I come now to say a word as to the care given to the bodies of our
men. The hospitals from the trenches up to the base are admirable,
and the appliances are of the most modern description. I shall not
soon forget how in one place I saw for the first time the travelling
X-ray caravan. It seemed very strange to be in the hospital whilst
the photograph was taken and then to go out in the road and see the
machine which did the work. What a convenience this must be in these
clearing hospitals can well be imagined. One cannot mention all the
splendid stationary and other hospitals over which one was shown by
officials with untiring patience and courtesy. The pride which our
fellow-citizens from the Dominions beyond the seas take in the
fitting up and working of their hospitals is quite extraordinary, and
the same spirit animates the private individuals who have their own
large institutions in hotels, casinos, and such-like places that they
have taken over. I am not sure that I was not more struck with the
splendid arrangements made by the Liverpool merchants for our wounded
than by anything else of this kind. There is also what one may call
a Convalescent Home for the tired soldier, weary in body, in mind and
nerve, which, thanks to the man at the head, seems to be very
effective. We all know how the strain of the Front tells upon our
soldiers, and especially upon the younger men. They come back to
this excellent Home by the thousand; they are kept until really
restored, and then they go back cheerful and ready for duty. The
last thing before they return is a little service in the chapel,
which I had the honour on one occasion to take. It was interesting
when paying a visit to another hospital to find that it had been
formerly a school, and that as the whole building had not been taken
over some of the classes were still being held. I intruded into the
schoolroom and gave a talk to the young people about the Alliance.
Although I must refrain most reluctantly from saying anything about
the great military personages whom I met in France, and with whom I
was so greatly impressed, I may perhaps refer to two French persons
of distinction, in no way connected with the war, whom I was
privileged to meet. First there is that outstanding personality the
Mayor of Hazebrouck, Abbé Lemire. He and I were brought together
because he is a clerical municipal dignitary and I was the first
clergyman who was ever a mayor in this country. He, however, does
more than I have ever been able to do, because he is a member of the
Chamber of Deputies, and here in England the doors of the House of
Commons are still shut against the clergy. Abbé Lemire was formerly
a professor of theology in a seminary and was a man of distinction in
his Church. However, since the present influence at Rome he has got
out with the authorities and is now excommunicated. The ostensible
reason given was that he did not ask Rome's permission to sit as a
Deputy. As it was only during the last few years that such a request
was made, and as he had been in Parliament for several years before
that fresh demand, the Abbé declined to submit. The probability is
that he was fairly certain that no permission would be granted,
because of the liberality of his opinions. One thing certainly was
in the eyes of Rome a grave offence on his part. When the Bill
dealing with the separation of Church and State was under discussion,
he spoke and voted against it, but when it was passed he did not
therefore give up his seat and refuse to serve the Republic any
longer. He suggested, when the Bill was in Committee, many
amendments which would have greatly eased the financial position of
the Church, but these were rejected, mainly because Rome would have
no compromise. The short-sighted policy which now prevails at the
Vatican, and which has been the cause of the vacillation of the Pope
on the subject of the war, has in regard to Abbé Lemire turned him
into the hero of all the Liberal Church people of France. He is an
extraordinarily winning personality, and as we walked through the
streets of his city every woman and child and old man had something
to say to him. With one he would discuss the imprisonment of a
soldier son in Germany; with another the fact that a married daughter
had had a bouncing boy who would be, so prophesied the Abbé, a
soldier of France in years to come. To another in deep mourning he
had a word of comfort to give; until at last I said to him that he
appeared to be not only _le maire_ but also _le père_ of Hazebrouck.
He took me round to his house, which is situated close to the church
from the altar of which he is repelled by the vicar, and there he
introduced me to the only priest in the neighbourhood who is brave
enough to be publicly his friend. Such is the man that Rome
ostracises and the people idolise.
[Illustration: ABBÉ LEMIRE]
One little matter which should endear Abbé Lemire to the English
people is the care which he takes himself, and makes his people take,
of the graves of our British soldiers. When flowers are placed upon
the French dead the Allies from the other side of the Straits of
Dover are not neglected. The religion of Christ will never suffer
loss so long as such men as the saint just sketched out exist to
prove by sacrifice their devotion to their Master.
Another beautiful character is the present Archbishop of Rouen.
