She seeks it, even as we do, and discovers it no more readily.  She seems to know no more than we whither she is going nor whither she is being led by that which leads all things.  We must not listen to her without enquiry; and we need not distress ourselves or despair because we are not of her opinion.  We are not dealing with an infallible and unchangeable wisdom, to oppose which in our thoughts would be madness.  We are actually proving to her that it is she who is in the wrong; that man’s reason for existence is loftier than that which she provisionally assigned to him; that he is already outstripping all that she foresaw; and that she does wrong to delay his advance.  She is, for that matter, full of goodwill, is able on occasion to recognize her mistakes and to obviate their disastrous results and by no means takes refuge in majestic and inflexible self-conceit.  If we are able to persevere, we shall be able to convince her.  This will take much time, for, I repeat, she is slow, though in no wise obstinate.  It will take much time because a very long future is in question, a very great change and the most important victory that man has ever hoped to win.

* * * * *

FOR POLAND

XXI

FOR POLAND

1

The Allies have entered into a solemn compact that none of them will conclude a separate peace.  They undertook recently, by an equally irrevocable convention, that they would not lay down their arms until Belgium was delivered.  These two acts, one of prudence, the other of elementary justice, appear at first sight superfluous.  Yet they were necessary.  It is well that nations, even more than men, because their conscience is less stable, should secure themselves against the mistakes and weakness and ingratitude which too often accompany strife and which even more often follow victory.  To-morrow they will do for Servia what they have done in the case of Belgium; but there is a third victim, of whom too little is said, who has the same rights as the other two; and to forget her would forever attaint the honour and the justice of those who took up arms only in the name of justice and honour.

2

I need not recall the fate of Poland.  It is in certain respects more tragic and more pitiful than that of Belgium or of Servia.  She had not even the opportunity to choose between dishonour and annihilation.

Three successive acts of injustice, which were, until to-day, the most shameful recorded by history, deprived her of the glory of that heroic choice which she would have made in the same spirit, for she had already thrice made it in the past, a choice which this day sustains and consoles her two martyred sisters in their profoundest tribulations.  It would be too unjust if an ancient injustice, which even yet weighs upon the memory and the conscience of Europe, should become the sole reason of yet a last iniquity, which this time would be inexpiable.