The first principle of German "Kultur" as respects the state is that
the sole business of the government is to advance the interests of the
state. No laws having been formulated in respect to the business of a
state, the government is without moral responsibility, and the laws
applicable to individual action do not apply to the state. Individuals
may do wrong, but the state cannot do wrong. Individuals may steal and
be punished therefor, but the state cannot steal. It is its business
to expand and to appropriate. Individuals may murder and be punished
for the crime, but it is the business of the state to kill for state
development or progress.

The English-speaking conception of morality is that what applies to an
individual in a community applies to the aggregate of the individuals,
that the state is only the aggregate of the individuals exercising the
natural human functions of government for law and order.

This is entirely outside the German conception. In the German
conception a government comes down from above and not up from the
people. It is not the people who rule or govern, but the government
from above rules the people, and the people must implicitly follow and
obey; thus is national progress and human progress. The whole of
Germany believes in the government of the Kaiser: that law and war flow
down through him and that neither can be questioned by the individual.
Obedience, union, efficiency, progress, and progress through war, if
necessary, are cardinal virtues.

Germany does not desire war with Russia, but German progress requires
the continuance of present tariff relations, and if war is a means to
that desirable end, war is divine.