Carrying well his seventy-six years, thanks in no small measure to
the loving care of his secretary, the great dignitary has passed
through the recent critical time for his Church, retaining throughout
his breadth of view and his sweetness of nature. Turned out of his
official residence, he has built himself another, beautifully
situated, in the grounds of which may to-day be seen English doctors
and nurses, and even wounded, resting and gaining health. The
morning upon which I saw him I had been celebrating the Holy
Communion in the chapel of what once was his palace. When I asked
him whether he felt any objection to this being done by our English
clergy, he answered, "Certainly not." And then, after a moment's
thought, he went on: "After all, what does it matter whether one
celebrates in one vestment and another in a different one, if at the
root of things we are the same? Of course, at the root there must be
union of belief." I do not claim that every Archbishop in France
would go so far as he does of Rouen, but when sometimes we accuse
others of narrowness we must bear in mind, first, that we are guilty
very often ourselves, and, secondly, that there are great instances
of breadth to be found within the ranks of Rome. I feel, honestly,
that out of this war should come a possibility of a better
understanding between the various religious bodies, whose men are
fighting for the Allies.
Out at the Front all are living for duty. In five hours from London
one can be at the very heart of affairs, and yet you are in a
different world. One thing, and one only, animates those brothers of
ours, so close to us and yet whose spiritual atmosphere seems so
different. All the little things are relegated to their proper
place; the really important question absorbs every one from the
Commander-in-Chief through the whole of the Army. The drop, as it
were, from the high standard of headquarters in France to the capital
of the Empire depresses a good deal. If only one could make people
understand that the whole position is intensely serious, and that the
possibility of our Empire in the days to come being influential for
the benefit of the world, nay, the possibility of our being a free
nation; that these things rest upon our being at home instinct with
the same devotion as our people at the Front, we should find that it
would be unnecessary to issue almost despairing recruiting bills, and
that all would be rushing to service in the cause of God and country,
crying, "Here am I, send me."
I am tempted after setting down my impressions of my visit to the
Front to take a general survey of the countries engaged in the war,
two of which I lived in for a considerable time, and all of which,
with the exception of Japan, I have visited during my life.
It is natural to turn one's attention first of all to the instigator
of the war, Germany. Those of us who know that country are capable
of understanding the readiness with which it plunged into the ocean
of blood, and the determination with which it has carried on
operations. Ever since 1870 Prussia has regarded itself as the
Dictator of the Continent of Europe. Although for some ten years
after the Franco-German War it was a poor country, it was
nevertheless laying the foundations of that preparedness for eventual
attack upon others, which it felt would be necessary in order to
consolidate its position of prominence. After 1880 the great growth
in material prosperity facilitated the extension of armed power,
whilst national pride, which before had been reasonable, now grew
into an extraordinary conception of the Divine right of Teutonic
aspirations. The Prussian was not blind to the fact that his claims
would meet with the inevitable opposition of other Continental
Powers, but having cowed the minor German States he felt sure of
victory, with those States by his side.
I suppose no people really dislike each other more than the Bavarian
dislikes the Prussian neighbour, and probably no characters are more
antagonistic than those of the Saxon and the Prussian, but under the
iron hand of the military despotism of Berlin, Munich and Dresden
came to heel. As to Austria, bearing in mind all the probable
disputes between its various component parts, so soon as the present
Empire passes away, she feels that safety for her lies only with
association with Prussia, though here again there is no love lost
between the peoples.
Germanic patriotism is aggressive, and there is certainly some
excuse, when we bear in mind that there is a constantly growing
population and there is not very much room still left uninhabited.
