lay down your arms 76

lay down your arms 76

But in my dreams, wonderful to relate, I never knew anything of my loss.

Thus it happened often that I was speaking to Frederick and conversing

with him as during his life. Whole scenes from the past were

represented, but never any sad ones, our meeting again after

Schleswig-Holstein, our jokes over Sylvia’s cradle, our walking tours in

Switzerland, our hours of study over favourite books, and occasionally

that same picture in the evening light, where my white-haired husband

with his garden-shears was pruning the rose-branches, and was saying

with a smile to me: “Are we not a happy old couple?”

 

I have never put off my mourning, not even at my son’s wedding. When any

one has loved, possessed, and lost such a husband, and lost him as I

did, her love “must be stronger than death,” her passion for vengeance

can never cool. But whom does this anger threaten? On whom would I

execute vengeance? The men who did the deed were not in fault. The only

guilty party is the _spirit of war_, and it is on this that my work of

persecution, all too weak as it is, must be exercised.

 

My son Rudolf agrees with my views, though this of course does not

prevent him from going through his military exercises every year, and

could not prevent him, either, from marching to the frontier, if the

European war, which is always hanging over our heads, should break out.

And then, perhaps, I shall have once more to see how all that is dearest

to me in the world has to be sacrificed on the altar of Moloch, how a

hearth blessed with love, and which is the sign to my old age of all its

rest and peace, has to be laid in ruins. Shall I have to see all this

once more, and then once more to fall into irrecoverable madness, or

shall I yet behold the triumph of justice and humanity, which now, at

this very moment, is striving for accomplishment in widely extended

associations and in all strata of society?

 

The red volumes, my diary, contain no further entries. Under the date

February 1, 1871, I marked a great cross, and so closed the history of

my life also. Only the so-called _Protocol_, a blue volume which

Frederick began along with me and in which we described the phases of

the idea of peace, has been since that time enriched with a few notes.

 

In the first years which succeeded the Franco-German war, I had few

opportunities, even apart from my diseased condition of mind, for

marking any tidings of peace. The two most influential nations on the

Continent were revelling in thoughts of war; the one proudly looking

back on the victories she had gained, the other longingly expecting her

impending revenge. The current of these feelings gradually began to

subside. On this side of the Rhine the statues of Germania were a little

less shouted over, and on that side those of Strasbourg decked with

fewer mourning-wreaths. Then, after ten years, the voice of the servants

of peace might again be heard. It was Bluntschli, the great professor of

international law, the same with whom my lost one had put himself in

communication, who set to work to obtain the views of various

dignitaries and Governments on the subject of national peace. And then

the silent “thinker-out of battles” let fall the well-known __EXPRESSION__:

“Everlasting peace is a dream, and not a pretty dream either”.

 

“Oh, of course,” I wrote at the time in my blue book, beside Moltke’s

words, “if Luther had asked the Pope what he thought of the revolt from

Rome, the answer he would have received would not have been very

favourable to the Reformation.” To-day there is hardly any one left who

has not dreamed this dream, or who would not confess its beauty. And

there are watchers too; watchers conspicuous enough, who are longing to

awake mankind out of the long sleep of savagery, and energetically and

with a single eye to their object collecting themselves for the purpose

of planting the white flag. Their battle-cry is, “War on War,” their

watchword, the only word which can have power to deliver from ruin

Europe armed against herself is, “Lay down your arms”. In all places, in

England and France, in Italy, in the northern countries, in Germany, in

Switzerland, in America, associations have been formed, whose object is,

through the compulsion of public opinion, through the commanding

pressure of the people’s will, to move the Governments to submit their

differences in future to an Arbitration Court, appointed by themselves,

and so once for all to enthrone justice in place of brute force. That

this is no dream, no “enthusiasm,” is proved by the facts that the

questions of the Alabama, the Caroline Islands, and several others have

already been settled in this manner. And it is not only people without

power or position, like the poor blacksmith of a former time, who are

now co-operating in this work of peace; no, members of parliament,

bishops, professors, senators, ministers are inscribed on the lists. I

know all this (which is unknown to most people), because I have kept in

communication with all those persons, with whom Frederick established

relations in the pursuit of his noble aim. What I found out, by means of

these persons, about the successes and the designs of the peace

societies has been duly entered in _The Protocol of Peace_. The last of

these entries is the following letter which the president of the

International Arbitration and Peace Association, having its headquarters

in London, wrote me in answer to an inquiry bearing on this subject:--

 

“INTERNATIONAL ARBITRATION AND PEACE ASSOCIATION,

“LONDON, 41 OUTER TEMPLE, _July, 1889_.

