Thus, while the German Emperor and the German folk have the same aims as the English King and the English people, the common weal and the fair fame of their respective countries, the two monarchs and the two peoples have agreed on almost contrary ways of trying to secure them.

The political system of Germany has had to be sketched introductorily as for the Englishman, a necessary preliminary to an understanding of the German Emperor’s character and policy.  One of the most important results of the character and policy is the state of Anglo-German relations; and the writer is convinced that if the character and policy were better and more generally known there would be no estrangement between the two countries, but, much more probably, mutual respect and mutual good-will.

With the growth of this knowledge, the writer is tempted to believe, would cease a delusion that appears to exist in the minds, or rather the imaginations, of two great peoples, the delusion that the highest national interests of both are fundamentally irreconcilable, and that the policies of their Governments are fundamentally opposed.

It seems indeed as though neither in England nor in Germany has the least attention been paid to the astonishing growth of commerce between the countries or to the repeated declarations made through a long series of years by the respective Governments on their countries’ behalf.  The growth in commerce needs no statistics to prove it, for it is a matter of everyday observation and comment.  The English Government declares it a vital necessity for an insular Power like Great Britain, with colonies and duties appertaining to their possession in all, and the most distant, parts of the world, to have a navy twice as powerful as that of any other possibly hostile Power.  The ordinary German immediately cries out that England is planning to attack him, to annihilate his fleet, destroy his commerce, and diminish his prestige among the nations.  The German Government repeatedly declares that the German fleet is intended for defence not aggression, that Germany does not aim at the seizure of other people’s property, but at protecting her growing commerce, at standing by her subjects in all parts of the world if subjected to injury or insult, and at increasing her prestige, and with it her power for good, in the family of nations.  The ordinary Englishman immediately cries out that Germany is seeking to dispute his maritime supremacy, to rob him of his colonies, and to appropriate his trade.  Is it not conceivable that both Governments are telling the truth, and that their designs are no more and no less than the Governments represent them to be?  The necessity for Great Britain possessing an all-powerful fleet that will keep her in touch with her colonies if she is not to lose them altogether, is self-evident, and understood by even the most Chauvinistic German.  The necessity for Germany’s possessing a fleet strong enough to make her rights respected