BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA
THE GIFT OF
CHARLES WILLIAM WENDTE
University of California • Berkeley Gift of
GRADUATE THEOLOGICAL UNION LIBRARY
THE
frue fettbw 0f Baftms:
AN ORATION,
BY CHARLES SUMNER,
DELIVERED
BEFORE THE AUTHORITIES OF THE CITY OF BOSTON,
JULY 4, 1845.
Oh ! yet a nobler task awaits thy hand !
For what can War but endless War still breed ?
Till Truth and Right from Violence be freed.
MILTON, SONNET TO FAIRFAX.
BOSTON:
AMERICAN PEACE SOCIETY. 1370.
CITY OF BOSTON, IN THE BOARD OF ALDERMEN, July 7, 1845.
Resolved, — That the thanks of this Board be presented, in behalf of the City Council, to CHARLES SUMNER, Esq., for the able and eloquent oration, delivered by him, before the Municipal Authori- ties of the City, at the recent celebration of the anniversary of the Declaration of the Independence of the United States; — and that he be requested to furnish a copy for the press.
Attest, 8. F. MCCLEARY, City Clerl
1 «7fi 9
CERTAINLY, if all who look upon themselves as men, not so much from the shape of their bodies, as because they are en- dowed with reason, would listen awhile unto Christ's wholesome and peaceable decrees, and, not puffed up with arrogance and conceit, rather believe their owne opinions than his admonitions ; the whole world long ago (turning the use of iron into milder workes), should have lived in most quiet tranquillity, and have met together in a firme and indissoluble League of most safe Concord. — ARNOBIUS, AD VERSUS GENTES, LIB. i., p. 6.
All high titles come hitherto from fighting. Your Herzog (Duke, Dux,) is leader of armies; your Earl (Jarl) is strong man ; Marshal, cavalry horse-shoer. A millenium, or reign of Peace, having been prophesied, and becoming daily more and more indubitable, may it not be apprehended that such fighting titles will cease to be palatable, and new and higher need to be devised ? — CARLYLE'S SARTOR RESARTUS.
THE
TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
In obedience to an uninterrupted usage of our community, we have all, on this Sabbath of the Na- tion, put aside the common cares of life, and seized a respite from the never-ending toils of labor, to meet in gladness and congratulation, mindful of the blessings transmitted from the Past, mindful also, I trust, of the duties to the Present and the Future. May he who now addresses you be en- abled so to direct your minds, that you shall not seem to have lost a day !.
THE NATIONAL ANNIVERSARY, AND ITS DUTIES.
All hearts turn first to the Fathers of the Re- public. Their venerable forms rise before us, in "the procession of successive generations. They come from the frozen rock of Plymouth, from the wasted bands of Raleigh, from the heavenly companionship of William Penn, from the anxious councils of the Revolution, and from all those fields of sacrifice, on which, in obedience to the Spirit of their Age, they sealed their devotion to duty with their blood. They speak to us, their children: " Cease to vaunt yourselves of what
6 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
you do, and of what has been done for you. Learn to walk humbly, and to think meekly of yourselves. Cultivate habits of self-sacrifice and of devotion to duty. Never aim at aught which is not BIGHT, persuaded that without this, every possession and all knowledge will become an evil and a shame ; and may these words of ours be always in your minds. Strive to increase the inheritance which we have bequeathed ; bearing in mind always, that, if we excel you in virtue, such a victory will be to us a mortification, while defeat will bring happi- ness. In this way, you may conquer us. Nothing is more shameful for a man, than to found his title to esteem, not on his own merits, but on the fame of his ancestors. The Glory of the Fathers is doubt- less to their children a most precious treasure ; but to enjoy it without transmission to the next genera- tion, and without any addition, this is the height of imbecility. Following these counsels, when your days are finished on earth, you will eome to join us, and we shall receive you as friends receive friends ; but if you neglect our words, expect no happy greeting then from us." *
Honor to the memory of our Fathers ! May the turf lie gently on their sacred graves ! Not in words only, but in deeds also, let us testify our reverence for their name. Let us imitate what in them was lofty, pure, and good ; let us from them learn to bear hardship and privation. Let us, who now reap in strength what they sowed in weak-
* This is borrowed almost literally from the words attributed by Plato to the Fathers of Athens, in the beautiful funeral dis- course of the Menezenus.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 7
ness, study to enhance the inheritance we have received. To do this, we must not fold our hands in slumber, nor abide content with the Past. To each generation is committed its peculiar task ; nor does the heart, which responds to the call of duty, find respite except in the world to come.
Be ours, then, the task which, in the order of Providence, has been cast upon us ! And what is this task? How shall we best perform our ap- pointed part ? What can we do, to make our com- ing welcome to our Fathers in the skies, and draw to our memory hereafter the homage of a grateful posterity? How may we add to the inheritance received ? The answer cannot fail to interest all, particularly on this festival, when we celebrate the Nativity of the Republic. In truth, it well becomes the patriot citizen, on this anniversary, to consider the national character, and how it may be advanced — as the good man dedicates his birthday to meditation on his life, and to aspira- tion for its improvement. Avoiding, then, all customary exultation in the abounding prosperity of the land, and in that Freedom, whose influence is widening to the uttermost circles of the earth, let us turn our thoughts on the character of our country, and humbly endeavor to learn what we must do, to the end that the Republic may best secure the rights and happiness of the people committed to its care ; that it may perform its part in the World's History ; that it may fulfil the aspira- tions of generous hearts ; and, practising that righteousness which exalteth a Nation, thus at- tain to the heights of True Grandeur.
8 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS NOT IN WAR.
With this aim, and believing that I can in no other way so fitly fulfil the trust reposed in me when I was selected as the voice of Boston, on this welcome Anniversary, I propose to consider what, in our age, are the true objects of National Ambition — what is truly National Honor — Na- tional Glory — WHAT is THE TRUE GRANDEUR OP NATIONS. I would not depart from the modesty that becomes me, but I am not without hope that I may contribute something to rescue these terms, now so powerful over the minds of men, from the mistaken objects to which they are ap- plied, from deeds of War, and the extension of empire, that they may be reserved for works of JUSTICE and BENEFICENCE.
The subject may be novel, on an occasion like the present; but it is comprehensive and trans- cendant in importance. It raises us to the con- templation of things that are not temporary or local in character ; but which belong to all ages and countries ; which are as lofty as Truth, as universal as Humanity. Nay, more ; it practically concerns the general welfare, not only of our own cherished Republic, i>ut of the whole Federation of Nations. At this moment, it derives a peculiar and urgent interest from transactions in which we are unhappily involved. On the one side, by an act of unjust legislation, extending our power over Texas, we have endangered Peace with Mexico ; while, on the other, by the petulant assertion of a disputed claim to a remote terri-
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 9
tory beyond the Rocky Mountains, we have kindled anew, on the hearth of our Mother Coun- try, the smothered fires of hostile strife. Mexico and England both aver the determination to vin- dicate what is called the National Honor; and our Government now calmly contemplates the dread Arbitrament of War, provided it cannot obtain what is called an honorable Peace.*
Far be from our country and our age the sin and shame of contests hateful in the sight of God and all good men, having their origin in no righteous though mistaken sentiment, in no true love of country, in no generous thirst for fame, that last infirmity of noble minds ; but springing in both cases from an ignorant and ignoble passion for new territories ; strengthened, in one case, by an unnat- ural desire, in this land of boasted freedom, to fasten by new links, the chains which promise soon to fall from the limbs of the unhappy slave ! In such contests, God has no attribute which can join with us. Who believes that the National Honor will be promoted by a war with Mexico, or a war with England? What just man would sacrifice a single human life, to bring under our rule both Texas and Oregon? An ancient Roman, a stranger to Christian truth, touched only by the relations of fellow-countryman, and not of. fellow-man said, as he turned aside from a career of Asiatic conquest,
* The official paper at Washington has said, "We presume the negotiation is really resumed, and will be prosecuted in this city, and not in London, to some definite conclusion — peace- ably, we should hope — but we wish for no peace but an honor" able peace."
10 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
that he would rather save the life of a single citi- zen, than become master of all the dominions of Mithridates.
A war with Mexico would be mean and cowardly ; with England it would be bold at least, though par- ricidal. The heart sickens at the murderous attack upon an enemy, distracted by civil feuds, weak at home, impotent abroad ; but it recoils in horror from the deadly shock between children of a com- mon ancestry, speaking the same language, soothed in infancy by the same words of love and tender- ness, and hardened into vigorous manhood under the bracing influence of institutions drawn from the same ancient founts of freedom. Ouram acuebat, quod adversus Latinos bellandum erat, lingua, mori bus, annorum genere, institutis ante omnia militari- bus, congruentes; milites militibus, centurionibus centuriones, tribuni tribunis compares, collegceque, iisdem pracesidiis, scepe iisdem manipulis permixti fuerant.*
IN OUR AGE THERE CAN BE NO PEACE THAT IS NOT HONORABLE ; THERE CAN BE NO WAR THAT IS
NOT DISHONORABLE. The True Honor of a Nation is to be found in deeds of Justice and Beneficence, securing and advancing the happiness of its people, inconsistent with War. In the clear eye of Chris- tian judgment, vain are its victories ; infamous are its spoils. He is the benefactor, and worthy of Honor, who brings, comfort where before was . wretchedness ; who dries the tear of sorrow ; who pours oil into the wounds of the unfortunate ; who feeds the hungry and clothes the naked ; who does
* Liv. VIII. c. 6.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. H
V.
justice ; who enlightens the ignorant ; who unlooses the fetter of the slave ; who, by virtuous genius, in art, in literature, in science, enlivens and exalts the hours of life ; who, by word, or action, inspires a love for God and for man. This is the Christian hero; this is the man of Honor in a Christian land. He is no benefactor, nor deserving of Honor, what- ever his worldly renown, whose life is passed in feats of brute force ; who renounces the great law of Christian brotherhood ; whose vocation is blood. Well may old Sir Thomas Browne exclaim, " The world does not know its Greatest Men ; " for thus far it has chiefly discerned the violent brood of battle, the armed men springing up from the drag- on's teeth sown by Hate, and cared little for the Truly Good Men, children of Love, guiltless of their country's blood, whose steps on earth have been noiseless as an angel's wing.
It must not be disguised that this standard differs from that of the world down to this day. The voice of man is yet given to praise of military chieftains ; and the honors of victory are chanted even by the lips of woman. The mother, while rocking her infant on- the knee, stamps upon his tender mind, at that age more impressible than wax, the images of War ; she nurses his slumbers with its melodies ; pleases his waking hours with its stories ; and selects for his playthings the plume and the sword. From the child is formed the man ; and who can weigh the influence of a mother's spirit on the opinions of later life ? The mind which trains the child is like the hand that commands the end of a long lever; a gentle effort at that time suffices to
12 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
heave the enormous weight of succeeding years. As the boy advances to youth, he is fed like Achilles, not on honey and milk only, but on bear's flesh and lion's marrow. He draws the nutriment of his soul from a literature, whose beautiful fields have been moistened by human blood. Fain would I offer my tribute to the Father of Poetry, standing with harp of immortal melody, on the misty moun- tain-top of distant antiquity ; to those stories of courage and sacrifice which emblazon the annals of Greece and Rome ; to the fulminations of Demos- thenes and the splendors of Tully ; to the sweet verse of Virgil and the poetic prose of Livy. Fain would I offer my tribute to the new literature, which shot up in modern times as a vigorous forest from the burnt site of ancient woods ; to the passionate song of the Troubadour of France, and the Minne- singer of Germany ; to the thrilling ballad of Spain, and the delicate music of the Italian lyre. But from all these has breathed the breath of War, that has swept the heart-strings of thronging generations of men !
And when the youth becomes a man, his country invites his service in War, and holds before his bewildered imagination the prizes of worldly Honor. For him is the pen of the historian, and the verse of the poet. His soul is taught to swell at the thought that he also is a soldier ; that his name shall be entered on the list of those who have borne arms for their country'; and perhaps he dreams that he too, may sleep, like the Great Captain of Spain, with a hundred trophies over his grave. The law of the land throws its sanction over this madness.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 13
The contagion spreads beyond those on whom is imposed any positive obligation. Peaceful citizens volunteer to appear as soldiers, and to affect in dress, arms, and deportment, what is called " the pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war." The ear- piercing fife has today filled our streets, and we have come to this Church on this National Sabbath, by the thump of drum, and with the parade of bristling bayonets.
It is not strange, then, that the Spirit of War still finds a home among us ; nor that its Honors continue to be regarded. All this may seem to give point to the bitter philosophy of Hobbes, who declared that the natural state of mankind was war, and to sustain the exulting language of the soldier in our own day, who has said, " War is the condi- tion of this world. From man to the smallest insect, all are at strife, and the glory of arms, which cannot be obtained without the exercise of honor, fortitude, courage, obedience, modesty, and temper- ance, excites the brave man's patriotism, and is a chastening correction of the rich man's pride." * This is broad and bold. In different mood, another British general is reported as saying, " Why, man, do you know that a grenadier is the greatest charac- ter in this world ; " and, after a moment's pause, with the added emphasis of an oath, " and I believe, in the next too." f All these spoke in harmony. If one is true, then all are true.
Alas ! in the existing relations of nations, the infi-
* Napier, Penins. War, VI. 688.
•j-Southey's Colloquies on the Progress of Society, vol. i. p. 211.
2
14 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
del philosopher, and the rhetorical soldier, to say nothing of the giddy general, find too much support for a theory which slanders human nature, and in- sults the goodness of God. It is true that there are impulses in us which unhappily tend to strife. There are propensities, that we have in common with the beast, which, if not kept in subordination to what in man is human, or, perhaps, divine, will break forth in outrage. This is the predominance of the animal qualities. Hence oome wars and fightings, and the false glory which crowns such barbarism. But the Christian elevation of nations, as of individuals, may well be determined by the extent to which these evil dispositions are re- strained. Nor does the Christian teacher ever perform his high office more truly than when, rec- ognizing the supremacy of the moral and intel- lectual faculties, he calls upon nations, as upon individuals, to declare independence of the bestial propensities, to abandon practices founded on these propensities, and in every way to beat down that profane spirit which is the genius of war. In mak- ing this appeal, he will be startled by the fact, as discreditable as important, that, while the muni- cipal law of each Christian nation — discarding the Arbitrament of Force — provides a judicial tribunal for the determination of controversies between indi- viduals, International law expressly establishes the Arbitrament of War for the determination of con- troversies between nations.
Here, then, in unfolding the True Grandeur of Nations, we encounter a practice, or custom, sanc- tioned by the Law of Nations, and constituting a
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 15
part of that law, which exists in defiance of princi- ples, such as no individuals can disown. If it is wrong and , inglorious in individuals to consent and agree to determine their petty controversies by combat, it must be equally wrong and in-glorious for nations to consent and agree to determine their vaster controversies by combat. Here is a positive, precise, and specific evil, of gigantic proportions — inconsistent with all that is truly honorable — mak- ing within the sphere of its influence all True Grandeur impossible — and it does not proceed from any uncontrollable impulses of our nature, but is expressly established and organized by law.
DEFINITION OF WAR.
As all citizens are parties to municipal law, and are responsible for its institutions, so are all the Christian nations parties to International Law, and responsible for its provisions. By recognizing these provisions, nations consent and agree before- hand to the Arbitrament of War, precisely as citi- zens, by recognizing Trial by Jury, consent and agree beforehand to the latter tribunal. As to understand the true nature of Trial by Jury, we first repair to the municipal law by which it is established : so, to understand the true nature of the Arbitrament of War, we must first repair to the Law of Nations.
Writers, of transcendent genius and learning, have defined this Arbitrament, and laid down the rules by which it is governed, constituting a complex code, with innumerable subtle provisions, regulating the resort to it, and the manner in which it shall
16 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OP NATIONS.
be conducted, — called the Laws of War. In these quarters, we catch our first authentic glimpse of its folly and wickedness. War is called by Lord Bacon, " One of the highest Trials of Right, when princes and states, that acknowledge no superior upon earth, shall put themselves upon the justice of God for the deciding of their controversies, by such success as it shall please Him to give on either side." (Works, vol. iii. p. 40.) This definition of the English philosopher has been adopted by the American jurist, Chancellor Kent, in his au- thoritative Commentaries on American Law (vol. i. p. 46). The Swiss Professor, Vattel, whose work is regarded as an important depository of the Law of Nations, defines War as " that state in which we prosecute our rights by Force" (Book III. ch. i. § 1.) In this, he very nearly follows the eminent Dutch authority, Bynkershoek, who says : " Bellum est eorum, qui suae potestatis sunt ; juris sui per- sequendi ergo, concertatio per vim vel dolum." (Qucest. Jur. Pub. Lib. I. ch. vi.) Mr. Whewell, who has done so much to illustrate philosophy in all its departments, says, in his recent work on the elements of Morality and Polity, " Though War is appealed to, because there is no other ULTIMATE TRIBUNAL to which states can have re- course, it is appealed to for justice" (Vol. ii. § 1146.) And in our country, Dr. Lieber says, in a work abounding in learning and sagacious thought (Political Ethics, vol. ii. 643), that War is a mode of obtaining rights, — a definition which hardly differs in form from that of Vattel and Bynkershoek.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 17
In harmony with these definitions, let me define the Evil which I now arraign. War is a public armed contest between nations, under "the sanction of International Law, to establish JUSTICE between them; as, for instance, to determine a disputed boundary line, or the title to territory.
This definition, it will be perceived, is confined to contests between nations. It is restrained to Inter- national War. It carefully excludes the question, so often agitated, of the right of revolution, and that other question, on which the friends of Peace sometimes differ, the right of personal self-defence. It does not in any way involve the question, of the right to employ force in the administration of jus- tice, or in the conservation of domestic quiet.
It is true that the term defensive is always applied to Wars in our day. And it is creditable to the moral sense of nations, that they feel con- strained to allege this seeming excuse, although its absurdity is attested by the fact, that it is advanced equally by each belligerent party. It is unreasonable to suppose that War can arise in the present age, under the sanctions of Interna- tional Law, except to determine an asserted right. Whatever may have been its character in periods of barbarism, or when invoked to repel an incursion of robbers or pirates — th.e enemies of the human race — War becomes in our day, among all the nations who are parties to existing International Law, simply a mode of litigation, or of deciding a Lis Pendens, between these nations. It is a mere TRIAL OF RIGHT. It is an appeal for justice to Force. The Wars that now lower from Mexico 2*
18 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
and from England are of this character. On the one side, we assert a title to Texas, which is dis- puted; and on the other, we assert a title to Oregon, which is disputed. It is only according to " martial logic," or the "flash language" of a dishonest pa- triotism, that the Ordeal by Battle in these causes can be regarded, on either side, as defensive War. Nor did the threatened War with France in 1834 promise to assume any different character. Its professed object was to secure the payment of five million dollars — in other words, to determine by this Ultimate Tribunal a simple question of justice. And, going back still further in our history, the avowed purpose of the War declared by the United States against Great Britain in 1812, was to obtain from the latter Power an abandonment of her claim to search American vessels. Unrighteous as was this claim, it is plain that War was here invoked only as a Trial of Right.
But it forms no part of my purpose to consider individual Wars in the Past, except so far as neces- sary by way of example. My aim is above this. I wish to expose the irrational, cruel, and impious custom of War, as sanctioned by the Law of Na- tions. On this account, I resort to that supreme law, for my definition. And here, let me be under- stood as planting myself on this definition. This is the foundation of the argument which I venture to submit.
ORDER OF TREATMENT.
When we have considered, in succession, first, the character of War; secondly, the miseries it
THE TRtt£ GKANDEtJE OF NATIONS. 19
produces ; and, thirdly r, its utter and shameful in- sufficiency, as a mode of determining justice, — we may be able to decide, strictly and logically, whether it must not be ranked with crimes from which no True Honor can spring, to individuals or nations, but rather condemnation and shame. It will then be important, in order to appreciate this Evil, and the necessity for its overthrow, to pass in review the various prejudices by which War is sustained, and especially that most pernicious prejudice, in obedience to which, uncounted sums are diverted from purposes of Peace to PREPARA- TIONS FOB WAR.
THE ANIMAL CHARACTER OF WAR.
I. And first, as to the character of War, or that part of our nature in which it has its origin. Lis- ten to the voice of the ancient poet of Boeotian Ascra : —
This is the law for mortals, ordained by the Ruler of Keayen ; Fishes^and Beasts and Birds of the air devour each other ; JUSTICE dwells not among them ; only to MAN has he given JUSTICE the Highest and Best.*
These words of the early Hesiod exhibit the dis- tinction between man and the beast ; but this very distinction belongs to the present discussion. The first idea that rises to the mind, is, that War is a
* Hesiod, Works and Days, v. 276-279 . Cicero also says : — Neque ulla re longius absumus a natura ferarum, in quibus in esse fortitudinern ssepe dicimus, ut in equis, in leonibus ; justi- tiarn, equitatem, bonitatem non dicimus.— De Offic. Lib. L cap. 16.
20 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
resort to brute Force, whereby each nation strives to overpower the other. Reason, and the divine part of our nature, in which alone we differ from the beast, in which alone we approach the Divinity, in which alone are the elements of justice, the pro- fessed object of War, are dethroned. It is, in short, a temporary adoption, by men, of the char- acter of beasts, emulating their ferocity, rejoicing like them in blood, and seeking, as with a lion's paw, to hold an asserted right. In more recent days, this character of War is somewhat disguised, by the skill and knowledge which it employs ; it is, however, still the same, made more destructive by the genius and intellect which have become its servants. The primitive poets, in the unconscious simplicity of the world's childhood, make this boldly apparent. The heroes of Homer are likened in rage to the ungovernable fury of animals, or to things devoid of reason or affection. Menelaus presses his way through the crowd, " like a beast." Sarpedon is aroused against the Argives, "as a lion against the crooked-horned oxen ; " and after- wards rushes forward, " like a lion nourished on the mountains for a long time famished for want of flesh, but whose courage compels him to go even to the well-guarded sheepfold." The great Tela- monian Ajax in one and the same passage is likened to " a beast," " a tawny lion," and " an obstinate ass ; " and all the Greek chiefs, the flower of the camp, are described as ranged about Diomed, " like raw-eating lions, or wild boars whose strength is irresistible." Even Hector, the hero in whom cluster the highest virtues of polished War, is
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 21
called by the characteristic term, " the tamer of horses ; " and one of his renowned feats in battle, indicating brute strength only, is where he takes up and hurls a stone, which two of the strongest men could not easily put into a wagon ; and he drives over dead bodies and shields, while the axle is defiled by gore, and the guard about the seat, sprinkled from the horse's hoofs, and from the tires of the wheels ; and, in that most admired passage of ancient literature, before returning his child, the young Astyanax, to the arms of the wife he is about to leave, he invokes the gods for a single blessing on the boy's head, "that he may excel his father, and bring home bloody spoils, his enemy being slain, and so make glad the heart of his mother!"
From the early fields of modern literature, as from those of antiquity, similar illustrations might be gathered, all showing the unconscious degrada- tion of the soldier, who, in the pursuit of justice, re- nounces the human character, to assume that of the beast. Henry V., as represented by our own Shak- speare, in the spirit-stirring appeal to his troops,
says : —
"When the blast of war blows in our ears, Then imitate the action of the tiger.
This is plain and frank, and reveals the true char- acter of War.
I need not dwell on the moral debasement that must ensue. The passions are unleashed like so many blood-hounds, and suffered to rage. All the crimes which fill our prisons stalk abroad, plaited with the soldier's garb, and unwhipt of justice.
22 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
Murder, robbery, rape, arson, theft, are the sports of this fiendish Saturnalia, when
The gates of mercy shall be all shut up, And the fleshed soldier, rough and hard of heart, In the liberty of bloody hand shall range With conscience wide as hell.
Such is the foul disfigurement which War pro- duces in man, of whom it has been so beautifully said, " How noble in reason, how infinite in facul- ties ! in form and moving, how express and admira- ble ! in action, how like an angel ! in apprehension, how like a god ! "
CONSEQUENCES OP WAR, AND ITS HORRORS.
II. The immediate effect of War is to sever all relations of friendship and commerce between the belligerent nations, and every individual thereof, impressing upon each citizen, or subject, the charac- ter of enemy. Imagine this change between Eng- land and the United States. The innumerable ships of the two countries, the white doves of commerce, bearing the olive of peace, are driven from the sea, or turned from their proper purpose to be ministers of destruction ; the threads of social and business intercourse, so carefully woven into a thick web, are suddenly snapped asunder ; friend can no longer communicate with friend ; the twenty thousand letters, which are speeded each fortnight from this port alone, can no longer be sent ; and the human affections, of which they are the precious expression, seek in vain for utterance. Tell me, you who have friends and kindred abroad, or who are bound to
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 23
foreigners by more worldly relations of commerce, are you prepared for this rude separation ?
This is little, compared with what must follow. It is but the first portentous shadow of the disas- trous eclipse, the twilight usher of thick darkness, covering the whole heavens as with a pall, broken only by the blazing lightnings of battle and siege.
These horrors redden every page of history ; while, to the scandal of humanity, they have never wanted historians to -describe them, with feelings kindred to those by which they were inspired. The demon that has drawn the sword, has also guided the pen. The favorite chronicler of modern Europe, Froissart — while bestowing his equal admiration upon braver}'" and cunning, upon the courtesy which pardoned, as upon the rage which caused the flow of blood in torrents — dwells with especial delight on "beautiful captures," " beautiful rescues," " beautiful prowesses," and " beautiful feats of arms ; " and he wantons in picturing the assaults of cities, " which, being soon gained by force, were robbed, and put to the sword without mercy, men, and women, and children, while the churches were burnt." * This was in a barbarous age. But popular writers, in our own day, dazzled by false ideas of greatness, at which reason and Christianity blush, do not hesitate to dwell on simi- lar scenes with terms of rapture and eulogy. Even the beautiful soul of Wilberforce, which sighed " that the bloody laws of his country sent many unprepared into another world," by capital punish-
* Froissart, c. 178, p. 68.
24 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
ment, could hail the slaughter of Waterloo, on the sabbath that he held so holy, by which thou- sands were hurried into eternity, as " a splendid victor}^." *
My present purpose is, less to judge the writer, than to expose the horrors on horrors which he applauds. At Tarragona, above six thousand hu- man beings, almost all defenceless, men and women, gray hairs and infant innocence, attractive youth and wrinkled age, were butchered by the infuriate troops in one night, and the morning sun rose upon a city whose streets and houses were inundated with blood. And yet this is called " a glorious ex- ploit." f Here was a conquest by the French. At a later day, Ciudad Rodrigo was stormed by the British ; when in the license of victory, there en- sued a savage scene of plunder and violence, while shouts and screams on all sides, mingled fearfully with the groans of the wounded. The churches were desecrated, the cellars of wine and spirits were pillaged; fire was wantonly applied to the city ; and brutal intoxication spread in every di- rection. Only when the drunken men dropped from excess, or fell asleep, was any degree of order restored ; and yet the storming of Ciudad Rodrigo is pronounced " one of the most brilliant exploits of the British army." { This " beautiful feat of arms " was followed by the storming of Badajoz, in which the same scenes were enacted again, with
* Life of Wilberforce, IV. 256, 261.
t Alison, Hist, of French Rev. VIII. 114,
J Alison, Hist. VIII. 189,
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 25
added atrocities. Let the story be told in the words of a partial historian, who saw what he so eloquently describes. " Shameless rapacity, brutal intemperance, savage lust, cruelty and murder, shrieks and piteous lamentations, groans, shouts, imprecations, the hissing of fire bursting from the houses, the crashing of doors and windows, and the report of muskets used in violence, resounded for two days and nights in the streets of Badajoz ! On the third, when the city was sacked, when the sol- diers were exhausted by their excesses, the tumult rather subsided than was quelled ! The wounded were then looked to, the dead disposed of." *
The same terrible War affords another instance of the atrocities of a siege, which cries to Heaven for judgment. For weeks before the surrender of Saragossa, the deaths were from four to five hun- dred daily ; the living were unable to bury the dead, and thousands of carcasses, scattered in streets and court-yards, or piled in heaps at the doors of churches, were left to dissolve in their own corruption, or be licked up by the flames of the burning houses. The city was shaken to its foundation, by sixteen thousand shells thrown during the bombardment, and the explosion of forty-five thousand pounds of powder in the mines ; while the bones of forty thousand persons, of every age and both sexes, bore dreadful testimony to the unutterable cruelty of War.
These might seem to be pictures from the age of Alaric, Scourge of God, or of Attila, whose boast
* Napier, History of Penins. War, IV. 431. 3
26 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
was, that the grass did not grow where his horse had set his foot ; but no ! they belong to our own times. They are portions of the wonderful but wicked career of him who stands forth as the fore- most representative of worldly Grandeur. The heart aches, as we follow him and his marshals from field to field of Satanic Glory,* finding every- where, from Spain to Russia, the same carnival of woe. The picture is various, yet identical in char- acter. Suffering, wounds, and death in every form, fill the terrible canvas. What scene more dismal than that of Albuera, with its horrid piles of corpses, while all night the rain pours down, and river, hill, and forest, on each side, resound with the cries and groans of the dying ? What scene more monumental than that at Salamanca, where, long after the great battle, the ground, strewn with fragments of casques and cuirasses, was still blanched by the skeletons of those who fell? What catalogue of horror more complete than the Russian campaign? At every step there is war, and this is enough ; — soldiers black with powder ; bayonets bent with the violence of the encounter ; the earth ploughed with cannon-shot; trees torn
*A living poet of Italy, who will be placed by his prose among the great names of his country's literature, in a remark- able ode, which, he has thrown on the Urn of Napoleon, leaves to posterity to judge whether his career of battle was True
Glory.
Fu ver a gloria? Aiposteri
L'ardua sentenza.
Manzoni, II Cinque Maggio.
"When men learn to appreciate moral Grandeur, the easy sen- tence will be rendered.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 27
and mutilated ; the dead and dying ; wounds and agony; fields covered with broken carriages, out- stretched horses, and mangled bodies ; while dis- ease, sad attendant on military suffering, sweeps thousands from the great hospitals of the army, and the multitude of amputated limbs, which there is no time to destroy, accumulate in bloody heaps, filling the air with corruption. What tongue, what pen, can describe the bloody havoc at Borodino, where, between rise and set of a single sun, more than one hundred thousand of our fellow-men, equalling in number the population of this whole city, sank to earth, dead or wounded? Fifty days after the battle, no less than twenty thousand are found, stretched where they gasped out their breath, and the whole plain is strewn with half-buried car- casses of men and horses, intermingled with garments dyed in blood, and bones gnawed by dogs and vul- tures. Who can follow the French army, in dismal retreat, avoiding the spear of the pursuing Cossack, only to sink beneath the sharper frost and ice, in a temperature below zero, on foot, without shel- ter for the bod3r, famishing on horse-flesh and a miserable compound of rye and snow-water ? With a fresh array, the war is continued against new forces under the walls of Dresden ; and as the emperor — after indulging in royal supper with the king of Saxony — rides over the field of battle, he sees ghastly new-made graves, with hands and arms projecting, stark and stiff, above the earth. And shortly afterwards, when shelter is needed for the troops, the order is given to occupy the Hospitals for the Insane, saying, " turn out the mad."
28 THE- TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
WAR ILLUSTRATED BJ SIEGE OF GENOA.
Why follow further in this career of blood? There is one other picture of the atrocious, though natural consequences of War, occurring almost within our own day, that I would not omit. Let me bring to your mind Genoa, called the Superb, City of palaces, dear to the memory of American childhood as the birthplace of Christopher Colum- bus, and one of the spots first enlightened by the morning beams of civilization, whose merchants were princes, and whose rich argosies, in those early days, introduced to Europe the choicest products of the East, the linen of Egypt, the spices of Arabia, and the silks of Samarcand. She still sits in queenly pride, as she sat then, — her mural crown studded with towers, — her churches rich with marble floors and rarest pic- tures, — her palaces of ancient doges and admi- rals yet spared by the hand of Time, — her close streets, thronged by one hundred thousand inhabi- tants, — at the feet of the maritime Alps, as they descend to the blue and tideless waters of the Mediterranean Sea, — leaning with her back against their strong mountain-sides, overshadowed by the foliage of the fig-tree and the olive, while the orange and the lemon fill with their perfume the air where reigns perpetual spring. Who can con- template such a city without delight? Who can listen to the story of her sorrows without a pang ?
In the last autumn of the last century, the armies of the French Republic, which had domi- nated over Italy, were driven from their conquests,
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 29
•
and compelled, with shrunk forces, to seek shelter under Massena, within the walls of Genoa. After various efforts by the Austrian general on the land, aided by a bombardment from the British fleet in the harbor, to force the strong defences by assault, the city was invested by a strict blockade. All communication with the country was cut off, while the harbor was closed by the ever-wakeful British watch-dogs of war. Besides the French troops, within the beleagured and unfortunate city, were the peaceful unoffending inhabitants, more than those of Boston in number. Provisions soon become scarce ; scarcity sharpens into want, till fell Famine, bringing blindness and madness in her train, rages like an Erinnys. Picture to yourself this large population, not pouring out their lives in the exulting rush of battle, but wasting at noonday, the daughter by the side of the mother, the husband by the side of the wife. When grain and rice fail, flaxseed, millet, cocoas, and almonds are ground by hand-mills into flour, and even bran, baked with honey, is eaten not to satisfy, but to deaden hunger. During the seige, but before the last extremities, a pound of horse-flesh is sold for thirty-two cents ; a pound of bran for thirty cents ; a pound of flour for $1.75. A single bean is soon sold for four cents, and a biscuit of three ounces for $2.25, and none are finally to be had. The wretched soldiers, after devouring all the horses, are reduced to the degradation of feeding on dogs, cats, rats, and worms, which are eagerly hunted in the cellars and common sewers. Happy were now, exclaims an Italian historian, not those who lived, but those 3*
3p THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
who died ! The day is dreary from hunger ; the night more dreary still, from hunger accompanied by delirious fancies. Recourse is had to herbs, — monk's rhubarb, sorrel, mallows, wild succory. People of every condition, women of noble birth and beauty, seek on the slope of the mountain within the defences, those aliments which nature destined solely for the beasts. A scrap of cheese and scanty vegetables are all that can be afforded to the sick and wounded, those sacred stipendiaries of human charity. Men and women, in the last anguish of despair, fill the air with groans and shrieks ; some in spasms, convulsions, and contor- tions, gasping their expiring breath on the unpity- ing stones of the streets ; alas ! not more unpitying than man. Children, whom a dying mother's arms had ceased to protect, the orphans of an hour, with piercing cries, seek in vain the compassion of the passing stranger ; but none pity or aid. The sweet fountains of sympathy are all closed by the selfishness of individual distress. In the general agony, some precipitate themselves into the sea, while the more impetuous rush from the gates, and impale their bodies on the Austrian bayonets. Others still (pardon the dire recital !) are driven to devour their shoes and the leather of their pouches ; and the horror of human flesh so far abates, that numbers feed like cannibals on the corpses about them.*
*This account has been drawn from the animated sketches of Botta (History of Italy, under Napoleon, vol. i. cap. i.), Ali- son (History of French Rev., vol. iv. cap. xxx.), and Arnold (Modem History, lee. iv.). The humanity of the latter is
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 31
At this stage, the French general capitulated, claiming and receiving what are called " the honors of War ; " but not before twenty thousand innocent persons, old and young, women and children, having no part or interest in the contest, had died the most horrible of deaths. The Austrian flag floated over the captured Genoa but a brief span of time ; for Bonaparte had already descended, like an eagle from the Alps, and in less than a fortnight after- wards, on the plains of Marengo, shattered, as with an iron mace, the Austrian empire in Italy.
DESOLATE HOMES.
But wasted lands, famished cities, and slaugh- tered armies are only a part of " the purple testa- ment of bleeding war." Every soldier is connected with others, as all of you, by dear ties of kindred, love, and friendship. He has been sternly sum- moned from the embrace of family. To him, there is, perhaps, an aged mother, who has fondly hoped to lean her decaying frame upon his more youthful form; perhaps a wife, whose life has been just
particularly aroused to condemn this most atrocious murder of innocent people, and he suggests, as a sufficient remedy, a modi- fication of the Laws of War, permitting all non-combatants to withdraw from a blockaded town ! In this way, they may be spared a languishing death by starvation ; but they must desert firesides, pursuits, all that makes life dear, and become homeless exiles, — a fate little better than the former. It is strange that Arnold's pure soul and clear judgment did not recognize the truth, that the whole custom or institution of War is unrighteous and unlawful, and that the horrors of this siege are its natural consequence. Laws of War ! Laws in what is lawless ! rules of wrong! There can be only one law of War; that is the great law, which pronounces it unwise, unchristian, and unjust.
