SERBIA’S PLACE IN HUMAN HISTORY
‘Serbia is the route to the East... It cannot be repeated too often that Serbia is the chief obstacle to those plans of political predominance from Berlin to Bagdad, which lie at the back of Germany’s mind in this world-war; that her services to the common cause entitle her to be treated on an equal footing with all the other allies; and that just as Serbia is the route from the West to Constantinople and Salonica, so she is the route, as in Turkish days, from Eastern Europe to Vienna and Berlin. Sooner or later it will become clear, even to the man in the street, that the way to Berlin lies not through Belgium but through the Balkans and the great Hungarian plains.’ - R. Seton-Watson, The Balkans, Italy and the Adriatic, pp 31-32.
I
The Struggle between Super-man and All-man
‘Our strong arms be our conscience, swords our law,’ says Super-man.
‘Whosever exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted,’ says All-man.
If the little children, our posterity, should ask us, how long have you lived upon this earth, we, brethren, should answer: thousands of years. And our answer would be true.
All that our eyes have seen, and our ears heard, and our hands made, and our hearts felt, and our minds created during our life upon the earth: all that is not easy of accomplishment in a thousand years.
And in our answer we can also say that the time for us has not been long. Indeed, we have not felt it, because our generation has kept on growing, not by reason of long time but because of our great sorrows, and died, not old in years, but exhausted in working and creating.
The contents of our time have been the very essence of good and evil of many, many centuries. By this essence, but only diluted, will live many after-generations, through whom fate will continue our own life upon this unquiet and terrible planet.
Now in these ‘essential’ times when human life is measured not by days but by deeds, and when the greatest events have happened since the creation of the world, in this time our Serbian people have not been merely spectators but active participants and creators of these events, and first in point of time as well as in energy. Our Serbian people have occupied on the page of today’s world history a place almost parallel with the greatest and most famous modern nations, with English, Russian and French.
Is this fact only accidental and ephemeral? Will it be that at the end of this war the Serbian will be forgetful of its Allies and maliciously despised by its neighbours?
Will this nation be punished by Fate, as a bold parvenu who succeeded momentarily in reaching the heights and in mingling with a society which is not its own? In a word: What place henceforth, in the world’s history, will the Serbian nation occupy?
But before we answer our question as to what place it will occupy in the future, we must first enquire what place it has occupied in the past, and what place it has at the present time. We need to have two points to be able to draw a straight line which can prolong into the future, and by which we can measure the future.
If we had the same point of view as the modern German philosophers of history and law, we would not put above question. For almost fifty years past, these philosophers have conducted a fanatical propaganda of the idea that the little nations have no right to existence, and that all small national and political entities have to be merged in the greater ones who alone, according to this famous theory, have the right to independent being and capability for cultured creation. Read: Max Stirner, Nietzsche, Treitschke, Bernhardi.
But we cannot possibly accept this German theory, because it is desperate from every point of view; it is desperate for small nations because it threatens the destructions of the body of the small nations, and it is desperate also for the great nations because it threatens the destruction of their souls. We must not accept this theory as Christians because that would mean we were falling back to the pagan times when the weak were cast down from the Tarpeian Rock, and we cannot as Christians again experiment with Neros and gladiators, with adoration of pagan idols and with the slavetrade. And we cannot accept this theory as human beings because it approximates us to the animal life, and the superiority of our human life over the animal life consists in greater sociablity, in greater indulgence towards the weak, in common support of each other, and in the accomplishment of all – and not only of some human beings, and of rising from the beast up to God.
This political Nietzscheanism whose theorists have been Treitschke and Bernhardi, and which has been carried into practice by Bismarck, the Prussian Junkers and Kaiser William, not only cannot avoid the individual Nietzcheanism, but would be the most servile guide, who would go ahead and carry this individual Nietzscheanism just as a body carries its shadow. For as soon as it is said and accepted that a stronger state possesses the full right of domination over a smaller neighbouring state, at once it must be conclusively said and accepted that a stronger man, too, possesses the full right of domination over his weaker fellow man. And as soon as the notion of a physical super-nation and super-state may be fixed in the mind of human kind, the notion of a physical super-man must be subsequently fixed and acknowledged too. Once the physical super-man is acknowledged as the ideal of men, the history and culture of mankind will be thereby brought down to South Sea cannibalism, singing the words of Richard the Third: ‘Our strong arms be our conscience, swords our law.’
