“Now this young lunatic should have been examined and condemned and sent to an asylum as a paranoiac. Instead of that, he was given full power and allowed to endow and develop a school of bribed historians and lunatic philosophers to justify his plans---Treitschke, Nietzsche, Bernhardi, backed by the throne and all the supermaniacs that surrounded it. They created the new morality of Williamism in which all human decency was disemboweled and God and the devil exchanged crowns. Gosh almighty! It seems incredible now that we look back upon it. “From the beginning there has been a flavor of the little tin god about these Hohenzollern fellers. Frederick the Great had a menacing rattle of self-assertion, like that of a Ford car going to a country picnic. His favorite dissipation was kicking soldiers. It was a way he had of advertising his superiority. “Macaulay tells us that he needed proximity and not provocation to kick a soldier. What a brave Captain he was! Funny, isn't it, how the great Captains have managed to take care of themselves. Died on hair mattresses, every one of them except two, Gustavus Adolphus and Stonewall Jackson. “The only man who ever insulted me by just shaking my hand was a mule-eared Hohenzollern chap known as Prince Heinrich of Prussia. I can never forget that you-to-hell air of his as he took my hand as if it was a clod of dirt, without even a look at me. I have always been sorry that I didn't invite him to the sidewalk. “William II began to strut in the military and hot-air game as soon as he ascended the throne, and lost no opportunity to tighten his hold upon the consciences of his people. “Let me tell you the story of THE MISLAID CONSCIENCE. “I used to know a feller here of the name of Sam Hopkins. He worked for a client of mine who ran a lock factory. Sam had been a poor lad--sold newspapers on the street night and morning. My client liked him and took him over to the big shop and taught him the trade of making locks and paid his board until he was able to earn it. Sam became an expert mechanic and shoved money into his coffers every Saturday night. By and by he had a wife and three children and a comfortable home and a goodly amount of spondoolix earning interest. Now for the chance to accomplish all that he was indebted to my friend and client. “By and by Sam joined the Trade Union. Nobody could find any fault with Sam for uniting with his fellow workers to accomplish any fair and reasonable purpose. But Sam had given to the Trade Union exactly what the Germans had given to the Kaiser and the Bundesrath. He had, in effect, turned his conscience over to the Union, which had full authority to do as it thought best with this sacred piece of property. Sam didn't realize what he had done until the Union ordered him to strike.