32 THE TEUE GEANDEUE OF NATIONS.
entwined inseparably with his, now condemned to wasting despair ; perhaps sisters, brothers. As he falls on the field of war, must not all these rush with his blood ? But who can measure the distress that radiates as from a bloody sun, penetrating innu- merable homes? Who can give the guage and dimensions of this incalculable sorrow? Tell me, ye who feel the bitterness of parting with dear friends -and kindred, whom you watch tenderly till the last golden sands are run out and the great hour-glass is turned, what is the measure of your anguish? Your friend departs, soothed by kind- ness and in the arms of Love ; the soldier gasps out his life with no friend near, while the scowl of Hate darkens all that he beholds, darkens his own departing soul. Who can forget the anguish that fills the bosom and crazes the brain of Leonora, in the matchless ballad of Burger, when seeking in vain among returning squadrons for her lover left dead on Prague's ensanguined plain? But every field of blood has many Leonoras. Every war has its desolate homes, as is most vividly pictured by a master poet of antiquity, whose verse is an argu- ment.*
But through the bounds of Grecia's land, Who sent her sons for Troy to part, See mourning, with much suffering heart, On each man's threshold stand, On each sad hearth in Grecia's land. Well may her soul with grief be rent; She well remembers whom she sent, She sees them not return ;
* Agamemnon of ^Eschylus ; Chorus. This is from the beau- tiful translation by John Symmons.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 33
Instead of men, to each man's home,
Urns and ashes only come,
And the armor which they wore ;
Sad relics to their native shore.
For Mars, the barterer of the lifeless clay,
Who sells for gold the slain,
And holds the scale in battle's doubtful day,
High balanced o'er the plain,
From Ilium's walls for men returns
Ashes and sepulchral urns ;
Ashes wet with many a tear,
Sad relics of the fiery bier.
Round the full urns the general groan
Goes, as each their kindred own.
One they mourn in battle strong,
And one, that 'mid the armed throng
He sunk in glory's slaughtering tide,
And for another's consort died.
****** Others they mourn whose monuments stand By Ilium's wall on foreign strand ; "Where they fell, in beauty's bloom, There they lie in hated tomb ; Sunk beneath the massy mound, In eternal chambers bound.
WAR INEFFECTUAL TO ESTABLISH JUSTICE.
III. But all these miseries are to no purpose. War is utterly ineffectual to secure or advance the object which it professes to seek. The wretched- ness which it entails, contributes to no end, helps to establish no right, and, therefore, in no respect determines justice between the contending nations.
The fruitlessness and vanity of War appear in the great conflicts by which the world has been lacerated. After long struggle, where each nation inflicts and receives incalculable injury, peace has been gladly obtained on the basis of the condition before the War, known as the Status ante Bellum.
34 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
I cannot better illustrate this point, than by the familiar example — humiliating to both countries — of the last war with Great Britain, the professed object of which was to obtain from the latter Power a renunciation of her insolent claim to impress our seamen. The greatest number of American seamen officially alleged to be compulsorily serving in the British navy was about eight hundred. To overturn this injustice, the Arbitrament of War was invoked, and the whole country was doomed for more than three years to its accursed blight. American commerce was driven from the seas ; the resources of the land were drained by taxa- tion ; villages on the Canadian frontier were laid in ashes ; the metropolis of the Republic was cap- tured, while gaunt distress raged everywhere within our borders. Weary at last with this rude Trial, our Government appointed Commissioners to treat for Peace, with these specific instructions: "Your first duty will be to conclude peace with Great Britain ; and you are authorized to do it, in case you obtain a satisfactory stipulation against im- pressment, one which shall secure under our flag protection to the crew. If this encroachment of Great Britain is hot provided against, the United States have appealed to arms !in vain" * After- wards, finding small chance of extorting from Great Britain a relinquishment of the unrighteous claim, and foreseeing only an accumulation of ca- lamities from an inveterate prosecution of the War, our Government directed their negotiators, in con-
• American State Papers, vol. vii. p. 577.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 35
eluding a treaty of Peace, " to omit any stipulation on the subject of impressment" The instructions were obeyed, and the Treaty that once more re- stored to us the blessings of Peace, so rashly cast away, but now hailed with an intoxication of joy, contained no allusion to impressment, nor did it provide for the surrender of a single American sailor detained in the British navy. Thus, by the confession of our own Government, " the United States had appealed to arms IN VAIN. "
All this is the natural result of an appeal to War, in order to establish justice. Justice implies the exercise of the judgment in the determination of right. Now War not only supersedes the judgment, but delivers over the pending question to superiority of /orce, or to chance.
.Superior Force may end in conquest ; this is its natural consequence ; but it cannot adjudicate any right. We expose the absurdity of its Arbitra- ment, when, by a familiar phrase of sarcasm, we speak of the right of the strongest — excluding, of course, all idea of right, except that of the lion, as he springs upon a weaker beast ; of the wolf, as he tears in pieces the lamb ; of the vulture, as he fattens upon the dove. The grossest spirits will admit that this is not justice.
But the battle is not always to the strong. Supe- riority of Force is often checked by the proverbial contingencies of War. Especially are such con- tingencies revealed in rankest absurdity, where nations, as is their acknowledged custom, without regard to their respective forces, whether weaker or stronger, voluntarily appeal to this mad Urn-
36 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
pirage. Who can measure beforehand the currents of the heady fight? In common language, we speak of the chances of battle ; and soldiers whose lives are devoted to this harsh vocation, yet call it a game. The Great Captain of our age, who seemed to drag victory at his chariot-wheels, in a formal address to his officers, on entering Russia, says, " In war, fortune has an equal share with ability in procuring success." * The famous victory of Marengo, accident of an accident, wrested unex- pectedly at the close of the day from a foe, who at an earlier hour was successful, taught him the uncertainty of War. Afterwards, in bitterness of spirit, when his immense forces had been shivered, and his triumphant eagles driven back with broken wing, he exclaimed, in that remarkable conversa- tion recorded by the Abbee de Pradt : " Well, this is War. High in the morning, — low enough at night. From a triumph to a fall, is often but a step." f The same sentiment is repeated by the military historian of the Peninsular campaigns, when he says : " Fortune always asserts her su- .premacy in War ; and often from a slight mistake, such disastrous consequences flow, that, in every age and in every nation, the uncertainty of wars has been proverbial ; " J and again, in another place, considering the conduct of Wellington, the same military historian, who is an unquestionable au- thority, confesses : " A few hours' delay, an acci- dent, a turn of fortune, and he would have been foiled ! Ay ! but this is War, always dangerous
• Alison, VIII. 346. f Ib. IX. 239. J Napier, IV. 687.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 37
and uncertain, an ever-rolling wheel, and armed with scythes." * And can intelligent man look for justice to an ever-rolling wheel armed with scythes? Chance is written on every battle-field. It may be discerned less in the conflict of large masses, than in that of individuals, though equally present in each. How capriciously the wheel turned when the fortunes of Rome were staked on the combat between the Horatii and Curiatii ! — and who, at one time, could have augured that the single Hora- tius, with two slain brothers on the field, would overpower the three living enemies? But this is not alone. In all the combats of history, involving the fate of individuals or nations, we learn to revolt at the frenzy which carried questions of property, of freedom, or of life, to a judgment so uncertain and senseless.
THE TRIAL BY BATTLE.
During the early modern centuries, and especially in the moral night of the dark ages, the practice extensively prevailed throughout Europe, of sub- mitting controversies, whether of individuals or communities, to this adjudication. I pass over the custom of Private War, though it aptly illustrates the subject, stopping merely to join in that delight, which, — at a time of ignorance, before this mode of determining justice had gradually yielded to the ordinances of monarchs and an advancing civiliza- tion,— hailed its temporary suspension, as The
* Napier IV 477.
38 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
Truce of God; and I come at once to the Judicial Combat, or TRIAL BY BATTLE. In this custom, or institution, as in a mirror, we may behold the hideousness of War.
Trial by Battle was a formal and legitimate mode of deciding controversies, principally between in- dividuals. Like other ordeals, by burning plough- shares, by holding hot iron, by dipping the hand in hot water or hot oil — and like the great Ordeal of War — it was a presumptuous appeal to Provi- dence, under an apprehension and hope, that Heaven would give the victory to him who had the right. Its object was precisely the professed object of War, — the determination of Justice. It was sanc- tioned by Municipal Law as an Arbitrament for in- dividuals ; as War — to the scandal of civilization — is still sanctioned by International Law, as an Arbitrament for nations. Men, says the brilliant Frenchman, Montesquieu, subject to rules even their prejudices ; and Trial by Battle was sur- rounded by artificial regulations of multifarious detail, constituting an extensive system, determin- ing how and when it should be waged ; as War is surrounded by a complex code, known as the Laws of War.
No question was too sacred, grave, or recondite for this Tribunal. The title of an abbey to a neigh- boring church, in France, was decided by it ; and an emperor of Germany, according to a faithful ecclesiastic, " desirous of dealing honorably with his people and nobles " (mark here the standard of honor !), waived the judgment of the court on a grave question of law, as to the descent of property,
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 39
and referred it to champions. Human folly did not stop here. In Spain, a subtle point of theology was submitted to the same determination. But Trial by Battle was not confined to particular coun- tries or to rare occasions. It prevailed everywhere in Europe, superseding in many places all other ordeals and even trials by proofs, and extending not only to criminal matters, but to questions of prop- erty. Like War in our day, its justice and fitness as an Arbitrament were early doubted or con- demned. Luitprand, a king of the Lombards, in Italy, during that middle period which belongs neither to ancient nor to modern times, in a law bearing date 713, expresses his distrust of it as a mode of determining justice ; but the monarch is compelled to add that, considering the custom of his Lombard people, he cannot forbid the impious law. His words deserve emphatic mention : Propter con- suetudinem gentis nostrse Longobardorum legem im- piam vetare nonpossumus.* The appropriate epithet by which he branded Trial by Battle is the im- portant bequest of the royal Lombard to a distant posterity. For this, the name of the law-giver will be cherished, with grateful regard, in the annals of civilization.
This custom received another blow from Rome. At the latter part of the thirteenth centuiy, Don Pedro of Aragon, after exchanging letters of de- fiance with Charles of Anjou, proposed to the latter a personal combat, which was accepted, on condition that Sicily should be the prize of sue-
* Muratori, Rerum Italic. Script, t. 2, p. 65.
40 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
cess.* Each called down upon himself all the vengeance of Heaven, and the last dishonor, if, at the appointed time, he failed to appear before the Seneschal of Aquitaine, or, in case of defeat, if he refused to consign Sicily undisturbed to the victor. While the two champions were preparing for the .lists, the pope, Martin IV., protested with all his power against this new Trial by Battle, which staked the sovereignty of a kingdom, a feu- datory of the Holy See, on a wild stroke of chance. By a papal bull, dated at Civita Vecchia, April 5th, 1283, he threatened excommunication to either of the princes, who proceeded to a combat which he pronounced criminal and abominable. By a letter of the same date, the Pope announced to Edward I. of England, Duke of Aquitaine, the agreement of the two princes, which he most earnestly declared to be full of indecency and rashness, hostile to the concord of Christendom, and careless of Christian blood ; and he urged upon the English monarch to spare no effort to prevent the combat — menacing him with excommunication, and his territories with interdict, if it should take place. Edward re- fusing to guarantee the safety of the combatants in Aquitaine, the parties retired without consummat- ing their duel. The judgment of the Holy See, which thus accomplished its immediate object, though not in terms directed to the suppression of the custom of Trial by Battle, remains, neverthe- less, from its peculiar energy of language, in per- petual testimony against it.
*Sismondi, Histoire des Fran9, VIII. 338-340.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 41
ST. LOUIS ABOLISHES TRIAL BY BATTLE IN FRANCE.
To a monarch of France belongs the honor of first interposing the royal authority, for the entire suppression within his jurisdiction, of this impious custom, so universally adopted, so dear to the no- bility, and so profoundly rooted in the institutions of the Feudal Age. And here let me pause with reverence, as I mention the name of St. Louis, a prince, whose unenlightened errors may find easy condemnation in an age of larger toleration and wider knowledge, but whose firm and upright soul, whose exalted sense of justice, whose fatherly re- gard for the happiness of his people, whose respect for the rights of others, whose conscience, void of offence before God and man, make him foremost among Christian rulers, and the highest example for a Christian prince or a Christian people, — in one word, a model of True Greatness. He was of angelic conscience, subjecting all that he did to the single and exclusive test of moral rectitude, disre- garding every consideration of worldly advantage, every fear of worldly consequence.
His soul, thus tremblingly sensitive to questions of right, was shocked by the judicial combat. It was a sin, in his sight, thus to tempt God, by demanding of him a miracle, whenever judgment was pronounced. From these intimate convictions sprung a royal Ordinance, first promulgated at a Parliament assembled in 1260: " We forbid to all persons throughout our dominions the TRIAL BY BAT- TLE ; and instead of battles, we establish proofs by witnesses; and we do not take away the other good 4*
42 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
and loyal proofs which have been used in lay courts to this day. * * * AND THESE BAT- TLES WE ABOLISH IN OUR DOMINIONS FOREVER." *
Such were the restraints on the royal authority, that this Ordinance did not extend to the demesnes of the barons and feudatories of the realm, being confined in its operation to those of the king. But where the power of the sovereign did not reach, there he labored by example, influence, and express intercession ; treating with many of the great vas- sals, and inducing them to renounce this unnatural usage. Though for many years later it vexed some parts of France, its overthrow commenced with the Ordinance of St. Louis.
Honor and blessings attend the name of this truly Christian king; who submitted all his actions to the Heaven-descended sentiment of duty ; who be- gan a long and illustrious reign, by renouncing and restoring a portion of the conquests of his predeces- sor, saying to those about him, whose souls did not ascend to the height of his morality, " I know that the predecessors of the king of England have lost by the right of conquest the land which I hold ; and the land which I give him, I do not give be- cause I am bound to him or his heirs, but to put love between my children and his children, who are cousins- german; and it seems to me that what I thus give, I employ to good purpose ! " f Honor to him who never grasped by force or cunning any new acquisition ; who never sought advantage from
* Guizot, Histoire de la Civilization en France, IV. 162-164. 1 1 b. IV. 151.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 43
the turmoil and dissension of his neighbors, but studied to allay them ; — who, first of Christian Princes, rebuked the Spirit of War, saying to those who would have him profit by the strifes of others, "Blessed are the Peacemakers;"* who, by an immortal Ordinance, abolished Trial by Battle throughout his dominions ; who executed equal justice to all, whether his own people, or neigh- bors, and in the extremity of his last illness on the sickening sands of Tunis, among the bequests of his spirit, enjoined on his son and successor, " in maintaining justice, to be inflexible and loyal, turning neither to the right hand nor to the left ! " f
TRIAL BY BATTLE ABOLISHED IN ENGLAND.
To condemn Trial by Battle, no longer requires the sagacity above his age of the Lombard mon- arch, or the intrepid judgment of the Sovereign Pontiff, or the ecstatic soul of St. Louis. An inci- dent of history, as curious as it is authentic, illus- trates this point, and shows the certain progress of opinion. This custom, as a part of the common law of England, was partially restrained by Henry II., and rebuked at a later day by Elizabeth. Though fallen into desuetude, quietly overruled by the enlightened sense of successive generations, yet, to the disgrace of English jurisprudence, it was not legislatively abolished till almost in our own day, — as late as 1817, — when the right to it was
* Benoist soient tuit li apaiseur. Joinville, p. 143. •»• Sismondi, Histoire des Fran^. VIII. 196,
44 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
openly claimed in Westminster Hall. An ignorant man charged with murder, — whose name, Abraham Thornton, is necessarily connected with the history of this monstrous usage, — being proceeded against by the ancient process of appeal, pleaded, when brought into court, as follows : " Not guilty, and I am ready to defend the same by my body ; " and thereupon taking off his glove, he threw it upon the floor. The appellant not choosing to accept this challenge, abandoned his proceedings. The bench, the bar, and the whole kingdom were startled by the outrage ; and at the next session of parliament, Trial by Battle was abolished in England. On in- troducing a bill for this purpose, the Attorney- General remarked, in appropriate terms, that "if the party had persevered, he had no doubt the legislature would have felt it their imperious duty to interfere, and pass an ex post facto law to prevent so degrading a spectacle from talcing place."*
These words aptly portray the impression which Trial by Battle excites in our day. Its folly and wickedness are apparent to all. As we revert to those early periods in which it prevailed, our minds are impressed by the general barbarism ; we recoil with horror from the awful subjection of justice to brute force ; from the impious profanation of God in deeming him present at these outrages ; from the moral degradation out of which they sprang, and which they perpetuated ; we involve ourselves in self-complacent virtue, and thank God that we are
* Annual Register, vol. Ixi. p. 52 (1819) ; Blackstone, Com. Ill 337, Chitty's note.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 45
not as these men, that ours is an age of light, while theirs was an age of darkness !
ONE AND THE SAME LAW OF RIGHT FOR NATIONS AND INDIVIDUALS.
But do not forget, fellow-citizens, that this crimi- nal and impious custom, which we all condemn in the case of individuals, is openly avowed by our i own country, and by the other countries of the 'great Christian Federation — nay, that it is ex- pressly established by International Law — as the proper mode of determining justice between na- tions ; while the feats of hardihood by which it is waged, and the triumphs of its fields, are exalted beyond all other labors, whether of learning, in- dustry, or benevolence, as a well-spring of Glory. Alas ! upon our own heads be the judgment of barbarism, which we pronounce upon those that have gone before ! At this moment, in this period of light, while to the contented souls of many the noonday sun of civilization seems to be standing still in the heavens, as upon Gibeon, the relations between nations continue to be governed by the odious rules of brute violence, which once predomi- nated between individuals. The dark ages have not yet passed away ; Erebus and black Night, born of Chaos, still brood over the earth ; nor can we hail the clear day, until the hearts of the nations are touched, as the hearts of individual men, and all acknowledge one and the same Law of Eight.
Who has told you, fond man ! thus to find Glory in an act — when performed by a nation — which you condemn as a crime or a barbarism when com-
46 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
mitted by an individual ? In what vain conceit of wisdom and virtue do you find this incongruous morality? Where is it declared that God, who is no respecter of persons, is a respecter of multi- tudes ? Whence do you draw these partial laws of a powerful and impartial God ? Man is immortal ; but States are mortal. He has a higher destiny than States. Can States be less amenable to the supreme moral law ? Each individual is an atom of the mass. Must not the mass, in its con- science, be like the individuals of which it is com- posed? Shall the mass, in relations with other masses, do what individuals in relations with each other may not do? As in the physical creation, so in the moral, there is but one rule for individuals and masses. It was the lofty discovery of Newton, that the simple law, which determines the fall of an apple, prevails everywhere throughout the Universe — ruling each particle in reference to every other particle, whether large or small — reaching from earth to heaven, and controlling the infinite motions of the spheres ; so, with equal scope, another sim- ple law, the Law of Right, which binds the indi- vidual, binds also two or three when gathered together ; binds conventions and congregations of men ; binds villages, towns, and cities ; binds states, nations, and empires ; clasps the whole human family in its sevenfold embrace ; nay, more,
Beyond the flaming bounds of place and time, The living throne, the sapphire blaze,
it binds the angels of Heaven, the Seraphim, full of love, the Cherubim, full of knowledge ; above all, it
THE TEUE GEANDEUE OP NATIONS. tf
binds, in self-imposed bonds, a just and omnipotent God. This is the law, of Which the ancient poet sings, as Queen alike of mortals and immortals. It/ is of this, and not of any earthly law, that Hooker speaks in that magnificent period which sounds like an anthem ; "Of law, no less can be said, than that her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world ; all things in Heaven and earth do her homage, the very least as feeling her care, the greatest as not exempted from her power ; both angels and men, and creatures of what condition soever, though each in different sort and manner, yet all with uniform consent ad- miring her as the mother of their peace and joy." Often quoted, and justly admired, sometimes as the finest sentence of our English speech, this grand declaration cannot be more justly invoked than to condemn the pretension of one law for individuals and another for nations.
Stripped of all delusive apologies, and tried by that comprehensive law — under which nations are set to the bar like common men — "War falls from Glor}7 into barbarous guilt. It takes its place among bloody transgressions, while its flaming honors are turned into shame. Painful to existing prejudices as it may be, we must learn to abhor it, as we abhor similar trangressions by a vulgar offender. Every word of reprobation, which the enlightened conscience now fastens upon the savage combatant in Trial by Battle, or which it applies to the un- happy being, who, in murderous duel, takes the life of his fellow-man, belongs also to the nation that appeals to War. Amidst the thunders which
48 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
made Sinai tremble, God declared, " Thou shalt not kill ; " and the voice of these thunders, with this commandment, has been prolonged to our own day in the echoes of Christian churches. What mortal shall restrain the application of these words? Who on earth is empowered to vary or abridge the commandments of God? Who shall presume to declare, that this injunction was di- rected, not to nations, but to individuals only ; not to many, but to one only ; that one man may not kill, but that many may ; that one man may not slay in duel, but that a nation may slay a multitude in the duel of war ; that it is forbidden to each individual to destroy the life of a single human being, but that it is not forbidden to a nation to cut off by the sword a whole people ? We are struck with horror and our hair stands on end at the report of a single murder ; we think of the soul that has been hurried to its final account ; we seek the murderer ; and the State puts forth all its energies to secure his punishment. Viewed in the unclouded light of truth, what is War but organized murder ; murder of malice aforethought ; in cold blood ; under the sanctions of an impious law; through the operation of an extensive ma chinery of crime ; with innumerable hands ; at in- calculable cost of money; by subtle contrivances of cunning and skill ; or amidst the fiendish atro- cities of the savage brutal assault ?
The Scythian, undisturbed by- the illusion of military Glory, snatched a phrase of justice from an acknowledged criminal, when he called Alex- ander " the greatest robber in the world." And
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 49
the Roman satirist, filled with similar truth, in pungent words, touched to the quick that flagrant unblushing injustice which dooms to condign pun- ishment the very guilt, that in another sphere, and on a grander scale, under the auspices of a nation, is hailed with acclamation.
Ille crucem sceleris pretium tulit, hie diadema.*
Mankind, blind to the real character of War, while condemning the ordinary malefactor, may continue yet a little longer to crown its giant actors with Glory. A generous posterity may pardon to un- conscious barbarism the atrocities which they have waged ; but the whole custom — and it is of this that I speak — though sanctioned by existing law, cannot escape the unerring judgment of reason and religion. The outrages which, under solemn sanc- tions of law, it permits and invokes for professed purposes of justice, cannot be authorized by any human power ; and they must rise in overwhelming judgment, not only against those who wield the weapons of Battle, but more still against all who uphold its monstrous Arbitrament.
THE ST. LOUIS OF THE NATIONS.
When, oh ! when shall the St. Louis of the Nations arise — the Christian ruler, or Christian people, who, in the spirit of True Greatness, shall proclaim, that henceforward forever the great Trial by Battle shall cease; that "these battles" shall be abolished throughout the Commonwealth of civili-
* Juyenal, lat. xiii. 105.
50 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
zation ; that a spectacle so degrading shall nevei be allowed again to take place ; and that it is the duty of Nations, involving of course the highest policy, to establish love between each other, and, in all respects, at all times, with all persons, whether their own people or the people of other lands, to be governed by the sacred Law of Right, as between man and man. May God speed the coming of that day !
OBSTACLES.
I have already alluded, in the early part of this Address, to some of the obstacles encountered by the advocate of Peace. One of these is the war- like tone of the literature, by which our minds are formed. The world has supped so full with battles, that all its inner modes of thought, and many of its rules of conduct, seem to be incarnadined with blood ; as the bones of swine, fed on madder, are said to become red. But I now pass this by, though a fruitful theme, and hasten to other topics. I propose to consider in succession, very briefly, some of those prejudices, which are most powerful in keeping alive the custom of War.
BELIEF THAT WAR IS A NECESSITY.
1. One of the most important is the prejudice founded on a belief in its necessity. When War is called a necessit}', it is meant, of course, that its object can be attained in no other way. Now I think that it has already appeared with distinct- ness, approaching demonstration, that the pro- fessed object of War, which is justice between nations, is in no respect promoted by War ; that
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 51
force is not justice, nor in any way conducive to justice ; that the eagles of victory are the em- blems of successful force only, and not of es- tablished right. Justice is obtained solely by the exercise of reason and judgment; but these are silent in the din of arms. Justice is without passion ; but War lets loose all the worst passions of our nature, while " Chance, high arbiter, more embroils the fray." The age has passed in which a nation within the enchanted circle of civilization, can make war«upon its neighbor, for any professed purpose of booty or vengeance. It does " naught in hate, but all in honor." There are profession* of tenderness even which mingle with the first mutterings of strife. As if conscience-struck at the criminal abyss into which they are plunging, each of the great litigants seeks to fix the charge of hostile aggression on the other, and to set up the excuse of defending some asserted right, some Texas, some Oregon. Like Pontius Pilate, it vainly washes its hands of innocent blood, and straightway allows a crime at which the whole heavens are darkened, and two kindred countries are severed, as the vail of the Temple was rent in twain.
The proper modes, for the determination of in- ternational disputes, are Negotiation, Mediation, Arbitration, and a Congress of Nations — all prac- ticable and calculated to secure peaceful justice. These may be employed at any time under the existing Law of Nations. But the very law itself, which sanctions War, may be changed, as regards two or more nations by treaty between them, and as-
52 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
regards all the Christian nations by general con- sent. If nations can agree together in the solemn provisions of International Law, to establish War as an Arbiter of Justice, they can also agree together to abolish this Arbitrament, and to estab- lish peaceful substitutes; precisely as similar sub- stitutes have been established by municipal law to determine controversies among individuals. A system of Arbitration may be instituted by treaties, or a Congress of Nations may be charged with the high duty of organizing an Ultimate Tribunal instead of "these battles" for the decision -of international controversies. The will only is re- quired for success in this work.
Let it not be said, then, that War is a necessity ; and may our country aspire to the Glory of taking the lead in disowning the barbarous system of In- ternational LYNCH LAW,* and in proclaiming peaceful substitutes as the only proper mode of determining justice between nations ! Such a Glory, unlike the earthly fame of battle, will be immortal as the stars, dropping perpetual light upon the souls of men !
THE PRACTICE OP NATIONS NO RULE OP DUTY.
2. Another prejudice in favor of War is founded on the practice of nations, past and present. There is no crime or enormity in morals which may not find the support of human example, often on an extended scale. But it will not be urged in our day, that we are to look for a standard of duty in the conduct of vain, mistaken, fallible man. It is not in the power of man, by any subtle alchemy, to
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 53
transmute wrong into right. Because War is ac- cording to the practice of the world, it cannot follow that it is right. For ages, the world wor- shipped false gods ; but these gods were not less false, because all bowed before them. At this moment, the larger portion of mankind are Heathen ; but Heathenism is not true. It was once the practice of nations to slaughter prisoners of war ; but even the Spirit of War recoils now from this bloody sacrifice. In Sparta, theft, in- stead of being judged as a crime, was, by a per- verse morality, like War itself, dignified into an art and an accomplishment ; like War, it was ad- mitted into the system of youthful education ; and it was illustrated like War also, by an instance of unconquerable firmness, which is a barbaric counter- feit of virtue. The Spartan youth, with the stolen fox beneath his robe eating into his heart, is an example of mistaken fortitude, not unlike that which we are asked to admire in the soldier. Other illus- trations crowd upon the mind ; but I will not dwell upon them. We turn with disgust from Spartan cruelty and the wolves of Taygetus ; from the awful cannibalism of the Fejee Islands ; from the profane rites of innumerable savages; from the crushing Juggernaut ; from the Hindoo widow lighting her funereal pyre ; from the Indian danc- ing at the stake. But in their respective places and days, had not all these, like War, the sanction of established usage ?
It is often said, that we need not be wiser than our fathers. Rather strive to excel our fathers. What in them was good, imitate; but. do not bind our- 5*
54 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
selves, as in chains of Fate, by their imperfect ex- ample. Principles are higher than human examples. Examples may be followed when they accord with the admonitions of duty. But he is unwise who attempts to lean upon these, rather than upon those truths, which, like the Everlasting Arm, cannot fail ! In all modesty be it said, we have lived to little purpose, if we are not wiser than the generations that have gone before. It is the lofty distinc- tion of man that he is a progressive being ; that his reason at the present day is not merely the reason of a single human being, but the reason of the whole human race, in all ages from which knowledge has descended, in all lands from which it has been borne away. We are the heirs to an inheritance of truth, grandly accumulating from generation to generation. The child at his mother's knee is now taught the orbits of the heavenly bodies,
Where worlds on worlds compose one Universe,
the nature of this globe, the character of the tribes of men by which it is covered, and the geography of nations, to an extent far beyond the ken of the most learned in other days. Therefore, it is true that antiquity is the real infancy of man. Then it is, that he is immature, ignorant, wayward, child- ish, selfish, finding his chief happiness in pleasures of sense, unconscious of the higher delights of knowledge, justice, love. The animal nature reigns supreme, and he is driven on by the gross impulses of force. He seeks contest, war, and blood. But man is no larger in childhood. Reason and the
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 55
kindlier virtues of age, repudiating and abhorring force, now bear sway. We are the true Ancients. The single lock on the battered forehead of Old Time is thinner now than when our fathers at- tempted to grasp it; the hour-glass has been turned often since ; the scythe is heavier laden with the work of death.
Cease, then, to look for a lamp to our feet, in the feeble tapers that glimmer from the sepulchres of the Past. Rather hail those ever-burning lights above, in whose beams is the brightness of noon- day!
INFIDELITY OP THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.
3. There is a topic which I approach with diffi- dence, but in the spirit of frankness. It is the influence which War, though condemned by Christ, has derived from the Christian Church. When Constantino, on one of his marches, at the head of his army, beheld the luminous trophy of the cross in the sky, right above the meridian sun, in- scribed with these words, By this conquer, had his soul been penetrated by the true spirit of Him, whose precious symbol it was, he would have found in it no inspiration to the spear and the sword. He would have received the lesson of self-sacrifice, as from the lips of the Saviour, and have learned that by no earthly weapon of battle can true vic- tory be won. The pride of conquest would have been rebuked, and the bauble sceptre of Empire have fallen from his hands. By this conquer; by patience, suffering, forgiveness of evil, by all those virtues of which the cross is the affecting token,
56 THE TRUE GKANDEUB OF NATIONS.
conquer; and the victory shall be greater than any in the annals of Roman conquest ; — it may not find a place in the records of man, but it shall appear in the register of everlasting life.
The Christian Church, after the first centuries of its existence, failed to discern the peculiar spiritual beauty of the faith which it professed. Like Con- stant! ne, it found new incentives to War in the religion of Peace ; and such has been its character, even to our own day. The Pope of Rome, the as- serted head of the church, Vicegerent of Christ on earth, whose seal is a fisherman, on whose banner is a LAMB before the HOLY CROSS, assumed the command of armies, mingling the thunders of battle with the thunders of the Vatican. The dagger which projected from the sacred vestments of de Retz, while still an archbishop, was called by the Parisian crowd, u the Archbishop's Breviary." We read of mitred prelates in armor of proof, and seem still to catch the jingle of the golden spurs of the bishops in the streets of Cologne. The sword of knighthood was consecrated by the church; and priests became expert masters in military exer- cises. I have seen, at the gates of the Papal Palace in Rome, a constant guard of Swiss soldiers; I have seen, too, in our own streets, a show, as incon- gruous and as inconsistent, — a pastor of a Christian church swelling by his presence the pomp of a mili- tary parade ! Aye ! more than this : some of us have heard, within a few short weeks, in a Christian pulpit, from the lips of an eminent Christian divine, a sermon, in which we are encouraged to serve the God of Battles, and, as citizen soldiers^ to fight for
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 57
Peace; — a sentiment, in unhappy harmony with the profane language of the British peer, when, in addressing the House of Lords, he said,* " The best road to Peace, my Lords, is War; War, carried on in the same manner in which we are taught to worship our Creator, namely, with all our souls, with all our minds, with all our hearts, and with all our strength ; " but which surely can find no support in the Religion of Him who expressly enjoins, when one cheek is smitten, to turn the other, and to which we listen with pain and mortification from the lips of one who has voluntarily become a minister of Christian truth ; alas ! in his mind inferior to that of the Heathen, who declared that he preferred the unjustest peace to the justest war^
Well may we be astonished, that now in an age of civilization, the God of Battles should be invoked. Deo imperante, QUEM ADESSE BELLANTIBUS CREDUNT, are the appropriate words of surprise, by which Tacitus describes a similar savage superstition of the ancient Germans. J The polite Roman did not think God present, to cheer those who fight in
* May 30th, 1794.
| Iniquissimam pacem, justissimo bello antefero, are the words of Cicero. Only eight days after Franklin had placed his name to the Treaty of Peace, which acknowledged the independence of his country, he wrote to a friend : " May we never see another war ; for, in my opinion, there never was a good war, nor a bad peace." It was with sincere reluctance, that I here seemed, by a particular allusion, to depart for a moment from so great a theme • but the person and the theme here become united. I cannot re- frain from the effort to tear this iron branch of War from the golden tree of Christian truth, even though a voice come forth from the breaking bough.
t De Moribus German, § 7.
58 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
battle. And this Heathen superstition must at last have lost something of its hold, even in Germany ; for, at a recent period, her most renowned captain
— whose false Glory procured from flattering courtiers and a barbarous world the title of Great
— Frederick of Prussia, declared, with a commenda- ble frankness, that he always found the God of Battles on the side of the strongest regiments ; and when it was proposed to adopt as an inscrip- tion for his banner, soon to flout the sky of Silesia, " For God and Country," he rejected the first word, declaring that it was not proper to introduce the name of the Deity in the quarrels of men. By this Christian sentiment, the war-worn monarch may be remembered, when the fame of his battles has passed away.
And who is the God of Battles ? It is Mars ; man-slaying, blood-polluted, city-smiting Mars ! * Him we cannot adore. It is not He who binds the sweet influences of the Pleiades, and looses the bands of Orion ; who causes the sun to shine on the just and the unjust ; who tempers the wind to the shorn lamb ; who distils the oil of gladness upon every upright heart ; the fountain of Mercy and Goodness, the God of Justice and Love. The God of Battles is not the God of Christians ; he is not Our Father in Heaven ; — to him can ascend none of the prayers of Christian thanksgiving ; for him there can be no words of worship in Chris- tian temples ; no swelling anthem to peal the note of praise.
* Iliad, V. 31.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 59
And yet Christ and Mars are still brought into fellowship. Let us see them together. There now floats in this harbor a national ship of the line. Many of you have pressed its deck, and observed with admiration the completeness which prevails in all its parts ; its lithe masts and complex net- work of ropes ; its thick wooden walls, within which are more than the soldiers of Ulysses ; its strong defenses, and its numerous dread and rude-throated engines of War. There each sabbath, amidst this armament of blood, while the wave comes gently plashing against the frowning sides, from a pulpit supported by a cannon, in repose now, but ready to awake its dormant thunder, charged with death, a Christian preacher addresses the officers and crew ! May his instructions carry strength and succor to their souls ! But in such a place, those highest words of the Master he professes, " Blessed are the Peacemakers ; " " Love your Enemies ; " " Render not evil for evil," — must, like Macbeth's " Amen," stick in the throat.
It cannot be doubted that this strange and un- blessed conjunction of the Christian clergy with War, has had no little influence in blinding the world to the truth now beginning to be recognized, that Christianity forbids the whole custom of War.
Individual interests are mingled with prevailing errors, and are so far concerned in maintaining them, that it is not surprising how reluctantly military men yield to this truth. They are naturally like lawyers, as described by Voltaire, " the conservators of ancient barbarous usages;" but that these usages — espe- cially that the impious Trial by Battle — should obtain
60 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
countenance in the Christian church is one of those anomalies which make us feel the weakness of our nature and the elevation, of Christian truth. It is important to observe, as the testimony of history, that for some time after the Apostles, while the lamp of Christianity burnt pure and bright, not only the Fathers of the church held it unlawful for Christians to bear arms, but those who came within its pale abstained from their use, although at the cost of life, thus renouncing not only the umpirage of War, but even the right of self-defence. Marcellus, the Cen- turion, threw down his military belt at the head of the legion, and in the face of the standards, declared with a loud voice, that he would no longer serve in the army, for he had become a Christian; others fol- lowed his example. It was not until Christianity became corrupted, that its followers became soldiers, and its priests learned to minister at the altar of the God of Battles.
