Public opinion in the United States should firmly seek to impress upon the warring nations the conviction that nothing can secure a lasting peace except assurance of conditions under which not mighty armies and tremendous navies are held to be the factors through which trade expansion and the conquest of the markets of the world are to be obtained, but that this can be accomplished better and more lastingly through rigid adherence to the qualities and methods which generally make for success in commercial or any other peaceful competition--fairness, thorough efficiency, and hard work. The concentrated power of the American press and people would be tremendous. I am sure that, in this instance, it is possible to concentrate it for righteousness and the future good of all humanity. Prof. Mather on Mr. Schiff Professor of Art at Princeton University; editorial writer for The New York Evening Post and Assistant Editor of The Nation, 1901-06. _To the Editor of The New York Times:_ It seems to me that the Belgian previous question ought to be moved with all candid pro-Germans. Mr. Schiff is plainly candid, so I have framed an open letter to elicit his opinion: [_An Open Letter to Jacob H. Schiff._] Mr. Jacob H. Schiff, New York. My Dear Sir: The universal esteem which you enjoy in the country of your adoption lends great weight to any utterance of yours on public matters. Your interview on the war in THE TIMES of Nov. 22 will everywhere have influence for its gravity and fineness of feeling. It is with compunction that I call your attention to the fact that your statement is ambiguous on precisely those issues of the conflict which your fellow-citizens have nearest at heart. Your general position may be described as a desire for prompt peace and restoration of the former balance of power. More specifically you wish "Germany to be victorious, but not too victorious." If this be merely an instinctive expression of the residual German in you, an expression made with no practical implications of any sort, no American will do otherwise than respect such a sentiment. But if you deliberately desire a moderate victory for Germany, with all that such moderate victory practically implies, it behooves your fellow-citizens to judge your views in the light of what these really call for. An ever so slightly victorious Germany would presumably retain Belgium, in whole or in part. Does such a conquest have your moral assent? Or suppose the rather improbable event of a Germany driven out of Belgium, but otherwise slightly victorious. In such case not a pfennig of indemnity would come to Belgium. Do you believe that no indemnity is morally due Belgium?