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Rh what they think of the article of Thomas Mann which appeared in the November number of the Neue Rundschau: "Gedanken im Kriege." But I do know what certain French intellectuals will think of it. Germany could not offer them a more terrible weapon against herself.

In an access of delirious pride and exasperated fanaticism Mann employs his envenomed pen to justify the worst accusations that have been made against Germany. While an Ostwald endeavours to identify the cause of Kultur with that of civilisation, Mann proclaims: "They have nothing in common. The present war is that of Kultur (i.e. of Germany) against civilisation." And pushing this outrageous boast of pride to the point of madness, he defines civilisation as Reason (Vernunft, Aufklärung), Gentleness (Sittigung, Sänftigung), Spirit (Geist, Auflôsung), and Kultur as "a spiritual organisation of the world" which does not exclude "bloody savagery." Kultur is "the sublimation of the demoniacal" (die Sublimierung des Dämonischen). It is "above morality, above reason, and above science." While Ostwald and Haeckel see in militarism merely an arm or instrument of which Kultur makes use to secure victory, Thomas Mann affirms that Kultur and Militarism are brothers—their Rh