Shall indeed the dramatic history and the glorious culture of mankind end so miserably? No! This philosophy, which means the negation of the greatest moral achievements to which mankind climbed up through blood and tears, - this philosophy must never be ours. Our ideal is not the super-man, but the All-man.
The Son of God designed the same ideal by His words, and sanctified it by His blood upon the earth. By degreees, during many centuries, this ideal was carved in the ethical consciousness of European mankind, and was in detail elaborated and accentuated by the most spiritual and most gifted men of the European and American continents: Emerson, Victor Hugo, Dickens, Tolstoi, Longfellow, Dostoievsky, i.e. the men whose works came to be the first and most sacred after Holy Writ for nine-tenths of reading people.
According to this theory, which is presented lastly more and more as the Slavonic philosophy and which consequently is ours too, we confess that no man has the full right over his fellow man and that no nation has the full right over its fellow nation. The first principle of this philosophy is – freedom, the second – love.
We consider ourselves not as the lords of this world. We look upon this world as upon God’s field and upon human beings as upon God’s seed. The great Sower has sown the seed upon his field. Who gave us the right to say: this and that seed is not good, therefore He shall root it out? Who gave us the right to say: this and that creature must be burnt because it is not of our colour, of our smell and of our fruit? Who made us judges of the world, so that we could pronounce these pretentious words: this nation must be exterminated because it is too small; and this one must be dispersed because it is perilous; and this one must be subjugated because it speaks not our tongue and prays to God not according to our rite? No; we have not one right without a corresponding obligation.
We have the right to live in this world, but also the obligation to let other people live too.
We have the right to be free, but also the obligation to make other people free.
We have the right to our daily bread, but also the obligation to take care of our hungry neighbours.
We have the right to demand the protection of our person, but also the obligaton to protect people in danger.
We have the right to look upon ourselves as the sons of God and upon our nation as God’s nation, but the obligation, too, to look upon all men as the sons of God and upon all nations as God’s nations.
We Serbians uphold such a philosophy not because we are little but because this philosophy is great and sublime. The day will come when this philosophy will be generally acknowledged as the only salutary philosophy for the soul and body of humankind. It will draw man nearer to man, nation to nation, state to state, and it will join all in one brotherhood, one love, one kingdom of God upon the earth. We keep this philosophy because we have sufficiently experienced throughout the centuries the perniciousness of the opposite philosophy of our neighbours, that, namely, which is appropriated by the Germans as their national, political and social guide in this world, and which is completely expressed in the words: Might is right!
We have never been the followers of such a philosophy but we have never feared it. Our struggle against the nations who follow this watchword (‘Might is right’) fills the whole of our history.
II
Before and after the Battle of Kosovo
‘I would, and my horse could, but God consented not.’
Serbian proverb
Let us now consider more closely what place we have occupied and what role we have played in the world’s history.
Our known history began at the time when we came in contact with Byzantium, at the very time of the great Settlement of Nations, which meant a new start in the game of world-history. Hudreds of years of our earlier history are shrouded in darkness. We do not know our Carpathian history – our bucolic and pagan antiquity, shared by the Russians and all the Slav brethren in common – we know only our Balkan history. From the earliest times the Balkans may be compared to a theatre in which the worst places were the most expensive; and here from the very first, Destiny has exacted from us Serbians very heavy entrance-prices. From the first day our task was to protect ourselves against the lack of scruple and the Nietzcheanism of cultured and uncultured nations; firstly against the decadent cultured Byzantines, afterwards against the barbarous Huns abd Avars, Bulgars and Magyars, then against the new invaders, the Turks, and finally against the artful Venetians and the Germans.
At the very moment when Byzantium ceased to be dangerous to us we took up the task of defending Byzantium from her horrible enemy, the Turk. Our Tsar Dushan made the alliance with the Byzanthine regent Cantacuzene so as to defend the Balkans against the Asiatic flood which approached nearer and nearer to Constantinople.
After Tsar Dushan, the King Vukashin excelled as the great champion of the Christian Balkans against the Osmanlis. For before the famous battle of Kosovo in Old Serbia we had to sustain a similar battle at Adrianople, on the river Maritza. On the threshold of Bulgaria, which country was unable to give any resistance to the Turks, King Vukashin fell with a splendid Serbian army of 60,000, the victims for the freedom of the Christian Balkans. This happened in 1371; and only 18 years later was the famous battle of the field of Kosovo. Here fell Tsar Lazar with the rest of the Serbian kingly splendour and might. The enslaved Serbian people sang this heroic battle in wonderful poetry, and even found an explanation for the terrible conflict of Kosovo in the religious sphere.
