living the life described would arise when the State so set up issued
its ordinances requiring every able-bodied man to become a competent
soldier.

There are those who believe, or fancy they believe, that the words I
have quoted involve the principle that the use of force or of violence
between man and man, or between nation and nation, is wicked. To the man
who thinks it right to submit to any violence or to be killed rather
than to use violence in resistance, I have no reply to make. The world
cannot conquer him and fear has no hold upon him. But even he can carry
out his doctrine only to the extent of allowing himself to be
ill-treated, as I will now convince him. Many years ago the people of
South Lancashire were horrified by the facts reported in a trial for
murder. In a village on the outskirts of Bolton lived a young woman,
much liked and respected as a teacher in one of the Board schools. On
her way home from school she was accustomed to follow a footpath through
a lonely wood, and here one evening her body was found. She had been
strangled by a ruffian who had thought in this lonely place to have his
wicked will of her. She had resisted successfully and he had killed her
in the struggle. Fortunately the murderer was caught and the facts
ascertained from circumstantial evidence were confirmed by his
confession. Now, the question I have to ask of the man who takes his
stand on the passage I have quoted from the Gospel is: "What would have
been your duty if you had been walking through that wood and come upon
the girl struggling with the man who killed her?" This is a crucial
instance which, I submit, utterly destroys the doctrine that the use of
violence is in itself wrong. The right or wrong is not in the employment
of force but simply in the purpose for which it is used. What the case
establishes, I think, is that to use violence in resistance to violent
wrong is not only right but necessary.