Thee to defend the Moloch priest prefers The prayer of Hate, and bellows to the herd That Deity, accomplice Deity, In the fierce jealousy of waked wrath, Will go forth with our armies and our fleets To scatter the red ruin on our foes ! O blasphemy ! to mingle fiendish deeds With blessedness ! *
One of the beautiful pictures adorning the dome of a church in Rome, by that master of art, whose immortal colors breathe as with the voice of a poet, the Divine Raffaelle, represents Mars, in the attitude
* Religious Musings by Coleridge, written Christmas Eve, 1794.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 61
of War, with a drawn sword uplifted and ready to strike, while an unarmed Angel from behind, with gentle but irresistible force, arrests and holds the descending arm. Such is the true image of Christian duty ; nor can I readily perceive the difference in principle between those ministers of the Gospel, who themselves gird on the sword, as in the olden time, and those others, who, unarmed, and in customary suit of solemn black, lend the sanction of their presence to the martial array, or to any form of Preparation for War. The drummer, who pleaded that he did not fight, was held more responsible for the battle than the mere soldier ; for it was the sound of his drum that inflamed the flagging courage of the troops.
THE POINT OF HONOR.
4. From prejudices engendered by the Church, I pass to prejudices engendered by the army itself; having their immediate origin in military life, but unfortunately diffusing themselves, in widening though less apparent circles, throughout the com- munity. I allude directly to what is called thepoint of honor, early child of chivalry, the living repre- sentative in our day of an age of barbarism. It is difficult to define what is so evanescent, so impalpa- ble, so chimerical, so unreal, and yet which exercises such fiendish power over many men, and controls the relations of States. As a little water, fallen into the crevice of a rock, under the congelation of winter, swells till it bursts the thick and ston}T fibres ; so a word or slender act, dropping into the heart of man, under the hardening influence of this pernicious sentiment, dilates till it rends in pieces the sacred 6
62 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
depository of human affections, while the demons Hate and Strife, no longer restrained, are let loose abroad. The musing Hamlet saw the strange and unnatural potency of this sentiment, when his soul pictured to his contemplations
— — — the army of such mass and charge, Led by a delicate and tender prince, Exposing what is mortal and unsure To all that fortune, death, and danger dare Even for an egg-shell;
and when he, with a point which has given to the sentiment its strongest and most popular expres- sion, exclaims —
Rightly to be great
Is not to stir without great argument; But greatly to find quarrel in a straw When honor's at the stake.
And when is Honor at stake ? This question opens again the argument with which I commenced and with which I hope to close this discourse. Honor can be afc stake only where justice and beneficence are at stake ; it can never depend on an egg-shell, or a straw ; it can never depend on an impotent word of anger or folly, not even if followed by violence. True Honor appears in the highest moral and intel- lectual excellence, in the dignity of the human soul, in the nearest approach to those qualities which we reverence as the attributes of God. Our community frowns with indignation upon the profaneness of the duel, which has its rise in this irrational point Q/ honor. Are you aware that you indulge this senti- ment, on a gigantic scale, when you recognize this
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 63
very point of honor as a proper apology for War ? We have already seen that justice is in no respect promoted by War. Is True Honor promoted, where justice is not ?
But the very word Honor, as used by the world, fails to express any elevated sentiment. How infi- nitely below the sentiment of duty ! It is a word of easy virtue, that has been prostituted to the most opposite characters and transactions. From the field of Pavia, where France suffered one of the greatest reverses in her annals, the defeated king writes to his mother : " All is lost, except honor." At a later day, the renowned cook, Vatel, in a paroxysm of grief and mortification at the failure of two dishes expected on the table, exclaims, " I have lost my honor" and afterwards stabs himself to the heart.* Montesquieu, whose writings are a con- stellation of epigrams, places honor in direct con- trast with virtue, and he calls it a prejudice only. Such as it is, he makes it the animating principle of monarchy, while virtue is the animating principle of a republic ; and he adds that, in well-governed mon- archies, almost everybody is a good citizen, but it is rare to meet with a really good man. By an instinct that points to the truth, we do not apply this term to the high columnar virtues which sustain and decorate life, to parental affection, to justice, to the attributes of God. He would seem to borrow a
* The death of the culinary martyr is described by Madame de Sevigne, with the accustomed coldness and brilliancy of her fashionable pen (Lettres L. and LI. Tom. I., p.164). Berchoux records his exclamation —
"Je suis perdu d'honneur, deux rotis ont manques."
64 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
worldly phrase, showing a slight appreciation of the distinctive qualities on which reverence is accorded, who should speak of a father, a mother, a judge, an angel, or finally of God, as persons of honor. In such sacred connections, we feel, beyond the force of any argument, the mundane character of the senti- ment which plays such a part in history and in com- mon life.
The rule of honor is founded in the imagined necessity of resenting by force a supposed injury, whether of word or act.* Admit that such an injury is received, falsely seeming to sully the character; is it wiped away by a resort to force, with a descent to the brutal level of its author? "Could I wipe your blood from my conscience as easily as this in- sult from my face," said a Marshal of France, greater on this occasion than on any field of fame, " I would lay you dead at my feet." It is Plato, reporting the angelic wisdom of Socrates, who declares in one of those beautiful dialogues, which shine with stellar light across the ages, that it is more shameful to do
* This is well exposed in a comedy of Moliere.
Don Pedre. Souhaitez-vous quelque chose de moi ?
Hali. Oui ; un conseil sur un fait d'honneur. Je sais qu'en ces matieres il est mal-aise de trouver un cavalier plus consomme que vous.
Seigneur, fai refu un soufflet. Vous savez ce qu'est un soufflet, lorsqu'il se donne a main ouverte sur le beau milieu de la joue. J'ai ce soufflet fort sur le coeur ; et Je suis dans Vincertitude si, pour me venger de V affront, je dots me battre avnc mon homme, ou bien lefaire assassiner.
Don Pedre. Assassiner c'est le plus sur et le plus court che- min. — Moliere, Le Sicilien, So. 13.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 65
a wrong than to receive a wrong.* And this benign sentiment commends itself, alike to the Christian who is told to render good for evil, and to the universal heart of man. But who that confesses its truth can vindicate a resort to force, for the sake of honor? It seems that in ancient Athens, as in unchristian- ized Christian lands, there were sophists who urged that to suffer was unbecoming a man, and would draw down incalculable evil. The following passage, which I translate with scrupulous literalness, will show the manner in which the moral cowardice of these persons of little faith was rebuked by him, whom the gods pronounced wisest of men : " These things being so, let us inquire what it is you reproach me with ; whether it is well said, or not, that I, for- sooth, am not able to assist either myself, or any of my friends or my relations, or to save them from the greatest dangers, but that, like the outlaws, I am at the mercy of any one, who may choose to smite me on the temple — and this was the strong point in your argument — or take away my property, or drive me out of the city, or (to take the extreme case) kill me ; now, according to your argument, to be so situ- ated is the most shameful thing of all. But my view is, — a view many times expressed already, but there is no objection to its being stated again, — my view, I sat/, £s, 0 Cattides, that to be struck unjustly on the temple is not most shameful, nor to have my body
* This proposition is enforced by Socrates with unanswerable reasoning and illustration, throughout the whole of the Gorgias, which it appears Cicero read diligently while studying at Athens (De Oratore, I., 11).
66 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
mutilated, nor my purse cut; but to strike me and mine unjustly, and to mutilate me and to cut my purse is more shameful and worse ; and stealing, too, and enslaving, and housebreaking, and in general, doing any wrong whatever to me and mine, is more shameful and worse for him who does the wrong, than for me who suffer it. These things thus established in the former arguments, as I maintain, are secured and bound, even if the expression be somewhat too rustical, with iron and adamantine arguments, and unless you, or someone more vigorous than you, can break them, it is impossible for any one, speak- ing otherwise than I now' speak, to speak well: since, for my part, I always have the same thing to say, that I know not how these things are, but that of all whom I have ever discoursed with as now, not one is able to say otherwise without being ridiculous"* Such is the wisdom of Socrates, as reported by Plato ; and it has found beautiful expression in the verse of an English poet, who says : —
Dear as freedom is, and in my heart's just Esteem prized above all price, myself Had rather be the slave, and wear the chains, Than fasten them on him ,
The modern point of honor did not obtain a place in warlike antiquity. Themistocles at Salamis did not send a cartel to the Spartan commander, when threatened by a blow. " Strike, but hear," was the response of that firm nature, which felt that True Honor was gained only in the performance of duty. It was in the depths of modern barbarism, in the age
* Gorgias, cap. buy.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 67
of chivalry, that this sentiment shot up in the wildest and most exuberant fancies. Not a step was taken without reference to it. No act was done which had not some point tending to the " bewitching duel." And every stage in the combat, from the ceremonial of its beginning, to its deadly close, was measured by this fantastic law. Nobody can forget the humorous picture of the progress of quarrel to a duel, through the seven degrees of Touchstone, in As You Like It. But the degradation, in which the law of honor has its origin, may be illustrated by an authentic incident from the life of its most brilliant representative. The Chevalier Bayard, the cynosure of chivalry, the knight without fear and without re- proach, in a contest with the Spaniard Don Alonzo de Soto Mayor, by a feint struck him such a blow in the throat, that the weapon, despite the gorget, pene- trated four fingers deep. The wounded Spaniard gasped and struggled until they both rolled on the ground, when Bayard, drawing his dagger, and thrusting its point in the nostrils of his foe, ex- claimed, " Senor Don Alonzo, surrender, or you are a dead man ; " a speech which appeared superfluous, as the second of the Spaniard cried out, " Senor Bayard, he is dead ; you have conquered." The French knight would have given one hundred thou- sand crowns for the opportunity to spare that life ; but he now fell upon his knees, kissed the ground three times, and then dragged his dead enemy out of the camp, saying to the second, " Senor Don Diego, have I done enough ? " To which, the other piteously replied, " Too much, senor, for the honor of Spain ! " when Bayard very generously presented him with
68 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
the corpse, although it was his right, by the law of honor, to dispose of it as he thought proper ; an act which is highly commended by the chivalrous Bran- tome, who thinks it difficult to say which did most honor to the faultless knight — not dragging the body ignominiously by a leg out of the field, like the carcass of a dog, or condescending to fight while laboring under an ague !
If such a transaction • conferred honor on the brightest son of chivalry, we may understand from it something of the real character of an age, the departure of which has been lamented with such touching but inappropriate eloquence. Do not con- descend to draw a comprehensive rule of conduct from a period like this. Let the fanaticism of honor stay with the daggers, swords, and weapons of combat by which it was guarded ; let it appear only with its inseparable American companions, the bowie-knife and the pistol !
I would that our standard of conduct were de- rived, not from the degradation of our nature, though it affect the semblance of sensibility and refinement, but from the loftiest attributes of man, from truth, from justice, from duty; and may this standard, while governing our relations to each other, be recognized also among thfc nations ! Alas ! when shall we behold the dawning of that happy day, harbinger of infinite happiness beyond, in which nations, like individuals, shall feel that it is better to receive a wrong than to do a wrong.
Apply this principle to our relations at this mo- ment with England. Suppose that proud monarchy, refusing all submission to Negotiation or Arbitra-
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 69
tion, should absorb the whole territory of Oregon into her own overgrown dominions, and add, at the mouth of the Columbia River, a new morning drum- beat to the national airs with which she has encircled the earth ; who, then, is in the attitude of Truest Honor, England appropriating, by an unjust act, what is not her own, or the United States, the victim of the injustice?
A FALSE PATRIOTISM.
5. There is still another influence which stimu- lates War, and interferes with the natural attractions of Peace ; I refer to a selfish and exaggerated preju- dice of country, leading to its physical aggrandize- ment, and political exaltation, at the expense of other countries, and in disregard of justice. Nursed by the literature of antiquity, we have imbibed the narrow sentiment of heathen patriotism. Exclusive love for the land of birth was a part of the religion of Greece and Rome. It is an indication of the lowness of their moral nature, that this sentiment was so material as well as exclusive in character. The Oracle directed the returning Roman to kiss his mother, and he kissed the Mother Earth. Aga- memnon, according to -ZEschylus, on regaining his home, after a perilous separation of more than ten years, at the siege of Troy, before addressing family, friend, or countryman, salutes Argos :
By your leave, lords, first Argos I salute.
The schoolboy cannot forget the cry of the victim of Verres, which was to stay the descending fasces of the lictor, " I am a Roman citizen ; " nor those
70 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
other words echoing through the dark Past, " How sweet to die for country ! " Of little avail that nobler cry, " I am a man ; " or that Christian ejacu- lation, swelling the soul, " How sweet to die for duty ! " The beautiful genius of Cicero, at times instinct with truth almost divine, did not ascend to that highest heaven, where is taught, that all man- kind are neighbors and kindred, and that the rela- tions of fellow-countryman are less holy than those of fellow-man. To the love of universal man may be applied those words by which the great Roman elevated his selfish patriotism to a virtue when he said, that country alone embraced all the charities of all* Attach this admired phrase to the single idea of country, and you will see how contracted are its charities, compared with that world-wide circle in which our neighbor is the suffering man, though at the farthest pole. Such a sentiment would dry up those fountains, whose precious waters now diffuse themselves in distant unenlightened lands, bearing the blessings of truth to the icy mountains of Green- land and the coral islands of the Pacific sea.
It has been a part of the policy of rulers to en- courage this exclusive patriotism ; and the people of modern times have all been quickened by the feeling of antiquity. I do not know that any one nation is in a condition to reproach another with this patriotic selfishness. All are selfish. Men are taught to live, not for mankind, but only for a small
* De Offic. Lib. 1, cap. xvii. It is curious to observe how Cicero puts aside that expression of true Humanity, which fell from Terence, Humani nikila me alienum puto. He says, Est enim difficilis cura rerum alienarum. De Offic. Lib. 1, cap. ix.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 71
portion of mankind. The pride, vanity, ambition,
brutality even, which all rebuke in individuals, are
accounted virtues when displayed in the name of a
country. Among us, the sentiment is active, while
it derives new force from the point with which it has
been expressed. An officer of our Navy, one of the
heroes nurtured by War, whose name has been
praised in churches, going beyond all Greek, all
Roman example, exclaims, " Our country, be she
right or wrong; " a sentiment dethroning God and
enthroning the devil, whose flagitious character
must be rebuked by every honest heart. Unlike
this officer was the virtuous Andrew Fletcher, of
Saltonn, in the days of the English Revolution, of
whom it was said, that he " would lose his life to
serve his country, but would not do a base thing
to save it." Better words, or more truly patriotic,
have never been uttered. " Our country, our whole
country, and nothing but our country," are other
words which, falling first from the lips of an eminent
American, have often been painted on banners, and
echoed by the voices of innumerable multitudes.
Cold and dreary, narrow and selfish, would be this
life, if nothing but our country occupied our souls ;
if the thoughts that wander through eternity, if the
infinite affections of our nature, were restrained to
that spot of earth where we have been placed by the
accident of birth.
I do not inculcate indifference to country. We incline by a natural sentiment to the spot where we were born, to the fields that witnessed the sports of childhood, to the seat of youthful studies, and to the institutions under which we have been trained.
72 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
The finger of God writes all these things indelibly upon the heart of man, so that in the anxious ex- tremities of death, he reverts in fondness to early associations, and longs for a draught of cold water from the bucket in his father's well. This sentiment is independent of reflection, for it begins before reflection, grows with our growth, and strengthens with our strength. It is blind in nature ; and there- fore, it is a duty to watch that it does not absorb and pervert the whole character. In the moral night which has enveloped the world, nations lived ignorant and careless of the interests of others, which they imperfectly saw ; but the thick darkness is now scattered, and we begin to discern the dis- tant mountain-peaks of other lands, all gilded by the beams of morning. "We find that God has not placed us on this earth alone ; that there are others, equally with us, children of his protecting care.
The curious spirit goes further, and while recog- nizing an inborn sentiment of attachment to the place of birth, inquires into the nature of the alle- giance due to the State. According to the old idea, still too much received, man is made for the State, and not the State for man. Far otherwise is the truth. The State is an artificial body, intended for the security of the people. How constantly do we find, in human history, that the people have been sacrificed for the State ; to build the Roman name, to secure for England the trident of the sea. ^his is to sacrifice the greater to the less ; for the False Grandeur of earth, to barter life and the soul itself.
Not that I love country less, but Humanity more, do I now, on this National Anniversary, plead the
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 73
cause of a higher and truer patriotism. I cannot forget that we are men, by a more sacred bond than we are citizens ; that we are children of a common Father more than we are Americans.
Recognizing this truth, the seeming diversities of nations, — separated only by the accident of moun- tain, river, or sea, — all disappear, and the various people of the globe stand forth as brothers — mem- bers of one great Human Family. Discord in this family is treason to God ; while all War is nothing else than civil war. In vain do we restrain this odious term, importing so much of horror, to the petty dissensions of a single nation. It belongs as justly to the feuds between nations, when referred to the umpirage of battle. The soul trembles aghast, as we contemplate fields drenched in frater- nal gore, where the happiness of homes has been shivered by the unfriendly arms of neighbors, and kinsman has sunk beneath the steel nerved by a kinsman's hand. This is civil war, which stands accursed forever in the calendar of time. But the Muse of History, in the faithful record of the future transactions of nations, inspired by a loftier justice, and touched to finer sensibilities, will extend to the general sorrows of Universal Man the sympathy still profusely shed for the selfish sorrow of country, while it pronounces international War to be civil War, and the partakers in it traitors ta God and enemies to man.
THE GENERAL COST OF WAR.
6. I might here pause, feeling that those of my hearers who have kindly accompanied me to this 7
74 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
stage, would be ready to join in the condemnation of War, and hail Peace, as the only condition be- coming the dignity of human nature. But there is still one other consideration, which yields to none of the rest in importance ; perhaps it is more im- portant than all. It is at once cause and effect, — the cause of much of the feeling in favor of War, and the effect of this feeling. I refer to the costly PREPARATIONS FOR WAR in time of Peace. And here is an immense practical evil, requiring an im- mediate remedy. Too much time cannot be taken in exposing its character.
I shall not dwell upon the immense cost of War itself. That will be present to the minds of all, in the mountainous accumulations of debt, piled like Ossa upon Pelion, with which Europe is pressed to the earth. According to the most recent tables to which I have access, the public debt of the different European nations, so far as known, amounts to the terrific sum of $6,387,000,000, — all the growth of War ! It is said that there are throughout these states, 17,900,000 paupers, or persons subsisting at the expense of the country, without contributing to its resources. If these millions of public debt, forming only a part of what has been wasted in War, could be apportioned among these poor, it would give to each, $375, — a sum which would place all above want, and which is about equal to the average wealth of each inhabitant of Massachusetts.
The public debt of Great Britain reached, in 1839, to $4,265,000,000, the growth of War since 1688 ! This amount is nearly equal, according to the calculations of Humboldt, to the sum-total of
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 75
all the treasures reaped from the harvest of gold and silver in the mines of Spanish America, including Mexico and Peru, since the first dis- covery of our hemisphere by Christopher Colum- bus ! It is much larger than the mass of all the precious metals, which at this moment form the circulating medium of the world ! It is sometimes rashly said by those who have given little attention to this subject, that all this expenditure is widely distributed, and therefore beneficial to the people ; but this apology does not bear in mind that it is not bestowed in any productive industry, or on any useful object. The magnitude of this waste will appear by a contrast with other expenditures. For instance, the aggregate capital of all the joint-stock companies in England, of which there was any known record in 1842, embracing^ canals, docks, bridges, insurance companies, banks, gas-lights, water, mines, railways, and other miscellaneous ob- jects, was about $835,000,000; a sum which has been devoted to the welfare of the people, but how much less in amount than the War Debt ! For the six years ending in 1836, the average payment for interest on this debt was about $140,000,000 annu- ally. If we add to this sum, $60,000,000 during this same period paid annually to the armyr navy,, and ordnance, we shall have $200,000,000 as the annual tax of the English people, to pay for former wars and to prepare for new. During this same period, there waa an annual appropriation of only $20,000,000 for all the civil purposes of the Govern- ment. It thus appears that War absorbed ninety cents of every dollar that was pressed by heavy
76 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
taxation from the English people, who seem almost to sweat blood ! What fabulous monster, or chi- mera dire, ever raged with a maw so ravenous? The remaining ten cents sufficed to maintain the splendor of the throne, the administration of justice, and the diplomatic relations with foreign powers, — in short, all the proper objects of a Christian Nation.*
COST OF PREPARATIONS IN TIME OP PEACE.
Thus much for the general cost of War. Let us now look exclusively at the Preparations for War in time of peace. It is one of the miseries of War, that, even in Peace, its evils continue to be felt by the world, beyond any other by which poor suffering Humanity is oppressed. If Bellona withdraws from the field, we only lose sight of her flaming torches ; the bay of her dogs is heard on the mountains, and civilized man thinks to find protection from their sudden fury, only by enclosing himself in the barba- rous armor of battle. At this moment, the Christian nations, worshipping a S3-mbol of common brother- hood, live as in intrenched camps, with armed watch, to prevent surprise from each other. Recognizing the custom of War as a proper Arbiter of Justice, they hold themselves perpetually ready for the bloody umpirage.
It is difficult, if not impossible, to arrive at any
* I have relied here and in subsequent pages upon Me Cul- loch's Commercial Dictionary; The Edinburgh Geography, founded on the works of Malte Brun and Balbi ; and the Calcula- tions of Mr. Jay, in Peace and War, p. 16, and hi his Address before the Peace Society, pp. 28, 29.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 77
exact estimate of the cost of these Preparations, ranging under four different heads, — Standing Army ; Navy ; Fortifications and Arsenals ; and Militia, or irregular troops.
The number of soldiers now affecting to keep the peace of European Christendom, as a Standing Army, without counting the Navy, is upwards of two millions. Some estimates place it as high as three millions. The army of Great Britain exceeds 300,000 men ; that of France, 350,000 ; that of Rus- sia, 730,000, and is reckoned by some as high as 1,000,000 ; that of Austria, 275,000 ; that of Prussia, 150,000. Taking the smaller number, and supposing these two millions to require for their annual sup- port an average sum of only $150 each, the result would be $300,000,000, for their sustenance alone ; and reckoning one officer to ten soldiers, and allow- ing to each of the latter an English shilling a day, or $87 a year, for wages, and to the former an aver- age salary of $500 a year, we shall have for the pay of the whole no less than $256,000,000, or an appalling sum-total, for both sustenance and pay, of $556,000,000. If the same calculation be made, supposing the forces three millions, the sum-total will be $835,000,000 ! But to this enormous sum another still more enormous must be added, on ac- count of the loss sustained by the withdrawal of two millions of hardy, healthy men, in the bloom of life, from useful, productive labor. It is supposed that it costs an average sum of $500 to rear a soldier ; and that the value of his labor, if devoted to useful objects, would be $150 a year. The Christian Powers, therefore, in setting apart two millions of 7*
78 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
men, as soldiers, sustain a loss of $1,000.000,000 on account of their training ; and $300,000,000 annu- ally, on account of their labor, in addition to the millions already mentioned as annually expended for sustenance and pay. So much for the cost of the standing army of European Christendom in time of Peace.
Glance now at the Navy of European Christen- dom. The Royal Navy of Great Britain consists at present of 557 ships of all classes ; but deducting such as are used for convict ships, floating chapels, coal depots, the efficient navy embraces 88 sail of the line; 109 frigates; 190 small frigates, cor- vettes, brigs, and cutters, including packets ; 65 steamers of various sizes ; 3 troop-ships and yachts ; in all, 455 ships. Of these, there were in commission, in 1839, 190 ships, carrying in all 4,202 guns. The number of hands was 34,465. The Navy of France, though not comparable in size with that of England, is of vast force. By royal ordinance of 1st Janu- aiy, 1837, it was fixed in time of peace at 40 ships of the line, 50 frigates, 40 steamers, and 19 smaller vessels ; and the amount of crews, in 1839, was 20,317 men. The Russian Navy consists of two large fleets in the Gulf of Finland and the Black Sea ; but the exact amount of their force and their available resources has been a subject of dispute among naval men and publicists. Some idea of the size of the navy may be derived from the number of hands. The crews of the Baltic fleet amounted, in 1837, to not less than 30,800 men ; and those of the fleet in the Black Sea to 19,800, or altogether 50,600, — being nearly equal-to those of England and
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 79
France combined. The Austrian Navy embraced, in 1837, 8 ships of the line, 8 frigates, 4 sloops, 6 brigs, 7 schooners or galleys, and a quantity of smaller vessels ; the number of men in its service, in 1839, was 4,547. The Navy of Denmark embraced, at the close of 1837, 7 ships of the line, 7 frigates, 5 sloops, 6 brigs, 3 schooners, 5 cutters, 58 gun- boats, 6 gun-rafts, and three bomb-vessels, requir- ing about 6,500 men. The Navy of Sweden and Norway consisted recently of 238 gunboats, 11 ships of the line, 8 frigates, 4 corvettes, 6 brigs, with several smaller vessels. The Navy of Greece is 32 ships of war, carrying 190 guns and 2,400 men. The Navy of Holland, in 1839, was 8 ships of the line, 21 frigates, 15 corvettes, 21 brigs, and 95 gunboats. Of the immense cost of all these mighty Preparations for War, it is impossible to give an accurate idea. But we may lament that means, so gigantic, should be applied by European Christendom to the erection, in time of Peace, of such superfluous wooden walls !
In the Fortifications and Arsenals of Europe, crowning every height, commanding every valley, and frowning over every plain and every sea, wealth beyond calculation has been sunk. Who can tell the immense sums expended in hollowing out, for purposes of War, the living rock of Gibraltar? Who can calculate the cost of all the Preparations at Woolwich, its 27,000 cannons, and its hundreds of thousands of small arms ? France alone contains upwards of one hundred and twenty fortified places. And it is supposed that the yet unfinished fortifica- tions of Paris have cost upward of fifty millions oj dollars!
80 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.'
The cost of the Militia, or irregular troops, the Yeomanry of England, the National Guards of Paris, and the Landwehr and Landsturm of Prussia, must add other incalculable sums to these enormous amounts.
Turn now to the United States, separated by a broad ocean from immediate contact with the Great Powers of Christendom, bound by treaties of amity and commerce with all the nations of the earth, connected with all by the strong ties of mutual interest, and professing a devotion to the prin- ciples of Peace. Are the Treaties of Amity mere words ? Are the Relations of Commerce and mutual interest mere things of a day ? Are the professions of Peace vain ? Else why not repose in quiet, unvexed by Preparations for War?
Enormous as • are these expenses in Europe, those in our own country are still greater in pro- portion to other expenditures of the Federal Gov- ernment.
It appears that the average annual expenditures of the Federal Government, for the six 3Tears ending with 1840, exclusive of payments on account of debt, were $26,474,892. Of this sum, the average appropriation each year for military and naval purposes, amounted to $21,328,903, being eighty per cent of the whole amount ! Yes ; of all the annual appropriations by the Federal Government, eighty cents in every dollar were applied in this irrational and unproductive manner. The remain- ing twenty cents sufficed to maintain the Govern- ment in all its branches, — Executive, Legislative, and Judicial ; the administration of justice ; our rela-
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. SI
tions with foreign nations ; the post-office, and all the lighthouses, which, in happy useful contrast with any forts, shed their cheerful signals over the rough waves, beating upon our long and indented coast, from the Bay of Fundy to the mouth of the Mis- sissippi. A table of the relative expenditures of nations, for Military Preparations in time of Peace, exclusive of payments on account of debts, ex- hibits results which will surprise the advocates of economy in our country. These are in proportion to the whole expenditure of Government ; —
In Austria, as 33 per cent ;
In France, as 38 per cent ;
In Prussia, as 44 per cent ;
In Great Britain, as 74 per cent ;
In the UNITED STATES, as 80 per cent ! *
To this stupendous waste may be added the still larger and equally superfluous expenses of the Militia throughout the country, placed recently by a candid and .able writer at $50,000,000 a year ! f
By a table J of the expenditures of the United States, exclusive of payments on account of the Public Debt, it appears, that, in fifty-three years from the formation of our present Government, from 1789 down to 1843, $246,620,055 have been ex- pended for civil purposes, comprehending the execu- tive, the legislative, the judiciary, the post-office,
* I have verified these results by the expenditures of these dif- ferent nations ; but I do little more than follow Mr. Jay, who has illustrated this important point with his accustomed accuracy. — • Address, p. 30.
•f Jay's Peace and War, p. 13.
j American Almanac for 1845, p. 143.
82 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
lighthouses, and intercourse with foreign govern- ments. During this same period, $368,626,594 have been devoted to the Military establishment, and $170,437,684 to the Naval establishment; the two forming an aggregate of $538,964,278. De- ducting from this sum appropriations during three years of war, and we shall find that more than four hundred millions were absorbed by vain Prepa- rations in time of Peace for War. Add to this amount, a moderate sum for the expenses of the Militia during the same period, which, as we have already seen, have been placed at $50,000.000 a year, — for the past years, we may take an average of $25,000,000, — and we shall have the enormous sum of $1,335,000,000 to be added to the $400,000,000 ; the whole, amounting to seventeen hundred and thirty-jive millions of dollars, a sum not easily con- ceived by the human faculties, sunk under the sanction of the Government of the United States in mere peaceful Preparations for War; more than seven times as much as was dedicated by the Gov- ernment, during the same period, to all other purposes whatsoever !
COST OP WAR AND EDUCATION COMPAKED.
From this serried array of figures, the mind in- stinctively retreats. If we examine them from a nearer point of view, and, selecting some particular part, compare it with the figures representing other interests in the community, they will present a front still more dread. Let us attempt the comparison.
Within a short distance of this city stands an
THE TRUE GRA.NDEUR OF NATIONS. 83
institution of learning, which was one of the earli- est cares of the early forefathers of the country, the conscientious Puritans. Favored child of an age of trial and struggle ; carefully nursed through a period of hardship and anxiety ; endowed at that time by the oblations of men like Harvard ; sus- tained from its first foundation by the paternal arm of the Commonwealth, by a constant suc- cession of munificent bequests, and by the prayers of good men, — the University at Cambridge now invites our homage as the most ancient, most in- teresting, and most important seat of learning in the land ; possessing the oldest and most valuable library ; one Of the largest museums of mineralogy and natural history ; a School of Law, which annually receives into its bosom more than one hundred and fifty sons from all parts of the Union, where they listen to instruction from professors whose names have become among the most valuable possessions of the land ; a School of Divinity, the nurse of true learning and piety ; one of the largest and most flourishing Schools of Medicine in the country ; besides these, a general body of teachers, twenty-seven in number, many of whose names help to keep the name of the country respectable in every part of the globe, where science, learning, and taste are cherished ; — the whole, presided over at this moment, by a gentleman early distinguished in public life by unconquerable energies and mas- culine eloquence, at a later period, by the unsur- passed ability with which he administered the affairs of our city, and now, in a green old age, full of years and honors, preparing to lay down his present
44 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
high trust.* Such is Harvard University ; and as one of the humblest of her children, happy in the recollection of a youth nurtured in her classic re- treats, I cannot allude to her without an expression of filial affection and respect.
It appears from the last Report of the Treasurer, that the whole available property of the University, the various accumulation of more than two cen- turies of generosity, amounts to $703,175.
Change the scene, and cast your eyes upon an- other object. There now swings idly at her moor- ings, in this harbor, a ship of the line, the Ohio, carrying ninety guns, finished as late as 1836, for $547,888 ; repaired only two years afterwards, in 1838, for $223,012 ; with an armament which has cost $53,945 ; making an amount of $834,845,t as the actual cost at this moment of that single ship ; more than $100,000 be}"ond all the available wealth of the richest and most ancient seat of learning in the land ! Choose ye, my fellow-citizens of a Christian state, between the two caskets — that wherein is the loveliness of knowledge and truth, or that which contains the carrion death.
I refer thus particularly to the Ohio, because she happens to be in our waters. But in so doing, I do not take the strongest case afforded by our Navy. Other ships have absorbed still larger sums. The expense of the Delaware, in 1842, had been $1,051,000.
* Hon. Josiah Quincy.
f Document No 132, House of Representatives, Third Session, Twenty-Seventh Congress.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. §5
Pursue the comparison still farther. The expendi- tures of the University during the last year, for the general purposes of the College, the instruction of the Undergraduates, and for the Schools of Law and Divinity, amount to $46,949. The cost of the Ohio for one year of service, in salaries, wages, and pro- visions, is $220,000; being $175,000 above the annual expenditures of the University, and more than four times as much as those expenditures. In other words, for the annual sum lavished on a single ship of the line, four institutions like Har- vard University might be sustained throughout the country !
Still further pursue the comparison. The pay of the Captain of a ship like the Ohio is $4,500, when in service ; $3,500, when on leave of absence, or off duty. The salary of the President of Harvard University is $2,205 ; without leave of absence, and never, off duty !
If the large endowments of Harvard University are dwarfed by a comparison with the expense of a single ship of the line, how much more so must it be with those of other institutions of learning and beneficence, less favored by the bounty of many generations. The average cost of a sloop of war is $315,000 ; more, probably, than all the endowments of those twin stars of learning in the Western part of Massachusetts, the Colleges at Williamstown and Amherst, and of that single star in the East, the guide to many ingenuoas youth, the Seminary at Andover. The yearly cost of a sloop of war in service is about $50,000, — more than the annual expenditures of these three institutions combined. S
8G THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
I might press the comparison with other insiitu- tions of Beneficence, with the annual expenditures for the Blind — that noble and successful charity, which has shed true lustre upon our Commonwealth — amounting to $12,000 ; and the annual expendi- tures for the Insane of the Commonwealth, another charity dear to humanity, amounting to $27,844.
Take all the institutions of Learning and Benefi- cence, — the crown jewels of the Commonwealth, — the schools, colleges, hospitals, asylums, — and the sums by which they have been purchased and preserv- ed are trivial and beggarly, compared with the treas- ures squandered, within the borders of Massachu- setts, in vain Preparations for War. There is the Navy Yard at Charlestown, with its stores on hand, costing $4,741,000 ; the fortifications in the harbors of Massachusetts, where incalculable sums have been already sunk, and in which it is now proposed to sink $3,853,000 more ; * and besides, the Arsenal at Springfield, containing, in 1842, 175,118 muskets, valued at $2,999,998,f and fed by an annual appro- priation of $200,000 ; but whose highest value will ever be, in the judgment of all lovers of truth, that it inspired a poem, which in its influence will be mightier than a battle, and will endure when arse- nals and fortifications have crumbled to earth. Some of the verses of this Psalm of Peace may happily relieve the detail of statistics, while they blend with my argument.
* Document; Report of Secretary of War; No. 2 Senate, Twenty-Seventh Congress, Second Session ; where it is proposed to invest in a general system of land defences, $51,677,929.
t Exec. Documents of 1842-43, vol. i., No. 3.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 37
Were half the power that fills the world with terror, Were half the wealth bestowed on camp and courts,
Given to redeem the human mind from error, There were no need of arsenals and forts.
The warrior's name would be a name abhorred !
And every nation that should lift again Its hand against its brother, on its forehead
Would wear for evermore the curse of Cain !
Look now for one moment at a high and peculiar interest of the nation, the administration of justice. Perhaps no part of our system is regarded, by the enlightened sense of the country, with more pride and confidence. To this, indeed, all other concerns of Government, all its complications of machinery, are in a manner subordinate, since it is for the sake of justice that men come together in states and establish laws. What part of the Government can compare, in importance, with the Federal Judiciary, that great balance-wheel of the Constitution, con- trolling the relations of the States to each other, the legislation of Congress and of the States, besides private interests to an incalculable amount? Nor can the citizen, who discerns the True Glory of his country, fail to recognize in the judicial labors of MARSHALL, now departed, and in the immortal judgments of STORY, who is still spared to us — serus in coelum redeat — a higher claim to admiration and gratitude than can be found in any triumph of battle. The expenses of the administration of justice throughout the United States, under the Federal Government, in 1842, embracing the sala- ries of judges, the cost of juries, court-houses, and all its officers ; in short, all the outlay by which justice, according to the requirement of Magna
88 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OP NATIONS.
Charta, is carried to ever}'' man's door, amounted to $560,990, — a larger sum than is usually appropri- ated for this purpose, but how insignificant, compared with the cormorant demands of Army and Navy ! Let me allude to one more curiosity of waste. It appears, by a calculation founded on the expenses of the Navy, that the average cost of each gun carried over the ocean, for one year, amounts to about fifteen thousand dollars, — a sum sufficient to sustain ten or even twenty professors of Colleges, and equal to the salaries of all the Judges of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts and the Governor combined I
THE GLACIER OF WAR.