The battle of Kosovo was symbolised as the battle of Heaven and Earth. Mystically King Lazar was asked which he preferred, the Kingdom of Earth or the Kingdom of Heaven? In the first case he might be victorious over the Sultan, in the second case he might be beaten by the Sultan, the bearer of entirely earthly ambitions.
‘Tsar Lazar! thou Tsar of noble lineage,
Tell me now, what kingdom hast thou chosen?
Wilt thou have heaven’s kingdom for thy portion,
or an earthly kingdom? If an earthly,
saddle thy good steed – and gird him tightly,
Let thy heroes buckle on their sabres,
Smite the Turkish legions like a tempest,
And these legions all will fly before thee.
But if thou wilt have heaven’s kingdom rather,
speedily erect upon Kosovo,
Speedily erect a church of marble;
Not of marble, but of silk and scarlet;
That the army, to its vespers going,
May from sin be purged – for death be ready;
For thy warriors all are doom’d to stumble;
Thou, too, prince, wilt perish with thy army!’
When the Tsar Lazar had read the writings, many were his thoughts and long his musings.
‘Lord my God! what – which shall be my portion,
which my choice of these two proffer’d kingdoms?
Shall I choose heaven’s kingdom? Shall I rather
choose an earthly one? – for what is earthly
is all fleeting, vain, and unsubstantial;
heavenly things are lasting, firm, eternal.’
So the Tsar preferred a heavenly kingdom rather than an earthly.
Tsar Lazar, a saint in his noble character, preferred the Kindom of Heaven, and he fell with all his dukes and armies as a holy and necessary victim for Justice. Was it not a struggle between Christianity and Nietzscheansim? Was it not the struggle of the same principles which are fighting today against each other? The Turks are today again on the scene allied with the nation which produced Nietzche and which believes in Nietzche as the Turks believe in the Coran or in their sword.
But let us continue.
The Turks were a terrible power. But soon there came from Central Asia a still more terrible power threatening the Turks. It was Tamerlane with his Mongol hordes. Now Tsar Lazar’s son, Stephen the Tall, hastened shoulder to shoulder with his brother-in-law, the sultan Bayezid, to stand against the bloody flood of the Mongols. The Serbian cooperation in the memorable battle at Angora is related as very prominent. The noble son of Lazar, King Stephen the Tall, perhaps the most noble person amongst the old Serbian kings, was constrained and determined by circumstances so hardly as to ally himself with the evil in order to fight against the worse.
When all had been done on the part of the Serbian people that it was possible to do by unaided human might to save the freedom or even the semi-freedom of Balkan Christianity, Fate placed the weights on the contrary side of the scales, so that the balance was reversed and the shadow of the Coran covered all the land and people from the Bosphorus to the Danube.
So began the slavery that was a great period in our history, immense in its tragedy. What did this slavery mean? The Serbian slave must be disarmed and must serve the armed master. He must not only take off his shoes, but with his own hands put them on the feet of his despots. He must take the bread from his own children and give it to the dogs of the strangers. He was a human being, but he must never say so aloud. He had the constant memory of his kingly past, yet he must live from hour to hour like an insect. In a word he had to suffer, lest all Christian Europe should suffer. For the Asiatic invaders, occupied with the frequent Serbian insurrections, with the Serbian haiduks and guerrilla fighters, with the Serbian crossroads and bushy forests, the home of all the valiant lovers of freedom – were obliged very often to abandon their daring projects for the ultimate conquest of Europe – and that of Central Europe in the first place.
III
The Insurrection of Humble against the Proud.
‘No bad winter without wind, no bad guest without Turk.’
Serbian proverb.
‘The first spontaneous national movement against the Turks was the Serbian rising of 1804, and the following years. It cannot be too often repeated that Serbia, unlike her Balkan neighbours, achieved her own freedom. What she has, she won almost unaided’. – R. W. Seaton-Watson.
This continued till the beginning of the 19th century. And when all the world thought that midnight reigned in the Balkans, there began the dawn of day. The Serbian people, who were the last to lay down their arms before the Turks, were the first to take them up against the Turks. These were not the arms of steel but the hearts of steel. A handful of such hearts with justice on one side and a great empire with injustice on the other!