Colonial expansion is the special desire of the heart of Germany, and
it is here where she comes into conflict with Great Britain, though
it must never be forgotten that there is nowhere a German feels
happier than in one of our English dominions. Conscious that her
colonising power has proved to be very slight, there have been
moments when she has been anxious to meet Great Britain for the
purpose of securing some dominions beyond the seas in association
with ourselves, and I should not be surprised if, when the question
of peace is before us, she should suggest a bargain whereby it is
made easy for her to expand on other continents, she agreeing to
surrender that which she so far holds by temporary conquest in
Europe. It is when one reads the Old Testament that one can best
understand Germanic patriotism of to-day. Just as the Jews of old
got an inflated idea of the meaning of being the people of God, so is
it with Prussia to-day. She believes herself to be appointed for the
management of much of the world, and she thinks that she can be
allowed to attain this goal by a most uncivilised war. The German
does not love cruelty, but the civilisation of the Prussian is
something which is a thin coating over a rather brutal nature. The
constant mention of Kultur in German writings has in itself almost
proved that it is something only lately put on, and that it fits
badly. The Prussian is easily made coarse. He is learned, he is
what he calls "gemuethlich," which can be described as kindly
disposed. He has an over-elaborated polish which is a clumsy
imitation of French politeness. His table manners are slightly
improving, but the vice of his capital city is disgusting in its
coarseness, and some of the jests he attempts are Rabelaisian, except
that they have no humour. His religion is that of the Old Testament,
and his preachers are powerful to stir him to warfare, but incapable
of instilling into him high principles. His jealousy of England was
not unnatural. With a strenuous determination Germany was working
earnestly for pre-eminence, and we seemed over here to be
comparatively careless and to be lacking in force and in the
deepening of character.
It was in the less useful things in our social life that Germany
imitated us, because in regard to the greater things the Prussian
felt himself to be a more earnest striver than we here were. He was
ready to copy our clothes, some of our sports, certain peculiarities
of our manner, but he could not, and to-day he cannot, understand the
real centre, as it were, of the English disposition. The Crown
Prince is a typical case of a man who anglicises himself in regard to
the excrescences upon our national character, but who cannot by any
possibility, though he had an English grandmother, ever understand
what a Britisher is. He may wear collars and riding breeches which
are copied from productions of a Bond Street hosier or tailor, but he
will still go on looting, and he will still show by his utter want of
nobility of ideal that he is a somewhat decadent specimen of the
lower type of Prussian character.
Although Germany meant war on the Continent, it was not until after
the Agadir incident and the diplomatic defeat inflicted by England
that there was any real dislike of ourselves. After that time there
was undoubtedly a belief that sooner or later there would have to be
war with Great Britain, or a great general settlement which should
prevent the two nations from engaging in strife. Before that time
there were always possibilities of disagreement, but there were also
means by which the difficulties could be reconciled. It seemed good
to bring the various elements in the two nations together. Some
tried to associate the merchants, the legal administrators, the
journalists of the two countries; I myself took some part in bringing
together the clergy and ministers of England and Germany. I suppose
we all felt the possibility of disturbance between our two lands, and
it was when I became practically certain that the efforts we were
making were vain that I became merely a nominal adherent of the
excellent associations which were striving to promote union.
The war came and found Germany ready, united, patriotic, with the
feeling of "Deutschland ueber Alles," running through the whole of
the central Empires and being a very real inspiration. I may take a
very low view of some parts of the German character, but as to the
determination, the thoroughness and the unyielding devotion to what
is believed to be the goal, I cannot but bend my head in the deepest
respect. Let no one believe in the suggested breakdown of Germany.
There must be an absolute crushing of the despotic ideals which
instigated and at the present day carry on the war. The Brandenburg
Gate at Berlin will have to be battered down, or at least the
Niederwald Monument of the victory of 1870 hurled into the Rhine,
before peace will be secured.
Just now the German is a brave, disciplined, determined, brutal foe,
led by a Sovereign who knows that this campaign will either place him
first of all Earth's monarchs, or disgrace him and his country for
all time. He knows also that he must do the work himself, for from
his eldest born nothing stable or wholesome is to be expected.
Germany will offer Britain a bargain before this war is over,
probably disgraceful to us but tempting in its clauses. It might be
summed up, "the land for Germany and the sea for Britain." It is not
surprising that up to the present, neutral nations on the Continent
believe, or profess to believe, in the victory of Germany. All that
they can see is that on the whole success has so far, on the
Continent, rested with the central Powers. Sir Edward Grey was
absolutely right when he said that the Balkan States, and it probably
would be true of Turkey also, would be at the disposal of the Powers
towards which victory seemed to incline. Self-interest has to be,
unfortunately, the motive inspiring petty States. If it be true that
M. Delcassé, the French Foreign Minister, resigned because of his
distrust of Greece, no one need be surprised. Greece is in a very
difficult position, not only because her Queen is a German Princess,
but also because if by any chance Germany were victorious and Greece
had taken up arms against her, the German demands upon that small
country would be such as would mean practical destruction.
