“Did you try to influence him? Did you, as a clergyman, try to appeal to his feelings, preach to him, and tell him that his conduct was contrary to morality?” Of course, the very courageous Propst had done nothing of the sort, and his answers now were highly embarrassing. He said that “deeds are more effective than words,” and that “words would have been useless”; he spoke in clichés that had nothing to do with the reality of the situation,
The author goes on to point out that "mere words" would have been deeds, and that perhaps it was the duty of a clergyman to test the "uselessness of words". The author is not being sarcastic when she speaks of "the very courageous Propst"; he had indeed worked to save some Jews and had even tried to visit a concentration camp. The point isn't that he was faking courage, the point is that he had allowed certain ideas to subvert his courage when he misapplied them in certain situations.
