What will this new world that is arisen from the destruction of empires and from the ashes of tyrannical institutions be like? In what way will it be better and more satisfying than the one that existed previous to the war? What are the benefits that will flow from the sacrifices that have been made? What are the rewards that will follow the labor and effort expended to win the war? What are the mercies that will be vouchsafed us for our deeds of commission and of omission? How shall things be ordered that man, mere man, without other possession than intelligence, without other aspiration than to be permitted to display his dominant instincts,--love and constructiveness,--without other ambition than to enjoy life and make others enjoy it, may be worthy of his mission and deserving of its reward? These are the questions that are occupying the mind of every thinking person in the whole world to-day. Before any one of them can be answered the fate of the former Central Empires must be settled, because the Allies must know with whom they are dealing and how much they are deserving of confidence and trust, and how much they can be relied upon to carry out the terms of any agreement. We may be absolutely certain that recent advantageous treaties will be abrogated and that territories appropriated in the last half-century will be restored. That which we cannot feel reasonable assurance of is what form of government the former Central Empires will have, or whether that which they bring forth will not be, in reality, a resurrected Trojan horse, the Teuton's contribution to political camouflage. The spokesmen of these newly formed governments say they will be democracies. But who are the spokesmen? Are they not of them who until yesterday were fighting for the preservation of the country and government which had been selected by God and by themselves to thrust "Kultur" upon the world, and which had been wantonly attacked by its neighbors on the north, the south, the east, and the west? Did they admit until that fateful yesterday that their government was not perfect, or at least possessed of only such trifling imperfections that they, the Socialists of one kind or another, could readily remove them? Nothing has transpired in Germany since the abdication of the Kaiser, so far as we have been informed, that permits us to say with anything like assurance what form of government Germany hopes to have. All that we really know is that the government has fallen into the hands of the German Socialists, the deeply dyed-in-the-wool Socialists and the Socialistic Democrats. So far as one can predicate judgment on the reported sayings of the spokesmen of either of these two parties, the purpose of the present government is to save as much as it can of the previous régime and to continue it, minus the Kaiser and the war lords.