CHAPTER IX.
PEACE AND DEMOCRACY _There is no more unsafe politician than a conscientiously rigid doctrinaire, nothing more sure to end in disaster than a theoretic volume of policy that admits of no pliability for contingencies._--J.R.

LOWELL.
It is often assumed that a change in the form of Government in Germany would completely alter the attitude and conduct of the nation, and secure permanent peace, but that alone would not be sufficient.

It would undoubtedly help; for under a more popular Government it would be easier for a different spirit in the German nation to assert itself.
Democracies, however, have from time to time been aggressive, and have claimed to dominate their neighbours.

A change far deeper than a change in the form of Government is needed.

The claim put forward both by word and deed to impose the German will on others by organised force of any kind must be abandoned utterly, if the world is to be really at peace with Germany and with those whom Germany has been able to compel or to beguile into alliance with her.