There are certain complicated circumstances in
which the manifestation of a sense of honour or loyalty becomes a
weakness: at all costs one should avoid being led into it.
The Emperor of Germany possesses a special talent for adding new
complications to a difficult situation, so as to render it impossible of
solution. He has now so completely tangled up the parliamentary skein,
that in a little while it will be impossible for Parliament to govern.
Can one conceive of a majority of the Chamber rallying around the
Catholic centre, or the socialists, for the same reason, increasing in
number at the bye-elections? In such a case William II, equally unable
to surrender in favour of the clericals or to submit to the socialists,
will find himself, as others have been before him, driven to adopt the
ultimate remedy of war.
February 12, 1892. [19]
If the States of Germany, in joining themselves on to Prussia, have
thereby increased in power, they have gained very little in humanity.
The circular, secretly issued by Prince George of Saxony, commanding the
12th Army Corps, reveals something of the brutalities and exquisite
torture which German soldiers have to suffer. This circular was
addressed to the commanders of regiments, and has been published by a
socialist newspaper, the _Vorwaerts_. This Prince of Saxony is indignant
at these things, doubtless because he is a Saxon; Bavaria, we are told,
declines to accept the application of the Prussian Military Code.
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