object, the cause of being, the supreme manifestation of armies. Every
measure which departs therefrom, which relegates it to the middle
ground is deceitful, chimerical, fatal. All the resources accumulated
in time of peace, all the tactical evolutions, all the strategical
calculations are but conveniences, drills, reference marks to lead up
to it. His obsession was so overpowering that his presentation of it
will last as long as history. This obsession is the role of man in
combat. Man is the incomparable instrument whose elements, character,
energies, sentiments, fears, desires, and instincts are stronger than
all abstract rules, than all bookish theories. War is still more of an
art than a science. The inspirations which reveal and mark the great
strategists, the leaders of men, form the unforeseen element, the
divine part. Generals of genius draw from the human heart ability to
execute a surprising variety of movements which vary the routine; the
mediocre ones, who have no eyes to read readily therein, are doomed to
the worst errors.

Ardant du Picq, haunted by the need of a doctrine which would correct
existing evils and disorders, was continually returning to the
fountain-head. Anxious to instruct promising officers, to temper them
by irrefutable lessons, to mature them more rapidly, to inspire them
with his zeal for historical incidents, he resolved to carry on and
add to his personal studies while aiding them. Daring to take a
courageous offensive against the general inertia of the period, he
translated the problem of his whole life into a series of basic
questions. He presented in their most diverse aspects, the basic
questions which perplex all military men, those of which knowledge in
a varying degree of perfection distinguish and classify military men.
The nervous grasp of an incomparable style models each of them, carves
them with a certain harshness, communicates to them a fascinating yet