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MILITARISM

infamous outrage, capitalism remains true to its faith unto death, its faith in the golden calf.

To be sure, that shifting of the military burdens on to the shoulders of the poorer classes diminishes the possibility of exploiting those classes. That can not be explained away, and that likewise contributes to the annoyance of capitalism, ever intent on exploitation, at Moloch.

Militarism rests like a leaden weight on our whole life. It is particularly, however, a leaden weight for our economic life, a nightmare under which our economic life is groaning, a vampire sucking its blood, because it withdraws the best energies of the people from production and the works of civilization continually, year after year (In Germany there are at the moment of writing 655,000 of the strongest and most productive men, mostly between the ages of 20 and 22, permanently in the army and navy), and also because of its insane direct costs. In Germany the military and naval budget, which is increasing by leaps, amounted in the year 1906–07 (inclusive of the colonial budget, but exclusive of the supplemen-