The purposes of the United States in this war are known to the whole world, to every people to whom the truth has been permitted to come. They do not need to be stated again. We seek no material advantage of any kind. We believe that the intolerable wrongs done in this war by the furious and brutal power of the Imperial German Government ought to be repaired, but not at the expense of the sovereignty of any people rather a vindication of the sovereignty both of those that are weak and of those that are strong. Punitive damages, the dismemberment of empires, the establishment of selfish and exclusive economic leagues, we deem inexpedient and in the end worse than futile, no proper basis for a peace of any kind, least of all for an enduring peace. That must be based upon justice and fairness and the common rights of mankind.

We cannot take the word of the present rulers of Germany as a guarantee of anything that is to endure, unless explicitly supported by such conclusive evidence of the will and purpose of the German people themselves as the other peoples of the world would be justified in accepting. Without such guarantees treaties of settlement, agreements for disarmament, covenants to set up arbitration in the place of force, territorial adjustments, reconstitutions of small nations, if made with the German Government, no man, no nation could now depend on. We must await some new evidence of the purposes of the great peoples of the Central Powers. God grant it may be given soon and in a way to restore the confidence of all peoples everywhere in the faith of nations and the possibility of a convenanted peace.

ROBERT LANSING,

Secretary of State of the United States of America.

REPLY OF GERMANY TO THE POPE'S PEACE APPEAL1

HERR CARDINAL,

Berlin, September 21, 1917

Your eminence has been good enough with your letter of August 2 to transmit to the Kaiser and King, my most gracious master, the note of his Holiness the Pope, in which his Holiness, filled with grief at the devastations of the world war, makes an emphatic appeal for peace to the heads of the belligerent peoples. The Kaiser and King has deigned

1 The London Times (Weekly Edition), September 28, 1917.

to acquaint me with your eminence's letter and to entrust the reply to me.

His Majesty has been following for a considerable time, with high respect and sincere gratitude, his Holiness's efforts in a spirit of true impartiality to alleviate as far as possible the sufferings of the war and to hasten the end of hostilities. The Kaiser sees in the latest step of his Holiness a fresh proof of his noble and humane feelings, and cherishes a lively desire that, for the benefit of the entire world, the Papal appeal may meet with success.

The effort of Pope Benedict XV to pave the way to an understanding among the peoples might the more surely reckon on a sympathetic reception and whole-hearted support from his Majesty seeing that the Kaiser, since taking over the government, has regarded it as his principal and most sacred task to preserve the blessings of peace for the German people and the world.

In his first speech from the throne at the opening of the German Reichstag on June 25, 1888, the Kaiser promised that love of the German Army and his position towards it should never lead him into the temptation to cut short the benefits of peace, unless war was a necessity forced upon us by an attack on the empire or its allies. The German Army should safeguard peace for us, and should peace nevertheless be broken, be in a position to win [fight for] it with honor. The Kaiser has by his acts fulfilled the promise he then made in twenty-six years of happy rule, despite provocations and temptations.

In the crisis which led to the present world conflagration his Majesty's efforts were up to the last moment directed towards settling the conflict by peaceful means. After war had broken out against his wish and desire, the Kaiser, in conjunction with his high allies, was the first solemnly to declare his readiness to enter into peace negotiations. The German people supported his Majesty in his keen desire for peace.

Germany sought within her national frontiers the free development of her spiritual and material possessions, and outside Imperial territory unhindered competition [communication] with nations enjoying equal rights and equal esteem [privileges]. The free play of forces in the world in a peaceful wrestling with one another would lead to the highest perfecting of the noblest human possessions. The disastrous concatenation of events in the year 1914 abruptly broke off the hopeful course of development, and transformed Europe into a bloody battle

arena.

Appreciating the importance of the declaration of his Holiness, the Imperial Government has not failed to submit the suggestions contained in it to earnest and scrupulous examination. The special measures which the government has taken, in the closest contact with the representatives of the German people, to discuss and answer the questions raised prove how earnestly it desires, in accordance with the desire of his Holiness and with the peace resolution adopted by the Reichstag on July 19, to find a practical basis for a just and lasting peace.

The Imperial Government welcomes with special sympathy the leading idea of the peace appeal, in which his Holiness clearly expresses his conviction that in the future the material power of arms must be superseded by the moral power of right. We also are convinced that the sick body of human society can only be healed by the fortifying moral strength of right. From this would follow, according to the view of his Holiness, the simultaneous diminution of the armed forces of all states and the institution of obligatory [binding] arbitration in international disputes.

We share the view of his Holiness that definite rules and certain safeguards for the simultaneous and reciprocal limitation of armaments on land and sea and in the air, as well as for the true freedom and community of the high seas [constitute the subjects for discussion between the states] are the things in treating which the new spirit that in future should prevail in international relations, should find its first hopeful expression. The task would then of itself arise of deciding international differences of opinion, not by the use of armed forces but by peaceful methods, especially by arbitration, the great peace-producing effect of which we, together with his Holiness, fully recognize. The Imperial Government will, in this respect, support every proposal which is compatible with the vital interests of the German Empire and people.

Germany, owing to her geographical situation and her economic requirements, has to rely on peaceful intercourse with her neighbors and distant countries. No people, therefore, has more reason than the German people to wish that, instead of universal hatred and battle, a conciliatory and fraternal spirit should prevail between the nations. If the nations are guided by this spirit it will be recognized to their advantage that the important thing is to lay more stress upon what unites them than upon what separates them in their relations. They will also succeed in settling individual points of conflict which are still undecided, in such a way that conditions of existence will be created

which will be satisfactory to every nation, and thereby a repetition of the great world catastrophe would appear to be impossible.

Only on this condition can a lasting peace be founded which will promote an intellectual rapprochement and a return to the economic prosperity of human society. This serious and sincere conviction encourages our confidence that our enemies also may see a suitable basis in the ideas submitted by his Holiness for approaching nearer to the preparation of the future peace under conditions corresponding to the spirit of reasonableness, and to the situation in Europe.

[The document is signed by the Imperial Chancellor, and is addressed to Cardinal Gasparri.]

REPLY OF AUSTRIA-HUNGARY TO THE POPE'S PEACE APPEAL1
Vienna, September 21, 1917

HOLY FATHER,

With due veneration and deep emotion we take cognizance of the new representations which your Holiness, in fulfillment of the holy office entrusted to you by God, makes to us and the heads of the other belligerent states with the noble intention of leading the heavily-tried nations to a unity that will restore peace to them.

With a thankful heart we receive this fresh gift of fatherly care which you, holy father, always bestow on all peoples without distinction, and from the depth of our heart we greet the moving exhortation which your Holiness has addressed to the governments of the belligerent peoples. During this cruel war we have always looked up to your Holiness as to the highest personage, who, in virtue of his mission which reaches beyond earthly things, and thanks to the high conception of his duties laid upon him, stands high above the belligerent peoples and who, inaccessible to all influence, was able to find a way which may lead to the realization of our own desire for peace, lasting and honorable for all parties.

Since ascending the throne of our ancestors and fully conscious of the responsibility which we bear before God and men for the fate of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, we have never lost sight of the high aim of restoring to our peoples as speedily as possible the blessings of peace. Soon after our accession to the throne it was vouchsafed to us, in common with our allies, to undertake a step which had been considered and prepared by our exalted predecessor, Francis Joseph, to pave the way for a lasting and honorable peace.

1 New York Times, September 22, 1917.