Such was the great Beginning; the End of which was on the battlefields of Kumanovo, Monastir, and Adrianople, and the last sanctification of which will be the fall of Constantinople.
Look, what a wonderful thing; today the English, the French, and the Russians are carrying to the end the deed begun by the peasants of Shumadija a hundred years ago – to drive out the Turks from Europe and to free the enslaved Christians! The generals of the great nations who are now figthing under the walls of the town of Constantine, are busy on the same work on which were engaged the heroes from Mishar and Ljubic – Kara-George and Milosh Obrenovich; and they shake each other by the hand.
Is not that a great and wonderful thing?
Is it not a great and wonderful thing that a little enslaved nation traces out the right path and sees soon afterwards the greatest nations following the same path with glory and pride?
Our fighting a hundred years ago was like a mustard–seed sown at its time and grown up today into a big tree, the branches of which reach to Siberia and South Africa. Behold, Siberia and South Africa are now the allies of the Serbian peasants! Behold, we fought against Byzantium – Byzantium vanished; and then against Tamerlane – Tamerlane vanished with all his bloody glory; and then against the Avars and Bulgars – where are they today? And against the Turks – they are vanishing like the shadow of the of the Prophet’s sword; and finally we are engaged in the struggle against Austria – Austria’s case is now hopeless.
Remember: throughout our whole history we have been fighting against men or peoples great in might and injustice, and therefore condemned to destruction.
Hereby is our history justified. Hereby is our place in human history defined. We never have been so much a geographical as a historical power; our history has always been greater than our geography. For about four hundred years we disappeared from geography, but never from the history. History is often made under the earth. The first pages of the history of Christianity were written down in the catacombs. The history of millions of the working people in the mines is hidden in subterranean darkness. During four hundred years our Serbian history was written by blood and tears and hopes, in the darkness of slavery. We lived in the Sultan’s state, invisible to the rest of the world like the fire under the ashes. Strangers looked – if they looked at all – and saw the ashes but not the fire beneath.
The insurrection came, the Insurrection of the slaves, of broken hearts, and scattered the ashes – and the fire grew bright and was seen. I speak not only of Kara-George’s Insurrection. The Serbian Insurrection has lasted a hundred years. It is now at the climax and at the same time in its final phase. The goal of this Insurrection was designed and proclaimed from the first day as liberation from the yoke of tyranny. Our Insurrection like a volcano produced several violent commotions for the greater part of mankind. The first shot was fired in Topola (1804), and the Insurrection began; the second shot was fired in Nevesinje (Herzegovina, 1875), and the Insurrection continued; the third shot was fired in Kumanovo (1912) and the Insurrection approached its end. Our Insurrection caused also this world-war, the greatest commotion in history. And so our cause becomes today the cause of the greatest nations upon the earth.
Too small a cause for so big a war, it may be said. Not at all. The national cause of Serbia, i.e. of a small spot on the globe, is the justice of the Universe. Therefore it may be said to our great allies: You are not fighting for the Serbian interests but for universal justice. The principles which lay at the root of our Serbian Insurrection, and which have met very often with the bitterest irony and contempt of the world, are now the chief principles of our powerful allies.
We have been fighting against the Turks during the last century for the freedom of our enslaved brethren; and today the French people are fighting for the same freedom in Alsace and Lorraine.
We have been fighting against the Austrians for the respect of the independence of a small nation such as we were, - the British declared war on Germany just because Germany so scornfully trampled on Belgian independence.
The tendency of our Insurrection has been to set free not only ourselves but all our Slav brethren in the South and everywhere, - Russia has waged this costly war because of the brotherhood and solidarity of the Slav race.
It is clear that the principles which England, France, and Russia of today are fighting for have been the very principles of the Serbian people from Kara-George and his peasant collaborators up today. For a hundred years we have been desperately fighting against the brutal idea now upheld by Germany, that the small peoples have no right to life and freedom, against an idea which is old as degenerate Byzantium, as old as Tamerlane and the Turkish Sultanate, as old as the Austrian watchword divide et impera, and even as the most brutal instinct of men.
