Page:The Spirit of the Chinese People.djvu/28

18   Now if we want to help to put an end to this war, we must, all of us, try to put down first the worship of the mob and then the worship of might in the world to-day, which, as I have said, are the cause of this war. We can put down the worship of the mob, only when in our daily life, in everything we say and do, every one of us will think, not of interests, of expediency—of what will pay, but think of that word in Goethe's saying—Right. Confucius says: "The gentleman understands right; the cad understands interests,—what will pay." Further we can only put down the worship of the mob in the world when we have the courage, even if it does not pay to do so, to refuse to join and go in with the crowd—with the mob. Voltaire says: "C'est le malheur des gens honnêtes qu'ils sont des laches. It is the mirfortunemisfortune [sic] of so-called good people that they are cowards." For it is the selfishness and cowardice in all of us, I want to say here, selfishness which makes us think of interests, of expediency, of what will pay, instead of right, and cowardice which makes us afraid to stand up alone against the crowd, against the mob,—it is this selfishness and cowardice in all of us which has given rise and created the mob and the worship of the mob in the world to-day. People say German Militarism is the enemy and danger of the world to-day. But I say it is the selfishness and cowardice in all of us which is the real enemy of the world to-day: selfishness and cowardice in all of us, which, when combined, becomes Commercialism. It is this spirit of