There are considerable numbers of Russians who do not love Germany, and who fortunately are not at the helm now, but who would not be unhappy if they were called there. What would they say to their compatriots, they and perhaps other statesmen who at present are not yet avowedly hostile to us? They would say: "With what sacrifices of blood and men and money have we not won the position which for centuries has been the ideal of Russian ambition! We could have maintained it against those opponents who may have a real interest in combating it. It was not Austria, with whom we have lived on moderately intimate terms for some time, it was not England, who possesses openly acknowledged counter-interests to ours--no, it was our intimate friend Germany who drew, behind our back, not her sword but a dagger, although we might have expected from her services in return for services rendered, and although she has _no_ interests in the Orient." Those approximately would be the phrases, and this the theme which we should hear in Russia. This picture which I have drawn in exaggerated lines--but the Russian orators also exaggerate--corresponds with the truth. We, however, shall never assume the responsibility of sacrificing the certain friendship of a great nation, tested through generations, to the momentary temptation of playing the judge in Europe. To jeopardize the friendship which fortunately binds us to most European states and at the present moment to all,--for the parties to whom it is an eyesore are not in power,--to jeopardize, I say, this friendship with one friend in order to oblige another, when we as Germans have no direct interests, and to buy the peace of others at the cost of our own, or, to speak with college boys, to substitute at a duel--such things one may do when one risks only one's own life, but I cannot do them when I have to counsel His Majesty the Emperor as regards the policy of a great State of forty million people in the heart of Europe. From this tribune I therefore take the liberty of saying a very definite "No" to all such imputations and suggestions. I shall under no condition do anything of the kind; and no government, none of those primarily interested, has made any such demands. Germany, as the last speaker remarked, has grown to new responsibilities as it has grown stronger. But even if we are able to throw a large armed force into the scales of European policies, I do not consider anybody justified in advising the emperor and the princes (who would have to discuss the matter in the Bundesrat if we wished to wage an offensive war) to make an appeal to the proven readiness of the nation to offer blood and money for a war. The only war which I am ready to counsel to the emperor is one to protect our independence abroad and our union at home, or to defend those of our interests which are so clear that we are supported, if we insist on them, not only by the unanimous vote of the Bundesrat, which is necessary, but