IV
Democracy and heroism in theory and practice
‘If you would have pity on me dying, have pity on me while I am still alive’ – Serbian proverb
All the small nations may be thankful to the Serbians because they, before all other nations in the nineteenth century, arose to fight for the rights of the small nations, and not only did they arise, but they persisted, too, in their fighting. ‘Nationalism’ – that is the watchword of the 19th century, that is the inspiration of the greatest modern politicians and the commonest topic of the endless discussions throughout the last century of European history. But this European theory of nationalism appeared after the Serbian practice of the same theory. For, behold, it was a whole generation after the insurrection under Kara-George and Serbia’s hard struggle for national independence that the national spirit awoke in Italy and Prussia. When as yet the Piedmonts of Italy and Germany were still scarcely conscious of their own theories, the Piedmont of Southern Slavdom, Serbia, was practically at work. And how much the idealism of Serbia today differs not only from the idealism of military Prussia but even from that of Italy, it is easy to prove.
In a declaration in the beginning of the world-war the Serbian government said: ‘Serbia is figthing for the freedom of all her enslaved brethren, Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes under the yoke of Austria.’ Contrast these simple idealistic words with the declaration of Signor Salandra last May. ‘Italy’, he said, ‘entered the greatest war recorded in history solely to defend her ancient aspirations and vital interests.’
Writing on Serbia, Dr. Dillon said: ‘Like a phoenix from the ashes, so Serbia rose from her unbeing into being, and became at once the Piedmont of South Slavdom and the chief factor in the international situation.’
‘The Serbians, the poor defenders of European civilisation for many centuries, these heroes in rags and sandals, deserved the admiration of the whole world.’ So spoke Maurice Barres, the famous French author.
‘The Serbians fulfilled their duty brilliantly. They have been fighting during a century for freedom and independence. Serbia deserves to be now supported materially and morally, and after this war she must be supported to unite all the Serbs, together with their brethren the Croats and Slovenes in one and the same state with a population of fourteen millions.’ So said M. Herve, the leader of French pacifists.
On the 13th of March last, a ’Serbian Day’ was fixed throughout the whole of France. On this occasion the French teachers in the schools explained to Young France the history of Serbian people and commended it as the most heroic history in the world.
In such terms the world wrote and spoke of Serbia in the spring of 1915, after a series of splendid Serbian victories over the Austrian army at Tser, Rudnik, Valjevo, Kosmaj, and Drina.
But a hundred years ago, in the year of our Lord 1815, nobody knew anything, nobody wrote or spoke anything of Serbia. In the year 1815 there did not as yet exist a state of Serbia. In the spring of the same year a handful of unlettered peasants prayed in the little wooden church of the village of Takovo just on the day celebrated as that of Christ’s solemn entry into Jerusalem. After sincere and hearty prayer, the peasants gathered under a shady oak next the church and in fearful and hopeful whispers determined to make a new insurrection against their Asiatic oppresors. They pledged each other their word of honour to fight until death against the common foe. The little wooden church, the shady oak and the great blue spring heaven over the poor peasants assisted their firm and touching resolution.
I cannot believe that the story of William Tell and his compatriots in Switzerland could be any more touching than the story of the Serbian revolutionists, of these humble and pious peasants of Serbia, who, beginning the greatest deed in their history, could look only towards Heaven and seek there a support, because all the earth around them, near and far, was peopled by their enemies, or oprressors, or despisers.
