In September, 1914, Winston Churchill said: "We want this war to remodel the map of Europe according to the principle of nationalities, and the real wish of the people living in the contested territories. After so much bloodshed we wish for a peace which will free races, and restore the integrity of nations.... Let us have done with the armaments, the fear of strain, intrigues, and the perpetual threat of the horrible present crisis. Let us make the regulation of European conflicts just and natural." The French republic, of one mind with the Allies, proclaimed through its authorized representatives that this war is a war of deliverance. "France," said Mr. Stephen Pichon, Foreign Minister, "will not lay down arms before having shattered Prussian militarism, so as to be able to rebuild on a basis of justice a regenerated Europe." And Mr. Paul Deschanel, the President of the Chamber, continued: "The French are not only defending their soil, their homes, the tombs of their ancestors, their sacred memories, their ideal works of art and faith and all the graceful, just, and beautiful things their genius has lavished forth: they are defending, too, the respect of treaties, the independence of Europe, and human freedom. We want to know if all the effort of conscience during centuries will lead to its slavery, if millions of men are to be taken, given up, herded at the other side of a frontier and condemned to fight for their conquerors and masters against their country, their families, and their brothers.... The world wishes to live at last, Europe to breathe, and the nations mean to dispose freely of themselves."
These engagements will be kept. But they will have been kept only when Alsace-Lorraine--the Belgium of 1871, as Rabbi Stephen Wise has called it--has been returned to France. Then, and only then, will there be real peace. Then, and only then, will the "Testament" of Paul Derouléde have been executed:
When our war victorious is o'er, And our country has won back its rank, Then with the evils war brings in its train Will disappear the hatred the conqueror trails.
Then our great France, full of love without spite Sowing fresh springing-corn 'neath her new-born laurels, Will welcome Work, father of Fortune, And sing Peace, mother of lengthy deeds.