I doubt whether they would even have destroyed the Venus de
Milo. More probably they would have put a pair of arms on it, designed by
some rising German artist--the Emperor or somebody. And the two arms thus
added would look at once like the arms of a woman at a wash-tub. The
destroyers of the tower of Rheims are quite capable of destroying the Tower
of Giotto. But they are equally capable of the greater crime of completing
it. And if they put on a spire, what a spire it would be! What an
extinguisher for that clear and almost transparent Christian candle! Have
you read some of the German explanations of Hamlet? Did I tell you that
Leonardo's hair must have been German hair, because so many of his
contemporaries said it was beautiful? This is what I call being
second-rate. All the German excitement about the colonies of England is
only a half understanding of what was once heroic and is now largely
caddish. The German Emperor's naval vision is a bad copy of Nelson, as
certainly as Frederick the Great's verses were a bad copy of Voltaire.
But the second point was even more important; that weak as the thing is
mentally it is strong materially; and will impose itself materially if we
permit it.
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