Appeal to the “Civilised Nations” [ Manifesto of the 93]
As representatives of German Science and Art, we hereby protest to the civilized world against the lies and calumnies with which our enemies are endeavouring to stain the honour of Germany in her hard struggle for existence -- in a struggle that has been forced on her.
The iron mouth of events has proved the untruth of the fictitious German defeats; consequently misrepresentation and calumny are all the more eagerly at work. As heralds of truth we raise our voices against these.
It is not true that Germany is guilty of having caused this war. Neither the people, the Government, nor the "Kaiser" wanted war....
It is not true that we trespassed in neutral Belgium. It has been proved that France and England had resolved on such a trespass, and it has likewise been proved that Belgium had agreed to their doing so. It would have been suicide on our part not to have been beforehand.
It is not true that the life and property of a single Belgian citizen was injured by our soldiers without the bitterest defense having made it necessary....
It is not true that our troops treated Louvain brutally. Furious inhabitants having treacherously fallen upon them in their quarters, our troops with aching hearts were obliged to fire a part of the town, as punishment. The greatest part of Louvain has been preserved....
It is not true that our warfare pays no respects to international laws. It knows no undisciplined cruelty. But in the east, the earth is saturated with the blood of women and children unmercifully butchered by the wild Russian troops, and in the west, dumdum bullets mutilate the breasts of our soldiers....
It is not true that the combat against our so-called militarism is not a combat against our civilization, as our enemies hypocritically pretend it is. Were it not for German militarism, German civilization would long since have been extirpated....
We cannot wrest the poisonous weapon -- the lie -- out of the hands of our enemies. All we can do is proclaim to all the world, that our enemies are giving false witness against us....
Have faith in us! Believe, that we shall carry on this war to the end as a civilized nation, to whom the legacy of a Goethe, a Beethoven, and a Kant, is just as sacred as its own hearths and homes.
Source: [English version] WW1 documentary archive
https://wwi.lib.byu.edu/index.php/Manifesto_of_the_Ninety-Three_German_Intellectuals
Among the signatories:
Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Adolf von Baeyer, Peter Behrens, Emil Adolf von Behring, Wilhelm von Bode, Aloïs Brandl, Lujo Brentano, Justus Brinkmann, Johannès-Ernst Conrad, Franz von Defregger, Richard Dehmel, Adolf Deissmann, Friedrich-Wilhem Doerpfeld, Friedrich von Duhn, Paul Ehrlich, Albert Ehrard, Carl Engler, Gerhart Esser, Rudolf Christoph Eucken, Herbert Eulenberg, Henrich Finke, Hermann Emil Fischer, Wilhelm Foerster, Ludwig Fulda, Eduard Gebhardt, Johann Jacobus Maria de Groot, Fritz Haber, Ernst Haeckel, Max Halbe, Gustav-Adolf von Harnack, Gerhart Hauptmann, Carl Hauptmann, Gustav Hellmann, Wilhelm Herrmann, Andreas Heusler, Adolf von Hildebrand, Ludwig Hoffmann, Engelbert Humperdinck, Leopold Graf von Kalckreuth, Arthur Kampf, Fritz-August von Kaulbach, Theodor Kipp, Felix Klein, Max Klinger, Aloïs Knoepfler, Anton Koch, Paul Laban, Karl Lamprecht, Philipp Lenard, Maximilien Lenz, Max Liebermann, Franz von Liszt, Ludwig Manzel, Joseph Mausbach, Georg von Mayr, Sebastian Merkle, Eduard Meyer, Heinrich Morf, Friedrich Naumann, Albert Neisser, Walther Hermann Nernst, Wilhelm Ostwald, Bruno Paul, Max Planck, Albert Plohn, Georg Reicke, Max Reinhardt, Aloïs Riehl, Karl Robert, Wilhelm Roentgen, Max Rubner, Fritz Schaper, Adolf von Schlatter, August Schmidlin, Gustav von Schmoller, Reinhold Seeberg, Martin Spahn, Franz von Stuck, Hermann Sudermann, Hans Thoma, Wilhelm Trubner, Karl Vollmoeller, Richard Voss, Karl Vossler, Siegfried Wagner, Heinrich Wilhelm Waldeyer, August von Wassermann, Felix Weingartner, Théodor Wiegand, Wilhelm Wien, Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, Richard Willstätter, Wilhelm Windelband, Wilhelm Wundt.