V
A hard struggle for a great idea – that is all
'Serbia cannot accept a lesser programme without betraying her kinsmen across the frontier, who look to her today as their representative before Europe.' - R.W. Seton-Watson
Evidently our place in human history is not marked either by big commerce like America’s , nor by an excellent fleet like England’s, nor by large towns like London, New York, Paris, and Moscow, nor by the brilliancy of science and literature, nor by the great mines and factories, neither by the Louvre nor by Windsor. But it is marked by something that is more precious because it costs more sacrifices, more persistence and more blood – it is marked by the struggle of a people for their freedom, by struggle and success. This success of the Serbian people is not to be considered solely as a material success. It is a success indeed of a religious character, and therefore a universal, all-human character. This is the victory of the Christian idea over the anti-Christian or pagan idea. The pagan idea is the Super-man (Ubermensch), the Christian idea is the All-man. The pagan idea may be expressed as ‘Right in Might’, the Christian as ‘Might in Right’. The pagan idea means that earth belongs only to the strong; the Christian, that the earth belongs to all God’s creatures. The small peoples have the same right to exist upon the earth as have the big ones, or as the insignificant blades of grass have the right to grow under the sun close to the big oak. Indeed the struggle of the Serbian people has put this to a practical proof. The small peoples make with the big peoples a necessary and beautiful mosaic in history. History is just for this reason interesting and beautiful – it is just for this reason dramatic. Every nation has its dimensions – its space and number – has its strength, intellectual and moral. That is to say – every nation has its colour. The world–history is a drama; it is also a colour-painting, too. But it could not be either drama or painting, if one nation conquered all others and forced upon them its own individuality. In that case there would be one colour only, and therefore monotony and death.Now it is evident what is our place and part in our human history. Upon our flag is written: ‘For the Christian faith and golden freedom.’ This watchword is written today over the most Christian countries, over Russia, Great Britain and France. Our fighting today widens out to the furthest corners of the wide world. How wonderful is the shining of justice! Like the reflector’s light, so justice shines and its shining widening more and more as it goes further and further from the burning point. Serbia is today easily seen from Boston as well from India and China. What a change! Only a hundred years ago unknown Serbia was born. It is a youth, a fire, an enigma. Enigmatic Serbia may well seem, alike to her neighbours and to the remotest inhabitants of the earth. She kindled a little fire a century ago, and this fire has grown into a world war. She rose at first against Turkish tyranny, and nine-tenths of mankind was on the side of the Turk. She succeeded. She rose again, against Austria-Hungary, and most of the world was on the side of Austria-Hungary. For the conflict between Serbia and Austria-Hungary has lasted more than fifty years. Serbia was supported by God and Austria-Hungary by the world. But what a change today! The more civilised part of the world is fighting today against Austria-Hungary, the ally of the Turks – and divine justice is once more on the side of Serbia.
VI
Always true to her own self
'To thine own self be true;
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.'
Shakespeare
How, it may be asked, did the whole civilised world come to adopt the Serbian point of view?
Because, we reply, the Serbian point of views from the beginning of Serbia’s Insurrection was grounded on Christian foundations. The world of today is pretty clearly divided into two camps: the anti-Christian and the Christian. Three great Caesars (of Stamboul, Vienna, and Berlin), with their tyrannous little servant, the Caesar of Bulgaria – that is the pagan camp. And the rest of the world is the Christian camp. Serbia’s justice and Serbia’s struggle for divine justice divided the world. That is the last conflict between Christianity and Paganism. That is the decisive struggle between Christ and Antichrist.
In the world a revolution in the opinions about Serbia is already in evidence. Russia abandons altogether the artificial policy of Count Ignatieff. Great Britain is in a hurry to correct her failures of the Berlin Congress. France most warmly greeted our victories and expressed her admiration and friendship for Serbia. Greece and Roumania are with us in spirit. The Bulgarian people respect us (although with hatred) after their defeat on Bregalniza. Our Southern Slav brethren from the Roumanian frontier as far as Trieste, and from Cattaro to Gratz, looks towards Heaven and towards us, awaiting freedom and union with us.
What was the Serbian past? The struggle for a Christian idea. What is the Serbian present? The same struggle for the same Christian idea. The difference is that we have been struggling alone in the past, and now our struggle is supported by the most powerful and most noble champions upon our planet.
Now we have found two points in our history and hereby the straight line connecting them and leading us some steps towards our national future.
We began our struggle alone, a struggle for the best cause – that is the first point. Today, we meet in the same struggle as our friends the best nations in the world – that is the second point.
What may be our future? Since we are today allied with the best amongst the nations in the struggle we shall be tomorrow allied with them in the work of peace – that is our future. The peaceful carrying out of the work of culture! Peaceful creative work! We will show in the peace of tomorrow that our national and human qualities are of the superior kind in the work of a culture, as they have been superior in war.
There is a heroic peace as well as a heroic war. A nation can be heroic in peace as in war. For what indeed is peace if not a fight with nature, with the things and elements of nature? We Serbians have a good hope that we shall be able to show ourselves equally heroic in the second kind of fighting as we did in the first. Some people speak a greater Serbia. Never was Serbia so great as she now is, in her suffering, in her heroism, and in her enthusiastic and optimistic belief in the Victory of Good over Evil. Young Serbia was always true to her Destiny, true to her own self. Serbia’s truth is at last recognised and accepted by many of her friends and critics. She recognised her cross from the beginning and she took it willingly – always true to her own Self.
'To thine own self be true;
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not be false to any man.'
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