Such are illustrations of that tax which the nations, constituting the great Federation of civilization, and particularly our own country, impose on the people, in time of profound Peace, for no permanent pro- ductive work, for no institution of learning, for no gentle charity, for no purpose of good. As we wearily climb, in this survey, from expenditure to expenditure, from waste to waste, we seem to pass beyond the region of ordina^ calculation ; Alps on Alps arise, on whose crowning heights of everlasting ice, far above the habitations of man, where no green thing lives, where no creature draws its breath, we behold the cold, sharp, flashing glacier of War.
DISARMING OP THE NATIONS.
In the contemplation of this spectacle, the soul swells with alternate despair and hope ; with cles-
THE TUUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 89
pair, at the thought of such wealth, capable of rendering such service to Humanity, not merely wasted, but given to perpetuate Hate ; with hope, as the blessed vision arises of the devotion of all these incalculable means to the purposes of Peace. The whole world labors at this moment with poverty and distress ; and the painful question occurs to every observer, in Europe more than here at home, — What shall become of the poor — the increasing Standing Army of the poor ? Could the humble voice that now addresses you penetrate those distant counsels, or counsels nearer home, it would say, disband your Standing Armies of soldiers, apply your Navies to purposes of peaceful and enriching commerce, abandon Fortifications and Arsenals, or dedicate them to works of Beneficence, as the statue of Jupiter Capitolinus was changed to the image of a Christian saint ; in fine, utterly forsake the present incongruous system of Armed Peace.
That I may not seem to reach this conclusion with too much haste, at least as regards our own country, I shall consider briefly, as becomes the occasion, the asserted usefulness of the national armaments ; and shall next expose the outrageous fallacy, at least in the present age, and among the Christian Nations, of the maxim by which they are vindicated, that, in time of Peace, we must prepare for War.
What is the use of the Standing Army of the United States? It has been a principle of freedom, during many generations, to avoid a standing army ; and one of the complaints, in the Declaration of Independence, was that George III. had quartered 8*
90 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
large bodies of troops in the colonies. For the first years, after the adoption of the Federal Constitu- tion, during our weakness, before our power was assured, before our name had become respected in the family of nations, under the administration of Washington, a small sum was deemed ample for the military establishment of the United States. It was only when the country, at a later day, had been touched by martial insanity, that, in imitation of monarchical states, it abandoned the true economy of a Republic, and lavished means, begrudged to purposes of Peace, in vain preparation for War. It may now be said of our army, as Dunning said of the influence of the crown, it has increased, is in- creasing, and ought to be diminished. At this moment, there are, in the country, more than fifty- five military posts. It would be difficult to assign a reasonable apology for any of these — unless, per- haps, on some distant Indian frontier. Of what use is the detachment of the second regiment of Artil- lery at the quiet town of New London, in Connecti- cut? Of what use is the detachment of the first regiment of Artillery in that pleasant resort of fashion, Newport? By exhilarating music and showy parade, they may amuse an idle hour ; but it is doubtful if emotions of a different character will not be aroused in thoughtful bosoms. He must have lost something of his sensibility to the dignity of human nature, who can observe, without at least a passing regret, all the details of discipline, • — drill, marching, countermarching, putting guns to the shoulder, and then dropping them to the earth, — which fill the life of the poor soldier, and prepare
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 91
him to become 'the rule inanimate part of that machine, to which an army has been likened by the great living master of the Art of War. And this sensibility may be more disturbed, by the spectacle of a chosen body of ingenuous youth, under the auspices of the Government, amidst the bewitching sceneiy of West Point, painfully trained to these same exercises — at a cost to the country, since the establishment of this Academy, of upwards of four millions of dollars.
In Europe, Standing Armies are supposed to be needed to sustain the power of governments ; but this excuse cannot prevail here. The monarchs of the Old World, like the chiefs of the ancient Ger- man tribes, are upborne by the shields of the sol- diery. Happily with us, government springs from the hearts of the people, and needs no janizaries for its support.
But I hear the voice of some defender of this abuse, some upholder of this " rotten borough," crying, the Army is needed for the defence of the country ! As well might you sa}', that the shadow is needed for the defence of the body ; for what is the army of the United States but the feeble shadow of the American people? In placing the army on its present footing, so small in numbers compared with the forces of great European States, our Government has tacitly admitted its super- ftuousness for defence. It only remains to declare distinctly, that the country will repose, in the con- sciousness of right, without the extravagance of supporting soldiers, unproductive consumers of the fruits of the earth, who might do the State good
92 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
service in the various departments of useful in- dustry.
What is the use of the Navy of the United States? The annual expense of our Navy, during recent years, has been upwards of six millions of dollars. For what purpose is this paid ? Not for the appre- hension of pirates, since frigates and ships of the line are of too great bulk for this service. Not for the suppression of the Slave Trade ; for, under the stipulations with Great Britain, we emplo}'' only eighty guns in this holy alliance. Not to protect our coasts ; for all agree that our few ships would form an unavailing defence against any serious attack. Not for these purposes, you will admit ; but for the protection of our Navigation. This is not the occasion for minute calculation. Suffice it to say, that an intelligent merchant, extensively en- gaged in commerce for the last twenty years, and who speaks, therefore, with the authority of knowl edge, has demonstrated, in a tract of perfect clear ness, that the annual profits of the whole mercantila marine of the country do not equal the annual expenditure of our Navy. Admitting the profit of a merchant ship to be four thousand dollars a year, which is a large allowance, it will take the earnings of one hundred ships to build and employ for one year a single sloop of war — one hundred and fifty ships to build and employ a frigate, and nearly three hundred ships to build and employ a ship of the line. Thus, more than five hundred ships must do a profitable business, to earn a sufficient sum for the support of this little fleet. Still further, taking a received estimate of the value of the mercantile
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 93
marine of the United States at forty millions of dollars, we find that it is only a little more than six times the annual cost of the navy ; so that this interest is protected at a charge of more than fifteen per cent of its whole value ! Protection at such a price is not less ruinous than one of Pyrrhus's victories !
But it is to the Navy, as an unnecessary arm of national defence, and as part of the War estab- lishment, that I confine my objection. So far as it is required for purposes of science and for the police of the seas, — to scour them of pirates, and, above all, to defeat the hateful traffic in human flesh, — it is an expedient instrument of Govern- ment, and cannot be obnoxious as a portion of the machinery of War. But surety, a navy, supported at immense cost in time of Peace, to protect navi- gation against the piracies of civilized nations, is absurdly superfluous. The free cities of Hamburg and Bremen, survivors of the great Hanseatic League, with a commerce that whitens the most distant seas, are without a single ship of war. Following this prudent example, the United States may be willing to abandon an institution which has already become a vain and most expensive toy !
Wliat is tJie use of tJie Fortifications of the United States? We have already seen the enormous sums, locked in the dead hands — the odious mortmain — of their everlasting masonry. Like the pyramids, they seem by mass and solidity to defy time. Nor can I doubt, that hereafter, like these same monu- ments, they will be looked upon with wonder, as
94 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
the types of an extinct superstition, not less de- grading than that of Ancient Egypt — the super- stition of War. It is in the pretence of saving the country from the horrors of conquest and blood- shed that they are reared. But whence the danger? On what side? What people is there any just cause to fear? No Christian nation threatens our borders with piracy or rapine. None will. Nor in the existing state of civilization, and under exist- ing International Law, is it possible to suppose any War, with such a nation, unless we voluntarily renounce the peaceful Tribunal of Arbitration, and take an appeal to Trial by Battle. The fortifica- tions might be of service in waging this impious appeal. But it must be borne in mind that they would invite the attack, which they might be inade- quate to defeat. It is a rule now recognized, even in' the barbarous code of War, one branch of which has been illustrated with admirable ability in the diplomatic correspondence of Mr. Webster, that non-combatants on land shall not in any way be molested, and that the property of private persons on land shall in all cases be held sacred. So firmly did the Duke of Wellington act upon this rule, that, throughout the revengful campaigns of Spain, and afterwards when he entered France, flushed with the victory of Waterloo, he directed his army to pay for all provisions, and even for the forage of their horses. War is carried on against public property — against fortifications, navy yards, and ar- senals. But if these do not exist, where is the aliment, where is the fuel for the flame ? Para- doxical as it may seem, and disparaging to the
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 95
whole trade of War, it may be proper to inquire, whether, according to the acknowledged Laws, which now govern this bloody Arbitrament, every new fortification and every additional gun in our harbor is not less a safeguard than a source of dan- ger to the city ? Plainly they draw the lightning of battle upon our homes, without, alas, any con- ductor to hurry its terrors innocently beneath the concealing bosom of the earth !
What is the use of the Militia of the United States f This immense system spreads, with innumerable suckers, over the whole country, draining its best life-blood, the unbought energies of the youth. The same painful discipline, which we have- observed in the soldier, absorbs their time, though, of course, to a less degree than in the regular army. Theirs also is the savage pomp of War. We read with astonishment of the painted flesh and uncouth vestments of our progenitors, the ancient Britons. But the generation must soon come, that will re- gard, with equal wonder, the pictures of their an- cestors closely dressed in padded and well-buttoned coats of blue, " besmeared with gold," surmounted by a huge mountain-cap of shaggy bear-skin, and with a barbarous device, typical of brute force, a tiger, painted on oil-skin, tied with leather to their backs ! In the streets of Pisa, the galle}7-slaves are compelled to wear dresses stamped with the name of the crime for which they are suffering punishment, — as theft, robbery, murder. It is not a little strange, that Christians, living in a land '* where bells have tolled to church," should volun- tarily adopt devices, which, if they have any mean-
96 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
ing, recognize the example of beasts as worthy of imitation by man.
The general considerations, which belong to the subject of Preparations for War, will illustrate the inanity of the Militia for purposes of national de- fence. I do not know, indeed, that it is now strongly advocated on this ground. It is oftener approved as an important part of the police of the country. I would not undervalue the blessings of an active, efficient, ever-wakeful police ; and I believe that such a police has been long required in our country. But the Militia, composed of youth of undoubted character, though of untried courage and little ex- perience, is inadequate for this purpose. No per- son, who has seen this arm of the police in an actual riot, can hesitate in this judgment. A very small portion of the means, absorbed by the Militia, would provide a substantial police, competent to all the emergencies of domestic disorder and violence. The city of Boston has long been convinced of the inexpediency of a Fire Department composed of accidental volunteers. A similar conviction with regard to the police, it is hoped, may soon pervade the country.
I am well aware, that efforts to abolish the Militia are encountered by some of the dearest prejudices of the common mind ; not only by the War Spirit; but by that other spirit, which first animates childhood, and, at a later day, u children of a larger growth," inviting to finery of dress and parade, — the same spirit which fantastically be- decks the dusky feather-cinctured chief of the soft regions warmed by the tropical sun ; which inserts
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 97
rings in the noses of the North-American Indian ; which slits the ears of the Australian savage ; and tattoes the New-Zealand cannibal.
Such is a review of the true character and value of the national armaments of the United States ! It will be observed that I have thus far regarded them in the plainest light of ordinary worldly econom}r, without reference to those higher con- siderations, founded on the nature and history of man, and the truths of Christianity, which pro-, nounce them to be vain. It is grateful to know, that, though they may yet have the support of what Jeremy Taylor calls the " popular noises," still the more economical, more humane, more wise, more Christian system is daily commending itself to wide circles of good people. On its side are all the virtues that truly elevate a state. Economy, sick of pigmy efforts to staunch the smallest fountains and rills of exuberant expenditure, pleads that here is an endless, boundless, fathomless river, an Amazon of waste, rolling its prodigal waters turbidly, ruinousty, hatefully, to the sea. It chides us with unnatural inconsistency when we strain at a little twine and paper, and swallow the monstrous cables and arma- ments of War. Wisdom frowns on these Prepara- tions as calculated to nurse sentiments inconsistent with Peace. Humanity pleads for the surpassing interests of Knowledge and Benevolence, from which such mighty means are withdrawn. Christi- anity calmly rebukes the spirit in which they have their origin, as of little faith, and treacherous to her high behests ; while History, exhibiting the 9
98 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
sure, though gradual, Progress of Man, points with unerring finger to that destiny of True Grandeur, when Nations, like individuals — disowning War as a proper Arbiter of Justice — shall abandon the oppressive apparatus of Armies, Navies, and For- tifications by which it is impiously waged.
BARBAROUS MOTTOES AND EMBLEMS.
And now, before considering the sentiment, that, in time of Peace, we must prepare for War, I hope I shall not seem to descend from the proper sphere of this discussion, if I refer to the parade of 5ar- barous mottoes, and of emblems from beasts, as furnishing another impediment to the proper ap- preciation *bf these Preparations. These mottoes and emblems, prompting to War, are obtruded on the very ensigns of power and honor ; and men, careless of their discreditable import, learn to re- gard them with patriotic pride. Beasts, and birds of prey, in the armorial bearings of nations and individuals, are selected as exemplars of Grandeur. The lion is rampant on the flag of England ; the leopard on the flag of Scotland ; a double-headed eagle spreads its wings on the imperial standard of Austria, and again on that of Russia. After ex- hausting the known kingdom of nature, the pennons of knights, like the knapsacks of our Militia, were disfigured by imaginary and impossible monsters, griffins, hippogriffs, unicorns, all intended to rep- resent the excess of brute force. The people of Massachusetts have unconsciously adopted this early standard. In the escutcheon which is used as the seal of the state, there is an unfortunate com-
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 99
binatiou of suggestions, to which I refer briefly, by way of example. On that part, which, in the language of heraldry, is termed the shield, is an Indian, with a bow in his hand — certainly, no agreeable memento, except to those who find honor in the disgraceful wars where our fathers robbed and murdered King Philip, of Pokauoket, and his tribe, rightful possessors of the soil. The crest is a raised arm, holding, in a threatening attitude, a drawn sabre — being precisely the emblem once borne on the flag of Algiers. The scroll, or legend, consists of the last of those two favorite verses, in questionable Latin, from an unknown source, which we first encounter, as they were inscribed by Alger- non Sydney, in the Album at the University of Co- penhagen, in Denmark : —
Manus haec, inimica tyrannis,
Ense petit placidam sub libertate quietem.
The Legislature of Massachusetts, with singular unanimity, has adopted resolutions expressing an earnest desire for the establishment of a High Court of Nations to adjudge international contro- versies, and thus supersede the Arbitrament of War. It would be an act of moral dignity, consis- tent with these professions of Peace, and becoming the character which it vaunts before the world, to abandon its bellicose escutcheon — at least, to erase that Algerine emblem, fit only for corsairs, and those words of questionable Latin, which tend to awaken the idea of ignorance and brute force. If a Latin motto be needed, it might be those words of Virgil, " Pacisque irnpouere morem ; " or that
100 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
sentence of noble truth from Cicero, " Sine SUM- MA JUSTITIA rempublican geri nullo modo posse." Where the spirit of these words prevailed, there would be little occasion to consider the question of Preparations for War.
THE MAXIM, "IN TIME OF PEACE, PREPARE FOR WAR," EXAMINED.
The maxim, that, in time of peace, we must pre- pare for War, has been transmitted from distant ages when brute force prevailed. It is the terrible inheritance, damnosa hcereditas, which painfully reminds present generations of their relations with the Past. It belongs to rejected dogmas of barbarism. It is the companion of those harsh rules of tyranny, by which the happiness of the many has been offered up to the propensities of the few. It is the child of suspicion and the forerunner of violence. Having in its favor the almost unin- terrupted usage of the world, it possesses a hold on popular opinion, which is not easily unloosed. And yet, no conscientious man can fail, on careful observation, to detect its mischievous fallacy — at least, among Christian Nations in the present age — a fallacy, the most costly the world has witnessed ; which dooms nations to annual tribute, in compari- son with which all extorted by conquest are as the widow's mite by the side of Pharisaical contri- butions. So, true is what Rousseau said, and Guizot has since repeated, " that a bad principle is far worse than a bad fact;" for the operations of the one are finite, while those of the other are infinite.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 101
I speak of this principle with earnestness ; for 1 believe it to be erroneous and false, founded in ignorance and barbarism, unworthy of an age of light, and disgraceful to Christians. I have called it a principle ; but it is a mere prejudice — sustained by vulgar example only, and not by enlightened truth — in obeying which, we imitate the early mariners, who steered from headland to headland and hugged the shore, unwilling to venture upon the broad ocean, where their guide was the lumi- naries of Heaven.
Dismissing the actual usage of nations, on the one side, and the considerations of economy on the other, let us regard these Preparations for War, in the simple light of reason, in a just appreciation of the nature of man, and in the injunctions of the highest truth. Our conclusion will be very easy. They are pernicious on two grounds ; and whoso would vindicate them must satisfactorily answer these two objections, — first, because they inflame the people, exciting to deeds of violence, otherwise alien to their minds ; and secondly, because, having their origin in the low motive of distrust and hate, they inevitably, by a sure law of the human mind, excite a corresponding feeling in other nations. Thus, in fact, are they the promoters of War, rather than the preservers of Peace.
In illustration of the first objections, it will oc- cur at once to every inquirer, that the possession of power is always in itself dangerous, that it tempts the purest and highest natures to self-indulgence , that it can rarely be enjoyed without abuse ; nor is the power to employ force in War an exception to 9*
102 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
this law. History teaches that nations, possessing the greatest armaments, have always been the most belligerent ; while feebler powers have enjo}Ted, for a longer period, the blessings of Peace. The din of War resounds throughout more than seven hundred years of Roman history, with only two short lulls of repose ; while smaller states, less potent in arms, and without the excitement to quarrel on this ac- count, have enjoyed long eras of Peace. It is not in the history of nations on]y that we find proofs of this law. Like every moral principle, it applies equalty to individuals. The experience of private life, in all ages, confirms it. The wearing of arms has always been a provocative to combat. It has excited the spirit and furnished the implements of strife. Reverting to the progress of society in modern Europe, we find that the odious system of private quarrels, of hostile meetings even in the street, continued so long as men persevered in the habit of wearing arms. Innumerable families were thinned by death received in these hasty, unpre- meditated encounters ; and the lives of scholars and poets were often exposed to their rude chances. Marlowe, " with all his rare learning and wit," perished ignominiously under the weapon of an unknown adversary ; and Savage, whose genius and misfortune inspired the friendship and eulogy of Johnson, was tried for murder committed in a sud- den broil. " The expert swordsman," says Mr. Jay,* " the practised marksman, is ever more ready to engage in personal combats, than the man who is
* Address before the American Peace Society, pp. 23, 24.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 103
unaccustomed to the use of deadly weapons,. In those portions of our country where it is supposed essential to personal safety to go armed with pistols and bowie-knives, mortal affrays are so frequent as to excite but little attention, and to secure, with rare exceptions, impunity to the murderer ; whereas at the North and East, where we are unprovided with such facilities for taking life, comparatively few murders of the kind are perpetrated. We might, indeed, safely submit the decision of the principle we are discussing to the calculations of pecuniary interest. Let two men, equal in age and health, apply for an insurance on their lives : one known to be ever armed to defend his honor and his life against every assailant ; and the other, a meek, unresisting Quaker ; — can we doubt for a moment which of these men would be deemed by the Insurance Company most likely to reach a good old age?"
The second objection is founded on that law of the human mind, in obedience to which, the sentiment of distrust or hate, — of which these Preparations are the representatives, — must excite a corresponding sentiment in others. This law is a part of the unalterable nature of man, recognized in early ages, though too rarely made the guide to peaceful inter- course among nations. It is an expansion of the old Horatian adage, Si vis me fare, dolendum est primum ipsi tibi; if you wish me to weep, you must yourself first weep. Nobody can question its force or its applicability ; nor is it too much to say, that it distinctly declares, that Military Preparations by one nation, in time of professed Peace, must natu-
104 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
rally prompt similar Preparations by other nations, and quicken ever}' where, within the circle of their influence, the Spirit of War. So are we all knit together, that the feelings in our own bosoms awaken corresponding feelings in the bosoms of others ; as harp answers to harp in its softest vibra- tion ; as deep responds to deep in the might of its power. What within us is good invites the good in our brother ; generosity begets generosity ; love wins love ; Peace secures Peace ; — while all within us that is bad challenges the bad in our brother ; distrust engenders distrust ; hate provokes hate ; War arouses War.
This beautiful law may be seen in numerous illus- trations. Even the miserable maniac, in whose mind the common rules of conduct are overthrown, confesses its overruling power ; and the vacant stare of madness may be illumined by a word of love. The wild beasts confess it : and what is the story of Orpheus, whose music drew, in listening rapture, the lions and panthers of the forest ; or of St. Jerome, whose kindness soothed a lion to lie down at his feet, but expressions of its prevailing influence ? *
* Scholars will remember the incident recorded by Homer in the Odyssey (XIV. 30, 31), where Ulysses, on reaching his loved Ithaca, is beset by dogs, who are described as wild beasts in ferocity, and who, barking, rushed towards him ; but he, with craft (that is the word of Homer) seats himself upon tLe earth, and lets his staff fall from his hands. A similar incident is no- ticed by Mr. Mure, in his entertaining travels in Greece; and also by Mr. Borrow, in his Bible in Spain. Pliny remarks that all dogs may be appeased in the same way. Impetus eorum, et sasvitia mitigantur ab nomine considente humi. Nat. His. Lib. VIII. cap. 40.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 1Q5
It speaks also in the examples of literature. Here, at the risk of protracting this discussion, I am tempted to glance at some of these curious instances, — asking your indulgence, and trusting that I may not seem to attach undue meaning to them, — and especially disclaiming any conclusions beyond the simple law which they illustrate.
Looking back to the historic dawn, one of the most touching scenes which we behold, illumined by that Auroral light, is the peaceful visit of the aged Priam to the tent of Achilles, entreating the body of his son. The fierce combat has ended in the death of Hector, whose unhonored corse the bloody Greek has already trailed behind his chariot. The venera- ble father, after twelve days of grief, is moved to regain the remains of the Hector he had so dearly loved. He leaves his lofty cedarn chamber, and with a single aged attendant, unarmed, repairs to the Grecian camp, by the side of the distant-sound- ing sea. Entering alone, he finds Achilles in his tent, with two of his chiefs. Grasping his knees, the father kisses those terrible homicidal hands which had taken the life of his son. The heart of the inflexible, the angry, the inflamed Achilles, touched by the sight which he beholds, responds to the feelings of Priam. He takes the suppliant by the hand, seats him by his side, consoles his grief, refreshes his weary body, and concedes to the pray- ers of a weak, unarmed old man, what all Troy in arms could not win. In this scene, which fills a large space in the Iliad, the master poet, with un- conscious power, has presented a picture of the omnipotence of that law, making all mankind of kin,
106 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
in obedience to which no word of kindness, no act of confidence, falls idly to the earth.
Among the legendary passages of Roman history, perhaps none makes a deeper impression, than that scene, after the Roman youth had been consumed at Allia, and the invading Gauls under Brennus had entered the city, where we behold the venerable Senators of the Republic, too old to flee, and care- less of surviving the Roman name, seated each on his curule chair, in a temple, unarmed, looking, as Livy says, more august than mortal, and with the majesty of the gods. The Gauls gaze upon them, as upon sacred images ; and the hand of slaughter, which had raged through the streets of Rome, is stayed by the sight of an assembly of unarmed men. At length, a Gaul approaches, and with his hand gentlj' strokes the silver beard of a Senator, who, indignant at the license, smites the barbarian with his ivory staff; which was the signal for general vengeance. Think you, that a band of savages could have slain these Senators, if the appeal to Force had not first been made by one of their own number? This story, though recounted by Livy, and also by Plutarch, is properly repudiated by Niebuhr as a legend ; but it is none the less interest- ing, as showing the law by which hostile feelings are necessarily aroused or subdued.
Other instances present themselves. An admired picture by Virgil, in his melodious epic, represents a person, venerable for piety and deserts, assuaging by words alone a furious populace, which had just broken into sedition and outrage. Guizot, in his
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 107
History of French Civilization,* has preserved a similar example of what was accomplished by an unarmed man, in an illiterate epoch, who, employing the word instead of the sword, subdued an angry multitude. And surely no reader of that noble historical romance, the Promessi Sposi, can forget that finest scene, where Fra Christofero, in an age of violence, after slaying a comrade in a broil, re- pairs in unarmed penitence to the very presence of the family and retainers of his victim, and by digni- fied gentleness, awakens the admiration of those already mad with rage against him. Another ex- ample, made familiar by recent translations of Frithiof's Saga, the Swedish epic, is more emphatic. The scene is a battle. Frithiof is in deadly combat with Atle, when the falchion of the latter breaks. Throwing away his own weapon, he says : —
Swordlessfoeman's life
Ne'er dye& this gallant blade.
The two champions now close in mutual clutch; they hug like bears, says the Poet :
Tis o'er ; for Frithiof s matchless strength
Has felled his ponderous size ; And 'neath that knee, at giant length,
Supine the Viking lies. "But fails my sword, thou Berserk swart! "
The voice rang far and wide, " Its point should pierce thy inmost heart,
Its hilt should drink the tide." " Be free to lift the weaponed hand,"
Undaunted Atle spoke ; " Hence, fearless, quest thy distant brand !
Thus I abide the stroke."
* Tom, II. p. 36.
108 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
Frithiof regains his sword, intent to close the dread debate, while his adversary awaits the stroke ; but his heart responds to the generous courage of his foe ; he cannot injure one who has shown such con- fidence in him ; —
This quelled his ire, this checked his arm. Outstretched the hand of peace.
I cannot leave these illustrations, without alluding particularly to the treatment of the insane, which teaches, by conclusive example, how strong in nature must be the principle, that makes us re- sponsive to the conduct and feelings of others. When Pinel first proposed to remove the heavy chains from the raving maniacs of the Paris hospi- tals, he was regarded as one who saw visions, or dreamed dreams. At last, his wishes were grati- fied. The change in the unhappy patients was im- mediate ; the wrinkled front of evil passions was smoothed into the serene countenance of Peace. The old treatment by Force is now universally abandoned ; the law of Love has taken its place ; and all these unfortunates mingle together, unvexed by those restraints, which implied suspicion, and, therefore, aroused opposition. The warring propen- sities, which, while hospitals for the insane were controlled by Force, filled them with confusion and strife, are a dark but feeble type of the present rela- tions of nations, on whose hands are the heavy chains of Military Preparations, assimilating the world to one Great Mad-house ; while the Peace and good-will, which now abound in these retreats, are the happy emblems of what awaits mankind when.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 1Q9
they recognize the supremacy of the higher senti- ments, — of gentleness, confidence, love ;
• making their future might
Magnetic o'er the fixed untrembling heart.
I might dwell also on the recent experience, so full of delightful wisdom, in the treatment of the distant, degraded convicts of New South Wales, showing how confidence and kindness, on the part of their overseers, awaken a corresponding senti- ment even in these outcasts, from whose souls virtue, at first view, seems to be wholly blotted out. Thus, from all quarters and sources, — the far-off Past, the far-away Pacific, the verse of the poet, the legend of history, the cell of the mad-house, the assembly of transported criminals, the experience of daily life, the universal heart of man, — ascends the spontaneous tribute to that law, according to which, we respond to the feelings by which we are addressed, whether of love or hate, of confidence or distrust.
It may be urged that these instances are excep- tions to the general laws by which mankind are governed. It is not so. They are the unanswerable evidence of the real nature of man. They reveal the divinity of Humanity, out of which all goodness, all happiness, all True Greatness, can alone proceed. They disclose susceptibilities which are universal, which are confined to no particular race of men, to no period of time, to no narrow circle of knowledge and refinement — but which are present wherever two or more human beings come together, and are strong in proportion to their virtue and 10
HO THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
intelligence. It is, then, on the nature of man, as on an impregnable ground, that I place the fallacy of that prejudice, in obedience to which, now, in an age of civilization, Christian nations, in time of Peace, prepare for War.
LOVE MORE PUISSANT THAN FORCE.
This prejudice is not only founded on a miscon- ception of the nature of man ; it is abhorrent to Christianity, which teaches that Love is more puissant than Force. To the reflecting mind, the Omnipotence of God himself is less discernible in. the earthquake and the storm, than in the gentle but quickening rays of the sun, and the sweet de- scending dews. And he is a careless observer, who does not recognize the superiority of gentleness and kindness, as a mode of exercising influence or securing rights among men. As the storms of vio- lence beat down, they hug those mantles, which are gladly thrown to earth under the warmth of a genial sun. Thus far, nations have drawn their weapons from earthly armories, unmindful of those others of celestial temper.
Christianity not only teaches the superiority of Love over Force ; it positively enjoins the practice of the former, as a constant primal duty. It says, " Love your neighbors ; " but it does not say, " In time of Peace, rear the massive fortification, build the man-of-war, enlist armies, train militia, and accumulate military stores to overawe your neigh- bors." It directs that we should do unto others as we would have them do unto us — a golden rule for nations, as well as individuals; but how
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. HI
inconsistent is that distrust of others, in wrong- ful obedience to which nations, in time of Peace, sleep like soldiers on their arms ! This is not all. Its precepts inculcate patience, suffering, forgive- ness of evil, even the duty of benefiting a destroyer, " as the sandal-wood, in the instant of its over- throw, sheds perfume on the axe which fells it." And can a people, in whom this faith is more than an idle word, consent to the diversion of such ines- timable sums from Good Works and all Christian purposes, to pamper the Spirit of War?
The injunction, "Love one another," is as appli- cable to nations as to individuals. It is one of the great laws of Heaven. And Nations, like individu- als, may well measure their nearness to God and to his Glory by the degree to which they regulate their conduct by this duty.
APOLOGIES FOR ARMAMENTS.
In response to these successive arguments, found- ed on economy, the true nature of man, and Christi- anity, I hear the skeptical note of some speaker for the transmitted order of things, some one who wishes " to fight for peace," sa3'ing, these things are beautiful, but visionary ; they are in advance of the age ; the world is not yet prepared for their recep- tion. To such, I would answer : nothing can be beautiful that is not true ; but these things are true, and the time is now come for their reception. Now is the dawning day, and now is the fitting hour. Every effort to impede their progress arrests the ad- vancing hand on the dial-plate of human happiness.
The name of Washington is invoked as authority
112 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
for a prejudice which Economy, Wisdom, Humanity, and Christianity, declare to be false. Mighty and reverend as is his name, more mighty and more rev- erend is truth. The words of counsel which he gave were in accordance with the Spirit of his age, — an age which was not shocked by the slave-trade. But his great soul, which loved virtue, and inculcated Jus- tice and Benevolence, frowns upon those who would use his authority as an incentive to War. God forbid that his sacred character should be profanely stretched, like the skin of John Ziska, on a militia- drum, to arouse the martial ardor of the American people !
Let the practice of Washington, during the eight years of his administration, compared with that of the eight years last past, explain his real opinions. His condemnation of the present wasteful system speaks to us from the following table : —
|
YEARS. |
MILITARY ESTABLISHMENT. |
NAVAL ESTABLISHMENT. |
|
1789-91 |
$835,000 |
$570 |
|
1792 |
1,223,594 |
53! |
|
1793 |
1,237,620 |
|
|
1794 |
2,733,540 |
61,409 |
|
1795 |
2,573,059 |
410,562 |
|
1796 |
1,474,661 |
274,784 |
|
Total, during eight) |
. • |
|
|
years of Washing- £ |
$10,078,092 |
$487,378 |
|
ton, 3 |
||
|
1835 1836 1837 1838 |
$9,420,313 18,466,110 19,417,274 19,936,412 |
$3,864,939 5,800,763 6,852,060 5,175,771 |
|
1839 |
14,268,981 |
6,225,003 |
|
1840 |
11,621,438 |
6,124,445 |
|
1842 1843 Total, during eight ) |
13,903,898 8,248,918 |
6,246,503 7,963,678 |
|
years, $ |
$114,283,244 |
$49,053,473 |
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 113
Thus it appears, that the expenditures for the arma- ments of the country, under the sanction of Wash- ington, amounted to about eleven million dollars ; while those during a recent similar period of eight years, reach to upwards of one hundred and sixty- four million dollars — an increase of fifteen hundred per cent! To him who quotes the precept of "Washington, I commend the example. He must be strongly possessed by the military mania who is not ready to confess, that, in this age, when the whole world is at peace, and when our national power is as- sured, there is less need of these Preparations than in an age, convulsed with War, when our national power was little respected. The only semblance of argument in their favor is the increased wealth of the country ; but the capacity to endure taxation is no criterion of its justice, or even its expediency.
The fallacy is also invoked, that whatever is, is right. Our barbarous practice is exalted above all those principles by which these preparations are condemned. We are made to count principles as nothing, because they have not yet been recognized by nations. But they have been practically applied to the relations of individuals, of towns, of counties, and of States in our Union. All these have disarmed. It remains only that they should be extended to the grander sphere of nations. Be it our duty to pro- claim the principles, whatever may be the practice ! Through us, let Truth speak. The bigots of the past, and all, selfishly concerned in the existing system, may close mind and heart to her message. Thus it has been in all ages. Nay, more ; there is often an irritation excited by her presence ; and 10*
114 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
men, who are kind and charitable, forget their kind- ness and lose their charity towards the unaccustomed stranger. Harshness, neglect, intolerance, ensue. It was this spirit which awarded a dungeon to Ga- lileo, when he declared that the earth moved round the sun — which neglected the great discovery by Harvey of the circulation of the blood — which bitterly opposed the divine philanthropy of Clark- son, when first denouncing the wickedness of the slave-trade. But Truth, rejected and dishonored in our day, will become the household companion of the next generation.
PROGRESS AND OMENS FOR THE FUTURE, AS SEEN IN LITERATURE AND HISTORY.
Auspicious omens from the past and the present cheer us for the future. The terrible wars of the French Revolution were the violent rending of the body, which preceded the exorcism of the fiend. Since the morning stars first sang together, the world has not witnessed a peace so harmonious and enduring as that which now blesses the Christian nations. Great questions between them, fraught with strife, and in another age sure heralds of War, are now determined by Mediation or Arbitration. Great political movements, which, only a few short years ago, must have led to forcible rebellion, are now conducted by peaceful discussion. Literature, the press, and various societies, all join in the holy work of inculcating good-will to man. The Spirit of Humanity pervades the best writings, whether the elevated philosophical inquiries of the Vestiges of Creation, the ingenious but melancholy moraliz-
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 115
ings of the Story of a FeatJier, or the overflowing raillery of Punch. Nor can the breathing thought and burning word of poet or orator have a higher inspiration. Genius is never so Promethean as when it bears the heavenly fire to the hearths of men.
In the last age, Dr. Johnson uttered the detestable sentiment, that he liked " a good Hatep-." The man of this age must say that he likes " a good Lover." Thus reversing the objects of regard, he follows a higher wisdom and a purer religion than the re- nowned moralist knew. He recognizes that peculiar Christian sentiment, the Brotherhood of Man, soon to become the decisive touchstone of human institu- tions. He confesses the power of Love, destined to enter, more and more, into the concerns of life. And as Love is more Heavenly than Hate, so must its influence redound more to the True Glory of man and to the approval of God. A Chris- tian poet — whose few verses bear him with unflag- ging wing on his immortal flight — has joined this sentiment with Prayer. Thus he speaks in words of uncommon pathos and power : —
He prayeth well who loveth well All things, both great and small.
He prayeth best who loveth best Both man and bird and beast, For the dear God who loveth us, He made and loveth all.
Surely the ancient Law of Hate is yielding to the Law of Love. It is seen in the manifold labors o^ philanthropy and in the missions of charity. It is seen in institutions for the insane, the blind, the
116 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
deaf, the dumb, the poor, the outcast; in generous efforts to relieve those who are in prison ; in public schools, opening the gates of knowledge to all the children of the land. It is seen in the diffusive amenities of social life, and in the increasing fellow- ship of nations. It is seen in the rising opposition to Slavery an^J to War.
There are yet other special auguries of this great change, auspicating, in the natural Progress of Man, the abandonment of all international Preparations for War. To these I allude briefly, but with a deep conviction of their significance.
Look at the Past ; and observe the change in dress. Down to a period quite recent, the sword was the indispensable companion of the gentleman, wher- ever he appeared, whether in the street or in society ; but he would be thought a madman, or a bully, who should wear it now. At an earlier period, the armor of complete steel was the habiliment of the knight. From the picturesque sketch by Sir Walter Scott, in the " Lay of the Last Minstrel," we may learn the barbarous constraint of this custom.
Ten of them were sheathed in steel, With belted sword, and spur on heel ; They quitted not the harness bright, Neither by day, nor yet by night ; —
They lay down to rest,
"With corset laced, Pillowed on buckler cold and hard;
They carved at the meal
With gloves of steel, And they drunk the red wine through the helmet barred.
