death, nor forget that this wretchedest of all the trades is none the
less craven because it can so easily be gilt with romance and heroism
and solemn national duty and patriotism and the like by persons whose
superficial literary and oratorical talent covers an abyss of
Godforsaken folly.


*The Only Real World Danger.*

The one danger before us that nothing can avert but a general raising of
human character through the deliberate cultivation and endowment of
democratic virtue without consideration of property and class, is the
danger created by inventing weapons capable of destroying civilization
faster than we produce men who can be trusted to use them wisely. At
present we are handling them like children. Now children are very
pretty, very lovable, very affectionate creatures (sometimes); and a
child can make nitroglycerine or chloride of nitrogen as well as a man
if it is taught to do so. We have sense enough not to teach it; but we
do teach the grown-up children. We actually accompany that dangerous
technical training with solemn moral lessons in which the most
destructive use of these forces at the command of kings and capitalists
is inculcated as heroism, patriotism, glory and all the rest of it. It
is all very well to fire cannons at the Kaiser for doing this; but we do
it ourselves. It is therefore undeniably possible that a diabolical
rhythm may be set up in which civilization will rise periodically to the
point at which explosives powerful enough to destroy it are discovered,
and will then be shattered and thrown back to a fresh start with a few
starving and ruined survivors. H.G. Wells and Anatole France have
pre-figured that result in fiction; and I cannot deny the strength of
its probability; for if England and Germany can find no better way of