consequently more than ever important and necessary, since, in
the differences of culture and opinion which prevail between
individuals and classes, law is almost the only moral power
the force of which is acknowledged by all, and which binds all
together under common rules. This pleasing and cheering
circumstance is one which constantly meets us in the Institut
de Droit International. We see a general legal persuasion ever
in process of more and more distinct formation uniting all
civilised peoples. Men of nations readily disunited and
opposed--Germans and French, English and Russians, Spaniards
and Dutchmen, Italians and Austrians--are, as a rule, all of
one mind as to the principles of international law.

"This is what makes it possible to proclaim an international
law of war, approved by the legal conscience of all civilised
peoples; and when a principle is thus generally accepted, it
exerts an authority over minds and manners which curbs sensual
appetites and triumphs over barbarism. We are well aware of
the imperfect means of causing its decrees to be respected and
carried out which are at the disposal of the law of nations.
We know also that war, which moves nations so deeply, rouses
to exceptional activity the good qualities as well as the evil
instincts of human nature. It is for this very reason that the
jurist is impelled to present the legal principles, of the
need for which he is convinced, in a clear and precise form,
to the feeling of justice of the masses, and to the legal
conscience of those who guide them. He is persuaded that his
declaration will find a hearing in the conscience of those
whom it principally concerns, and a powerful echo in the
public opinion of all countries.