We are all, I suppose, unconscious of our own foibles, but I wonder whether we are all so apt as the Germans to deny them (and very likely attribute them to other people) while in the very act of exemplifying them. For example, it is firmly fixed in the German mind that the English consider themselves God's Chosen People, predestined to the empire of the world. I have collected numerous instances of this allegation (Nos. 453-466), but not a single one which is substantiated by a quotation from an English writer. It is, I am convinced, impossible to bring evidence for it, unless some expressions to this effect may be found in the writings of persons who believe that the English are descended from the lost Ten Tribes--persons who are about as representative of the English nation as those who believe that the earth is flat. The English mind, indeed, is but little inclined to this primitive form of theism. The German mind, on the other hand, is curiously addicted to it, and I have brought together a number of instances (Nos. 117-135) in which German writers make the very claim to Divine calling and election which they falsely attribute to the English, and denounce as insanely presumptuous.[3] So, too, with egoism. The Germans do not actually consider themselves free from egoism; on the contrary, they are rather given to boasting of it (Nos. 212, 213, 248, 300); but while it is a virtue in them, it is a very repulsive vice in the English. As for cant, which is, of course, the commonest charge against the English, one can only say that, when the German gives his mind to it, he proves himself an accomplished master of the art (Nos. 47, 55, 79, 89, 94, 104, 237, 423). Here is an example, from a book about Germany by a German-Austrian,[4] which scarcely comes within the scope of my anthology, but it is too characteristic to be lost. "_If you want_," says the writer, in italics, "_thoroughly to understand the German, you must compare the German sportsman with the hunters of other countries_. Then a sacred thrill (_heiliger Schauer_) of deep understanding will come over your heart." For the German sportsman "takes more pleasure in the life that surrounds him and which he _protects_, than in the shot which only the last hot virile craving (_Mannesgier_) wrings from him, and which he fires only when he knows that he will _kill_, _painlessly kill_. For this is the root principle of German sportsmanship: 'God grant me one day such an end as I strive to bestow upon the game.' ... And if, by mischance, the German sportsman wounds without killing a head of game, he suffers with it, and does not sleep or rest till he has put it out of its misery." If this be not very nauseous cant, where shall we seek for it?