffered together the least amount
of diffidence possible. As it is, the United States, Great Britain,
France, Italy, Japan, all go their own way. France has obtained her
maximum of concessions, including those of least use to her, but never
before has the world seen her so alone in her attitude as after the
treaties of Paris.
What is most urgently required at the moment is to change the
prevalent war-mentality which still infects us and overcomes all
generous sentiments, all hopes of unity. The statement that war makes
men better or worse is, perhaps, an exaggerated one. War, which
creates a state of exaltation, hypertrophies all the qualities, all
the tendencies, be they for good or for evil. Ascetic souls, spirits
naturally noble, being disposed toward sacrifice, develop a state
of exaltation and true fervour. How many examples of nobility, of
abnegation, of voluntary martyrdom has not the War given us? But in
persons disposed to evil actions, in rude and violent spirits (and
these are always in the majority), the spirit of violence increases.
This spirit, which among the intellectuals takes the form of arrogance
and concupiscence, and in politics expresses itself in a policy of
conquest, assumes in the crowd the most violent forms of class war,
continuous assaults upon the power of the State, and an unbalanced
desire to gain as much as possible with the least possible work.
Before the War the number of men ready to take the law into their own
hands was relatively small; now there are many such individuals.
The various nations, even those most advanced, cannot boast a moral
progress comparable with their intellectual development. The explosion
of sentiments of violence has created in the period after the War in
most countries an atmosphere which one may call unbreathable. Peoples
accustomed to be dominated and to serve have come to believe that,
having become dominators in their turn, they have the right to use
every kind of violence against their overlords of yesterday. Are not
the injustices of the Poles against the Germans, and those of the
Rumanians against the Magyars, a proof of this state of mind? Even in
the most civilized countries many rules of order and discipline have
gone by the board.
After all the great wars a condition of torpor, of unwillingness to
work, together with a certain rudeness in social relations, has always
been noticed.
The war of 1870 was a little war in comparison with the cataclysm let
loose by the European War. Yet then the conquered country had its
attempt at Bolshevism, which in those days was called the Commune,
and the fall of its political regime. In the conquering country we
witnessed, together with the rapid development of industrial groups, a
quick growth in Socialism and the constitution of great parties like
the Catholic Centre. _Mutatis mutandis_, the same situation has shown
itself after the European War.
What is most urgently necessary, therefore, is to effect a return to
peace sentiments, and in the manifestations of government to abandon
those attitudes which in the peaces of Paris had their roots in hate.
I have tried, as Premier of Italy, as writer, and as politician, to
regulate my actions by this principle. In the first months of 1920 I
gave instructions to Italy's ambassador in Vienna, the Marquis della
Torretta, to arrange a meeting between himself and Chancellor Renner,
head of the Government of Vienna. So the chief of the conquered
country came, together with his Ministers, to greet the head of the
conquering country, and there was no word that could record in any way
the past hatred and the ancient rancour. All the conversation was of
the necessity for reconstruction and for the development of fresh
currents of life and commercial activity. The Government of Italy
helped the Government of Austria in so far as was possible. And in so
acting, I felt I was working better for the greatness of my country
than I could possibly have done by any kind of stolid persecution.
I felt that over and beyond our competition there existed the human
sorrow of nations for whom we must avoid fresh shedding of blood and
fresh wars. Had I not left the Government, it was my intention not
only to continue in this path, but also to intensify my efforts in
this direction.
The banal idea that there exist in Europe two groups of nations, one
of which stands for violence and barbarism--the Germans, the Magyars
and the Bulgarians--while the other group of Anglo-Saxons and Latins
represents civilization, must not continue to be repeated, because not
only is it an outrage on truth but an outrage on honesty.
Always to repeat that the Germans are not adapted for a democratic
regime is neither just nor true. Nor is it true that Germany is an
essentially warlike country, and therefore different from all other
lands. In the last three centuries France and England have fought many
more wars than Germany. One must read the books of the Napoleonic
period to see with what disdain pacificist Germany is referred
to--that country of peasants, waiters and philosophers. It is
sufficient to read the works of German writers, including Treitschke
himself, to perceive for what a long period of time the German lands,
anxious for peace, have considered France as the country always eager
for war and conquest.
Not only am I of the opinion that Germany is a land suited for
democratic institutions, but I believe that after the fall of the
Empire democratic principles have a wider prevalence there than in
any other country of Europe. The resistance offered to the peace of
Versailles--that is, to disorganization--may be claimed as a merit for
the democratic parties, which, if they are loyally assisted by the
States of the Entente, can not only develop themselves but establish a
great and noble democracy.
Germany has accustomed us in history to the most remarkable surprises.
A century and a half ago she was considered as a pacificist nation
without national spirit. She has since then become a warlike country
with the most pronounced national spirit. Early in the seventeenth
century there were in Germany more than one hundred territories and
independent States. There was no true national conscience, and not
even the violence of the Napoleonic wars, a century after, sufficed
to awaken it. What was required was a regular effort of thought, a
sustained programme of action on the part of men like Wolff, Fichte
and Hegel to mould a national conscience. Fifty years earlier no one
would have believed in the possibility of a Germany united and
compact in her national sentiment. Germany passed from the widest
decentralization to the greatest concentration and the intensest
national life. Germany will also be a democratic country if the
violence of her ancient enemies does not drive her into a state of
exaltation which will tend to render minds and spirits favourable to a
return to the old regime.
To arrive at peace we must first of all desire peace. We must no
longer carry on conversations by means of military missions, but by
means of ambassadors and diplomatic representatives.