of German culture, expressions which I should think were incredible to any people with a sense of the measure in the language they use.
Our Allies the French, with all their great history behind them have not always been supposed by unfriendly critics to hide their light under a bushel. There was a time when French culture—to use a word which is now in fashion—reigned supreme on the continent of Europe—from the Bay of Biscay to the Ural Mountains—when every small German thought he could do nothing better than imitate to the best of his ability the manners and the work of Versailles. The greatest of Prussian monarchs, while he was winning victories from French troops in the field, looked—and looked solely—to French criticisms and to French art as the measure of any culture he aspired to possess. Had the French in those days talked as the Germans talk now we should have accused them of gross exaggeration. But assuredly they had reason to describe triumphs of French culture in language far stronger than any which sober criticism would now apply to Germany. [Cheers.]
Do not suppose that I now underrate what Germany has done in the past, or that I entertain doubts of what Germany may do in the future for the general progress of the human race. Most gladly do I grant that at least in one art and in many sciences the work of Germany has been epoch-making. But while I make this acknowledgment fully and freely, I must add that nothing in her history justifies that amazing tone of arrogant self-laudation she has adopted for herself, or the equally arrogant contempt which she showers upon less fortunate nations. [Hear, hear.]
