hypocrisy, but a psychological necessity, though each nation, of course,
accuses the other of hypocrisy.

We are fighting "to put down militarism and the dominance of a military
class," says the great B.P., and one can only hope that when the war is
over we shall remember and rivet into shape this great and good
purpose--not only with regard to foreign militarism, but also with
regard to our own. Certainly, whatever other or side views we may take
of the war, we are bound to see in it an illustration of the danger of
military class-rule. You cannot keep a 60-h.p. Daimler motor-car in your
shed for years and years and still deny yourself the pleasure of going
out on the public road with it--even though you know you are not a very
competent driver; and you cannot continue for half a century perfecting
your military and naval organization without in the end making the
temptation to become a political road-hog almost irresistible.

Still, accepting for the moment the popular explanation given above of
Germany's action as to some degree justified, we cannot help seeing how
superficial and unsatisfactory it is, because it at once raises the
question, which, indeed, is being asked in all directions, and not
satisfactorily answered: "How does it happen that so peace-loving,
sociable, and friendly a people as the great German mass-folk, as we
have hitherto known them, with their long scientific and literary
tradition, their love of music and philosophy, their lager beer and
tobacco, and their generally democratic habits, should have been led
into a situation like the present, whether by a clique of Junkers or by
a clique of militarist philosophers and politicians?" And the answer to
this is both interesting and important.

It resolves itself into two main causes: (1) the rise of the great