According to this theory the essential truth about a Crusade was that it was not a Crusade.
It was something that the professors, in the old days before the war, used to call a Teutonic Folk-Wandering.

Godfrey and St.Louis were not, as Villehardouin would say, fighting for the truth; they were not even, as Voltaire would say, fighting for what they thought was the truth; this was only what they thought they thought, and they were really thinking of something entirely different.
They were not moved either by piety or priestcraft, but by a new and unexpected nomadism.

They were not inspired either by faith or fanaticism, but by an unusually aimless taste for foreign travel.
This theory that the war of the two great religions could be explained by "Wanderlust" was current about twenty years ago among the historical professors of Germany, and with many of their other views, was often accepted by the historical professors of England.
It was swallowed by an earthquake, along with other rubbish, in the year 1914.
Since then, so far as I know, the only person who has been patient enough to dig it up again is Mr.Ezra Pound.
He is well known as an American poet; and he is, I believe, a man of great talent and information.

His attempt to recover the old Teutonic theory of the Folk-Wandering of Peter the Hermit was expressed, however, in prose; in an article in the _New Age_.
I have no reason to doubt that he was to be counted among the most loyal of our allies; but he is evidently one of those who, quite without being Pro-German, still manage to be German.
The Teutonic theory was very Teutonic; like the German Hospice on the hill it was put together with great care and knowledge and it is rotten from top to bottom.

I do not understand, for that matter, why that alliance which we enjoy with Mr.Pound should not be treated in the same way as the other historical event; or why the war should not be an example of the Wanderlust.
Surely the American Army in France must have drifted eastward merely through the same vague nomadic need as the Christian Army in Palestine.
Surely Pershing as well as Peter the Hermit was merely a rather restless gentleman who found his health improved by frequent change of scene.
The Americans said, and perhaps thought, that they were fighting for democracy; and the Crusaders said, and perhaps thought, that they were fighting for Christianity.