But what the rulers of Germany have envied us most was power and wealth—the power derived from command of the seas and the straits, the wealth derived from a century of industrial supremacy. In both these respects they feel that their deserts are higher than ours. They have devoted far more thought and skill to military and industrial organization. Their average of intelligence and knowledge is far superior; their capacity for pursuing an attainable end, unitedly and with forethought, is infinitely greater. Yet we, merely (as they think) because we had a start in the race, have achieved a vastly larger Empire than they have, and an enormously greater control of capital. All this is unbearable; yet nothing but a great war can alter it. Besides all these feelings, there is in many Germans, especially in those who know us best, a hot hatred of us on account of our pride. Farinata degli Uberti surveyed Hell “_come avesse lo Inferno in gran dispitto_.” Just so, by German accounts, English officer prisoners look round them among their captors—holding aloof, as though the enemy were noxious, unclean creatures, toads or slugs or centipedes, which a man does not touch willingly, and shakes off with loathing if he is forced to touch them for a moment. It is easy to imagine how the devils hated Farinata, and inflicted greater pains upon him than upon his neighbors, hoping to win recognition by some slight wincing on his part, driven to frenzy by his continuing to behave as if they did not exist. In just the same way the Germans are maddened by our spiritual immobility. At bottom we have regarded the Germans as one regards flies on a hot day: they are a nuisance, one has to brush them off, but it would not occur to one to be turned aside by them. Now that the initial certainty of victory has faded, we begin to be affected inwardly by the Germans. In time, if we continue to fail in our military enterprises, we shall realize that they are human beings, not just a tiresome circumstance. Then perhaps we shall hate them with a hatred which they will have no reason to resent. And from such a hatred it will be only a short journey to a genuine _rapprochement_.