Page:Diplomacy and the War (Andrassy 1921).djvu/301

 The revolution, however, through which we had to live was not created by a similar necessity, but by an external political catastrophe. The power was not taken from the hands of the old section because the new section wanted to wield power according to a proven method. The new section was not in a position to demand exclusive power by virtue of their own services and by virtue of their own merits. They gained the power of government only in consequence of the momentary weakness and the momentary reversal of the old section. What will happen to a State which is made the prey of systems that have never been tried, and what will happen to a State when the power of government falls into hands which are not fitted for it, and is surrendered to elements who owe their triumph not to their own power but to the eternal changeability of the mood of the great events of the world?

The answer to this question would lead me beyond my real aim, because I had no part in politics in the post-revolutionary era. First of all I went into the country, and when I noticed that I could not even express my convictions in the press, and was condemned to complete inaction at home, I travelled to Switzerland (February, 1919) and attempted to work in the interests of the nation there. There I did everything that was humanly possible in order to fight for the rights of the nation and in order to secure the minimum of the conditions necessary to the existence of the Hungarian State. My labours were vain. It is no longer worth while to talk about them.