 

“Madam,--You have honoured me by inquiring as to the actual

position of the great question to which you have devoted your life.

Here is my answer: At no time, perhaps, in the history of the world

has the cause of peace and good-will been more hopeful. It seems

that, at last, the long night of death and destruction will pass

away; and we who are on the mountain-top of humanity think that we

see the first streaks of the dawn of the kingdom of Heaven upon

earth. It may seem strange that we should say this at a moment when

the world has never seen so many armed men and such frightful

engines of destruction ready for their accursed work; but when

things are at their worst they begin to mend. Indeed, the very ruin

which these armies are bringing in their train produces universal

consternation; and soon the oppressed peoples must rise and with

one voice say to their rulers: ‘Save us, and save our children from

the famine which awaits us, if these things continue; save

civilisation and all the triumphs which the efforts of wise and

great men have accomplished in its name; save the world from a

return to barbarism, rapine and terror!’

 

“‘What indications,’ do you ask, ‘are there of such a dawn of a

better day?’ Well, let me ask in reply, is not the recent meeting

at Paris of the representatives of one hundred societies for the

declaration of international concord, for the substitution of a

state of law and justice for that of force and wrong, an event

unparalleled in history? Have we not seen men of many nations

assembled on this occasion and elaborating, with enthusiasm and

unanimity, practical schemes for this great end? Have we not seen,

for the first time in history, a Congress of Representatives of the

parliaments of free nations declaring in favour of treaties being

signed by all civilised states, whereby they shall bind themselves

to defer their differences to the arbitrament of equity, pronounced

by an authorised tribunal instead of a resort to wholesale murder?

 

“Moreover, these representatives have pledged themselves to meet

every year in some city of Europe, in order to consider every case

of misunderstanding or conflict, and to exercise their influence

upon Governments in the cause of just and pacific settlements.

Surely, the most hopeless pessimist must admit that these are signs

of a future when war shall be regarded as the most foolish and most

criminal blot upon man’s record?

 

“Dear madam, accept the __EXPRESSION__ of my profound esteem.

 

“Yours truly,

 

“HODGSON PRATT.”

 

 

 

There is also to be found in the blue book the manifesto of a prince,

dated March, 1888, a manifesto from which at last, breaking with old

usage, instead of a warlike a peaceful spirit shines forth. But the

noble one, who left these words to his people, the dying one, who with

the last effort of his strength grasped the sceptre which he would have

swayed as if it had been a palm branch, remained helplessly chained to

his bed of pain, and after a short interval all was over.

 

* * * * *

 

“Mother, will you not put your mourning off for the day after

to-morrow?”

 

Rudolf came into my room with these words to-day. For the christening of

his first-born son is fixed for the day after to-morrow.

 

“No, my dear,” I replied.

 

“But think; at such a festival you surely will not be mournful. Why then

keep the outer signs of mourning?”

 

“And you will not be superstitious, and fear that the black dress of the

grandmother will bring bad luck to the child?”

 

“Oh no; but it does not harmonise with the surrounding gaiety. Have you

then sworn an oath?”

 

“No; it is only a firm resolution. But a resolution linked to such a

memory--you know my meaning--that it partakes of the inviolability of an

oath.”

 

My son bowed his head, and did not urge me further.

 

“I have interrupted you in what you were about--you were writing?”

 

“Yes--my autobiography. God be praised, it is at an end. That was the

last chapter.”

 

“But how can you bring your history to an end? For you are still alive,

and will live many years yet--many happy years--amongst us, mother.

Surely with the birth of my little Frederick, whom I will bring up to

adore his grandmamma, a new chapter must be opening for you.”

 

“You are a good child, dear Rudolf. I should be unthankful if I did not

take pride and joy in you; and just as much joy does my--and