But this is all changed now.
Observe, a?so, the change in architecture and in domestic life. The places once chosen for castles, or
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. H7
houses, were savage, inaccessible retreats, where the massive structure was reared, to repel attack, and to enclose its inhabitants. Even monasteries and churches were fortified, and girdled by towers, ram- parts, and ditches; while a child was stationed as a watchman, to observe what passed at a distance, and announce the approach of an enemy. Homes of peaceful citizens in towns were castellated, often without so much as an aperture for light near the ground, but with loop-holes through which the shafts of the cross-bow were aimed. From a letter of Margaret Paston, in the time of Henry VII. of Eng- land, I draw a curious and authentic illustration of armed life.* Addressing in dutiful phrase " her right worshipful husband," she asks him to procure for her " some cross-bows, and wyndnacs [grappling-irons] to bind them with, and quarrels" [arrows, with a square head] ; also, " two or three short pole-axes to keep within doors " ; and she tells her absent lord of Preparations made appar- ently by a neighbor — "great ordnance within the house" — "bars to bar the door crosswise, and wickets in every quarter of the house to shoot out at, both with bows and hand-guns." Savages could hardly live in greater distrust. Let now the poet of chivalry describe another scene :
Ten squires, ten yeomen, mail-clad men, Waited the beck of the warders ten ; Thirty steeds, both fleet and wight, Stood saddled in stable, day and night,
* Paston Letters, CXIII. (LXXVIL), vol. Hi. p. 31.
118 TEE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
Barbed with frontlet of steel, I trow, And with Jedwood axe at saddle-bow ; A hundred more fed free in stall : Such was the custom at Branksome Hall.
This also is all changed now.
The principles which have caused this change are not only active still, but increasing in activity, nor can they be restrained to individuals. Nations must soon confess them, and, abandoning martial habiliments and fortifications, enter upon a peaceful unarmed life. With shame let it be said, that they continue to live in the very relations of distrust towards their neighbors, which shocks us in the knights of Branksome Hall, and in the house of Margaret Paston. They pillow themselves on " buckler cold and hard ; " and their highest anx- iety and largest expenditure is for the accumulation of new munitions of War. The barbarism which in- dividuals have renounced, nations still cherish. So doing, they take counsel of the wild boar in the fable, who whetted his tusks on a tree of the forest, when no enemy was near, saying, that in time of Peace, he must prepare for War. Has not the time come, when man, whom God created in his own image, and to whom He gave the Heaven-directed countenance, shall cease to look down to the beast for an example of conduct? Nay ; let me not dis- honor the beasts by the comparison. Man alone of the animal creation preys upon his own species. The kingly lion turns from his brother lion ; the ferocious tiger will not raven upon his kindred tiger ; the wild boar of the forest does not glut his sharp- ened tusks upon a kindred boar !
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. H9
Sed jam serpentum major concordia ; parcit Cognatis maculis similis fera. Quando leoni Fortior eripuit vitam leo ? quo nemore unquam Exspiravit aper majoris dentibus apri ? Indica tigris agit rabida cum tigride Pacem Perpetuam.*
To an early monarch of France, homage has al- ready been offered for effort in the cause of Peace, particularly in abolishing the Trial by Battle. To another monarch of France, in our own day, a de- scendant of St. Louis, worthy of the illustrious lineage, Louis Philippe, belongs the honest fame of first, from the throne, publishing the truth, that Peace was endangered by Preparations for War. " The sentiment, or rather the principle," he says, in reply to an address from the London Peace Con- vention in 1843, " that in Peace you must prepare for war, is one of difficulty and danger ; for while we keep armies on land to preserve peace, they are, at the same time, incentives and instruments of War. He rejoiced in all efforts to preserve peace, for that was what all need. He thought the time was coming when we shall get rid entirely of War in all civilized countries." This time has been hailed by a gen- erous voice from the army itself, by a Marshal of France, — Bugeaud, the Governor of Algiers, — who gave, as a toast at a public dinner in Paris, these words of salutation to a new and approaching era of happiness : " To the pacific union of the great human family, by the association of individuals, na- tions, and races ! To the annihilation of War ! To the transformation of destructive armies into corps of industrious laborers, who will consecrate their
* Juvenal, Sat. XV. 159.
120 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
lives to the cultivation and embellishment of the world ! " Be it our duty to speed this consumma- tion ! And may other soldiers emulate the pacific aspiration of this veteran chief, until the trade of War has ceased from the earth !
To William Penn belongs the distinction, destined to brighten as men advance in virtue, of first in hu- man history establishing the Law of Love, as a rule of conduct, in the intercourse of nations. While recognizing the duty " to support power in reverence with the people, and to secure the people from abuse of power," * as a great end of government, he de- clined the superfluous protection of arms against Foreign Force, and " aimed to reduce the savage nations, by just and gentle manners, to the love of civil society and the Christian religion." His se- rene countenance, as he stands, with his followers, in what he called the sweet and clear air of Penn- sylvania, all unarmed, beneath the spreading elm, forming the great treaty of friendship with the un- tutored Indians, — who fill with savage display the surrounding forest as far as the eye can reach, — not to wrest their lands by violence, but to obtain them by peaceful purchase, is, to my mind, the proud- est picture in the history of our country. "The great God," said the illustrious Quaker, in words of sincerity and truth addressed to the Sachems, " has written his law in our hearts by which we are taught and commanded to love and to help, and to do good to one another. It is not our custom to use hostile weapons against our fellow-creatures, for which rea- son we have come unarmed. Our object is, not to do
* Preface to Penn's Constitution.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 121
injury, but to do good. "We have met, then, in the broad pathway of good faith and good will, so that no advantage can be taken on either side, but all is to be openness, brotherhood, and love ; while all are to be treated as of the same flesh and blood." * These are words of True Greatness. " Without any carnal weapons," says one of his companions, u we entered the land, and inhabited therein, as safe as if there had been thousands of garrisons." "This little State," says Oldmixon, " subsisted in the midst of six Indian nations, without so much as a militia for its defence." A Great Man, worthy of the mantle of Penn, the venerable philanthropist, Clarkson, in his life of the founder of Pennsylvania, says, "The Penusylvauians became armed, though without arms ; they became strong, though without strength ; they became safe, without the ordi- nary means of safety. The constable's staff was the only instrument of authority amongst them for the greater part of a centuiy, and never, during the administration of Penn, or that of his proper suc- cessors, was there a quarrel or a war." f
Greater than the divinity that doth hedge a king is the divinity that encompasses the righteous man and the righteous people. The flowers of prosperity smiled in the blessed footprints of William Penn. His people were unmolested and happy, while (sad, but true contrast !) those of other colonies, acting upon the policy of the world, building forts, and showing themselves in arms, not after receiving provocation, but merely in the anticipation, or from
^Clarkson's Life of Penn, I. cap. xviii. f Life of Penn, II. cap. xxiil. 11
122 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
the fear of insult or danger, were harassed by per- petual alarm, and pierced by the sharp arrows of savage war.
This pattern of a Christian commonwealth never fails to arrest the admiration of all who contemplate its beauties. It drew an epigram of eulogy from the caustic pen of Voltaire, and has been fondly painted by many virtuous historians. Every ingenu- ous soul in our day offers willing tribute to those celestial graces of justice and humanity, by the side of which, the hardness of other colonists seems coarse and earthly.
THE GOOD TO BE ACCOMPLISHED.
Let us not confine ourselves to barren words, in recognition of virtue. While we see the right, and approve it too, let us dare to pursue it. Let us now, in this age of civilization, surrounded by Christian nations, be willing to follow the success- ful example of William Penn, surrounded by sav- ages. While recognizing those two transcendent ordinances of God, the Law of Right and the Law of Love, — the double suns which illumine the moral universe, — let us aspire to the True Glory, and, what is higher than Glory, the great good of taking the lead in the disarming of the nations. Let us aban- don the S}7stem of Preparations for War in time of peace, as irrational, unchristian, vainly prodigal of expense, and having a direct tendency to excite the evil against which it professes to guard. Let the enormous means, thus released from iron hands, be devoted to labors of beneficence. Our battlements shall be schools, hospitals, colleges, and churches ;
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 123
our arsenals shall be libraries ; our navy shall be peaceful ships, on errands of perpetual commerce ; our army shall be the teachers of youth, and the ministers of religion. This is, indeed, the cheap defence of nations. In such entrenchments, what Christian soul can be touched with fear ? Angels of the Lord will throw over the land an invisible, but impenetrable panoply ;
Or if virtue feeble were,
Heaven itself would stoop to her.*
At the thought of such a change, the imagination loses itself in vain effort to follow the multitudinous streams of happiness, which gush forth as from a thousand hills. Then shall the naked be clothed and the hungry fed. Institutions of science and learn- ing shall crown every hill-top ; hospitals for the sick, and other retreats for the unfortunate children of the world, for all who suffer in any way, in mind,
* These are the concluding words of that most exquisite crea- tion of early genius, the Comus. I have seen them in Milton's own handwriting inscribed by himself, during his Italian trav- els, as a motto in an Album ; thus showing that they were re- garded by him as expressing an important practical truth. The- truth, which is thus embalmed by the grandest poet of modern times, is also illustrated, in familiar words, by the most graceful poet of antiquity.
Integer vitre scelerisque purus, Non eget Mauri jaculis, neque areu, Nee venenatis gravida sagittis,
Fusee, pharetra. Dryden pictures the same idea in some of his most magical lines.
A milk-white hind, immortal and unchanged, Fed on the lawns, and in the forest ranged ; Without unspotted, innocent within, She feared no danger, for she knew no sin.
124 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
body, or estate, shall nestle in every valley ; while the spires of new churches leap exulting to the skies. The whole land shall testify to the change. Art shall confess it in the new inspiration of the canvas and the marble. The harp of the poet shall pro- claim it in a loftier rhyme. Above all, the heart of man shall bear witness to it, in the elevation of his sentiments, in the expansion of his affections, in his devotion to the highest truth, in his appreciation of True Greatness. The eagle of our country, without the terror of his beak, and dropping the forceful thunderbolt from his pounces, shall soar, with the olive of Peace, into untried realms of ether, nearer to the sun.
SUMMARY.
Here I pause to review the field over which we have passed. We have beheld War, sanctioned by International Law, as a mode of determining justice between Nations, elevated into an established custom, defined and guarded by a complex code, kno'wn as the Laws of War ; we have detected its origin in an appeal, not to the moral and intellectual part of man's nature, in which alone is Justice, but in an appeal to that low part, which he has in com- mon with the beast ; we have contemplated its infi- nite miseries to the human race ; we have weighed its sufficiency as a mode of determining justice be- tween nations, and found that it is a rude appeal to force, or a gigantic game of chance, in which God's children are profanely treated as a pack of cards, while, in unnatural wickedness, it is justly likened to the monstrous and impious custom of Trial by
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 125
Battle, which disgraced the Dark Ages ; — thus show- ing, that, in this day of boastful civilization, justice between nations is determined by the same rules of barbarous, brutal violence, which once controlled the relations between individuals. We have next con- sidered the various prejudices by which War is sus- tained ; founded on a false belief in its necessity ; the practice of nations, past and present ; the infi- delity of the Christian Church ; a mistaken senti- ment of honor ; an exaggerated idea of the duties of patriotism ; and finally, that monster prejudice, which draws its vampire life from the vast Prepara- tions in time of peace for War ; — especially dwell- ing, at this stage, upon the thriftless, irrational, and unchristian character of these Preparations ; hail- ing also the auguries of their overthrow, and catch- ing a vision of the surpassing good that will be achieved, when the boundless means, thus barbar- ously employed, are dedicated to works of Peace, opening the serene path to that righteousness which exalteth a Nation.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
And now, if it be asked why, on this National Anniversary, in considering the TRUE GRANDEUR OP NATIONS, I have dwelt, thus singly and exclusively on War, it is, because War is utterly and irrecon- cilably inconsistent with True Greatness. Thus far, mankind have worshipped in Military Glory a phan- tom idol, compared with which the colossal images of ancient Babylon or modern Hindostan are but toys ; and we in this blessed land of freedom, in this blessed day of light, are among the idolaters. 11*
126 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
The Heaven-descended injunction, Know thyself, still speaks to an unheeding world from the distant letters of gold at Delphi ; — Know thyself; know that the moral nature is the most noble part of man, tran- scending far that part which is the seat of passion, strife, and War; nobler than the intellect itself. And the human heart, by its untutored judgment, — rendering spontaneous homage to the virtues of Peace, — -approves the same truth. It admonishes the military idolater, that it is not the bloody com- bats, even of the bravest chiefs, even of the gods themselves, — as they echo from the resounding lines of the great Poet of War, — which have re- ceived the warmest admiration ; but those two scenes, in which he has painted the gentle, unwar- like affections of our nature, — the Parting of Hector from Andromache, and the Supplication of Priam. In this definitive election of the peaceful pictures of Homer, the soul of man, inspired by a better wisdom than that of books, and drawn unconsciously by the Heavenly attraction of what is Truly Great, has acknowledged, by a touching instance, the vanity of Military Gloiy. The Beatitudes of Christ, which shrink from saying " Blessed are the War-makers," inculcate the same lesson. Reason affirms and re- peats what the heart has prompted, and Christianity declared. Suppose War to be decided by Force, where is the Glory? Suppose it to be decided by Chance, where is the Glory? Surely, in other ways True Greatness lies. Nor is it difficult to tell where.
True Greatness consists in imitating, as near as possible for finite man, the perfections of an Infinite
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 127
Creator ; above all, in cultivating those highest per- fections, Justice and Love ; — Justice, which, like that of St. Louis, does not swerve to the right hand or to the left ; Love, which, like that of William Penn, regards all mankind of kin. " God is angry," says Plato, " when any one censures a man like himself, or praises a man of an opposite charac- ter. And the God-like man is the good man." * Again : in another of those lovely dialogues, vocal -with immortal truth, " Nothing resembles God more than that man among us who has arrived at the high- est degree of justice." f The True Greatness of Nations is in those qualities which constitute the True Greatness of the individual. It is not in ex- tent of territory, or vastness of population or accu- mulations of wealth ; not in fortifications, or armies, or navies ; not in the phosphorescent glare of battle ; not in Golgothas, though covered by monuments that kiss the clouds ; for all these are the creatures and representatives of those qualities in our nature, which are unlike anything in God's nature. Nor is it to be found in triumphs of the intellect alone, — in literature, learning, science, or art. The polished Greeks, our masters in the delights of art, and the commanding Romans, overawing the earth with their power, were little more than splendid savages. And the age of Louis XIV., of France, spanning so long a period of ordinary worldly magnificence ; thronged by marshals, bending under military lau- rels ; enlivened by the unsurpassed comedy of Mo- Here ; dignified by the tragic genius of Corneille ; il-
« Minos, § 12. t Theaetetus, § 87.
128 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
lumined by the splendors of Bossuet, — is degraded by immoralities, that cannot be mentioned without a blush ; by a heartlessness, in comparison with which the ice of Nova Zembla is warm; and by a succes- sion of deeds of injustice, not to be washed out by the tears of all the recording angels of Heaven.
The True Greatness of a Nation cannot be in tri- umphs of the intellect alone. Literature and art may enlarge the sphere of its influence ; they may adorn it ; but they are in their nature but accessaries. The True Grandeur of Humanity is in moral eleva- tion, sustained, enlightened, and decorated by the in- tellect of man. The surest tokens of this Grandeur, in a Nation, are that Christian Beneficence, which diffuses the greatest happiness among the greatest number, and that passionless, God-like Justice, which controls the relations of the Nation to other Nations, and to all the people committed to its charge.
THE BLOODY HEEL OF WAR.
But War crushes, with bloody heel, all benefi- cence, all happiness, all justice, all that is God-like in man. It suspends every commandment of the Decalogue ; it sets at naught every principle of the Gospel ; it silences all law, human as well as di- vine, except only that blasphemous code of its own, the Laws of War. If, in its dismal annals, there is any cheerful passage, be assured that it is not inspired by a martial Fury. Let it not be forgotten, — let it be ever borne in mind, as you ponder this theme, — that the virtues, which shed their charm over its horrors, are all borrowed of Peace ; that they are
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 129
emanations of the Spirit of Love, which is so strong in the heart of man, that it survives the rudest as- saults. The flowers of gentleness, of kindliness, of fidelity, of humanity, which flourish unregarded in the rich meadows of Peace, receive unwonted admi- ration when we discern them in War, like violets, shedding their perfume on the perilous edges of the precipice, beyond the smiling borders of civilization. Gofl be praised for all the examples of magnanimous virtue which he has vouchsafed to mankind ! God be praised, that the Roman Emperor, about to start on a distant expedition of War, encompassed by squadrons of cavalry, and by golden eagles which swayed in the wind, stooped from his saddle to hear the prayer of the humble widow, demanding justice for the death of her son ! * God be praised, that Sydney, on the field of battle, gave, with dying hand, the cup of cold water to the dying soldier ! That single act of self-forgetful sacrifice has conse- crated the deadly field of Zutphen, far, oh, far beyond its battle ; it has consecrated thy name, gal- lant Sydney, beyond any feat of thy sword, beyond any triumph of thy pen ! But there are lowty sup- pliants, in other places than the camp ; there are hands outstretched, elsewhere than on fields of blood, for so little as a cup of cold water. Every- where are opportunities for deeds of like Greatness.
* This most admired instance of justice, according to the legends of the Catholic Church, opened to Trajan, although a heathen, the gates of salvation. Dante found the scene and the visibile parlare of the widow and Emperor storied on the walls of Purga- tory, and he has transmitted them in a passage which commends itself hardly less than any in the Divine Poem. —See Purgatorio, Canto X.
130 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
Know well, that these are not the product of War. They do not spring from enmity, hatred, and strife ; but from those benign sentiments, whose natural and ripened fruit, of joy and blessing, can be found only in Peace. If, at any time, they appear in the soldier, it is not because, but notwithstanding, he is the hire- ling of battle. Let me not be told, then, of the vir- tues of War. Let not the acts of generosity and sac- rifice, which have blossomed on its fields, be invoked in its defence. From such a giant root of bitterness no True Good can spring. The poisonous tree, in Oriental imagery, though watered by nectar, and covered with roses, can produce only the fruit of death !
Casting our eyes over the history of nations, with horror we discern the succession of murderous slaughters, by which their Progress has been marked. Even as the hunter traces the wild beast, when pur- sued to his lair, by the drops of blood on the earth, so we follow Man, faint, weary, staggering with wounds through the Black Forest of the Past, which he has reddened with his gore. Oh, let it not be in the future ages, as in those which we now contem- plate ! Let the Grandeur of man be discerned, not in bloody victory, or in ravenous conquest, but in the blessings which he has secured ; in the good he has accomplished ; in the triumphs of Beneficence and Justice ; in the establishment of Perpetual Peace.
VICTORIES OF PEACE.
As the ocean washes every shore, and, with all- embracing arms, clasps every land, while, on its
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 131
heaving bosom, it bears the products of various climes ; so Peace surrounds, protects, and upholds all other blessings. Without it, commerce is vain, the ardor of industry is restrained, justice is ar- rested, happiness is blasted, virtue sickens and dies.
And Peace has its own peculiar victories ; in com- parison with which, Marathon and Bannockburn and Bunker Hill, fields sacred in the history of human freedom, will lose their lustre. Our own Washing- ton rises to a truly heavenly stature, — not when we follow him over the ice of the Delaware to the capture of Trenton, — not when we behold him vic- torious over Cornwallis at Yorktown, — but when we regard him, in noble deference to Justice, refus- ing the kingly crown which a faithless soldiery prof- fered, and, at a later day, upholding the peaceful neutrality of the country, while he received un- moved the clamor of the people wickedly crying for War. What Glory of battle in England's annals will not fade by the side of that great act of Jus- tice, by which her Parliament, at a cost of one hun- dred million dollars, gave freedom to eight hundred thousand slaves! And when the day shall come (may these eyes be gladdened by its beams !) that shall witness an act of larger Justice still, — the peaceful emancipation of three millions of our fellow- men, " guilty of a skin not colored as our own," now in this land of jubilant freedom, bound in gloomy bondage, — then will there be a victory, in compari- son with which that of Bunker Hill will be as a far- thing-candle held up to the sun. That victory will need no monument of stone. It will be written on.
132 THE TRUE GRANDEUE OF NATIONS.
the grateful hearts of uncounted multitudes, that shall proclaim it to the latest generation. It will be one of the famed landmarks of civilization ; nay, more, it will be one of the links in the golden chain by which Humanity shall connect itself with the throne of God.
As man is higher than the beasts of the field ; as the angels are higher than man ; as Christ is higher than Mars ; as he that ruleth his spirit is higher than he that taketh a city, — so are the victories of Peace higher than the victories of War.
APPEAL FOR THE CAUSE.
Far be from us, fellow-citizens, on this Festival, the pride of national victory, and the illusion of na- tional freedom, in which we are too prone to indulge. None of }'ou make rude boast of individual prosper- ity or prowess. But there can be only one and the same rule, whether in morals or conduct, for nations and individuals. Our country will act wisely and in the spirit of True Greatness, by emulating, in public behavior, the reserve and modesty universally commended in private life. Let it cease to vaunt it- self and be puffed up ; but rather brace itself, by firm resolve and generous aspiration, to the duties before it. We have but half done, when we have made ourselves free. Let not the scornful taunt, wrung from bitter experience of the great French Revolu- tion, be directed at us : " They wish to be free; but know not how to be just." * Freedom is not an end in
*" Us veulent etre libres et ne savent pas etre justes," was the famous exclamation of Sieyes.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 133
itself, but a means only, — a means of securing Jus- tice and Beneficence, in which alone is happiness, the real end and aim of Nations, as of every human heart. It becomes us to inquire earnestly, if there is not much to be done by which these can be ad- vanced. If I have succeeded in impressing the truths which I have upheld today, you will be ready, as faithful citizens, alike of our own Republic and of the universal Christian Commonwealth, to join in efforts to abolish the Arbitrament of War, to suppress International Lynch Laic, and to induce the Disarming of the Nations, as indispensable to the establishment of Permanent Peace— that grand, comprehensive blessing, at once the child and parent of all those guardian virtues, without which National Honor and National Glory are vain things, and there can be no True Grandeur of Nations !
To this Great Work let me summon you. That Future, which filled the lofty vision of the sages and bards of Greece and Rome, which was foretold by the prophets and heralded by the evangelists, when man, in Happy Isles, or in a new Paradise, shall confess the loveliness of Peace, may be secured by your care, if not for yourselves, at least for your children. Believe that you can do it. and you can do it. The true golden age is before, not behind. If man has been driven once from Paradise, while an angel, with a flaming sword, forbade his return, there is another Paradise, even on earth, which he may form for himself, by the cultivation of knowl- edge, religion, and the kindly virtues of life ; where the confusion of tongues shall be dissolved in the union of hearts ; and joyous Nature, borrowing pro- 12
134 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
lific charms from the prevailing Harmony, shall spread her lap with unimagined bounty, and there shall be a perpetual jocund spring, and sweet strains borne on " the odoriferous wing of gentle gales," through valleys of delight, more pleasant than the Vale of Tempe, richer than the garden of the Hes- perides, with no dragon to guard its golden fruit.
Is it said that the age does not demand this work ? The robber conqueror of the Past, from his fiery sepulchre, demands it ; the precious blood of mil- lions unjustly shed in War, crying from the ground, demands it ; the heart of the good man demands it ; the conscience, even of the soldier, whispers " Peace." There are considerations, springing from our situation and condition, which fervently invite us to take the lead. Here should bend the patriotic ardor of the land ; the ambition of the statesman ; the effort of the scholar; the pervasive influence of the press ; the mild persuasion of the sanctuary ; the early teaching of the school. Here, in ampler ether and diviner air, are untried fields for exalted triumph, more truly worthy the American name, than any snatched from rivers of blood. \Var is known as the Last Reason of Kings. Let it be no reason of our Republic. Let us renounce, and throw off forever, the yoke of a tyranny more oppressive than any in the world's annals. As those standing on the mountain-top first discern the coming beams of morning, so may we, from the vantage-ground of liberal institutions, first recognize the ascending sun of a new era ! Lift high the gates, and let the King of Glory in, — the King of True Glory, — of Peace.
THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. 135
I catch the last words of music from the lips of in- nocence and beauty ; *
And let the whole earth be filled with His Glory !
It is a beautiful picture in Grecian story, that there was at least one spot, the small Island of De- los, dedicated to the gods, and kept at all times sacred from War. No hostile foot ever sought to press this kindly soil ; and citizens of all countries met here, in common worship, beneath the aegis of inviolable Peace. So Jet us dedicate our beloved countiy ; and may the blessed consecration be felt in all its parts, everywhere throughout its ample do- main ! The TEMPLE OF HONOR shall be surrounded by the Temple of Concord, that it may never more be entered through any portal of War ; the horn of Abundance shall overflow at its gates ; the angel of Eeligion shall be the guide over its steps of flashing adamant ; while within its enraptured courts, purged of Violence and Wrong, JUSTICE, returned to the earth from long exile in the skies, with mighty scales for Nations as for men, shall rear her serene and majestic front ; and by her side, greatest of all, CHARITY, sublime in meekness, hoping all and en- during all, shall divinely temper every righteous de- cree and, with words of infinite cheer, inspire those Good Works that cannot vanish away. And the fu- ture chiefs of the Republic, destined to uphold the Glories of a new era, unspotted by human blood,
* The services of the choir at the church, where the Oration was delivered, were performed by the youthful daughters of the public schools of Boston.
136 THE TRUE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS.
shall be " the first in PEACE, and the first in the hearts of their countrymen."
While seeking these blissful Glories for ourselves, let us strive for their extension to other lands. Let the bugles sound the Truce of God to the whole world forever. Let the selfish boast of the Spartan women become the grand chorus of mankind, that they have never seen the smoke of an enemy's camp. Let the iron belt of War, which now encompasses the earth, be exchanged for the golden cestus of Peace, clothing all with celeiitial beauty. History dwells with fondness on the reverent homage be- stowed, by massacring soldiers, upon the spot occu- pied by the Sepulchre of the Lord. Vain man ! to restrain his regard to a few feet of sacred mould ! The whole earth is the Sepulchre of the Lord ; nor can any righteous man profane any part thereof. Recognizing this truth, I would now, on this Sab- bath of our country, lay a new stone in the grand Temple of Universal Peace, whose dome shall be as lofty as the firmament of Heaven, as broad and comprehensive as the earth itself.
WAR-SYSTEM
OF THE
0f ations:
AN ADDRESS,
BY
CHARLES SUMNER,
BEFORE THE AMERICAN PEACE SOCIETY, AT ITS ANNIVERSARY IN BOSTON, MAY 28, 1849.
Thai it may please Thee to give to all nations unity, peace, and con- cord.—THE LITANY.
What angel shall descend to reconcile
The Christian States, and end their guilty toil ?— WALLER.
•
BOSTON: AMERICAN PEACE SOCIETY.
1870.
EXTRACT FROM THE SOCIETY'S RECORDS.
, — That the thanks of this Society be given to Mr. Sumner, for his able and eloquent Address; that a copy be requested for the press, and that efforts be made to give it the widest circulation possible."
A true copy.
Attest, WM. C. BROWN, Rec. Sec.
STEREOTYPE EDITION.
In pursuance of the above vote of our Society, several large editions were issued; but, thinking that a performance of such signal ability ought to have a still wider and more permanent circulation, we asked permission to stereotype it. Mr. Sumner kindly consented; and in preparing this edition, he has made no alteration in any principle or argument from the original address, his views, like our own, hav- ing experienced on the question of Peace and War, no change from any events of the last twenty years.
GEO. C. BECKWITH,
Corresponding Secretary, BOBTON, Jan., 1869.
" I look upon the way of treaties, as a retiring from fighting like beasts, to arguing like men, whose strength should be more in their understandings than in their limbs." — CHARLES I., Eikon Basilike.
"We daily make great improvements in natural— there is one I wish to see in moral— philosophy; the discovery of a plan that would induce and oblige nations to settle their disputes without first cutting one another's throats . When will human reason be sufficiently improved to see the advantage of this ? " — FRANKLIN.
" La memo politique qui lie, pour leur bonheur, toutes les families d'une nation les unes avec les autres, doit lier entro elles toutes les nations, qui sont des families du genre humain. Tous les hommes so communiquent, me'me sans s'en douter, leurs maux et leurs biens, d'un bout do la terre & 1'autre." — BERNARDIN DE ST. PIERRE.
"Only the toughest, harshest barbarism of past ages— War — remains yet to be vanquished by our innate anti-barbarism. There is a growing insight of its unlawfulness." — JEAN PAUL.
"War is on its last legs; and a universal peace is as sure as is the prevalence of civilization over barbarism, of liberal govern- ments over feudal forms. The question for us is only, How soon J " —EMERSON.
WAR-SYSTEM
OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF NATIONS
MR. PRESIDENT, AND GENTLEMEN, — We are as- sembled in what may be called the Holy Week of our community ; not occupied by pomps of a complex ceremonial, swelling in tides of music, be- neath time-honored arches, but set apart, with the unadorned simplicity of early custom, to Anni- versary meetings of those charitable and religious associations, from whose good works our country derives such true honor. Each association is dis- tinct. Gathered within the folds of each are its own members, devoted to its chosen objects ; and yet, all are harmonious together ; for all are inspired by one sentiment, — the welfare of the united Hu- man Family. Each has its own separate orbit, a pathway of light ; while all together constitute a system which moves in a still grander orbit. • Among all these associations, none is so truly comprehensive as ours. The prisoner in his cell, the slave in his chains, the sailor on his ocean wander- ings, the Pagan on his distant continent or island,
6 WAR-SYSTEM.
and the ignorant here at home, will all be com- mended by eloquent voices. I need not say that yon should listen to these voices, and answer to their appeal. But, while mindful of these inter- ests, justly claiming your care, it is my special and most grateful duty tonight, to commend that other cause, — the great cause of Peace, — which, in its Christian embrace, enfolds prisoner, slave, sailor, the ignorant, all mankind ; which, to each of these charities, is the source of strength and light, I may say of life itself, as the sun in the heavens.
THE PEACE CAUSE.
Peace is the grand Christian charity, the fountain and parent of all other charities. Let Peace be re- moved, and all other charities sicken and die. Let Peace exert her gladsome sway, and all other chari- ties^ quicken into life. Peace is a distinctive promise and possession of Christianity ; so much so, that, where Peace is not, Christianity cannot be. There is nothing elevated which is not exalted by Peace. There is nothing valuable which does not gain from Peace. Of wisdom herself it has been said, that all her ways are pleasantness, and all her paths are Peace. Peace has ever been the longing and aspira- tion of the noblest souls — whether for themselves or for country. In the bitterness of exile, away from the Florence which he has immortalized by his divine poem, and pacing the cloisters of a convent, where a sympathetic monk inquired, " What do you* seek?" Dante answered, in accents distilled from the heart, Peace, peace. In the memorable English struggles, while king and parliament were rending
WAR-SYSTEM. 7
the land, a gallant supporter of the monarchy, the chivalrous Falkland, touched by the intolerable woes of war, cried, in words which consecrate his memory more than any feat of arms, Peace, peace, peace. Not in aspiration only, but in benediction, is this word uttered. As the Apostle went forth on his errand, as the son forsook his father's roof, the choicest blessing was, Peace be with you. As the Saviour was born, angels from Heaven, amidst quiring melodies, let fall that supreme benediction, never before vouch- safed to the children of the Human Family, Peace on earth, and good-will towards men.
To maintain this charity, to promote these aspira- tions, to welcome these benedictions, is the object of our Society. To fill men in private with all those sentiments, which make for Peace ; to animate men in public with the recognition of those paramount principles, which are the safeguard of Peace ; above all, to teach the True Grandeur of Peace, and to unfold the folly and wickedness of the INSTITUTION of War and of the War-System, now recognized and established by the Commonwealth of Nations, as the mode of determining international controversies, — such is the object of our Society.
OBJECTIONS AND PREJUDICES.
There are persons who sometimes allow themselves to speak of associations like ours, if not with dis- approbation, at least with levity and distrust. A writer, so humane and genial as Robert Southey, has left on record a gibe at the " Society for the Aboli- tion of War," saying, that ''it had not obtained sufficient notice even to be in disrepute." It is not
8 WAR-SYSTEM.
uncommon to hear our aims characterized as vision- ary, impracticable, Utopian. It is sometimes hastily said that they are contrary to the nature of man ; that they require for their success a complete recon- struction of his character ; and that they necessarily assume in him qualities, capacities, and virtues, which do not belong to his existing nature. This mistaken idea was once strongly expressed by the remark, that " an Anti-War Society seemed as little practicable as an Anti-Thunder-and-Lightning Society."
It cannot be doubted that these objections, strik- ing at the heart of our cause, have exerted a cer- tain influence over the public mind. They proceed often from persons of unquestioned sincerity and goodness, who would rejoice to see the truth as we see it. But, plausible as they may appear, to those who have not properly meditated this subject, I can- not but regard them — I believe, that all who can- didly listen to me will hereafter regard them — as prejudices, without foundation in sense or religion, which must yield to a plain and careful examination of the precise objects proposed.
Let me not content myself, in response to these critics, by the easy answer, that, if our aims are visionar}*-, impracticable, Utopian, then the unful- filled promises of the prophecies are vain ; then the Lord's Prayer, in which we ask that God's kingdom shall come on earth, is a mockery ; then Christianity is no better than the statutes of Utopia. Let me not content myself by reminding you, that all the great reforms, by which mankind have been advanced, encountered similar objections ; that the abolition of the punishment of death for theft, so long delayed,
WAR-SYSTEM. 9
was first suggested in the Utopia of Sir Thomas More ; that the efforts to abolish the slave trade were opposed, almost in our day, as impracticable and visionary ; in short, that all the endeavors for human improvement, for knowledge, for freedom, for virtue, — that all the great causes which dignify human history, which save it from being a mere protracted War Bulletin, a common sewer, a cloaca maxima, flooded with perpetual uncleanness, — have been pronounced Utopian ; while, in spite of dis- trust, prejudice, and enmit}r, all these causes gradu- ally found acceptance, as they were gradually un- derstood, and the aspirations of one age became the realities of the next.
Satisfactory as such an answer might be to some, I cannot content myself with leaving our cause on such grounds. I desire to meet all assaults, and show, by a careful exposition, that our objects are in no respect visionary ; that the cause of Peace does not depend for success upon any reconstruction of the human character, or upon holding in check the general laws of man's nature ; but that it deals with man as he is, according to the experience of history ; and, above all, that our immediate and particular aim, the abolition of the Institution of War, and of the whole War-System, as an established Arbiter of Right, in the Commonwealth of Nations, is as prac- ticable, as it would be beneficent.
I begin by carefully putting aside questions, which have often occupied attention, but which an accurate analysis shows to be independent of the true issue. Their introduction has sometimes per- plexed the discussion, by transferring to the great
10 WAR-SYSTEM.
cause of International Peace the doubts by which these questions are encompassed.
RIGHT OF SELF-DEFENCE.
One of these is the declared right, appertaining to each individual, to take the life of an assailant in order to save his own life — compendiously called the right of self-defence, usually recognized by phi- losophers and publicists as founded in nature and the instincts of men. The exercise of this right is carefully restrained to cases where life itself is in actual jeopard}7. No defence of property, no vindi- cation of what is called personal honor, justifies this extreme resort. Nor does this right impty the right of attack ; for, instead of attacking one another, on account of injuries past or impending, men need only have recourse to the proper tribunals of justice. There are, however, many most respectable persons, particularly of the denomination of Friends, — some of whom I may now have the honor of addressing, — who believe that the exercise of this right, even thus limited, is in direct contravention of Christian pre- cepts. Their views find faithful utterance in the writings of Jonathan Dymond, of which at least this maybe said, that they strengthen and elevate, even if they do not always satisfy, the understanding. " I shall be asked," says Dymond, " suppose a ruffian breaks into your house, and rushes into your room with his arm lifted to murder you, do you not believe that Christianity allows you to kill him ? This is the last resort of the cause. My answer to it is explicit, — I do not believe it." But while thus can- didly and openly avowing this extreme sentiment
-WAR-SYSTEM. 11
of non-resistance, he is careful to remind the reader, that the case of the ruffian does not practically illus- trate the true character of war, unless it appears that war is undertaken simply for the preservation of life, when no other alternative remains to a people, than to kill or be killed.
