have proved the frailty of their hold on those elementary principles of sobriety and single mind that underlie all sound work in the field of learning. To any one who has the interest of the higher learning at heart, the spectacle of maudlin chauvinism and inflated scurrility unremittingly placed on view by the putative leaders of German science and scholarship can not but be exceedingly disheartening.
It may be argued, and it may be true, of course, that much of this failure of intelligence and spiritual force among Germany's men of learning is of the nature of a transient eclipse of their powers; that with the return of settled conditions there is due to come a return of poise and insight. But when all due argument has been heard, it remains true that the distrust set afoot in the mind of their neighbours, by this highly remarkable exhibition of their personal equation, will long inure to the disability of Germany's men of learning as a force to be counted on in that teamwork that is of the essence of things for the advancement of learning. In effect, Germany, and Germany's associates in this warlike enterprise, will presumably be found bankrupt in this respect on the return of peace, even beyond the other nations.
These others have also not escaped the touch of the angel of decay, but the visible corruption of spiritual and intellectual values does not go the same length among them. Nor have these others suffered so heavy a toll on their prospective scholarly man power. It is all a matter of degree and of differential decline, coupled with a failure of corporate organization and of the usages and channels of communion and co-operation. Chauvinistic self-sufficiency and disesteem of their neighbours have apparently also not gone so deep and far among the
