Above the Battle
into it. God sends men through this hell so that they may learn to love heaven. For the German people this war seems to me to be a punishment and a call to repentance, and most of all for our German Church. I have friends who suffer at the idea of being unable to do anything for the fatherland. Let them stay at home with a calm conscience! All depends on their peaceful work. But let the war enthusiasts come! Perhaps they will learn to keep silent.
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"Why publish these pages?" I shall be asked by some people in France. "What good is it, when once war is let loose, to arouse pity for our adversaries, at the risk of blunting the ardour of the combatants?"—I answer, because it is the truth, and because the truth substantiates our judgment, the judgment of the whole world against the German leaders and their policy. What their armies have done we know; but that they were able to do it containing as they did such elements as those whose confessions we have just heard, incriminates still more deeply their masters. From the depths of the battlefield, these voices of a sacrificed minority rise up as a vengeful condemnation of the oppressors. To the accusations drawn up against predatory Empires and their inhuman pride, in the name of violated right, of outraged humanity by the victim peoples and by the combatants, is added the cry of pain
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