According to this view, the robber on land who places his pistol at the breast of the traveller ; the pirate, who threatens life on the high seas ; and the riotous disturber of the public peace, who puts life in jeopardy at home, — cannot be opposed by the sacri- fice of life. Of course, all who subscribe to this re- nunciation of self-defence, must join in efforts to abolish the Arbitrament of War. Our appeal is to the larger number, who make no such application of Christian precepts, who recognize the right of self-defence as belonging to each individual, and who believe in the necessity at times of exercising this right, whether against a robber, a pirate, or a mob.
RIGHT OP REVOLUTION.
Another question, closely connected with that of self-defence, is the alleged right of revolt, or of revolution. Shall a people endure political oppres- sion or the denial of freedom, without resistance ? The answer to this question will necessarily affect the rights of three millions of fellow-men held in slavery among us. If such a right unqualifiedly exists, — and sympathy with our fathers, and with the struggles for freedom now agitating Europe, must make us hesitate to question its existence, — then these three millions of fellow-men, into whose
12 WAR-SYSTEM.
souls we tbrust the iron of the deadliest bondage the world has yet witnessed, would be justified in resisting to death the power that holds them. A popular writer on Ethics, Dr. Paley, has said : "It ma}' be as much a duty, at one time, to resist gov- ernment, as it is at another, to obey it ; to wit, whenever more advantage will, in our opinion, ac- crue to the community from resistance, than mis- chief. The lawfulness of resistance, or the lawful- ness of a revolt, does not depend alone upon the grievance which is sustained or feared, but also upon the probable expense and event of the cause." * This view distinctly recognizes the right of resist- ance, but limits it by the chances of success, found- ing it on no higher ground than expediency. A right, thus vaguely defined and bounded, must be invoked at any time with reluctance and distrust. The lover of peace, while admitting, that unhappily, in the present state of the world, an exigency for its exercise may arise, must confess the inherent barbarism of such an agency, and admire, even if he cannot entirely adopt, the sentiment of Daniel O'Connell : u Remember, that no political change is worth a single crime, or, above all, a single drop of human blood."
!
QUESTIONS PUT ASIDE.
These questions I put aside ; not as unimportant, not as unworthy of careful consideration, but as unessential to the cause which I have at heart. If I am asked, — as the advocates of Peace are often
* Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy, Book VI. chap. iv.
WAR-SYSTEM. 13
asked, — whether a robber, a pirate, a mob, may be resisted by the sacrifice of life, I answer that they may be so resisted — mournfully, necessarily. If I am asked to sympathise with the efforts for free- dom now finding vent in rebellion and revolution, I cannot hesitate to say, that, wherever Freedom struggles, wherever Right is, there my sympathies must be. And I believe I speak, not only for myself, but for our Society, when I add, that, while it is our constant aim to diffuse those sentiments which promote good-will in all the relations of life ; which exhibit the beauty of Peace everywhere, in internal- affairs, as well as international; and while we especially recognize that central truth, the Brotherhood of Man, in the light of which all vio- lence among men becomes dismal and abhorred, as among brothers, — it is, nevertheless, no part of our purpose to impeach the right to take life in self- defence, or when the public necessity requires, nor to question the justifiableness of resistance to outrage and oppression. On these points, there are diversities of opinion among the friends of Peace, whicli this Society, confining itself to efforts for the overthrow of War, is not constrained to determine.
THE QUESTION STATED.
Waiving, then, these matters, which have often thrown perplexity and difficulty over our cause, making many hesitate, I come now to the precise object whicli we hope to accomplish, — The Abolition of the Institution of TFar, and of the whole War-Sys- tem as an established Arbiter of Justice in the Com- monwealth of Nations. In the accurate statement
2
14 WAR-SYSTEM.
of our aims, you will at once perceive the strength of our position. Much is always gained by a clear understanding of the question in issue ; and the cause of Peace unquestionably suffers often, because it is misrepresented, or not fully comprehended. In the hope of removing this difficulty, I shall first unfold the true character of War and of the War- System, involving the question of Preparations for War, and the question of a Militia. The way will then be open, in the second branch of this address, for a consideration of the means by which this Sys- tem can be overthrown. And here I shall pass in review the tendencies and examples of nations, and the efforts of individuals, constituting the Peace Movement, with the auguries of its triumph, briefly touching, at the close, on our duties to this great cause, and on the vanity of Military Glory. In all that I say, I cannot forget that I am addressing a Christian association, for a Christian charity, in a Christian church.
THE COMMONWEALTH OF NATIONS, AND THE LAW OF NATIONS.
I. And, first, of War and the War-System in the Commonwealth of Nations. By the Commonwealth of Nations, I understand the Fraternity of Christian States, recognizing a Common Law in their rela- tions with each other, usually called the Law of Nations. This law, being established by the con- sent of nations, is not necessarily the law of all nations, but only of such as recognize it. The Europeans and the Orientals often differ with regard to its provisions ; nor would it be proper to say
WAR-SYSTEM. 3 5
that, at this time, the Ottomans, or the Mahomedans in general, or the Chinese, had become parties to it. The substantial elements of this law are derived from the law of nature, the truths of Christianity, the usages of nations, the opinions of publicists, and from the written texts or enactments of trea- ties. Thus, in origin and growth, it is not unlike the various systems of municipal jurisprudence, all of which may be referred to kindred sources.
It is often said, by way of excuse for the allow- ance of War, that nations are independent, and acknowledge no common superior. True, indeed, they are politically independent, and acknowledge no common political sovereign. But they acknowl- edge a common superior, of unquestioned influence and authority, whose rules they cannot disobey. This common superior, acknowledged by all, is none other than the Law of Nations. It were superfluous to dwell at length upon the opinions of publicists and jurists in confirmation of this assertion. " The Law of Nations," says Vattel,* a classic in this department, " is not less obliga- tory with respect to states, or to men united in political society, than to individuals." An eminent English authorit}', Lord Stowell, so famous as Sir William Scott,f says, " The Conventional Law of Mankind, which is evidenced in their practice, alloivs some and prohibits other modes of destruc- tion." A recent German jurist } says, " A nation associating itself with the general society of na-
* Law of Nations, Preface.
t Robinson's Rep., vol. i. p. 140.
J Heffler, quoted in Wheaton's Elements, Part I. cap. i., § 7.
16 WAR-SYSTEM.
tions, thereby recognizes a law common to all nations , by which its international relations are to be regu- lated." Lastly, a popular English moralist, whom I have already quoted, and to whom I refer be- cause his name is so familiar, Dr. Paley, * says, that the principal part of what is called the Law of Nations derives its obligatory character " simply from the fact of its being established, and the general duty of conforming to established rules upon ques- tions, and between parties, where nothing but posi- tive regulations can prevent difficulties, and where disputes are followed by such destructive conse- quences."
The Law of Nations is, then, the Supreme Law of the Commonwealth of Christian Nations, governing their relations with each other, determining their reciprocal rights, and sanctioning all remedies for the violation of these rights. To the Commonwealth of Nations, this Law is what the Constitution and Municipal Law of Massachusetts are to the associate towns and counties, composing this State, or what, by an apter illustration, the Federal Constitution of our Union is to the thirty sovereign States, which now recognize it as the supreme law.
WAR, AN INSTITUTION OP THE LAW OF NATIONS.
But the Law of Nations, — and I now come to a point of importance in 'the clear understanding of the subject, — while anticipating and providing for controversies between nations, recognizes and es- tablishes War as the final Arbiter. It distinctly says
* Philosophy, Book VI. cap. xii.
WAR-SYSTEM. 17
to the nations, "If you cannot agree together, then stake your cause upon Trial by Battle." And it pioceeds to define, at no inconsiderable length, under the name of Laws of War, the rules and regulations of this combat. " The Laws of War," says Dr. Paley, " are part of the Law of Nations, and founded, as to their authority, upon the same principle with the rest of that code, namely, upon the fact of their being established, no matter when or by whom."
It is not uncommon to speak of the practice of War, or the custom of War, a term adopted by that devoted friend^of Peace, the late Noah Worcester. Its apologists and expounders have called it " a judi- cial trial," — " one of the highest trials of right "
— "a process of justice " — "a prosecution of our rights by force " — "a mode of condign punishment "
— "an appeal for justice " — "a mode of obtaining rights." I prefer to characterize it as an INSTITU- TION, established by the Commonwealth of Nations, as an Arbiter of Justice. As Slavery is an Insti- tution, growing out of local custom, sanctioned, denned, and established by municipal law; so War is an Institution, growing out of general custom,, sanctioned, defined, and established by the Law of Nations.
It is only when we contemplate War in- this fight,, that we fully perceive its combined folly and wick- edness. Let me bring this yet further home to your minds. Boston and Cambridge are adjoining townsr separated by the river Charles. In the event of controversies between these different jurisdictions, the municipal law establishes a judicial tribunal, and
18 WAR-SYSTEM.
not War, as the Arbiter. Ascending higher : in the event of controversies between two different coun- ties, as between Essex and Middlesex, the same municipal law establishes a judicial tribunal, and not Wai-j as the Arbiter. Ascending yet higher : in the event of controversies between two different States of our Union, the Federal Constitution establishes a judicial tribunal, the Supreme Court of the United States, and not War, as the Arbiter. But now mark : at the next stage, there is a change in the Arbiter. In the event of controversies between two different States of the Commonwealth of Nations, the Su- preme Law establishes, not a judicial tribunal, but War, as the Arbiter. War is the Institution estab- lished for the determination of justice between nations.
The provisions of the municipal law of Massachu- setts, and of the Federal Constitution, are not vain words. It is well known to all familiar with our courts, that suits between towns, and also between counties, are often entertained and satisfactorily adjudicated. The records of the Supreme Court of the United States show also that States of the Union habitually refer important controversies to this tri- bunal. There is now pending before this high court, an action of the State of Missouri against the State of Iowa, arising out of a question of boundary, where the former claims a section of territory — larger than many German principalities — extending along the whole northern border of Missouri, with several miles of breadth, and containing more than two thousand square miles. Within a short peri- od, this same tribunal has decided a similar ques-
WAR-SYSTEM. 19
tion, between our own State of Massachusetts and our neighbor Rhode Island ; the latter pertinaciously claiming a section of territory, about three miles broad, on a portion of our Southern frontier.
Suppose that, in these different cases between towns, counties, states, War had been established by the supreme law as the Arbiter ; imagine the disas- trous consequences ; picture the imperfect justice which must have been the end and fruit of such a contest ; and , while rejoicing that in these cases we are happily relieved from an alternative so dismal and deplorable, do not forget, that, on a larger theatre, where grander interests are staked, in the relations between nations, under the solemn sanc- tion of the Law of Nations, War is established as the Arbiter of Justice. Do not forget that a complex and subtle code, known as the Laws of War, is es- tablished to regulate the resort to this Arbiter.
PETTY WAES UNDER MUNICIPAL LAW.
Recognizing the irrational and unchristian char- acter of War, as an established Arbiter between towns, counties, and States, we may learn to con- demn it as an established Arbiter between nations. History furnishes a parallel, by which we may form a yet clearer idea of its true nature. I refer to the system of Private Wars, or, more properly, of Petty Wars, which darkened the dark ages. This must not be confounded with the Trial by Battle, although the two were alike in recognizing the sword as the Arbiter of Justice. The right to wage war (le droit de yuerroyer) was accorded by the earl}' municipal law of European States, particularly of the Continent, to
20 WAR-SYSTEM.
all independent chiefs, however pett}^ but not to their vassals ; precisely as the right to wage war is now accorded by international law to all indepen- dent states and principalities; however petty, but not to their subjects. Nay ; it was often mentioned ex- pressly among the " liberties " to which independent chiefs were entitled ; as it is still recognized by inter- national law among the " liberties " of independent states. In proportion as the sovereignty of these chiefs was absorbed in some larger lordship, this offensive right or "liberty" gradually disappeared. It continued to prevail extensively in France, till at last King John, by an ordinance dated 1361, ex- pressly forbade Petty Wars throughout his kingdom, saying, " We order that all challenges, and wars, and acts of violence against all persons, in any part whatever of our kingdom, shall in future cease ; and also all assemblies, convocations, and cavalcades of men at arms or archers ; and also all pillages, seiz- ures of goods and persons without right, vengeances and counter-vengeances, — all these things we forbid, under pain of incurring our indignation, and of being reputed and held disobedient and rebel." * It was reserved for Louis XI., as late as 1451, to make another effort in the same direction, by expressly abrogating one of the /' liberties " of Dauphiny, which secured to the inhabitants of this province the right of war. From these royal ordinances, the Commonwealth of Nations might borrow appropri- ate words, in abrogating forever the Public Wars, or, more properly, the Grand Wars, with their ven-
*Cauchy, du Duelconsidere dans ses Origines,Tom. I., cap T.p. 91.
WAR-SYSTEM. 21
geances and counter-vengeances, which are yet sanc- tioned by international law among the "liberties" of Christian Nations.
At a later day, effective efforts were made in Ger- many against the same prevailing evil. Contests there were not confined to feudal chiefs. Associa- tions of tradesmen and of domestics sent defiances to each other, and even to whole cities, on pretences trivial as those which have sometimes been the occa- sions of the Grand Wars of Nations. There still remain to us Declarations of War by a lord of Prau- enstein, against the free city of Frankfort, because a young lady of the city refused to dance with hi« uncle ; by the baker and other domestics of the Margrave of Baden, against Eslingen, Reutlingen, and other imperial cities ; by the baker of the Count Palatine Louis, against the cities of Augsburg, Ulm, and Rothwell ; by the shoeblacks of the University of Leipzig, against the provost and other mem- bers ; and, in 1477, by the cook of Eppenstein, with his scullions, dairy-maids, and dish-washers, against Otho, Count of Solms. Finally, at the Diet of Worms, one of the most memorable in German annals, the Emperor Maximilian sanctioned an ordinance, which proclaimed a permanent Peace throughout Germany, abolished the right or " lib- erty" of Private War, and instituted a Supreme Tribunal, under the ancient name of the Imperial Chamber, to which recourse might be had, even by nobles, princes, and states, for the determination of their disputes, without appeal to the sword.*
* Cox's History of the House of Austria, cap. xix. and xxi.
22 WAR-SYSTEM.
TRIAL BY BATTLE UNDER MUNICIPAL LAW.
Trial by Battle, or "judicial combat," furnishes the most vivid picture of the Arbitrament of War, bej'ond even what is found in the system of Petty Wars. It was at one period, particularly in France, the universal umpire between private individuals. All causes, civil and criminal, with all the questions incident thereto, were referred to this senseless Ar- bitrament. Not bodily infirmity, or old age, could exempt a litigant from the hazards of the Battle, even to determine differences of the most trivial character. Substitutes were at last allowed ; and, as in War, bravos or champions were hired for wages to enter the lists. The proceedings were conducted gravely, according to prescribed forms, which were digested into a system of peculiar subtlety and minuteness ; as War in our day has its established code, — the Laws of War. Thus do violence, lawlessness, and absurdity, shelter them- selves beneath the Rule of Law ! Religion also lent her sanctions. The priest, with prayer and counte- nance, cheered the insensate combatant, and ap- pealed for aid to Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace. To its honor, the Church early perceived the wickedness of this system. By the voices of pious bishops, by the ordinances of solemn councils, by the anathemas of popes, it condemned* whomso-
* St.ituimus juxta antiquum ecclesiastics observationis morem, ut quicutnque tarn itnpia et Christianas paci inimica pugna alte- ruin occiderit seu vulneribus debilem reddiderit, velut homicida nequissimus et latro emeritus* ab Ecclesiaa et omnium fidelium coetu reidatur separatus, etc. (Canon 13 Concil. Valent.) Cauchy, du Duel, Tom. I. oh. iii. p. 43.
WAR-SYSTEM. 23
ever should slay another in a battle, so impious and inimical to Christian peace, as "a most wicked homicide and bloody robber ; " while it treated the unhappy victim as a volunteer, guilty of his own death, and handed his remains to an unhonored burial without psalm or prayer. With sacerdotal supplications it vainly sought from rulers, and espe- cially from successive emperors, the withdrawal of all countenance from this great evil, and the support of the civil power in ecclesiastical censures. Let praise and gratitude be offered to these just efforts ! But alas ! authentic incidents, and the forms still on record in ancient missals, attest the unhappy sanc- tion which Trial by Battle succeeded in obtaining even from the Church, — as in our da}r, the English Liturgy, and the conduct of the Christian clergy in all countries, attest the unhappy sanction which the Institution of War yet enjoys. The admoni- tions of the Church, and the efforts of good men, slowly prevailed. Proofs by witnesses and by titles were gradually adopted, though opposed by the selfishness of camp-followers, subaltern officers, and even of lords, greedy for the fees or wages of the combat. In England, Trial by Battle was attacked by Henry II., striving to substitute the trial by jury. In France, it was expressly forbidden, in an immortal ordinance, by that illustrious mon- arch, St. Louis. At last, this system, so wasteful of life, so barbarous in character, so vain and inef- ficient as an Arbiter of Justice, yielded to the estab- lishment of judicial tribunals.
An early king of the Lombards, in formal de- cree, condemned the Trial by Battle as " impious ; "
24 WAR-SYSTEM.
Montesquieu, at a later time, branded it as "mon- strous ; " and Sir William Blackstone, a writer of authority on the English law, characterized it as "clearly an unchristian, as well as most uncertain method of trial." In the light of our day, all unite in this condemnation. No man hesitates. No man undertakes its apology ; nor does any man count as "glory" the feats of arms which it prompted and displayed. But the laws of morals are general, and not special. They apply to communities and to nations as well as to individuals ; nor is it possible, by any cunning of logic, by any device of human wit, to distinguish between that domestic Institu- tion, the Trial by Battle, established by municipal law as the Arbiter between individuals, and that in- ternational Institution, the grander Trial by Battle, established by the Christian Commonwealth as the Arbiter between nations. If the judicial combat was impious, monstrous, and unchristian, then is War impious, monstrous, and unchristian.
WAR IS THE ESTABLISHED METHOD OF DETERMINING JUSTICE BETWEEN NATIONS.
It has been pointedly said in England, that the whole object of king, lords, and commons, and of the complex British Constitution, is to " get twelve men into a jury-box ; " and Mr. Hume repeats the idea when he declares that the administration of justice is the grand aim of government. If this be true of individual nations in their municipal affairs, it is equally true of the Commonwealth of Nations. The whole complex system of the Law of Nations, overarching all the Christian Nations, has but one
WAR-SYSTEM. 25
distinct object, the administration of justice between nations. Would that, with pen or tongue, I could adequately expose the enormity of this system, in- volving, as it does, a violation of the precepts of religion, the dictates of common sense, the sugges- tions of economy, and the most precious sympathies of humanity ! Would that now I could impart, to all who hear me, something of the strength of my own convictions !
I need not dwell on the waste and cruelty thus authorized. These stare us wildly in the face at every turn, as we travel the page of history. We see the desolation and death, that keep step with its bloody track ; we look upon sacked towns, ravaged territories, violated homes ; we behold all the sweet charities of life changed to wormwood and gall. The soul is penetrated by the sharp moan of mothers, sisters, and daughters, — of fathers, bro- thers, and sons, who, in the bitterness of bereave- ment, refuse to be comforted. The eye rests at last upon one of those fair fields, where nature, in her abundance, spreads her cloth of gold, spacious and apt for the entertainment of mighty multitudes — or, perhaps, from the curious subtlety of its posi- tion, like the carpet in the Arabian tale, con- tracting, for the accommodation of a few only, or dilating, for an innumerable host. Here, under a bright sun, such as shone at Austerlitz or Buena Vista — amidst the peaceful harmonies of nature — on the sabbath of Peace — are bands of brothers, children of a common Father, heirs to a common happiness, struggling together in deadly fight, — with the madness of fallen spirits, murderously
26 WAR-SYSTEM.
seeking the lives of brothers who have never in- jured them or their kindred. The havoc rages ; the ground is soaked with commingling blood ; the air is rent by commingling cries ; horse and rider are stretched together on the earth. More revolting than the mangled victims, the gashed limbs, the life- less trunks, the spattering brains, are the lawless passions which sweep, tempest-like, through the fiendish tumult.
Nearer comes the storm and hearer, rolling fast and frightful on. Speak, Ximena; speak and tell us, who has lost and who has won ? " Alas ! alas ! I know not ; friend and foe together fall ; O'er the dying rush the living; pray, my sister, for them all ! "
Horror-struck, we ask, wherefore this hateful con- test ? The melancholy, but truthful answer comes, that this is the established method of determining justice between nations !
The scene changes. Far away on the distant pathway of the ocean, two ships approach each other, with white canvas broadly spread to receive the flying gales. They are proudly built. All of human art has been lavished in their graceful pro- portions and compacted sides, while in dimensions they look like floating happy islands of the sea. A numerous crew, with costly appliances of comfort, hives in their secure shelter. Surely these two trav- ellers must meet in joy and friendship ; the flag at the mast-head will give the signal of fellowship ; the delighted sailors will cluster in the rigging and on yard-arms, to look each other in the face, while exhilarating voices mingle in acoents of gladness uncontrollable. Alas ! alas ! it is not so. Not as
WAR-SYSTEM. 27
brothers, not as friends, not as wayfarers of the common ocean, do they come together ; but as ene- mies. The gentle vessels now bristle fiercely with deaih-dealing instruments. On their spacious decks, aloft on all their masts, flashes the deadly musketry. From their sides spout cataracts of flame, amidst the pealing thunders of a fatal artillery. They, who had escaped the " dreadful touch of merchant- marring rocks ; " who, on their long and solitary way, had sped unharmed by wind or wave ; whom the hurricane had spared ; in whose favor storms and seas had intermitted their immitigable war, — now at last fall by the hand of each other. The same spectacle of horror greets us from both ships. On decks, reddened with blood, the murders of the Sicilian Vespers and of St. Bartholomew, with the fires of Smithfield, break forth anew, and con- centrate their rage. Each has become a swimming Golgotha. At length, these vessels — such pageants of the sea — such marvels of art — once so stately — but now rudely shattered by cannon-balls — with shivered masts and ragged sails — exist only as unmanageable wrecks, weltering on the uncertain- waves, whose transient lull of peace is their sole- safety. In amazement at this strange, unnatural contest, — away from country and home — where there is no country or home to defend, — we ask again, wherefore this dismal duel? Again, the melancholy, but truthful, answer promptly comes,, that this is the established method of determining justice between nations.
Yes ! the barbarous brutal relations which once prevailed between individuals, which prevailed still
28 WAR-SYSTEM.
longer between communities composing nations, are not yet banished from the great Christian Commonwealth. Religion, reason, humanity, first penetrate the individual, next larger bodies, and, widening in their influence, slowly leaven the na- tions. Thus, while we condemn the bloody contests of individuals, also of towns, counties, principalities, provinces, and deny to all these the right of waging war, or of appeal to Trial by Battle, we continue to uphold an atrocious System of folly and crime, which is to nations, what the System of Petty Wars was to towns, counties, principalities, provinces, also what the Duel was to individuals ; for War is the Duel of Nations.* As from Pluto's throne flowed those terrible rivers, Styx, Acheron, Cocytus, and Phlegethon, with their lamenting waters and currents of flame ; so from this established S3<stem flow the direful currents of War. " Give them Hell," was the language written on a slate by a speechless dying American officer. " Ours is a damnable profession," was the confession of a veteran British general. " War is a trade of bar- barians," exclaimed Napoleon, in a moment of truthful remorse, prompted by his bloodiest field.
* Plautus speaks, in the Epidicus, of one who had obtained great riches by the duelling art, meaning the art of War.
Ariz duellica
Divitias magnas adeptum.
And Horace, in his Odes (Lib. iv. 15.) hails the age of Augustus, as at peace or free from Duels, and with the temple of Janua closed.
. . . Taa, Caesar, setas
vacuum duellis
Jovem Quirini clausit.
WAR-SYSTEM. 29
Alas ! these words are not too strong. The busi- ness of War cannot be other than a trade of barba- rians — a damnable profession ; and War itself is certainly Hell on earth. But consider well — do not forget — let the idea sink deep into your souls, animating you to constant endeavors — that this trade of barbarians, this damnable profession, i« a part of the War-System, sanctioned by Inter- national Law ; and that War itself is Hell, recog- nized, legalized, established, organized by the Com- monwealth of Nations, for the determination of International questions !
WAR, WORSE THAN DESOLATION OF EARTHQUAKE.
" Put together," says Voltaire, " all the vices of all the ages and places, and they will not come up to the mischiefs of one campaign." This is a strong speech. Another of nearer truth might be made. Put together all the ills and calamities from the visitations of God, whether in convulsions of na- ture, or in pestilence and famine, and they will not equal the ills and calamities inflicted by man upon his brother-man, through the visitation of War — while, alas ! the sufferings of War are too often without the alleviation of those gentle virtues which ever attend the involuntary misfortunes of the race. Where the horse of Attila had been, a blade of grass would not grow ; but in the footprints of pestilence, famine, and earthquake, the kindly charities have sprung into life.
The last hundred years have witnessed three pe- culiar visitations of God ; first, the earthquake at Lisbon ; next, the Asiatic cholera, as it moved 3*
30 WAR-SYSTEM.
and ghastly, with scythe of death, from the Delta of the Ganges, over Bengal, Persia, Arabia, S3rria, Russia, till Europe and America shuddered before the spectral reaper ; and, lastly, the recent famine in Ireland, consuming with remorseless rage the population of that ill-fated land. It is impossible to estimate precisely the deadly work of cholera or of famine ; nor can we picture the miseries which they caused. But the single brief event of the earthquake may be portrayed in authentic colors.
Lisbon, whose ancient origin is referred by fable to the wanderings of Utysses, was one of the fairest cities of Europe. From the summit of seven hills, it looked down upon the sea, and the bay bordered with cheerful villages ; upon the broad Tagus, ex- panding into a harbor ample for all the navies of Europe ; and upon a country of rare beauty, smiling with the olive and the orange, amidst the grateful shadows of the cypress and the elm. A climate, which offered flowers in winter, enhanced the pe- culiar advantages of position ; and a numerous population thronged its narrow and irregular streets. Its forty churches, its palaces, its public edifices, its warehouses, its convents, its fortresses, its citadel, had become a boast. Not by War, not by the hand of man, were those solid structures levelled, and all these delights changed to deso- lation.
Lisbon, on the morning of November 1st, 1755, was taken and sacked by an earthquake. The spa- cious warehouses were destroyed ; the lordly edi- fices, the massive convents, the impregnable for- tresses, with the lofty citadel, were toppled to the
WAR-SYSTEM. 31
ground ; and, as the affrighted people sought shel- ter in the churches, they were crushed beneath the falling ruins. Twenty thousand persons perished. Fire and robbery mingled with earthquake, and the beautiful city seemed to be obliterated. The pow- ers of Europe were touched by this terrible catas- trophe, and succor from all sides was soon offered. Within three months, English vessels appeared in the Tagus, loaded with generous contributions, — twenty thousand pounds in gold, a similar sum in silver, six thousand barrels of salt-meat, four thou- sand barrels of butter, one thousand bags of biscuit, twelve hundred barrels of rice, ten thousand quintals of corn, besides hats, stockings, and shoes.
Such was the desolation, and such the charity, sown by the earthquake at Lisbon, — an event, which, after the lapse of nearly a centur}T, still stands without a parallel. But War shakes from its terrible folds all this desolation, without its at- tendant charity. Nay, more ; the Commonwealth of Nations voluntarily agrees, each with the other, under the grave sanctions of International Law, to invoke this desolation, in the settlement of contro- versies among its members, while it expressly de- clares that all nations, not already parties to the controversy, must abstain from any succor to the unhappy victim. High tribunals are established, whose special duty it is to uphold this Arbitrament, and, with unrelenting severity, to enforce its ancil- lary injunctions, to the end, that no aid, no charity, shall come to revive the sufferer or to alleviate the calamity. Vera Cruz has been bombarded and wasted by American arms. Its citadel, churches,
32 WAR-SYSTEM.
houses, have been shattered, and peaceful families at the fireside have been torn in mutilated fragments by the murderous bursting shell ; but the universal, the English charities, which helped restore Lisbon, were not offered to the ruined Mexican cit}^ They could not have been offered, without a violation of the Laws of War!
WE MUST ABOLISH WAR AS AN ARBITER OF JUSTICE.
It is because men see War, in the light of their prejudices, only as an agency of attack or defence, or as a desperate sally of wickedness, that they fail to recognize it as a form of judgment, sanctioned and legalized by Public Authority. Regarding it in .its true character, as an establishment of the Com- monwealth of nations, and one of the " liberties " accorded to independent states, it will seem no longer merely an expression of the lawless or hasty passion ; no longer a necessary incident of imperfect human nature ; no longer an unavoidable, uncon- trollable volcanic eruption of rage, of vengeances and counter-vengeances, knowing no bounds ; but it will be recognized as a gigantic and monstrous Institution for the adjudication of international rights, — as if an earthquake, with its uncounted /woes, and without its attendant charities, were legally invoked as the Arbiter of Justice.
Surely all must unite in condemning the Arbitra- ment of War. Does any one hesitate? The simplest may read and comprehend its enormity. But if War be thus odious ; if it be the Duel of Nations ; if it be the yet surviving Trial by Battle, — then, it must affect with its barbarism all its incidents, all
WAR-SYSTEM. 33
its enginery and machinery, all who sanction it, all who have any part or lot in it ; in fine, the whole vast S }' stem by which it is upheld. It is impos- sible, by any discrimination, to separate the com- ponent parts of this System. We must regard it as a whole, in its entirety. But half our work would be done, if we confined ourselves to a condemnation of the Institution merely. There are all its instru- ments and agencies, all its adjuncts and accessaries, all its furniture and equipage, all its armaments and operations ; the whole apparatus of forts, navies, armies, military display, military chaplains, and military sermons ; all together constituting, in connection with the Institution of War, what may be called the WAR-SYSTEM. It is this System which we seek to abolish ; believing that religion, humanity, and policy, all alike require the establish- ment of some peaceful means for the administration of international justice, and that they still further require the general disarming of the Christian na- tions, to the end that the enormous expenditures now absorbed by the War-System may be applied to purposes of usefulness and beneficence, and that the business of the soldier may cease forever.
While earnestly professing this object, I wish again to exclude all question of self-defence, and to affirm the duty of upholding government, and of maintaining the supremacy of the law, whether on land or sea. Admitting the necessity of Force for such purposes, Christianity revolts at Force as the substitute for a judicial tribunal. The example of the Great Teacher ; the practice of the early disciples ; the injunctions of self-denial, love, non-
34: WAR-SYSTEM.
resistance to evil, — which are sometimes supposed to forbid Force in any exigency, even of self-de- fence,— all these must apply with unquestionable certainty to the established System of War. Here, at least, there can be no doubt. If the sword, in the hand of an assaulted individual, may become the instrument of sincere self-defence ; if, under the sanction of a judicial tribunal, it may become the instrument of Justice also, — surely it can never be the Arbiter of Justice. Here is a distinction vital to the cause of Peace, and never to be forgotten in presenting its Christian claims. The cautious sword of the magistrate is unlike — oh ! how unlike — the flaming sword of War.
PREPARATIONS FOR WAR, A PART OF THE WAR-SYSTEM.
Look now at some of the component parts of the War-System. These may all be resolved into PREPARATIONS FOR WAR ; as court-house, jail, judges, sheriffs, constables, and posse comi- tatus, are preparations for the administration of municipal justice. If justice were not to be administered, these would not exist. If War were not sanctioned by the Commonwealth of Nations, as the means of determining interna- tional controversies, then forts, navies, armies, military display, military chaplains and military sermons, would not exist. They would be as useless and irrational — except for the rare occa- sions of a police — as similar preparations would now be in Boston, for defence against our learned neighbor Cambridge ; or in the County of Kssex, for defence against its neighbor, County of Mid-
WAR-SYSTEM. 35
dlesex ; or in the State of Massachusetts, for de- fence against its neighbor states, Rhode Island and New York. It is only recently that men have learned to question these preparations ; for it is only recently that they have opened their eyes to the true character of the System, in which they are a part. It will yet be seen, that, sustaining these, we sustain the System. Still further ; it will yet be seen, that, sustaining these, we wastefully offend against economy, and violate also the most precious sentiments of Human Brotherhood ; taking counsel of distrust, instead of love ; and provoking to ri- valry and enmity, instead of association and peace. Time would fail me now to discuss adequately the nature of these preparations ; and I am the more willing to abridge what I am tempted to say, because, on another occasion, I have treated this part of the subject. I should do wrong, how- ever, not to expose their inconsistency with the spirit of Christianity. It is from a comprehen- sion of the unchristian character of the War- System, that we perceive the unchristian char- acter of the preparations which it encourages and requires. I might exhibit this character by an examination of the Laws of War, drawn from no celestial fount, but from a dark profound of Heathenism. This is unnecessary. The Consti- tution of our own country furnishes an illustra- tion so remarkable as to be a touchstone of the whole System. No town, county, or state has the " liberty " to " declare War." The exercise of any proper self-defence, arising fro*m actual necessity, requires no such <c liberty." Congress
36 WAR-SYSTEM.
is expressly authorized to " declare War ; " that is, to invoke the Arbitrament of Arms. And the Constitution proceeds to state that all, 4t giving aid and comfort to the enemy," shall be deemed " traitors/' Mark now, what the Gospel has said. Love your enemies; if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink. Obedience to this positive injunction of Christianity may expose a person, under the War-System, to the penalty of the highest crime known to the law. Can this be a Christian system ? So long as War exists as an Institution, this terrible inconsistency must appear.
The character of these preparations is distinctl}7, though unconsciously, attested by the names of the vessels in the British Navy. I select an offensive catalogue from the latest official list. Most are steamships of recent construction. They may be considered, therefore, to represent the spirit of the British Navy in our day — nay, of those War Preparations, in which they play such a conspicuous part. Here is the list : — Acheron, Adder, Alecto, Avenger, Basilisk, Blood- hound, Bulldog, Crocodile, Erebus, Firebrand, Fury, Gladiator, Goliah, Gorgon, Harpy, Hecate, Hound, Jackal, Mastiff, Pluto, Rattlesnake, Re- venge, Salamander, Savage, Scorpion, Scourge, Serpent, Spider, Spiteful, Spitfire, Styx, Sulphur, Tartar, Tartarus, Teazer, Terrible, Terror, Ven- geance, Viper, Vixen, Virago, Volcano, Vulture, War spite, Wildfire, Wolf, Wolverine !
Such is the Christian array of Victoria, Defender of the Faith ! It may remind us of the cornpan-
WAR-SYSTEM. 37
ions of King John, at another period of English history, — " Falco without Bowels," "Maclean the Bloody," " Walter Buch, the Murderer," «' Sottira, the Merciless," and " Godeschal, the Iron-Hearted ; " or of the Pagan swarm of savage warriors upon our own continent, with the names of Black Hawk, Man Killer, and the Wild Bear. Well might they seem to be —
all the grisly legions that troop
Under the sooty flag of Acheron.
As a man is known by the company he keeps, as a tree is known by its fruits, so is the War- System fully and unequivocally known by these its chosen ministers, and by all the accursed fruits of War. Employing such representatives, sustained by such agencies, animated by such Furies, and producing such fruits of tears and bitterness, it mi\st be hateful to good men. Tell me not that it is sanctioned by the religion of Christ ; do not enroll the Saviour and his dis- ciples in its Satanic squadron ; do not invoke the Gospel of Peace, in profane vindication of an Institution, which, by its own too palpable confession, exists in defiance of all the most cherished Christian sentiments ; do not dishonor the Divine Spirit of gentleness, forbearance, love, by supposing that it can ever enter into this System, except to change its whole nature and name, to cast out the devils which possess it, and fill its gigantic energies with the inspiration of Beneficence.
I need say little of military chaplains or military
38 WAR-SYSTEM.
sermons. Like the steamships of the navy, they come under the head of Preparations for War. They are a part of the War-System. They be- long to the same school with priests of former times, who held the picture of the Prince of Peace before the barbarous champion of the Duel, saying, " Sir Knight, behold here the remembrance of our Lord and Redeemer, Jesus Christ, who willingly gave his most precious body to death, in order to save us. Now, ask of him mercy, and pra}7 that on this day he may be willing to aid you, if you have right, for he is the sover- eign judge." * They belong to the same school with the English prelates of our day, who, in the name of the Prince of Peace, consecrate banners to be used in remote East-Indian wars, sa}dng, " Be thou in the midst of our hosts, as thou wast in the plains of India, and in the field of Waterloo ; and may these banners, which we bless and con- secrate this day, lead them ever on to glorious victory." In thus consenting to degrade the " blessedness " of the Gospel to the " blasphemy " of the War-System, they follow long established custom, doubtless often without considering the true character of the System, whose ministers they become. Their apology will be, that " they know not what they do."
