Being an American citizen it was natural that the ideals of our constitution should be rooted in my nature, and now I could not but bring them into contrast with the ideals of Germanism as demonstrated in this war. I believed these American principles to be Christian principles and the very backbone of them to be at cross purposes with the German goal. Our forefathers ordained and established that constitution in order to establish justice which the German had tried to break down while he established injustice. Our forefathers desired to promote the general welfare and insure the blessings of liberty to themselves and to posterity, while the German machine had existed and had begun this war for the purpose of enslaving people and exploiting them, thus depriving them of liberty. Now one or the other of these viewpoints was right. If America was right, Germany was wrong. Every clod and stone of Belgium declared the guilt of Germany. And I now declare that Germany is wrong! And therefore when she menaces the world in a military sense she must be put down by military means. When one reasons the matter out from the facts he cannot get away from this logic. Germany must be put down by military means! Now, of course, I did not say this to the Germans who were constantly on guard in the towns and cities. I had no military forces at my command. They had the guns. Nevertheless, I was now morally on the side of the Allied nations who were fighting to defend justice, right, and truth. I firmly believe that this eye-opening experience in Belgium under the very noses of the Germans and within their very power was the thing which brought me to a right perspective of life and to be able to clearly see things in their relative and proper values. My viewpoint changed, and I am sure that I can never be the same man again. Nobody can be the same who has been in this war. CHAPTER XXXI A NIGHT IN LOUVAIN In Paris I had met and talked with Arno Dosch Fleuro, an American reporter who had been with Richard Harding Davis at Louvain while it was burning. He had told me that when he was there the party was locked in a railroad car but that they could see the blazing buildings from the car window and hear and see the ungodly things which were taking place in the station square. The German soldiers were heavily intoxicated and were bringing lots of Belgians from all quarters of the city and executing them. One group of soldiers would come in from the street, driving perhaps a dozen or twenty Belgians ahead of them. They would bring them into the station square, hand them over to another detachment which would take them out behind the station, and a volley of bullets would be heard. Then another crowd would be brought in. They too would be taken out behind the depot and then another volley of bullets. One hilarious German jumped up onto a wagon and began haranguing and explaining why it was necessary for these people to be killed.