Page:The Slavs among the nations by T G Masaryk.djvu/32

 admirable soldiers. But for centuries they have only fought when obliged to do so, and solely in self-defence. There is a great difference, both psychological and moral, between aggressive violence and the will to defend one’s rights. This War furnishes us with a striking and conclusive example. The English see themselves forced to accept militarism for the time being in spite of their strongly pronounced aversion for such a system. The Slavs, under the pressure of their enemies—Germans, Magyars, and Turks—have felt reawaken in them the old military virtues of their ancestors.

In my opinion, we are led to the following conclusion: If we analyse the general manifestations of the Slav soul, we do not find the aggressive domineering character that those who raise the cry of Panslavism are obliged to represent as so disquieting and dangerous in us.

V.—This tendency of the Slav nations to draw closer together—a tendency which our adversaries denounce as a Panslavic peril that threatens Europe—is then, in fact, nothing but an effort to bring about a conscious synthesis of the best elements of the culture of Western