life a still more difficult and complex task than to destroy it. Our
English habits of restless adventure, of latent revolt subdued to the
ends of law and order, of uncontrollable freedom and independence, are
even more fruitful here, in the organisation of the progressive tasks of
life, than they are in the organisation of the tasks of war.

That is the spirit in which these essays have been written by an
Englishman of English stock in the narrowest sense, whose national and
family instincts of independence and warfare have been transmuted into a
preoccupation with the more constructive tasks of life. It is a spirit
which may give to these little essays--mostly produced while war was in
progress--a certain unity which was not designed when I wrote them.


[1] O'Dalton, _Letters of Sidonius_, Vol. II., p. 149.




II


EVOLUTION AND WAR

The Great War of to-day has rendered acute the question of the place of
warfare in Nature and the effect of war on the human race. These have
long been debated problems concerning which there is no complete
agreement. But until we make up our minds on these fundamental questions
we can gain no solid ground from which to face serenely, or at all
events firmly, the crisis through which mankind is now passing.