Page:The Czechoslovak Review, vol4, 1920.pdf/184

On a previous occassion I took leave of the National Assembly in the belief that I would not address you any more prior to the elections. I could not know that this day would place me before the National Assembly as the spokesman of the government and the entire nation. Your kindness truly embarrasses me; on such an occasion you will expect words beyond ordinary, words that come not only from the depths of the soul, but that are also the fruit of long experience. Please accept merely a few remarks.

All my thought turns constantly on this one question: What is the real meaning of the world war and what will be the effects of the peace and the political re-arrangement of Europe? And what is our task, our place and the place of our state in the entire world situation? The significance of the war and peace—that at least is my conviction—lies in this that it is the beginning of a new era, an era of mankind and humanity. What Kollár hoped for a hundred years ago, what Šafařík, Palacký and others preached after him, is now becoming a reality. When Kollár recommended to us that when a Slav is called, man should respond, he did not of course dream that pure humanity which he bequeathed to us would only be realized after a murderous war, after the killing of millions and millions of people of all nations.

You are right, Mr. President Tomášek, when you say that I accepted the program of humanity of our national awakeners long ago and with full conviction. I stand by this program after all the horrors of the late war. The program of humanity is a moral ideal—to be truly a man. The program of humanity further signifies faith that humanity is not a mere abstraction, but a reality. And truly humanity seems to have been awakened by the war and begins to organize itself as a unit. The war was undoubtedly a world war. Against the four Central Powers there were opposed, I believe, 27 states from all the continents. The Central Powers represented 5.6% of all mankind, the Allies 86%, while only 8.4% remained neutral. The world character of this war consists just in this that all nations, all mankind realized the war’s extent and consciously determined to reorganize the world and its politics. Palacký’s “world centralization” is becoming a fact. The League of Nations already has in it 85.4% of all nations and states. This is practically a statistical proof that mankind as a whole has become conscious of its unity, that it begins to organize, that it begins to think of its further development as an entity. Dostoievský was right, when he argued that nations and individuals have a desire for pan-humanity, that every nation desires to get beyond its national boundaries and join the body of humanity. Dostoievski’s “Pan-man” was not an utopia, but a concrete program of Russian Slavophilism. Even Kollar’s Slav program is an expression of this natural desire for pan-humanity. You referred to my activity abroad, Mr. President. For four years I labored in the interests of the program of humanity. I began in Italy and continued in Switzerland, in France, England, Russia, Japan, America, and everywhere I spread the knowledge of our nation and created sympathies for its admirable national program. Today the Czech name is known everywhere. You, and all of you, have more than once expressed your thanks to the Allied nations for our liberation, and surely without Europe and America our Republic would not be.

Humanity truly is already in existence. To know humanity, as it is beginning to organize itself, as it develops, that is the duty of every sincere Czechoslovak public man. Long ago was expressed the axiom that states maintain themselves by the same means by which they took their rise. It is our task to harmonize our national desires with the desires of other nations and of all humanity. If I speak of humanity as a concrete fact, I mean and fully realize that humanity is composed of nations and states. Humanity cannot and must not be conceived as something that is above the nations or even against the individual nations. To labor for humanity does not mean to scatter oneself fantastically over the whole world, but it implies the duty for each of us to work for his own nation and in particular for that part of the nation to which we are joined and which we may by our acts foster or damage. The concept and principle of modern nationality developed together with the concept and principles of internationalism.

I recall Štefanik. We talked together for the last time in Washington, when he was going to Siberia; we discussed our future policies, and he vividly felt and realized that we must carry on European policies. I am sure that this conviction he was repeating to me before he boarded that unlucky aeroplane, even as he flew above his native Slovakia and as he met his heroic death. For Czechoslovak politics that is the only guiding principle: to be European, humanitarian, world inclusive, and therefore truly Czech and Slovak. That applies to all our relations with the nations of Europe and of the whole world. To our commerce,, our enterprise, all our national life.

By the Peace of Paris Europe was not organized strictly on the principle of nationality. This was indeed the leading principle, but next to it the historical principle made itself felt to a considerable extent. Our Republic in particular is