politics. You and I, General, are used to a standard of conduct between
responsible nations as high as that taken for granted between
responsible persons. But, if one considers, that was far from the case a
hundred years ago. It was in 1914, that von Bethmann-Hollweg spoke of "a
scrap of paper."

_American_. Ah--Germans!

_Englishman_. Certainly one does not expect honor or sincerity from
German psychology. Even the little Teutonic Republic of to-day is
tricky, scheming always to get a foothold for power, a beginning for the
army they will never again be allowed to have. Even after the Kaiser and
the Crown Prince and the other rascals were punished they tried to cheat
us, if you remember. Yet it is not that which I had in mind. The point I
was making was that today it would be out of drawing for a government
even of charlatans, like the Prussians, to advance the sort of claims
which they did. In commonplace words, it was expected then that
governments, as against each other, would be self-seeking. To-day
decency demands that they should be, as men must be, unselfish.

_America_. (_Musingly_.) It's odd how long it took the
world--governments--human beings--to find the truth of the very old
phrase that "he who findeth his life must lose it."

_Englishman_. The simple fact of that phrase before the Great War was
not commonly grasped. People thought it purely religious and reserved
for saints and church services. As a working hypothesis it was not
generally known. The every-day ideals of our generation, the friendships
and brotherhoods of nations as we know them would have been thought
Utopian.