Dr. BOttiger's article is an interesting illustration of the methods
and standards of Nazi journalism. He begins by confusing my father with Sir " Eric " Crowe, an error which could not have been committed by any educated German correspondent prior to 1933. He goes on to misquote my actual words. He represents me as having said that the conclusion of the Polish Agreement has reduced the German people to " a state of nervous prostration." I said nothing of the sort. What I did say was that five years of Dr. Goebbels' hysteria had created in the German people a mood of " nerve-stricken apathy." If Dr. Bottiger can honestly translate " apathy " into Niedergeschlagenheit, then either he does not know English or he did not read Hansard. The rest of his article consisted of frivolous personal abuse. It was not an agreeable article. Supposing, however, that Dr. Bottiger is right, and that the decent-minded German has not only been bullied into silence, but is actually tending to die out? Supposing that the rectitude, the scholarship and the Gemiitlichkeit, which we all admired so much both before and after the War, have really been replaced by the Spartan crudities of Baldur von Schirach? Supposing that the old honesty and love of learning have in fact been ousted by " National Honour " and the cult of ignorance? Then in truth a great nation has been led by political incapacity to destroy its own spiritual value.
Previous page
