Download or read book The Aims and Claims of Germany (Classic Reprint) written by David Kinley and published by Forgotten Books. This book was released on 2018-01-26 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from The Aims and Claims of Germany Three times since western civilization was established has it been in danger of overthrow and its light in danger of being blotted out under the attacks of more barbaric social orders. The first was by the invasion of the Huns who, in the fourth century after Christ, appeared on the eastern borders of Europe and drove the inhabitants in thousands across the Danube. Pushing westwards they later crossed the Rhine. All that had been accomplished by Roman civilization in the west was endangered; but, in the providence of God, the embattled armies of the Goths and Romans combined, on the plains of Chalons in France, overthrew the Hunnish army of and turned back the deluge of barbarism. The second great crisis in the life of that civilization of which we are the heirs occurred when the Saracens, after a wonderful career of victory, estab lished the banner of Mohammedanism through all Western Asia and Northern Africa and finally carried it across the Straits of Gibraltar with the avowed purpose that the Cres cent which they bore was to float over a Universal Empire built upon the ruins of Christendom. The dream of Mithri dates and of Caesar was to be realized in the actual achieve ments of the lieutenants of the Caliphs. The Saracen chief now upon the soil of Gaul was to subjugate the Franks and their confederates, cross the Rhine and crush the tribes beyond that stream, and then follow down the course of the Danube to its mouth. Upon the shores of the Hellespont the bands of the Faithful were to join hands and together give thanks to Allah for the conquest of the World. But in 732 A. D. The heirs of the civilization of the Roman Empire, the defenders of progress and of Christianity, met the Moslems on the battle field oi Tours and, after a seven days' terrific conflict, delivered the civilization of Europe from a danger which had not threat ened it since the invasion of Attila and his Huns. Today a plan of conquest for the domination of Europe, as the first step towards the domination of the world, very similar to that of the Saracens, has endangered once more the progress of centuries of civilization. The ultimate aim of the German Empire in the present war is no less the conquest of the world than was the ultimate aim of the Saracens. In the intervals between these great crises men and nations have fought for various causes. They have warred for creeds, for commerce, for land, for prestige, and for no reason' at all except the bid ding of princes and kings; but never before in the history of the modern world has any nation, any people, any govern ment, deliberately set about the destruction of their fellow peoples, fellow nations, fellow governments, for the purpose of crushing out their separate national existences, on the theory that all people but themselves were inferior races de serving only extinction or complete subordination. That this is the purpose and spirit of the German nation as avowed by its Government and its leaders in literature, education and public life, we find abundant evidence from their own testimony, to which I shall shortly advert. But before doing so it will help us to inquire somewhat into the character and growth of a government which, in the twentieth century, could precipitate upon the world so great a danger and avow itself an agent of Almighty God to destroy all that other peoples have aecom plished and other civilizations have achieved. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com