Page:French Calvinism, German Lutheranism and the War.pdf/14

- 13 - to the King of Hanover. The Hanoverian professors did not submit, because Hanover was not Prussia.

In our own days the Chaplain of His Imperial Majesty, Pastor Stoecker, the most influential preacher of Berlin, fell out of favour simply because he dared to preach a form of Christian Socialism which the Kaiser did not approve of. From the moment Stoecker was excommunicated by Willian II, he lost all influence with the people.

In this subservience of the Lutheran Church to the Prussian State you find the explanation of what would otherwise appear absolutely unexplainable namely that servile docility which has characterised the German universities and the German churches, throughout the war. In Great Britain and America there have been pacifists and conscientious objectors ready to suffer for their convictions. But not one single Pastor or Professor within the German Empire has dared to rise and to denounce the crimes of Prussian militarism.

In this connection how different has been the history of German Lutheranism on the one hand and of French Calvinism and Roman Catholicism on the