Again I repeat, that, so long as the War- System prevails under the sanction of Interna- tional Law, these painful incongruities will be apparent. They belong to a System which is so
* Cauchy, Du Duel, Tom. I. cap. iii. p. 74.
WAR-SYSTEM. 39
essentially irrational, that all the admitted virtues of many of its agents cannot save it from judg- ment.
THE MILITIA, AS PART OF THE WAR-SYSTEM.
Here the important question occurs, Is the Militia obnoxious to the same condemnation? So far as the militia constitutes a part of the War-System, it is impossible to distinguish it from the rest of the S}rstem. It is a portion of the apparatus provided for the administration of international justice. From this character it borrows the unwholesome attractions of War, while, like a North-American Indian, it disports itself in finery and parade. Of the latter feature, I shall speak only incidentally. If War be a Christian Institution, tlmse who act as its agents should shroud themselves in colors congenial with their dreadful trade. With sorrow and solemnity, not with gladness and pomp, they should proceed to their melancholy office. The Jew Shylock, speak- ing through the sarcasm of Shakspeare, exposes the mockery of the street-shows of Venice in words which sometimes find an echo here.
When you hear the drum,
And the vile squeaking of the wry-necked fife, Clamber not up to the casements then, Nor thrust your head into the public street, To gaze on Christian fools with varnished faces ; But stop my house's ears, I mean my casements ; Let not the sound of shallow foppery enter My sober house.
Not as a part of the War-System, but only as
40 WAR-SYSTEM.
an agent for preserving domestic peace, and for sustaining the law, can the militia be entitled to support. And here arises the important practical question — interesting to the opponents of the War-System and to the lovers of order — whether the same object may not be accomplished by an agent, less expensive, less cumbersome, and less tardy, forming no part of the War-System, and, therefore, in no respect liable to the objections encountered by the militia. Even the supporters of the militia do not disguise its growing unpopu- larity. The eminent Military Commissioners of Massachusetts, to whom, in 1847, was referred the duty of arranging a system for its organization and discipline, confess that there is " either a defect of power in the State government for an efficient and salutary militia organization, or the absence of a public sentiment in its favor, and a consequent unwillingness to submit to the require- ments of service which alone can sustain it ; " and they add, that " they have been met, in the per- formance of their task, with information from all quarters, of its general neglect, and of the cer- tain and rapid declension of the militia in num- bers and efficiency." And the Adjutant-General of Massachusetts, after alluding to the different sys- tems which have been vainly tried; and have fallen into disuse, remarks, that " the fate of each system is indicative of public sentiment ; and until public sentiment changes, no military system whatever can be sustained in the state." Nor is this condition of public sentiment for the first time noticed. It was also recognized by the Commissioners, who
WAR-SYSTEM. 41
were charged by the legislature with this subject, as long ago as 1839. In their report, they say, " It is enough to know that all attempts hitherto, to uphold the system in its original design of organization, discipline, and subordination, are at last brought to an unsuccessful issue"
None, who are familiar with public opinion in our country, and particularly in Massachusetts, will question the accuracy of these official statements. It is true, that there is an indisposition on the part of citizens to assume the burthens of the militia. Still further, its offices and dignities have ceased to be an object of general regard. This, certainly, must be founded in a conviction, that it is no longer necessary or useful ;• for it is not customary with the people of Massachusetts to de- cline occasions of service, necessary or useful to the community. The interest which once attended military celebrations has decayed. Nor should it be concealed, that there are large numbers, whose honest sentiments are not of mere indifference ; who regard with aversion the fanfaronade of a militia muster ; who question not a little the influ- ence exercised over those taking part in it, or even witnessing it, and who look with regret upon the expenditure of money and time which the service requires.
If such be the condition of the public mind, it is wrong for the Government not to recognize it. The soul of all effective laws is an animating public sentiment. This gives vitality to what else would be a dead letter. In vain enact what is not in- spired by this spirit. No skill in the device of the 4*
42 WAR-SYSTEM.
system, no penalties, no bounties even, can up- hold it. But, happily, we are not without remedy. If the State Legislatures should deem it proper to provide a substitute for this questionable or offen- sive agency, as a conservator of domestic quiet, it is entirely within their competency. Let the gen- eral voice demand the substitute.
Among the powers reserved to the States, under the Federal Constitution, is that of Internal Police. Within its territorial limits, a state has municipal power, to be exercised according to its own will. In the exercise of this will, it may establish a system, congenial with the sentiment of the age, to supply the place of the militia, as a guardian of municipal quiet. This system may consist of un- paid volunteers, or special constables, like the fire companies in the country, or of hired men, enrolled for this particular purpose, and always within call, like the fire companies in Boston. They need not be clad in showy costume, or subjected to all the peculiarities of military drill. A system so simple, practical, efficient, unostentatious, and cheap, espe- cially as compared with the militia, would be in harmony with the existing sentiment ; while it could not fail to remedy those evils which are feared from the present neglect of the militia. Many unsuccessful attempts have been made to reform -the militia. It remains, that a proper effort should be made to provide a substitute for it.
An eminent English jurist, of the last century — renowned as a scholar also, — Sir William Jones, — in a learned and ingenious tract, entitled "An Inquiry into the Legal Mode of Suppressing Riots, with a
WAR-SYSTEM. 43
Constitutional Plan of Future Defence." * after de- veloping the obligations of the citizen, tinder the common law, as a part of the Power of the County, has presented a system of organization indepen- dent of the military. It is not probable that this system, in all its details, would be acceptable to the people of our community ; but there is one of his recommendations, which seems to harmonize with existing sentiment. " Let companies," he says, " be taught, in the most private and orderly manner, for two or three hours early every morning, until they are completely skilled in the use of their arms ; let them not unnecessarily march through the streets or high roads, nor make any the least military parade, but consider themselves entirely as part of the civil State"
While divorcing the Police from the unchristian and barbarous War- System, I can never fail to inculcate the vital importance of maintaining law and order. Life and property should be guarded. Peace must be preserved in our streets. And it is the duty of Government to provide such means as shall be most expedient for this purpose, if those already established are found in any respect inade- quate, or uncongenial with the Spirit of the Age.
COST OF WAR— SYSTEM.
I cannot close this exposition of the War-System without an attempt to display the inordinate expen- diture by which it is sustained. And here figures appear to lose their functions. They seem to pant,
* Jones's Works, vol. vi. p. 685.
44 WAR-SYSTEM.
as they toil vainly to represent the enormous sums consumed in this unparalleled waste. Our own experience, measured by the concerns of common life, does not allow us adequately to conceive these sums. Like the periods of geological time, or the distances of the fixed stars, they baffle the imagina- tion. Look, for instance, at the cost of this System to the United States. Without any allowance for the loss sustained by the withdrawal of active men from productive industry, we find that, from the adoption of the Federal Constitution down to 1848, there has been paid directly from the National Treasury, —
For the Army and Fortifications, $366,713,209 For the Navy and its Operations, 209,994,428
$576,707,637
This amount of itself is immense. But it is not all. Regarding the militia as a part of the War-System, we must add a moderate estimate for its cost during this period, which, according to the calculations of an able and accurate economist, may be placed at $1,500,000,000. The whole presents an inconceiv- able sum-total of more than two thousand millions of dollars, already dedicated by our Government to the support of the War-System — more than seven times as much as was set apart by the Govern- ment, during the same period, to all other purposes whatsoever !
Look now at the Commonwealth of European Nations. I do not intend to speak of War Debts, under whose accumulated weight these Nations are now pressed to the earth. These are the terrible
WAR-SYSTEM. 45
legacy of the Past. I refer directly to the existing War-System, the establishment of the Present. According to recent calculations, its annual cost is not less than a thousand millions of dollars. En- deavor for a moment, by a comparison with other interests, to grapple with this sum.
It is larger than the entire profit of all the com- merce and manufactures of the world.
It is larger than all the expenditure for agricul- tural labor, producing the food of man, upon the whole face of the globe.
It is larger, by a hundred millions, than the value of all the exports of all the nations of the earth.
It is larger, by more than five hundred millions, than the value of all the shipping of the civilized world.
It is larger, by nine hundred and ninety-seven millions, than the annual combined charities of Europe and America for preaching the Gospel to the Heathen.
Yes ! the Commonwealth of Christian Nations, including our own country, appropriates, without hesitation, as a matter of course, upwards of a thousand millions of dollars annually to the main- tenance of the War-System, and vaunts its two millions of dollars, laboriously collected, for diffus- ing the light of the Gospel in foreign lands ! With untold prodigality of cost, it perpetuates the worst Heathenism of War ; while, by charities insignificant in comparison, it doles to the Heathen a message of Peace. At home, it breeds and fattens a cloud of eagles and vultures, trained to swoop upon the land. To all the Gentiles across the sea, it dismisses a solitary dove.
40 WAR-SYSTEM.
Still further; every ship of war that floats coats more than u well-endowed college.
Kvcry sloop of war that (louts costs more than the largest public library in our country.
1MIOVOOATIVB TO WAR.
But it is sometime* said, by persons yet in the leading-strings of inherited prejudice, and with little appreciation of the true safety found in the principles of I'euee, that all these comprehensive preparation*} arc needed for the protection of the country against enemies from abroad. Wishing to present the cause, without any superfluous question on what have been apologetically called " defensive wars," let rne say, in reply, — n-wl hare all can unite, — - that, if these preparations should be needed ut any time, accord- ing to the aggressive martial interpretation of- the right of self-defence, there is much reason to bulieve it would be, because the unchristian spirit in which they have their birth, lowering and scowling in the very names of the ships, had provoked the (lunger ; us the presence of a bravo might chal- lenge the attack he was hired to resist.
Frederick of Prussia, sometimes called the Great, — with an honesty or impudence unparalleled in the history of warriors, — has left on record, most Instructively prominent among the real reasons which urged him to make war upon Maria Theresa, that he h,nd trtHtpR alwdya rvady to act. Thus did these pri'i)'irativnn unhappily become, as they have too often shown themselves, incentives to War. Lord Brougham has dwelt on this confession as a lesson of history. A carcfUl consideration of human nature,
WAR-SYSTEM. 47
manifest in tho conduct of individuals, or commu- nities, will whow that the fatal War Spirit derives much of it« aliment from this origin. They scatter the Hoods of the evil which, it is sometimes vainly supposed, tliey help to avert. Let it never be for- gotten, let it be treasured as a solemn warning of history, that, by tho confession of Frederick hiniHelf, it was tho possession of troop* alww/H read// to act, that Horvod to inspire the succession of bloody wars, which, (Irnt pouncing upon Silesia, mingled at last with the (strifes of Kngland and France, even in distant colonies across the Atlantic, ranging the Bavages of tho forest under hostile Kuropean banners.4
Hut i deny, distinctly, that these preparations are needed for any just Helf-defenco. In tho Hrst place, it is difficult, if not Impossible, to suppose any Hiich occasion, in the Fraternity of Christian States, '//' Wn,i' nhould MUM', to h<>, (an established Arbitrament^ or if any state? should bo so truly great as to decline its umpirago. There is no such occasion among the towns, or counties, or states, of our extended coun- try ; there is no such occasion among tho counticn
* Quo Ton jol^no & GOH OOnfldArftfcloiU '/«* trmtpf.n toujuurit pr6lt-.it d • "in , uioti • |iu '.n'i blonrotnplio, ot la vlvaol W do uaon canust^ro, c'<Stult IOH ralHonrt quoj'aviilM <!o fulru la Kuorru & Mario TlioniHo, rolno <lo
t «l»
ThoMo tiro tlio vory wonln of Frod<»rlok, d«lll)«rat«»ly wrltton In hla own AOOOUnt of tho war. Voltalro, on rovlwln^ tlio work, ntruok out tliln Iinjiorbaiit oonloMHion ; but dlihonMily preferred iv copy, which nii.'-i w.ii.i , appcarod lit lilM own inutitolrri. Lord Brougham, In hlu wkofccli of Voltalro, Hiiyw that " tlio pnHfii^c, iliiiN criiHtid and pro- lorvoil, i« oxtroincily curloUM, and for lionoaty or hnpudouoo ha» no par- ailol In tho hiMtory of warrlorH."
48 WAR-SYSTEM.
of Great Britain, or among the provinces of France ; but the same good-will, the same fellowship, and the same ties of commerce which unite towns, counties, states, and provinces, are fast drawing into similar communion the whole Commonwealth of Nations. France and England, so long regarded as natural enemies, are now better known to each other, than, only a short time ago, were different provinces of the former kingdom. At the present moment, there is a closer intimacy in business and social inter- course, between Great Britain and our own country, than there was at the beginning of the century, between Massachusetts and Virginia.
CHEAP DEFENSE OF NATIONS.
Admitting that an enemy might approach our shores, for piracy, or plunder, or conquest, who can doubt that the surest protection would be found — not in the waste of long-accumulating preparations — not in idle fortresses along the coasts, built at a cost far surpassing all our light-houses and all our colleges — but in the intelligence, union, and pacific repose of good men, with the unbounded resources derived from an uninterrupted devotion to productive industry? I think it may be assumed as beyond question, in the present light of political economy, that the people who have spent most sparingly in preparations for War, all other things being equal, must possess the most enduring means of actual self-defence at home, on their own soil, before their own hearths — if any such mel- ancholy alternative should occur. Consider the prodigious sums, exceeding in all two thousand mil-
WAR-SYSTEM. 49
lions of dollars, squandered by the United States, since the adoption of the Constitution, for the sake of the War-System. Surely, if such means had been devoted to railroads and canals, schools and colleges, the country would possess, at the present moment, an accumulated material power grander far than any it now boasts. But there is another power of more unfailing temper, which would not be wanting, Overflowing with intelligence, with charity, with civilization, with all that constitutes a generous state, we should win peaceful triumphs transcending all yet achieved — surrounding the laud -vith an invincible self-defensive might, and, in their unfading brightness, rendering the glory of War impossible. Well does the poet say, with persuasive truth, —
What constitutes a State ? Not high-raised battlement or labored mound,
Thick wall or moated gate; Not cities proud with spires and turrets crowned;
Not bays and broad-armed ports, Where, laughing at the storm, rich navies ride ;
But MEN, high-minded MEN.
Such men will possess a Christian greatness, ren- dering them unable to do an injury to a neighbor ; while their character, instinct with all the guardian virtues, must render their neighbors unable to do an injury to them ; and there can be none to molest them or make them afraid.
The injunction, " In time of Peace, prepare for War," is of Heathen origin. As a rule of interna- tional conduct, it is very questionable in a Chris- tian age. It can be vindicated on two grounds only. First, by assuming that the Arbitrament of 5
50 WAR-SI STEM.
War is the proper agency for deciding controversies between nations ; and that the War-System is, there- fore, to be maintained and strengthened, as the essential means of international justice. Or, sec- ondly, by assuming the rejected dogma of an Atheist philosopher, Hobbes, that war is the natural state of man. Whatever may be the infirmities of our passions, all must perceive that the natural state of man, in which he has the highest happiness, and to which he tends by an irresistible heavenly attraction, is Peace. And this is true of communities and nations, as of individuals. The proper rule is, "In time of Peace, cultivate the arts of Peace. " So doing, you will render the country truly strong and truly great ; not by arousing the passions of War ; not by nursing men to the business of blood ; not by converting the land into a flaming arsenal, a magazine of gunpowder, or an " infernal machine," just ready to explode, — but by dedicating its whole energies to productive and beneficent works.
INCONGRUITY AND BARBARISM OF WAR-SYSTEM.
The incongruity of this System of Armed Peace may be illustrated by an example. Look into the life of that illustrious philosopher, John Locke, and you will find that, in the journal of his tour through France, describing the arches of the amphitheatre at Nismes, he says, " there is a stone laid, about twenty inches or two feet square, and about six times the length of my sword, which was about a philosophic yard long." Who is not struck with the unseemly incongrui- ty of the exhibition, as he sees the author of the " Es- say on the Human Understanding" travelling with a
WAK-SYSTEM. 51
sword by his side? But in this the philosopher only followed the barbarous custom of his time. Individuals then lived in the same relations towards eacli other which now characterize nations. The War-System had not yet entirely retreated from municipal law and custom, to find its last citadel and temple in the law and custom of nations. Do not forget, that, at the present moment, our own country, the great Author, among the nations, of a new Essay on the Human Understanding, not only travels with a sword by its side, like John Locke, but lives encased in complete armor, bur- thensome to its limbs and costly to its treasury. In condemning the War-System, as a barbarous and most wasteful agency, the token and relic of a society alien to Christian civilization, we may ex- cept the navy, so far as it is necessary in the arrest of pirates, of traffickers in human flesh, and gen- erally in preserving the police of the sea. But after the present surve3r, it will be difficult for the unprejudiced mind to regard the array of fortifica- tions and of standing armies, otherwise than ob- noxious to the condemnation which attaches to the War-System. The fortifications are the instruments,, and the armies are the hired champions, in the great Duel of Nations.
Here I quit this part of the subject. Sufficient has been said to expose the true character of the War-System of the Commonwealth of Nations. It stands before us, a colossal image of Interna- tional Justice, with the sword, but without the scales; like a hideous Mexican idol, besmeared
52 WAR-SYSTEM.
with human blood, and surrounded by the sickening stench of human sacrifice. But this image, which seems to span the continents, while it rears aloft its flashing form of brass and gold, hiding far in the clouds " the top and round of sovereignty " which it wears upon its head, can be laid low ; for its feet are of clay. Everything which exists in violation of right and reason, of religion and humanity, is weak and brittle. And such is the War-System. It stands on wrong and folly, on impiety and in- humanity. Its feet are of clay.
THE REMEDY.
II. And now I come, in the second branch of this Address, to the more grateful consideration of the means by which the War-System can be over- thrown. Here I shall unfold the tendencies and examples of nations, and the sacred efforts of in- dividuals, constituting the Peace Movement, now ready to triumph ; and shall offer practical sug- gestions on our duties to this cause, with a conclud- ing glance at the barbarism of Military Glory. In this review, I cannot avoid details incident to a multiplicity of topics ; 'but I shall try to introduce nothing that does not bear directly on the subject.
Civilization now writhes in travail and torment, and asks for liberation from an oppressive sway. Like the slave, under a weary weight of chains, it raises its exhausted arms, and pleads for the aagel Deliverer. And lo ! the beneficent angel comes ; not like the Grecian God of Day, with vengeful arrow to slay the destructive Python ; not like the
WAR-SYSTEM. 53
Archangel Michael, with potent spear to transfix Satan to the earth, — but with words of gentleness and Christian cheer, saying to all nations, and to all children of men, " Ye are all brothers, of one flesh, of one fold, of one shepherd, children of one Father, heirs to one happiness. By your own en- ergies, by united fraternal endeavor, in the name of Christ, will the tyranny of War be overthrown, and its Juggernaut be crushed to earth."
UNITY, FOUNDED ON FORCE.
In this spirit, and with this encouragement, we must labor for that grand and final object, the watchword of all ages, the Unity of the Human Family. Not in benevolence, but in selfishness, has Unity been sought in times past ; not to promote the happiness of all, but to establish the dominion of one. It was the mad lust of power which car- ried Alexander, from conquest to conquest, till he boasted that the whole world was one empire, of which his Macedonian phalanx was the citadel. The same passion animated Rome ; till, at last, while Christ lay in a manger, this single city swayed a broader empire than that of Alexander. The Gospel, in its simple narrative, says, " And it came to pass about these times, that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed." History recalls the exile of Ovid, who, falling under the displeasure of the same emperor, was condemned to close his days in melancholy longings for Rome, far away in Pontus, beyond the Euxine Sea. With singular significance, these two contemporaneous incidents reveal the universality 5*
54 WAR-SYSTEM.
of Roman dominion, stretching from Britain to Parthia. The mighty empire crumbled, to be re- constructed for a brief moment, in part by Charle- magne, in part by Tamerlane. In our own age, Napeleon made a last effort for Unit}-, founded on Force. And now, from his utterances at St. Helena, the expressed wisdom of his unparalleled experi- ence, comes the remarkable confession, worthy of constant memory : " The more I study the world, the more am I convinced of the inability of brute force to create anything durable." From the sepul- chre of Napoleon, now sleeping on the banks of the Seine, surrounded by the trophies of battle ; nay more, from the sepulchres of all these departed em- pires, maybe heard the words, "They that take the sword shall perish by the sword."
UNITY, FOUNDED ON PEACE.
Unity is the longing and tendency of Humanity ; not the enforced Unity of military power ; not the Unity of might triumphant over right ; not the Unity of Inequality ; not the Unity which occupied the soul of Dante, when, in his treatise De Mon~ archia, the earliest political work of modern times, he strove to show that all the world ought to be governed by one man, the successor of the Roman Emperor. Not these ; but the voluntary Unity of the nations of the earth in fraternal labor ; — the Unity promised, when it was said, "there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female, for ye are all one in Christ Jesus ; " — the Unity which has filled the delighted vision of good men,
WAR-SYSTEM. 55
prophets, sages, and poets, in times past ; — the Unity which, in our own age, prompted Beranger, the incomparable lyric of France, in an immortal ode, to salute the Holy Alliance of the peoples, summoning them in all lands, and by whatever names they may be called, French, English, Belgian, German, Russian, to give each other the hand, that the useless thunderbolts of War ma}r all be quenched, and Peace sow the earth with gold, with flowers, and with corn ; — the Unity which prompt- ed an early American statesman and poet to anti- cipate the time when all the nations shall meet in Congress ; —
To give each realm its limits and its laws,
Bid the last breath of dire contention cease,
And bind all regions in the leagues of Peace;
Bid one great empire, with extensive sway,
Spread with the sun, and bound the walks of day
One centered system, one all-ruling soul
Live through the parts, and regulate the whole; —
the Unity, which has inspired the contemporary British poet, of exquisite beauty, Alfred Tennyson, to hail the certain day,
When the drums shall throb no longer; and the battle-flags be
furled, In the Parliament of man, the Federation of the World.
Such is Unity in the bonds of Peace. The com- mon good and mutual consent are its adamantine base ; Justice and Love its animating soul. These alone can give permanence to combinations of men, whether in states or in confederacies. Here is the vital elixir of nations — the true philosopher's stone
56 WAR-SYSTEM.
of divine efficacy, potent to keep alive the civilization of mankind. So far as these are neglected or for- gotten, will the people, though under one apparent head, fail to be in reality united. So far as these are regarded, will the people, within the sphere of their influence, constitute one body, and be inspired by one spirit. And just in proportion as these find recognition from individuals and from nations, will War be impossible.
EXAMPLES OF HISTORY.
Not in vision, nor in promises only is this Unity discerned. History reveals constant efforts for it in the voluntary associations, confederacies, leagues, coalitions, and Congresses of Nations, which, though fugitive and limited in influence, all attest the un- satisfied desires of men, solicitous for union, and show the means by which it may be permanently accomplished. I will enumerate some of these. 1. The Amphictyonic Council, embracing, at first, twelve, and finally thirty-one states or cities, was established in the year 497 before Christ. Each city sent two deputies, and had two votes in the Council, which had full power to consider all dif- ferences between the associate cities. 2. Next comes the Achcean League, founded at a very early period, and renewed in the year 284 before Christ. Each member was independent, and yet all to- gether constituted one body. So great was the fame of their justice and probity, that the Greek cities of Italy were glad to invite their peaceful arbitration. 3. Passing over other confederacies of antiquity, 1 mention next the Hanseatic League^
WAR-SYSTEM. 57
begun in the twelfth century, completed in the middle of the thirteenth, and comprising at one time nearly eighty cities. A system of Interna- tional Law was adopted in their general assem- blies, and courts of arbitration were established to determine controversies among the cities. The de- crees of these courts were enforced by placing the condemned city under what was called the ban, a sentence equivalent to the excommunication of the ecclesiastical law. 4. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, other cities and nobles of Germany en- tered into alliances and associations for mutual pro- tection, under various names, as the League of the Rhine and the League of Suabia. 5. To these, I may add the combination of the Armed Neutrality in 1780, uniting, in declared support of certain principles, a large cluster of nations, — Russia, France, Spain, Holland, Sweden, Denmark, Prus- sia, and the United States. 6. And still further, I may refer to Congresses at Utrecht, Westphalia, Cambray, Aix la Chapelle, and Vienna, whose pro- fessed object has been, after the wasteful struggles of War, to arrange terms of Peace and to arbitrate between nations.
These examples, which belong to the Past, reveal the tendencies and capacities of nations. There are other instances, which come with the effect of living authority, while they afford a practical illustration of the means by which the War-System may be over- thrown. There is, ftrst, the Swiss Republic, or Hel- vetic Union, which, beginning as long ago as 1308, has preserved Peace among its members during the greater part of five centuries. Speaking of this
58 WAR-SYSTEM.
Union, Vattel said, in the middle of the last cen- tury,* " The Swiss have had the precaution, in all their alliances among themselves, and even with neighboring powers, to agree beforehand on the man- ner in which their disputes were to be submitted to arbitrators, in case they could not adjust them in an amicable manner. This wise precaution has not a little contributed to maintain the Helvetic Republic in that flourishing condition, which secures its lib- erty, and renders it respectable throughout Europe." Since these words were written, many changes have occurred in the Swiss Constitution, but its present Federal System, embracing upwards of twenty-four different States, established on the downfall of Napoleon, and again confirmed in 1830, provides that differences among the states shall be referred to " special arbitration." This is an instructive example. But, secondly, our own happy country furnishes one yet more so. The United States of America are a Federal Union of thirty inde- pendent sovereign States, — each having peculiar interests, — in pursuance of a Constitution, estab- lished in 1788, which not only provides a high tribunal for the adjudication of controversies between the States, but expressly disarms the individual States, declaring that " no State shall, without consent of Congress, keep troops, or ships of war, in time of peace, or engage in any war, unless actually invaded or in such imminent danjer as will not admit of delays." (Art. I., Sec. 9.) A third example, not unlike that of our own country, is the Confederation of Germany,
* Law of Nations, Book II. cap. xviii. § 329.
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composed of thirty-eight sovereignties, who, by re- ciprocal stipulation in their Act of Union (Sec. 12), on the 8th June, 1815, deprived each sovereignty of the right of war with its confederates. The words of this stipulation, which, like those of the Constitution of the United States, might furnish a model to the Commonwealth of Nations, are as follows : " The members further bind themselves under no pretence to declare war against one another, nor to pursue their mutual differences by force of arms, but engage to submit them to the Diet. The Diet is in such cases competent to attempt a reconciliation by the appointment of a select committee, and should this not prove successful, to procure a decision from a well-organized Court of Arbitration, whose sentence is implicitly binding upon the disputants."
TENDENCIES TOWARD UNITY.
Such are authentic well-defined examples of history. This is not all. It is in the order of Providence, that individuals, families, tribes, and nations, should tend, by means of association, to a final Unity. A law of mutual attraction, or affi- nity, first exerting its influence upon smaller bodies, draws them by degrees into well-established fel- lowship, and then continuing its power, fuses the larger bodies into nations ; and nations themselves, stirred by this same sleepless energy, are now mov- ing towards that grand sj'stem of combined order, which will complete the general harmony ;
Spiritus intus alit, totamqne infusa par artus Mens agitat molem, et magno se corpore miscet.
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History bears ample testimony to the potency of this attraction. Modern Europe, in its early periods, was filled by petty lordships, or communi- ties, constituting so many distinct units, acknowl- edging only a vague nationality, and maintaining among cherished " liberties," the right of war with each other. The great nations of our day have grown and matured into their present form, by the gradual absorption of these political bodies. Terri- tories, which once possessed an equivocal and tur- bulent independence, feel new power and happiness in peaceful association. Spain, composed of races, dissimilar in origin, religion, and government, slowly ascended by progressive combinations among principalities and provinces, till at last, in the fif- teenth century, by the crowning union of Castile and Aragon, the whole country, with its various sovereignties, was united under one common rule. Germany once consisted of more than three hundred different principalities, each with the right of war. These slowly coalesced, forming larger principalities; till at last, the whole complex aggregation of States, embracing abbeys, bishoprics, archbishoprics, baili- wicks, counties, duchies, electorates, margraviates, and free imperial cities, was gradually resolved into the present Confederation, where each state ex- pressly renounces the right of war with its asso- ciates. France has passed through similar changes. By a power of assimilation, in no nation so strongly marked, she has absorbed the various races, and sovereignties, which once filled her territories with violence and conflict, and has converted them all to herself. The Roman or Iberian of Provence, the
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indomitable Celtic race, the German of Alsace, have all become Frenchmen, while the various provinces, once inspired by such hostile passions, Brittany and Normandy, Franche Comte and Burgundy, Gascony, and Languedoc, Provence and Dauphiny, are now blended in one powerful united nation. And Great Britain shows the influence of the same law. The many hostile principalities of England were first re- solved into the Heptarchy ; and these seven king- doms became one under the Saxon Edgar. Wales, which was forcibly attached to England under Ed- ward I., has at last entirely assimilated with her conqueror ; Ireland, after a protracted resistance, was finally absorbed under Edward III., and at a later day, after a series t>f bitter struggles, was united, I do not say how successfully, under the imperial parliament ; Scotland was connected with England by the accession of James I. to the throne of the Tudors, and these two countries, which had so often encountered in battle, at last, under Queen Anne, were joined together by an act of peaceful legislation.
Thus has the tendency to Unity predominated over independent sovereignties and states, slowly conducting the process of crystallization, which is constantly going on among the nations. This cannot be arrested. The next stage must be the peaceful association of the Christian nations. In this anti- cipation, we but follow analogies of the material creation, as seen in the light of chemical or of geo- logical science. Everywhere nature is busy with her combinations ,* exerting an occult incalculable power ; drawing elements into new relations of
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harmony ; uniting molecule with molecule, atom with atom ; and, by progressive changes, in the lapse of time, producing new structural arrange- ments. Look still closer, and the analog}' continues. At first, we detect the operation of cohesion, rudely acting upon particles near together ; then subtler influences, slowly imparting regularity of form ; while heat, electricity, and potent chemical affini- ties, conspire in the work. As yet, there is only an incomplete body. Light now exerts its myste- rious powers, and all assumes an organized form. So it is with mankind. The rude cohesion of early ages, acting only upon individuals near to- gether, first appears. Slowly does the work pro- ceed. But time and space, the great obstructions, if not annihilated, are now subdued, giving free scope to the powerful affinities of civilization. At last, light — hail ! holy light ! — in whose glad beams are knowledge, morals, and religion, with empyrean sway, will resolve these separate and distracted elements into one organized system.
EFFORTS OF INDIVIDUALS FOR PEACEFUL UNITY.
Thus much for examples and tendencies. In harmony with these are the efforts of individuals extending through various ages, and strengthen- ing with time, till now at last they swell into a voice that must be heard. A rapid glance at these will show the growth of the cause which we have met to welcome. Far off in the writings of the early Fathers, we learn the duty and importance of Universal Peace. But the .rude hoof of War trampled down these sparks of generous truth
WAR-SYSTEM. 63
destined to flame forth at a later day. In the fifteenth century, the character of the good Man of Peace was described in that work of unexampled circulation, which has been translated into all mod- ern tongues, and republished more than a thousand times, the " Imitation of Christ, by Thomas a Kempis." A little later, the cause of Peace found important support from the pen of a great scholar, the gentle and learned Erasmus. At last, it obtained a specious advocacy from the throne. Henry IV. of France, with the cooperation of his minister, Sully, conceived the beautiful scheme of blending the Christian nations in one Confederacy, with a high tribunal for the decision of controversies between them. He had drawn into his plan Queen Elizabeth of England, when all was arrested by the dagger of Ravaillac. This gay and gallant monarch was lit- tle penetrated by the divine sentiment of Peace ; for, at his death, he was gathering materials for fresh War ; and it is unhappily evident, that even in his scheme of a European Congress, he was animated by a selfish ambition to humble Austria, rather than by a comprehensive humanity. Still., his scheme has performed the important office of holding aloft before Christendom the practical idea of a tribunal for the Commonwealth of Nations.
Universal Peace was not thus early to receive the countenance of government. Meanwhile pri- vate efforts began to multipl}7. Grotius, in his won- derful work on the Law of Nations, while lavishing learning and genius in illustrating the Arbitrament of War, bears testimony in favor of a more rational tribunal. " It would be useful, and in some sort
fl4 WAR-SYSTEM.
necessary," he says, — in language which, if carried out practically, would sweep away the whole system of the Laws of War, — " to have Congresses of the Christian Powers, where differences might be deter- mined by the judgment of those who were not inter- ested in them, and means might be found to constrain parties to accept peace on just conditions." * To the discredit of his age, these moderate words were received with derision ; and the eminent expounder of the Laws of War and Peace was, on this account, condemned as rash, visionary, and impracticable. But the sentiment in which they had their origin, found other forms of utterance. Before the close of the seventeenth century, Nicole, the friend of Pascal, belonging to the fellowship of Port-Royal, and one of the highest names in the Church of France, gave to the world, in his Moral Essays, a brief Treatise on the means of preserving Peace among men (Traite des Moyens de conserver la Paix avec les Hommes), a production which Voltaire, in ex- aggerated praise, terms '* a masterpiece, to which nothing equal has been left by Antiquity." There next appeared a work, which is now a bibliographi- cal curiosity, entitled Nouveau Cyneas, — the name being suggested by the pacific adviser of Pyrrhus, the warrior king of Epirus, — where the unknown author counsels sovereigns to govern in Peace, sub- mitting their differences to an established tribunal. In Germany, at the close of the seventeenth cen- tury, as we learn from Leibnitz, who also mentions the last authority, a retired general, who had com- manded armies, the Landgrave Ernest of Hesse
* Lib. II. cap. xxiii. § 8.
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Reinfels, in a work entitled The Discreet Catholic, offered a project for Perpetual Peace, by means of a tribunal established by associate sovereigns. Con- temporaneously with these efforts, William Penn, in England, published an " Essay on the present and future Peace of Europe," in which he urged the plan of a general Congress, and referred with praise to the kt great design" of Henry IV. Thus, by his writings, as also by his illustrious example in Penn- sylvania, did he show himself the friend of Peace.
THE ABBE SAINT PIERRE.
These were soon followed by the untiring labors of the good Abbe Saint Pierre, of France, — the most efficient among the early apostles of Peace. He is not to be confounded with the eloquent and eccentric Bernardin de Saint Pierre, the author of :x Paul and Virginia," who, at a later day, beauti- fully painted the true Fraternity of Nations.* Of a genius less artistic and literary, the abbe con- secrated a whole life, crowned by extreme old age, to the improvement of mankind. There was no humane cause which he did not espouse ; but he was especially filled with the idea of Univer- sal Peace, and with the importance of teaching nations, not less than individuals, the duty of of doing to others as they would have others do unto them. His views are elaborately presented in a work of three volumes, entitled, A Project for Perpetual Peace, where he proposes a Diet
* (Euvres de Bernardin de Saint Pierre, Tom. X. p. 138. Har- monies de la Nature, Tom. II. p. 168. V&ux d'un Solitaire. 6*
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or Congress of Sovereigns, for the adjudication of international controversies without resort to War. Throughout his voluminous writings, he constantly returns to this project, which was the cherished vision of his life. More than once the regret falls from him, that the exalted genius of Newton and Descartes had not been devoted to the study and exposition of the laws which determine the welfare of men and of nations ; believing that they might have succeeded in organizing Peace. He often dwells on the beauty of Christian precepts, as a rule of public conduct, and on the true glory of beneficence ; while he exposes the vanity of military renown, and does not hesitate to question that false glory which procured for Louis XIV., the undeserved title of Great, echoed by flattering courtiers and a bar- barous world. He enriched the French language with the word bienfaisance ; and D'Alembert said that it was right he should have invented the word, who practised so largely the virtue which it expresses.
