credited with a power to which war must yield. But, undisturbed by such
human theories and the change of times, war has again and again marched
from country to country with the clash of arms, and has proved its
destructive as well as creative and purifying power. It has not
succeeded in teaching mankind what its real nature is. Long periods of
war, far from convincing men of the necessity of war, have, on the
contrary, always revived the wish to exclude war, where possible, from
the political intercourse of nations.

This wish and this hope are widely disseminated even to-day. The
maintenance of peace is lauded as the only goal at which statesmanship
should aim. This unqualified desire for peace has obtained in our days a
quite peculiar power over men's spirits. This aspiration finds its
public expression in peace leagues and peace congresses; the Press of
every country and of every party opens its columns to it. The current in
this direction is, indeed, so strong that the majority of Governments
profess--outwardly, at any rate--that the necessity of maintaining peace
is the real aim of their policy; while when a war breaks out the
aggressor is universally stigmatized, and all Governments exert
themselves, partly in reality, partly in pretence, to extinguish the
conflagration.

Pacific ideals, to be sure, are seldom the real motive of their action.
They usually employ the need of peace as a cloak under which to promote
their own political aims. This was the real position of affairs at the
Hague Congresses, and this is also the meaning of the action of the
United States of America, who in recent times have earnestly tried to
conclude treaties for the establishment of Arbitration Courts, first and
foremost with England, but also with Japan, France, and Germany. No
practical results, it must be said, have so far been achieved.