Turning now to France, we realise that her impelling force in this
war is a sacred devotion to country. The pathetic mistake made at
the beginning of operations of attempting an incursion into Alsace
sprang out of the longing to give back to the beloved land the
portion which had been torn from her in 1870. To a Frenchman his
earth has a deep meaning, his country has an absolute right to his
life, a right never disputed and which is acknowledged with the
greatest fervour in the hour of gravest danger. There is no doubt
that in the early months of the war the oppression of the last
campaign was upon the people; they could still, some of them,
remember, and all the others had been told of, the terrible
experiences undergone five and forty years ago. When once more
Germany was overrunning the land there was for a little time a belief
in the inevitable victory of the enemy, but very soon France pulled
herself together, and she was enabled to do so because the men
leading her, and she herself, had developed a greatness which did not
show itself in 1870. I look back to the time when I saw French
prisoners spit as they passed their own principal leaders, also in
the hands of the enemy. I remember in one German town how subaltern
prisoners would cross a road in order to avoid saluting men of
superior rank in their own army. I can also call to mind a great
moral degradation on the part of many French officers. How different
it all is to-day. It seems to me as if Joffre were typical of the
new patience which has entered into the French character. At all
times the Frenchman has been the best attacker in the world; to-day
he has learnt the duty of patient warfare. When the French
Commander-in-Chief says that he is nibbling at the Germans, he is
making a statement which would have been impatiently received in the
days gone by, but which is, after all, under present conditions not
only necessary but the most difficult of warlike methods. To-day
France is earnest, whilst in 1870 she was only eager. Her moral
position has also changed. Behind the armies to-day woman is
present, not to minister to passion but to minister to suffering, and
to ennoble in thought.
The salvation of France has been, under God, its motherhood. The
relationship between, not only the boy, but the grown man and his
mother, has remained upon me as the most beautiful thing in the way
of relationship that I have ever known. When I hear that almost
invariably the dying soldier in France, of all ranks, speaks as his
last word upon earth the one that he first spoke--"Maman," I know
that I am being told an absolute truth. It may be that in the past
the French character has suffered through passion, but if woman has
sometimes been an evil influence, assuredly she has oftener certainly
proved herself a blessing to the men of the land.
It is a delight to one who loves France, but who was never quite sure
that she was to be trusted in difficult moments, to feel now that she
has all the stability which will make her carry on to the end this
awful war.
There is another class to which France owes much of her reformation:
the religious, the Clergy and the Sisters. It is a pity that at the
present time, through harsh dealing, she is deprived of the perfect
nursing and caring for, of some of the religious Orders, as one hears
rather painful accounts of the conditions in some of the French War
Hospitals, but she has her clergy, her priests, who fight and pray
and bear no grudge for injustice done to the Church they serve.
Whatever we may feel sometimes about the great Roman Catholic
religion, we know this, at any rate, that the power of its members is
always at its highest in the hour of greatest sacrifice. I have seen
some of its priests ministering, themselves wounded and suffering,
and I have thanked God that there were such examples of Christlike
devotion at this great hour of the world's history. The sacredness
of _la patrie_ for Frenchmen is a beautiful thing to dwell upon. We
are just learning here in England the first lesson of that which is a
finished, perfected knowledge to the meanest of French subjects.
Russia.--Here the atmosphere is different. We are in the presence of
a nation naturally, often superstitiously, religious and somewhat
uneducated. Russia does not make war in a cool and calculating way.
The peasant is ignorant even of the causes of the war. His "little
father" orders and thenceforth the war becomes a Crusade, a Holy War.
The illiterate, religious, patriotic man or woman in Russia knows no
such end to warfare except that which comes from the Czar's command.
When you turn to the mercantile class you are conscious that all of
it which is not German is strongly, almost vehemently anti-Prussian.
The language of commerce to-day is German. French has been left to
the aristocracy. In the shops of Moscow, Petrograd and
Nijni-Novgorod, German is the universal language. It is idle to
dispute the Teutonic influence which exists, but there is also an
intensely antagonistic feeling on the part of those who have
experienced the competition of the German. The aristocracy of Russia
has a loathing of German coarseness and is French in speech and
feeling. All the classes in Russia are simple, the word Kultur does
not impress them. The art, the music and the stage effects of Russia
are very natural, though often most perfectly expressed.
