to any laws except those of Germany's interests and needs. Hence
it fell into bad habits of thought and feeling, got into trouble,
and brought infinite trouble upon the world."

"And do you claim," interrupted Hardman, "that this would have been
prevented by reading the classics? Would that have been the only
and efficient cure for Germany's disease? Rather a large claim,
that!"

"Much too large," replied the professor. "I did not make it. In
the first place, it may be that Germany's trouble had gone beyond
any cure but the knife. In the second place, I regard the intelligent
reading of the Bible and the vital apprehension of the real spirit
of Christianity as the best of all cures for mental and moral ills.
All that I claim for the classics--the works of the greatest of
the Greek and Roman writers--is that they have in them a certain
remedial and sanitary quality. They contain noble thoughts in noble
forms. They show the strength of self-restraint. They breathe the
air of clearness and candor. They set forth ideals of character
and conduct which are elevating. They also disclose the weakness
and the ugliness of things mean and base. They have the broad and
generous spirit of the true _literae humaniores._ They reveal
the springs of civilization and lead us--


'To the glory that was Greece,
To the grandeur that was Rome.'


Now these are precisely the remedies 'indicated,' as the physicians