grave to be easily made use of by a military class for its own ends, or by an armaments ring or a clique of financiers for theirs. Indeed, it would be interesting to know what enormous profits Kruppism (to use H.G. Wells' expressive term) _has_ already made out of this world-madness. Nor can it be denied that the commercial interest in England, if not deliberately intending to provoke war with Germany, has not been at all sorry to seize this opportunity of laying a rival Power low--if only in order to snatch the said rival's trade. That, indeed, the daily Press reveals only too clearly. From all this the danger of class-domination emerges more and more into relief. In Prussia the old Feudal caste remains--in a decadent state, certainly, but perhaps for that very reason more arrogant, more vulgar, and less conscious of any _noblesse oblige_ than even before. By itself, however, and if unsupported by the commercial class, it would probably have done little harm. In Britain the Feudal caste has ceased to be exclusively military, and has become blended with the commercial class. The British aristocracy now consists largely or chiefly of retired grocers and brewers. Commercialism here has become more confessedly dominant than in Germany, and whereas there the commercial class may _support_ the military in its ambitions, here the commercial class _uses_ the military as a matter of course and for its own ends. We have become a Nation of Shopkeepers having our own revolvers and machine-guns behind the counter. And yet not really a Nation of Shopkeepers, but rather a nation ruled by a shopkeeping _class_. [This is the point in the text referred to by Footnote 25 below]