The questions that seem to have agitated the American public mostly in connection with this awful conflict have been: _First_--Who is to blame for bringing about this war, and, _Second_--Assuming that Germany was not to blame for beginning the war, is she to blame for violating the neutrality of Belgium? If we should find the fault regarding the first question to lie primarily with England and secondarily with Russia, we should at once clear the German people and their Government from the charge that has heretofore been brought against them for having incited the war. And if we should find that the neutrality of Belgium was not binding upon any country whose existence or whose interests were threatened by other countries, that fact would then absolve either country from a charge which thus far seems to have been brought against one of them. _How was the war brought about?_ As far back as 1906 it is known, and can be proved by the files of New York papers, to say nothing of official correspondence now found in Brussels and elsewhere, that measures were started by England to circumscribe or isolate the German Empire, and treaties were entered between England, France, and Russia (the Triple Entente) to insure joint action against Germany when necessary. Germany herself has been peaceful, progressive, and anxious to retain her position as a nation undisturbed by others, as a nation that should advance in art, in science, in population, and in all things that make happiness through peace. What was the situation in other countries? Since 1870 _France_ had cried for revenge (_revanche_). Its school books, newspapers, public speakers, and political leaders were all charged with the one great idea of seeking revenge against Germany for having retaken Alsace and Lorraine in 1870, which France had wrongfully occupied since the time of Louis XIV. Alsace and Lorraine had been German for centuries before; they were wrested from Germany without even a semblance of an excuse at the close of the seventeenth century, and were largely German in language and in spirit in 1870. Goethe's studies in Strassburg and his visits to Frederica von Sesenheim in the eighteenth century show that he was living in a German country whenever he was in Alsace. A _united_ Germany did not exist prior to 1870. However, the cry for revenge was there, and France distinctly declared it to be her policy to take her revenge as soon as opportunity offered. France was, therefore, a pronounced enemy of Germany ever since 1870, and when asked by the German Government on July 31, 1914, whether she would remain neutral in a Russian-German war (Annex 25, German "White Paper") she answered: "France would do that which might be required of her _by her interests_." This answer was given on Aug. 1, 1914, (Annex 27, German "White Paper.") Today we may well ask France whether, since Aug. 1, 1914, she has done that which was required by her interests.