of which the fabric of civilization--German civilization perhaps most of
all--could not hold together for a single day, should really be treated
in the asylums of Europe, not on battlefields.

I conclude that we might all very well make a beginning by pledging
ourselves as America has done to The Hague tribunal not to take up arms
in any cause that has been less than a year under arbitration, and to
treat any western Power refusing this pledge as an unpopular and
suspicious member of the European club. To break such a pledge would be
an act of brigandage; and the need for suppressing brigandage cannot be
regarded as an open question.


*The Security Will o' the Wisp.*

It will be observed that I propose no guarantee of absolute security.
Not being a sufferer from _delirium tremens_ I can live without it.
Security is no doubt the Militarists' most seductive bait to catch the
coward's vote. But their method makes security impossible, They
undertook to secure the English in Egypt from an imaginary Islam rising
by the Denshawai Horror, as a result of which nobody has ventured to
suggest that we should trust the Egyptian army in this conflict, though
India, having learnt from Mr. Keir Hardie and Mr. Ramsay Macdonald that
there are really anti-Militarists in England who regard Indians as
fellow creatures, is actually rallying to us against the Prussian
Junkers, who are, in Indian eyes, indistinguishable from the
Anglo-Indians who call Mr. Keir Hardie and Mr. Ramsay Macdonald
traitors, and whose panicstricken denial of even a decent pretence of
justice in the sedition trials is particularly unfortunate just now. We
must always take risks; and we should never trade on the terror of