Page:Addresses to the German nation.djvu/256

 conquered people may blend with us; we can at any rate make use of their fists to overcome the opponent we have to rob, and every man is welcome to us as an addition to our fighting strength. Now, suppose that some wise man, who wished for peace and quiet, had had his eyes opened to this state of affairs; from what source could he expect quiet to come? Obviously not from the limitation set by nature to human greed, viz., that superfluity is of no benefit to anyone; for there was a prey which tempted everyone. Just as little could he expect peace to come from the will to set a limit to one’s self; for, where everyone grabs for himself everything that he can, anyone who limits himself must of necessity go under. No one wants to share with another what he then owns himself; everyone wants to rob the other of what he has, if he possibly can. If one of them is quiet, it is only because he does not think himself strong enough to begin a quarrel; he will certainly begin it as soon as he perceives the necessary strength in himself.

Hence, the only means of maintaining peace is this: that no one shall acquire enough power to be able to disturb the peace, and that each one shall know that there is just as much strength to resist on the other side as there is to attack on his side; and that thus there may arise a balance and counterbalance of the total power whereby alone, now that all other means have vanished, each one is kept in possession of what he has at present and all are kept in peace. This well-known system of a balance of power in Europe, therefore, assumes two things: first, a prey to which no one at all has any right, but for which all have a like desire; and second, the universal, ever-present, and unceasingly active lust for booty. Indeed, on these assumptions, this balance of power would be the only means of maintaining peace,