For this reason the German Government was right, in my judgment, to accept the Ultimatum unqualified, even though it still included demands impossible of fulfilment. For good or ill Germany had signed the Treaty. The new scheme added nothing to the Treaty’s burdens, and, although a reasonable permanent settlement was left where it was before,—in the future,—in some respects it abated them. Its ratification, in May 1921, was in conformity with the Treaty, and merely carried into effect what Germany had had reason to anticipate for two years past. It did not call on her to do immediately—that is to say, in the course of the next six months—anything incapable of performance. It wiped out the impossible liability under which she lay of paying forthwith a balance of $3,000,000,000 due under the Treaty on May 1. And, above all, it obviated the occupation of the Ruhr and preserved the peace of Europe. There were those in Germany who held that it must be wrong that Germany should under threats profess insincerely what she could not perform. But the submissive acceptance by Germany of a lawful notice under a Treaty she had already signed committed her to no such profession, and involved no recantation of her recent communication through the President of the United States as to what would eventually prove in her sincere belief to be the limits of practicable performance. In the existence of such sentiments, however, Germany’s chief difficulty lay. It has not been understood in England or in America how deep a wound has been inflicted on Germany’s self–respect by compelling her, not merely to perform acts, but to subscribe to beliefs which she did not in fact accept. It is not usual in civilized countries to use force to compel wrongdoers to confess, even when we are convinced of their guilt; it is still more barbarous to use force, after the fashion of inquisitors, to compel adherence to an article of belief because we ourselves believe it. Yet towards Germany the Allies had appeared to adopt this base and injurious practice, and had enforced on this people at the point of the bayonet the final humiliation of reciting, through the mouths of their representatives, what they believed to be untrue. But in the Second Ultimatum of London the Allies were no longer in this fanatical mood, and no such requirement was intended. I hoped, therefore, at the time that Germany would accept the notification of the Allies and do her best to obey it, trusting that the whole world is not unreasonable and unjust, whatever the newspapers may say; that Time is a healer and an illuminator; and that we had still to wait a little before Europe and the United States could accomplish in wisdom and mercy the economic settlement of the war. EXCURSUS I COAL