war.

The interest in war also takes attention and effort away from the
remedying of social and moral evils; it is useless to attempt any moral
campaign while a war is on. Jane Addams tells us, in Twenty Years at
Hull House, that when she visited England in 1896 she found it full
of social enthusiasm, scientific research, scholarship, and public
spirit; while on a second visit, in 1900, all enthusiasm and energy
seemed to be absorbed by the Boer War, leaving little for humanitarian
undertakings.

(3) A less obvious, but even more lasting, evil is that caused by the
loss of the best blood of a nation. In general, the strongest and best
men go to the field; the weaklings and cowards are left to produce
the next generation. The inevitable result is racial degeneration.
The decline of the Greek and Roman civilizations was doubtless in large
part due to the continual killing off of the best stocks, until the
earlier and nobler breed of men almost ceased to exist. The effect
of modern war is the exact opposite of that of primitive war, where
all the men had to fight, and the strongest or bravest or swiftest
survived; strength and valor and speed avail nothing against modern
projectiles, and it is the stay-at-homes who are selected for survival,
in general the weakest and least worthy. War is the greatest of
dysgenic forces, and undoes the effect of a hundred eugenic laws.

(4) The vast and increasing expense of war is a very serious matter
for the moralist, because it means a drain of the resources that might
otherwise be utilized for the advance of civilization. The cost of
a modern war goes at least into the hundreds of millions of dollars,
and any great war would cost billions. Every shot from a modern sixteen