Maintaining peace in his own land is not
sufficient from one whose invitation to other leading civilized
nations to combine and establish arbitration of all international
disputes would be gladly responded to. Whether he is to pass into
history as only the preserver of internal peace at home or is to
rise to his appointed mission as the Apostle of Peace among leading
civilized nations, the future has still to reveal.
The year before last (1912) I stood before him in the grand palace in
Berlin and presented the American address of congratulation upon his
peaceful reign of twenty-five years, his hand unstained by human
blood. As I approached to hand to him the casket containing the
address, he recognized me and with outstretched arms, exclaimed:
"Carnegie, twenty-five years of peace, and we hope for many more."
I could not help responding:
"And in this noblest of all missions you are our chief ally."
He had hitherto sat silent and motionless, taking the successive
addresses from one officer and handing them to another to be placed
upon the table. The chief subject under discussion had been World
Peace, which he could have, and in my opinion, would have secured, had
he not been surrounded by the military caste which inevitably gathers
about one born to the throne--a caste which usually becomes as
permanent as the potentate himself, and which has so far in Germany
proved its power of control whenever the war issue has been presented.
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