One is tempted to sum up the present Russian position as that of a
simple, religious, almost fatalistic people, ready for all things at
the order of the man who is their civil and spiritual head. But
Russia was not prepared for war last year. Those of us who have seen
in Moscow the drilling of even some of the best known regiments were
conscious that we were not looking at the finished article. The
Cossack is a natural horseman who in some ways has hardly anything to
learn, but the infantry need to be modernised. The Russian will not
turn his back, and his preparedness will grow each day.
Italy.--One or two words only in regard to this country, as to which
I fancy we at home are a little disappointed. Let us not forget that
it was by no means easy for Italy to sever herself from Germany, with
whom she had been allied for a long time. We must not leave out of
account that there had been no close sympathy with France for some
years, nor must the impoverished condition of the country be
forgotten. It needed some courage and some faith to ignore the
continental impression of the power of Germany and to take up arms at
all against her. We must be patient with her, because, though she
may not be "on fire" for this war, yet she is in earnest, and her
love for England is real.
Belgium.--This little land faced the inevitable, the never-dreamt-of,
with an army not intended for international warfare, and which had to
be strengthened by utterly untrained civilians. Her action was
magnificent. She could have had terms, but she scorned them.
Belgium did not love England before this war. One may doubt whether
she even trusted her, but she does now. Still even here there has
always been a pro-German class, well-to-do and influential, which may
be said to have dominated the commerce of Antwerp and other leading
centres. There has also been some sympathy with Germany on the part
of the people living near to the German border, and no doubt the
Belgian nation has suffered through this war from the treachery of
some of its own people. But the tenacity of this little land is
unquestionable, and her King and Queen will go down to posterity as
perhaps the two most knightly characters of this war, two people who
seem more to fit in with the days of the Round Table than with the
age of Zeppelins and Mines.
On turning to our own Empire, we have to confess that the level of
earnestness at the beginning of the war was lower than in the case of
France, Russia, or Belgium, and, indeed, in some ways lower than that
of Germany. We were thrilled for a moment, as it were, by the
knowledge that we were taking up arms because honour demanded that we
should, but the public heart was not greatly stirred. Gradually we
began to realise that we were engaged in a struggle for our own
existence, but even now there are millions in Great Britain who are
not persuaded of this fact. Canada, Australia, New Zealand seem to
have understood, before the Motherland, how serious the war was for
the Empire. It is not for me to declare to Britain her duty; I do
not suggest that I know more of the mind of the nation or of the
needs of the nation than any other Briton. I think that I may have
had greater opportunity of feeling the pulse of other lands than many
people, but all of us here at home can see now what our own duty is,
and that whilst the usual mistakes have been made, there is now an
awakened Empire which dare not in the sight of God refuse any
sacrifice in order to crush for at least the generation that is
coming, the accursed ideals which the military party in Germany
wishes to see dominating the world. Upon this subject the Church
must continue to speak and to act; her words being stronger and her
actions firmer than up to the present they have been. This war is in
my judgment a fight between right and wrong, between God and evil.
Had I my way I would relegate to obscurity for at any rate the whole
period of the war every religious division; I would on this
all-important matter fall gladly into line with all sides of
Christianity in order that men should know that in our judgment the
followers of Jesus cannot understand their Leader without being ready
to give, if needs be, life, to prevent the victory of wickedness.
This is my reasoned judgment, more than ever impressed upon me by my
visit to the Front. If we all face the future with this conviction
pessimism will die, not to be superseded by a stupid, unreflecting
optimism, but by an unremitting devotion, which shall spring out of
that courage which belongs to the man who knows his cause is that of
God, and that he himself can and must do something towards hastening
the triumph which is inevitable if only we are worthy. The religious
England to which I look forward is one which has been taught by the
awakening of the spirit of Christian patriotism, that in life the
beginning and the end of perfection, for nation as well as
individual, is the willing offering of body, mind, and spirit in
order that it shall be easy for humanity to be free and for right to
triumph over evil. May it be our Empire's glory to have the grandest
share in this great offering.
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