A varied menu spread before The hungry Kaiser and his son, From which the royal epicure With other courses chose this one-- Paris to follow when ’twas done.
A dainty dish the waiter thought To set before a king, or clown; Yet though they gulped and chewed and fought Not sire nor son could get it down-- This little, sturdy, ancient town.
And, what is more, their appetites, That yesterday were sharp and keen, This wretched dish of Verdun blights: Its toughness they had not foreseen; The cooking’s bad, the inn unclean.
“My son, I think we’ll try elsewhere.” “Right O! dear father, so we will. I’m spoiling for a change of air. Don’t let this trifle make you ill: Our cannon fodder pay the bill!”
The magnificent imagery of Isaiah is alone adequate to interpret the artist’s picture. The German Kaiser is at the entrance to hell, on the gloomy portals of which is written the motto: “Abandon hope all ye who enter here.” The devil, with a Mephistophelian irony, tells his captive: “You need not storm this place.” Hell is only too ready to house the great malefactors who have sinned against light and are doomed to torment.
It is inevitable to recall the great oracles of Isaiah on the King of Babylon--that enemy of his race who had enslaved the Jewish people, persecuted God’s elect and led them into captivity. “Hell from beneath is moved for thee to meet thee at thy coming; it stirreth up the dead for thee, even all the chief ones of the earth; it hath raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. All they shall speak and say unto thee, Art thou also become weak as we? Art thou become like unto us?... How art thou fallen from Heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cast down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!”
But the King of Babylon was received with greater ceremony than falls to the lot of the German Kaiser. To welcome the former the old kings rise from their thrones. Wilhelm is led by the devil alone, and no pomp or circumstance of war surrounds him. His sin is as the sin of those who have believed in their transcendent power and are the victims of megalomania. He, too, said in his heart: “I will ascend into Heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will be like the Most High.” Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.