I need hardly add, that, though thus of benevo- lence all compact, Saint Pierre was not the favorite of his age. A profligate minister, Cardinal Dubois, the ecclesiastical companion of a vicious regent in the worst excesses, condemned his ideas in a phrase of satire, as " the dreams of a good man." The pen of La Bruyere wantoned in a petty portrait of the good man's personal peculiarities. Many averted from him the countenance. To the scandal of literature and of science, the French Academy, of which he was a member , on the oc-
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casion of his death, forbore the eulogy which is its customary tribute to a departed academician. But an incomparable genius in Germany, — aa authority not to be questioned on any subject upon which he ventured to speak, — the great and universal Leibnitz, bears his testimony to the Project of Perpetual Peace, and so doing, enrolls his own mighty name in the catalogue of our cause. In some observations on this Project, communicated to its author, under date of Feb. 7, 1715,* after declaring, that it touches a matter which interests the whole human race, and is not foreign to his studies, as from his youth, he had occupied him- self with law, and particularly with the Law of Nations, Leibnitz says : UJ have read it with atten- tion, and am persuaded that such a Project, on the whole, is feasible, and that its execution would be one of the most useful things in the world. Al- though my suffrage cannot be of any weight, I have nevertheless thought that gratitude obliged me not to withhold it, and to join to it some remarks for the satisfaction of a meritorious author, who ought to have much reputation and firmness, to have dared and been able to oppose with success the prejudiced crowd, and the un- bridled tongue of mockers." Such testimony from Leibnitz must have been grateful even to Saint Pierre. I cannot close this brief record of a philanthropist, ever constant in an age when phi- lanthropy was little regarded, without offering him my unaffected homage. To him may be addressed
* Leibnitz, Opera, Tom. V. pp. 56-62 (ed. Dutens).
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the sublime salutation, which hymned from the soul of Milton ;
Servant of God, well-done ! well hast thou fought The better fight, who single hast maintained Against revolted multitudes the cause Of truth, in word mightier than in arms ; And for the testimony of truth hast borne
.... reproach, far worse to bear Than violence ; for this was all thy care To stand approved in sight of God, though worlds Judged thec perverse.
The world waking hereafter from its martial trance will salute, with gratitude and admiration, the true greatness of his career. It may well measure its advance in civilization by its appreciation of his character.
ROUSSEAU.
Saint Pierre was followed in 1761 by that re- markable genius, Jean Jaques Rousseau, in a small work with the modest title, Extract from the Project of Perpetual Peace by the Abbe Saint Pierre. Without referring to those higher mo- tives, fouad in humanity, conscience, and re- ligion,— for aldressing which to sovereigns, Saint Pierre incurred the ridicule of what are called practical statesmen, — Rousseau appeals to the common-sense of rulers, and shows how much their worldly interests would be promoted by submit- ting their pretensions to the Arbitration of an impartial tribunal, rather than to the uncertain issue of arms, which cannot bring adequate com- pensation even to the victor for the blood and treasure sacrificed. If this project fails, it is not,
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according to him, because it is chimerical ; but because men have lost their wits, and it is a sort of madness to be wise in the midst of fools. As no scheme more grand, more beautiful or more useful ever occupied the human mind, so, says Rousseau, no author ever deserved attention more than one proposing the means for its practical adoption ; nor can any humane and virtuous man fail to regard it with something of enthusiasm.
The recommendations of Rousseau were encoun- tered in Germany by a writer who is remem- bered chiefly by his hardihood on this occasion. I allude to Embser, who treats of Perpetual Peace in a work first published in 1779, under the title of The Idolatry of our Philosophical Century (Die Abgotterei unsers philosophischen Jahrhunderts), and, at a later day, with a new title, under the alias of the Refutation of the Project of Perpetual Peace (Widerlegung des ewigen Friedens-projekts). The objections, com- mon with the superficial or prejudiced, are here vehemently urged ; the imputation upon Grotius is reproduced ; and the project is pronounced visionary and impracticable, while war is held up as an instrument more beneficent than Peace, in advancing the civilization of mankind.
GERMAN VOICES.
But the cause of Saint Pierre and Rousseau was not without other champions. In 1763, we have at Gottingen the work of Totze, entitled Permanent and Universal Peace, according to the Plan of Henry IV. (Ewiger und allgemeiner Friede nach
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der Entwurf Heiiirichs IV.) ; and in 1767, at Leipzig, an ample and mature treatise by Lili- enfels, under the name of New Constitution for States (Neues Staatsgebaude). Truth often ap- pears contemporaneously to different minds, having no concert with each other ; and the latter work, though in remarkable harmony with Saint Pierre and Rousseau, is said to have been composed without any knowledge of their labors. Lilienfels exposes the causes and calamities "of war, the expenses of- armaments in time of Peace, and the miserable chances of the battle-field, where controversies are determined, in defiance of all justice, as by the throw of dice ; and he urges a submission to Arbitrators, unless a Supreme Tribunal is established to administer the Law of Nations, and to judge between them, enforcing its decrees by the combined power of the Con- federacy.
IMMANUEL KANT.
It was left to another German, in intellectual preeminence the successor of Leibnitz, to illus- trate this cause by especial and repeated labors. At Konigsberg, in a retired corner of Prussia, away from the great lines o'f travel, Immanuel Kant consecrated his da}*s to the pursuit of truth. During a long, virtuous, and disinterested life, stretching beyond the period appointed for man — from 1724 to 1804 — in retirement, undisturbed by the shocks of revolution or war, never drawn by the temptations of travel more than seven German miles from the place of his birth, he
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assiduously studied books, men, and things. Among the fruits of his ripened powers was that system of Philosophy, known as the Cri- tique of Pure Reason, by which he was at once established as a master-mind of his country. His words became the text for writers without num- ber, who vied with each other in expounding, illustrating, or opposing his principles. At this period, after an unprecedented triumph in phi- losophy, when his name had become familiar wherever his mother-tongue was spoken, and while his rare faculties were yet untouched by decay — in the Indian summer of life — the great thinker published a work On Perpetual Peace (Zum ewigen Frieden, 1796). The interest in the author, or in the cause, was attested by prompt translations into the French, Danish, and Dutch languages. The same cause was espoused in an- other effort, entitled Idea for a General History in a Cosmopolitan View (Idee zu einer allgemei- nen Geschichte in weltburgerlicher Absicht) ; and, finally, in his Metaphysical Elements of Jurispru- dence (Metaphysiche Anfangsgrunde der Rechts- lehre). In the lapse of time, the speculations of the philosopher have lost much of their origi- nal attraction ; and other systems, with other names, have taken their place. But these early and faithful labors for Perpetual Peace cannot be forgotten. By these, perhaps, the fame of the applauded philosopher of Konigsberg may yet be preserved.
By Perpetual Peace, Kant understood a con- dition of nations, in which there could be no
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fear of war ; and this condition, he said, was demanded by reason, which abhorring all war, as little adapted to establish right, must regard this final development of the Law of Nations as a consummation worthy of every effort. To this all persons, and particularly all rulers, should bend their energies. A special league or treaty should be entered into, which may be truly called a Treaty of Peace, differing from other treaties in this regard, that, whereas these terminate a single existing war only, this should terminate forever all war between the parties to it. Trea- ties of Peace, tacitly acknowledging the right to wage war, as all treaties now do, are nothing more than a truce; they are not Peace. By these treaties, an individual War may be ended ; but not the state of war. There may not be con- stant hostilities ; but there will be constant fear of them, with constant threats of aggression and attack. The soldiers and armaments now nursed as a Peace establishment, become the fruitful parent of new wars. With real Peace, these would be abandoned. Nor should nations hesi- tate to submit, like individuals, to law. They should form one comprehensive Federation which, by the addition of other nations, should at last embrace the whole earth. And this, according to Kant, in the succession of years, by a sure progress, is the irresistible tendency of nations.
FICHTE, AND OTHER GERMANS.
These views found immediate support from an- other German philosopher, Fichte, of remarkable
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acuteness and perfect devotion to truth, whose name, in his own day, awakened an echo inferior only to that of Kant. In his Groundwork of the Law of Nature (Grundlage des Naturrechts), pub- lished in 179(5, he urges a Federation of Nations, with a tribunal for the determination of inter- national controversies, as the best way of secur- ing the triumph of justice, and of subduing the power of the unjust. To the suggestion, that by this Federation injustice might be done, he re- plied, that it would not be easy for the confed- erate nations to find any common advantage tempting them to do this wrong. The subject was again handled in 1804, by a learned Ger- man, Charles Schwab, whose work, entitled Of unavoidable Injustice (Uber das unvermeidliche Unrecht) is marked by clearness and directness. He looks forward to the Universal State, in which nations will be united, as citizens are now united in a municipal state. He does not believe that in this condition justice will be always inviolate,, for between citizens it is not so ; but that it will become generally established. As under a municipal state war no longer prevails, but of- fences, wrongs, and sallies of vengeance often proceed from individual citizens, while insubor- dination and anarchy sometimes show themselves ; — so in the Universal State, war will be extin- guished ; but here also, between the different nations, who will be as citizens in the Feder- ation, there ma}r be wrongs, and aggressions, and even the common power may be resisted. 7
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In short, the Universal State will be subject to the same accidents with the municipal state.
The cause of Permanent Peace now became a thesis for Universities. At Stuttgarcl, in 1796, there was an oration by J. H. La Motte, entitled Utrum Pax Perpetua pangi possit, nee ne? And again at Leyden, in Holland, in 1808, a Dis- sertation was written by Gabinus de Wai, on taking his degree as Doctor of Laws, entitled Disputatio Pliilosopliico-Juridica de Conjunctions Populorum ad Pacem Perpetuam. This learned and elaborate performance, after reviewing pre- vious efforts in the cause, accords a preeminence to Kant. Such a voice from a pupil of the Uni- versity is the token of a growing sentiment, and an example for the youth of our own day.
JEREMY BENTHAM.
Meanwhile in England, that indefatigable jurist and reformer, Jeremy Bentham, embraced this cause in his comprehensive labors. In an Essay on International Law, bearing date from 1786 to 1789, and first published in 1839, by his executor, Dr. Bowring,* he develops a plan for Universal and Perpetual Peace in the spirit of Saint Pierre. According to him, such is the extreme folly, the madness of War, that on no supposition can it be else than mischievous. All trade, in its essence, is advantageous, even to that party to whom it is least so. All war, in its essence, is ruinous ; and yet the great
* Bentham's Works, Part VIII. pp. 537-554.
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employments of government are to treasure up occasions of War, and to put fetters upon trade. To remj.ly this evil, Bentham proposes, first, 44 The reduction and fixation of the forces of the several Nations, that compose the European system," and in enforcing this proposition, he says, '• Whatsoever nation should get the start of the other in making the proposal to reduce, and fix the amount of its armed force, would crown itself with everlasting honor. The risk would be nothing — the gain certain. This gain would be, the giving an incontrovertible demon- stration of its own disposition to peace, and of the opposite disposition in the other nation in case of its rejecting the proposal." He next proposes the establishment of an International Court of Judicature, with power to report its opinion, and cause it to be circulated in each nation ; and after a certain time, to put a re- fractory nation under the ban. He denies that the arrangement can in any respect be styled, visionary, for it is proved, first, that it is the interest of the parties concerned ; secondly, that the parties are already sensible of that interest ;. and, thirdly, that the parties enlightened by dip- lomatic experience in difficult and complicated conventions, are prepared for the new situation .. All this is sober and practical.
AMERICAN VOICES.
Corning to our own country, I find many names worthy of commemoration. No person, in all history, has borne his testimony in phrases of
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greater pungenc}^ or more convincing truth than Benjamin Franklin. " There never has been," he says, " nor ever will be, any such thing as a good War, or a bad Peace ; " and he asks, " When will mankind be convinced of this, and agree to settle their difficulties by Arbitration? Were they to do it even by the cast of a die, it would be better than by fighting and destroy- ing each other." As a diplomatist, Franklin strove to limit the evils of War. From him, while Minister of the United States at Paris, proceeded those instructions, more honorable to the American name than any battle, directing our naval cruisers, among whom was the re- doubtable Paul Jones, if they should encounter the returning expedition of the English naviga- tor, Capt. Cook, to allow it, in the interest of universal science, a fre'e and undisturbed pas- sage. To him also belongs the honor of intro- ducing, into a treaty with Prussia, a provision for the abolition of that special scandal, private War on the ocean. In similar strain with Frank- lin, Jefferson says, " Will nations never devise a more rational umpire of differences than Force? War is an instrument entirely inefficient towards redressing wrong, and multiplies instead of in- demnifying losses." And he proceeds to exhibit the waste of War, and the beneficent conse- quences, if its expenditures could be diverted to purposes of practical utility.
To Franklin and Jefferson let thanks be ren- dered for their authoritative words and precious example. But there are three names, fit sue-
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cessors of Saint Pierre, — I speak only of those whose career is ended, and on whose good works is the seal of death, — which more than theirs deserve affectionate regard. I refer to Noah Worcester, William Ellery Charming, and Wil- liam Ladd. It would be a grateful task to dwell on the services of these our virtuous champions. The occasion will allow only a passing notice.
In Worcester, we behold the single-minded coun- try clergyman, little gifted as a preacher, with narrow means, — and his example teaches what such a character may accomplish, — in his humble retirement, pained by the reports of War, and at last, when the protracted drama of battles closed at Waterloo, publishing that appeal, entitled " A Solemn Review of the Custom of War," which has been so extensively circulated at home and abroad, and has done so much to correct the inveterate prejudices which surround the cause. He was the founder, and for some time the inde- fatigable agent, of the earliest Peace Society in the country.
The eloquence of Channing, both with tongue and pen, was often directed against War. He was heart-struck by the awful moral degradation which it caused, rudely blotting out in men the image of God their Father ; and his words of flame have lighted in many souls those exterminating fires that shall never die, until this evil is swept from the earth.
William Ladd, after completing his education at Harvard University, entered into commercial pur- suits. Early blessed with competency, through his 7*
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own exertions, he could not be idle. He was child- less ; and his affections embraced all the children of the human family. Like Worcester and Chan- ning, his attention was arrested by the portentous crime of War, and he was moved to dedicate the remainder of his days to earnest, untiring efforts for its abolition ; going about, from place to place, to inculcate the lesson of Peace ; with simple, cheerful manner winning the hearts of good men, and drop- ping in many youthful souls precious seeds, to ripen in more precious fruit. He was the founder of the American Peace Society, in which was finally merged the earlier association, established by Wor- cester. By a long series of practical labors, and especially by developing, maturing, and publishing to the world, the plan of a Congress of Nations, has William Ladd enrolled himself among the benefac- tors of mankind.
Such are some of the names which, hereafter, when the warrior no longer usurps the " blessings*' promised to the " peace-maker," will be inscribed on immortal tablets.
THE PEACE MOVEMENT.
Now at last, in the fulness of time, in our own day, by the labors of men of Peace, by the irresisti- ble cooperating affinities of mankind, nations seem to be visibly approaching — even amidst tumult and discord — that Unity, so long hoped for, prayed for. By steamboats, railroads, and telegraphs, ou '•strip- ping the traditional movements of government, men of all countries daily commingle ; ancient prejudices fast dissolve ; while ancient sympathies strengthen
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and new sympathies come into being. The chief commercial cities of England send addresses of friendship to the chief commercial cities of France ; and the latter delight to return the salutation. Similar cords of amity are woven between cities in England and cities in our own country. The visit to London of a band of French National Guards is reciprocated by the visit to Paris of a large company of Englishmen. Thus are pacific conquests achieved, where formerly all the force of arms could not prevail. Mr. Vattemare peram- bulates Europe and the United States to estab- lish a system of literary international exchanges. By the daily agency of the press, we are made shar- ers in the trials and triumphs of our brethren in all lands, and learn to live no longer in the solitude of insulated nationalities, but in the communion of as- sociated states. By the multitudinous reciprocities of commerce are developed relations of mutual dependence, stronger than treaties or alliances en- grossed on parchment; while, from a truer appre- ciation of the ethics of government, we arrive at the conviction, that the divine injunction, " Do unto others, as you would have them do unto you," v;as spoken to nations as well as to individuals.
From increasing knowledge of each other, and from a higher sense of duty as brethren of the Hu- man Family, arises an increasing interest in each other ; and charity, which was once, like patriotism, exclusively national, is beginning to clasp the world in its embrace. Every discovery of science, every aspiration of philanthropy, in whatever country it may have its origin, is now poured into the common
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stock of mankind. Assemblies, whether of science or philanthropy, are no longer merely municipal, but welcome delegates from all the nations. Science has had Congresses in Italy, Germany, and England. Great causes — grander even than science, like Temperance, Freedom, Peace — have drawn to Lon- don large bodies of men from different countries, under the title of World Conventions, in whose very name, and in whose spirit of fraternity, we discern the prevailing tendency . Such a convention, dedi- cated to Universal Peace, held at London in 1843, was graced by the presence of many well known for labors of humanity. At Frankfort, in 1846, was assembled a large Congress from all parts of Europe, to consider what could be done for those who are in prison. The succeeding year witnessed, at Brussels, a similar Congress, convened in the same charity. At last, in August, 1848, we hail, at Brussels, another Congress, inspired by the presence of a generous American, Elihu Burritt, — who has left his anvil at home to teach the nations to change their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning- hooks, — presided over by an eminent Belgian magis- trate ; and composed of numerous individuals, speak- ing various languages, living under diverse forms of government, differing in political opinions, differing in religious convictions, but all drawn together by a common sentiment, to unite in strenuous effort for the abolition of War, and the Disarming of the Nations.
The Peace Congress at Brussels constitutes an epoch. It is a palpable development of those inter- national attractions and affinities which now await
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their final organization. The resolutions it has put forth are so important, that I cannot hesitate to introduce them : —
First. — That, in the judgment of this Congress, an appeal to arms for the purpose of deciding disputes among nations, is a custom condemned alike by religion, reason, justice, humanity, and the best interests of the people; and that, therefore, it con- siders it to be the duty of the civilized world to adopt measures calculated to effect its entire abolition.
Second. — That it is of the highest importance to urge on the several Governments of Europe and America the necessity of in- troducing a clause into all International Treaties, providing for the settlement of all disputes by Arbitration, in an amicable man- ner, and according to the rules of justice and equity, by special Arbitrators, or a Supreme International Court, to be invested with power to decide in cases of necessity, as a last resort.
Third. — That the speedy convocation of a Congress of Nations, composed of duly appointed representatives, for the purpose of framing a well digested and authoritative International Code, is of the greatest importance, inasmuch as the organization of such a body, and the unanimous adoption of such a Code, would be an effectual means of promoting universal Peace.
Fourth. — That this Congress respectfully calls the attention of civilized Governments to the necessity of a general and simultane- ous disarmament, as a means whereby they may greatly diminish the financial burthens which press upon them; remove a fertile cause of irritation and inquietude; inspire mutual confidence, and promote the interchange of good offices; which, while they advance the interests of eanh state in particular, contribute largely to the maintenance of general Peace and the lasting prosperity of nations.
In France, these resolutions have received the adhesion of Lamartine ; in England, of Richard Cobclen. They have been welcomed throughout Great Britain, by large and enthusiastic popular assemblies, hanging with delight upon the practical lessons of peace on earth and good- will to men. At
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the suggestion of the Congress at Brussels, and in harmony with the demands of an increasing public sentiment, another Congress will be convened at Paris, in the approaching month of August. The place of meeting is auspicious. There, as in the very cave of ^Eolus, whence have so often raged forth the conflicting winds and resounding tempests of War, will gather delegates from various nations, including a large number from our own country, whose glad work will be to hush and imprison these winds and tempests, and to bind them in the chains of everlasting Peace. May God prosper the en- deavor !
Not in voluntary assemblies only has our cause found welcome. It has effected an entrance into legislative halls. A document now before me, in the handwriting of Samuel Adams, an approved patriot of the Revolution, bears witness to his desire for action on this subject in the Congress of the United States. It is in the form of a Letter of Instructions from the Legislature of Massachusetts to the dele- gates in Congress of this State ; and, though without date, seems to have been prepared some time between the Treaty of Peace in 1783, and the adoption of the Federal Constitution in 1789. It is as follows : —
GENTLEMEN,— Although the General Court have lately in- structed you concerning various matters of very great import- ance to this Commonwealth, they cannot finish the business of the year until they h ive transmitted to you a further instruction which they have louj; had in contemplation; and which, if their most ardent wish could be obtained, might in its consequences extensively promote the happiness of man.
You are, therefore, hereby instructed and urged, to move the United States in Congress assembled to take into their deep and
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most serious consideration, whether any measures can by them be used, through their influence with such of the nations in Europe with whom they are united by Treaties of Amity or Com- merce, that National Differences may be settled and determined, without tho necessity of WAR in which the world has too long been deluged, to the destruction of human happiness, and the disgrace of human reason and government.
If, after the most mature deliberation, it shall appear that no measures can be taken at present on this very interesting subject, it is conceived, it would redound much to the honor of the United States, that it was attended to by their great Representa- tive in Congress, and be accepted as a testimony of gratitude for most signal favors granted to the said states by Him who is the almighty and most gracious Father and Friend of mankind.
And you are further instructed to move that the foregoing Letter of Instructions be entered on the Journals of Congress, if it may be thought proper, that so it may remain for the inspection of the delegates from this Commonwealth, if necessary, in any future time.
I am not able to ascertain whether this document ever became a legislative act ; but it attests, in au- thentic form, that a great leader in Massachusetts, after the establishment of that Independence for which he had so assiduously labored, hoped to enlist not only the Legislature of his state, but the Con- gress of the United States, in efforts for the emanci- pation of nations from the tyranny of War. For this early effort, at a period when the cause of Per- manent Peace had never been introduced to any legislative body, Samuel Adams deserves grateful mention.
Many years later, the subject reached Congress. In 1838, in a report drawn up by the late Mr. Legare, and prompted by memorials from the friends of Peace, the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Representatives, while injudiciously dig-
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countenancing an Association of Nations, as not yet sanctioned by public opinion, acknowledge, " that the union of all nations in a state of Peace, under the restraints and protection of law, is the ideal perfec- tion of civil society ; that they accord fully in the benevolent object of the memorialists, and believe there is a visible tendency in the spirit and institu- tions of the age towards the practical accomplish- ment of it, at some future period ; that they heartily agree in recommending a reference to a Third Power of all such controversies as can be safely confided to any tribunal unknown to the Constitution of our country ; and that such a practice will be followed by other powers, and will soon grow up into the customary law of civilized nations." The Legisla- ture of Massachusetts, by a series of resolutions, in harmony with the early sentiments of Samuel Adams, adopted with exceeding unanimity in 1844, declare, that they " regard Arbitration as a practical and desirable substitute for War, in the adjustment of international differences ; " and still further declare their " earnest desire that the government of the United States would, at the earliest opportunity, take measures for obtaining the consent of the pow- ers of Christendom to the establishment of a general Convention or Congress of Nations, for the purpose of settling the principles of international law, and of organizing a high Court of Nations to adjudge all cases of difficulty which may be brought before them by the mutual consent of two or more na- tions." During the winter of 1849, the subject was again presented to the American Congress by Mr. Tuck, who asked the unanimous consent of the House
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of Representatives to offer the following preamble and resolution : —
Whereas the evils of War are acknowledged by all civilized nations, and the calamities, individual and general, which are inseparably connected with it, have attracted the attention of many humane and enlightened citizens of this and other coun- tries; and whereas it is the disposition of the people of the Uni- ted States to co-operate with others in all appropriate and judicious exertions to prevent a recurrence of national conflicts; therefore,
Resolved, — That the Committee on Foreign Affairs be directed to inquire into the expediency of authorizing a correspondence to be opened by the Secretary of State with Foreign Govern- ments, on the subject of procuring Treaty stipulations for the reference of all future disputes to a friendly Arbitration, or for the establishment instead thereof of a Congress of Nations, to determine International law and settle International disputes.
Though, for the present unsuccessful, this excellent effort will prepare the way for another trial.
Nor does it stand alone. Almost contemporane- ously, M. Bouvet, in the National Assembly of France, submitted a proposition of a similar charac- ter, the official record of which is as follows : —
NATIONAL ASSEMBLY.
Proposition relative to the opening of a Universal Congress, having for its object a proportional disarmament among all recognized States. Presented the eighth of January, 1849, by the Citizen, Francisque Bouvet, representative of the People. Referred to the Committee of Foreign Affairs.
(Urgency Demands.)
Seeing that War between nations is contrary to religion, humanity, and the public well-being, the French National Assembly decrees: —
FIRST ARTICLE. — The French Republic proposes to the Govern- ments and Representative Assemblies of the different States of 8
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Europe, America, and other civilized countries, to unite by their representation, in a Congress which shall have for its object a proportional disarmament among the powers, the abolition of War, and a substitution for that barbarous usage, of an Arbitral jurisdiction, of which the said Congress shall immediately fulfil the functions
SECOND ARTICLE. — The Universal Congress shall commence on the first of May, 1849, at Constantinople.
THIRD ARTICLE. — The President of the Republic is charged to notify the present proposition to all the Governments and Repre- sentative Assemblies of civilized States, and to use all the means in his power to induce them to concur in it.
In an elaborate report, the French Committee on Foreign Affairs, while declining at present to recom- mend this proposition, distinctly sanction its object.
At a still earlier date, some time in the summer of 1848, Arnold Ruge brought the same measure before the German Parliament, at Frankfort, by moving the following amendment to the Report of the Committee on Foreign Affairs : —
That, as armed peace, by its standing armies, imposes an intolerable burden upon the people of Europe, and endangers civil freedom, we, therefore, recognize the necessity of calling into existence a Congress of Nat'ons, for the object of effecting a general disarmament of Europe.
Though this proposition failed, yet the mover is reported to have sustained it by a speech, which was received with applause, both in the assembly and gallery. Among other things, he used these impor- tant words : —
There is no necessity of feeding an army of military idlers and eaters. There is nothing to fear from our neighboring barba- rians, as they are called. You must give up the idea that the
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French will eat us up, and that the Prussians can eat us up. Sol .Hers must cease to exist; then shall no more cities be bom- barded. These opinions must be kept up and propagated by a Congress of Nations. I vote that the nations of Europe disarm at once.
In the British Parliament, our cause has found an able representative in Mr. Cobden, whose name is an omen of success. He has addressed many large popular meetings in its behalf, and already, by speech and motion, in the House of Commons, has striven for a reduction .in the armaments of Great Britain. Only lately, he has given notice of the following motion, which he intends to call up in that assembly, at the earliest moment : —
That an humble address be presented to her Majesty, praying she will be graciously pleased to direct her Principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, to enter into communication with Foreign Powers, inviting them to concur in treaties, binding the respective parties, in the event of any future misunderstanding, which cannot be arranged by amicable negotiation, to refer the matter in dispute to the decision of arbitrators.
CHARACTER OP THE PEACE MOVEMENT.
Such is the Peace Movement.* With the ever- flowing current of time, it has gained ever-increasing strength ; and it has now become like a mighty river. At first, but a slender fountain, sparkling on some lofty summit, it has swollen with every tribu- tary rill, with the friendly rains and dews of heaven,
* It will be remarked that this history stops with the date of this Address.
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and at last, with the associate waters of various na- tions, until it washes the feet of populous cities, rejoicing on its peaceful banks. J$y the voices of poets ; by the aspirations and labors of statesmen, philosophers, and good men ; loy the experience of history ; by the peaceful union into nations, of families, tribes, and provinces, divesting themselves of the " liberty " to wage War ; by the example of leagues, alliances, confederacies, and congresses ; by the kindred movements of our age, all tending to Unity ; by an awakened public sentiment, and a growing recognition of the Brotherhood of Man ; by the sympathies of large, popular assemblies ; by the formal action of legislative bodies ; by the promises of Christianity, — are we encouraged to persevere. So doing, we shall act not against nature, but with nature, making ourselves, according to the injunc- tion of Lord Bacon, its ministers and interpreters. From no single man, from no body of men, does our cause proceed. Not from Saint Pierre or Leibnitz, from Rousseau or Kant, in other days ; not from Jay or Burritt, from Cobden or Lamartine, in our own. It is the irrepressible utterance of longing with which the heart of Humanity labors ; it is the universal expression of the Spirit of the Age, thirsting after Harmony ; it is the heaven-born whisper of Truth, immortal and omnipotent ; it is the word of God, published in commands as from the burning-bush ; it is the voice of Christ, declar- ing to all mankind that they are brothers, and saying to the turbulent nationalities of the earth, as to the raging sea, " Peace, be still ! "
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OUR OBJECT ENTIRELY PRACTICAL.
GENTLEMEN OF THE PEACE SOCIETY, — Such is the War-System of the Commonwealth of Nations ; and such are the means and auguries of its over- throw. It is the chosen object of this Society, to aid and direct public sentiment so as to hasten the coming of this day. All who have candidly attended me in this exposition, will bear witness that our attempt is in no way inconsistent with the human character ; that we do not seek to suspend, or hold in check, any general laws of nature ; but simply to overthrow a barbarous Institution, having the sanction of International Law, and to bring nations within that system of social order, which has already secured such inestimable good to civil society, and is as applicable to nations in their rela- tions with each other, as to individuals.
The tendencies of nations, as revealed in history, teach that our aims are in harmony with those pre- vailing laws, which God, in his benevolence, has ordained for mankind.
Examples teach also that we attempt nothing that is not directly practicable. If the several states of the Helvetic Republic ; if the thirty independent States of the North American Union ; if the thirty- eight independent sovereignties of the German Confederation, can, by formal stipulation, divest themselves of the right of war with each other, and consent to submit all mutual controversies to Arbi- tration, or to a High Court of Judicature, then can the Commonwealth of Nations do the same. Nor should they hesitate, while, in the language of Wil- 8*
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liara Penn, such surpassing instances show that it may be done, and Europe, by her incomparable miseries, that it ought to be done. Nay, more ; if it would be criminal in these several clusters of states to reestablish the Institution of War, as the Arbiter of Justice, then is it criminal in the Commonwealth of Nations to continue it.
Changes already wrought in the Laws of War, teach still further that the whole System may be abolished. The existence of laws implies an author- it}7 that sanctions or enacts, which, in the present case, is the Commonwealth of Nations. But this authority can, of course, modify, or abrogate what it has originally sanctioned or enacted. In the exer- cise of this power, the Laws of War have, from time to time, been modified in important particulars. Prisoners taken in battle cannot now be killed ; nor can they be reduced to slavery. Poison and assasi- nation can no longer be employed against an enemy. Private property on land cannot be seized. Persons, occupied on land exclusively with the arts of Peace, cannot be molested. It remains that the authority, by which the Laws of War have been thus modified, should entirely abrogate them. Their existence is a disgrace to civilization ; for it implies the common consent of nations to the Arbitrament of War, as regulated by these laws. Like the Laws of the Duel, they should yield to some arbitrament of reason. If the former, once so firmly imbedded in municipal law, could be abolished by individual nations, so also can the Laws of War, which are a part of international law, be abolished by the Commonwealth of Nations. In the light of reason
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and of religion, there can be but one Law of War — the great law which pronounces it unwise, unchristian, and unjust, and forbids it forever as a crime.
Thus distinctly alleging the practicability of our aims, I may properly introduce an incontrovertible authority. Listen to the words of an American statesman, — whose long life was spent in the ser- vice of his country at home and abroad, and whose undoubted familiarity with the Law of Nations was never surpassed, — John Quincy Adams. " War," he says, in one of the legacies of his venerable expe- rience,* " by the common consent and mere will of civilized man, has not only been divested of its most atrocious cruelties, but for multitudes, growing mul- titudes of individuals, has already been and is abol- ished. WJiy should it not be abolished for all? Let it be impressed upon the heart of every one of you, — impress it upon the minds of your children, — that this total abolition of War upon earth is an improvement in the condition of man, entirely .dependent on his own will. He cannot repeal or change the laws of physical nature. He cannot redeem himself from the ills that flesh is heir to ; but the ills of war and slavery are all of his own creation. He has but to will, and he effects the cessation of them altogether."
Well does John Quincy Adams sa}' that mankind have but to will it, and War is abolished. Let them will it ; and War disappears like the Duel. Let them will it ; and War skulks like the torture. Let
* Oration at Newburyport, July 4, 1839.
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them will it; and War fades away like the fires of religious persecution. Let them will it ; and War passes among profane follies, like the ordeal of burning ploughshares. Let them will it ; and War hurries to join the earlier Institution of Cannibalism. Let them will it; and War is chastised from the Commonwealth of Nations, as Slavery has been chastised from their municipal jurisdictions by England and France, by Tunis and Tripoli.
WAR MUST BE EXHIBITED IN ITS TRUE LIGHT.
To arouse this public wiU, which, like a giant, yet sleeps, but whose awakened voice nothing can with- stand, should be our earnest endeavor. To do this, we must never tire in exposing the true character of the War-System. To be hated, it needs only to be comprehended ; and it will surely be abolished, as soon as this is accomplished. See, then, that it is comprehended. Expose its manifold atrocities, in the light of reason, humanity, religion. Strip from it all its presumptuous pretences, its specious apolo- gies, its hideous sorceries. Above all, let men no longer deceive themselves by the shallow thought that this System is a necessary incident of imperfect human nature, and thus continue to cast upon God the responsibility for their crimes. Let them see clearly that it is a monster of their own creation, born with their consent, whose vital spark is fed by their breath, and without their breath must necessa- rily die. Let them see distinctly, what I have so carefully presented tonight, that War, under the Law of Nations, is nothing but an Institution, atad the whole War-System is nothing but an Establish-
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ment for the administration of international justice, for which the Commonwealth of Nations is directly responsible, and which this Commonwealth can at any time remove.
As men come to recognize these things, they must cease to cherish War, and will refuse all appeal to its Arbitrament. They will forego rights even, rather than wage an irreligious battle. But, crimi- nal and irrational as is War, we cannot, unhappily, — in the present state of human error — expect large numbers to appreciate its true character, and to hate it with that perfect hatred which shall cause them to renounce its agenc}r, unless we can offer an approved and practical mode of determining inter- national controversies, as a substitute for the imagined necessity of an appeal to the barbarous ordeal. This we are able to do ; and so doing, we reflect new light upon the atrocity of a System, which discards reason, defies justice, and tramples upon all the precepts of the Christian faith.
A CONGRESS OF NATIONS, A SUBSTITUTE FOR WAR.
1. The most complete and permanent substitute for War would be a Congress of Nations, with a High Court of Judicature. Such a system, while ad- mitted on all sides to promise excellent results, is opposed on two grounds. First; because, as regards the smaller states, it would be a tremen- dous engine of oppression, subversive of their political independence. Surely, it could not be so oppressive as the War-System. But the experience of the smaller states in the German Confederation, and in the American Union, — nay, the experience
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of Belgium and Holland, by the side of the over- topping power of France, and the experience of Denmark and Sweden, in the very night-shade of Russia, — all show the futility of this objection. And, secondly, because the decrees of such a court could not be carried into effect. Even if they were enforced by the combined power of the associate nations, as the executive arm of the high tribunal, the sword would be the melancholy instrument of Justice onty, but not the Arbiter of Justice, and, therefore, not condemned by the conclusive reasons against international appeals to the sword. We may learn, however, from the experience of history, and particularly from the experience of the thirty States of our Union, that the occasion for any executive arm will be rare. The State of Rhode Island, in its recent controversy with Massachu- setts, submitted, with much indifference, to the ad- verse decree of the Supreme Court ; and I doubt not that Missouri and Iowa will submit with equal contentment to any determination of their present controversy, by the same tribunal. The same sub- mission would attend the decrees of any Court of Judicature, established by the Commonwealth of Nations. There is a growing sense of justice, com- bined with a growing might of public opinion, too little known to the soldier, that would maintain the judgments of the august tribunal, assembled in the face of the nations, better than the swords of all the marshals of France, better than the bloody terrors of Austerlitz or Waterloo.
The idea of a Congress of Nations with a High Court of Judicature, is as practicable as its consum-
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mation is confessedly dear to the friends of Universal Peace. Whenever this Congress is convened, as surely it will be, I know not all the names that will deserve commemoration in its earliest proceedings ; but there are two, whose particular and long-con- tinued advocacy of this Institution, will connect them forever indissolubly with its fame — the Abbe Saint Pierre, of France, and William Ladd, of the United States.
ARBITRATION, ALSO A SUBSTITUTE.
2. There is still another substitute for War, which is not open even to the superficial objections launched against a Congress of Nations. By formal treaties between two or more Nations, Arbitration may be established as the mode of determining controver- sies between them. In every respect, this is a con- trast to War. It is rational, humane, and cheap. Above all, it is consistent with the precepts of Christianity. As I mention this substitute, I should do injustice to the cause and to my own feelings, if I did not express our obligations to its efficient proposer and advocate, our fellow-citizen, and the President of our Society, the honored son of an illustrious father, whose absence tonight enables me, without offending his known modesty of char- acte1*, to introduce this tribute, — I mean William Jay.
DISARMING OF THE NATIONS.
The complete overthrow of the War-System, in- volving, of course, the disarming of the Nations, would follow the establishment of a Congress of
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Nations, or any general System of Arbitration. Then at last would our a,iras be accomplished ; then at last would Peace be organize 1 among the nations. Then might Christians repeat the fitful boast of the generous Mohawk, saying : '• We have thrown the hatchet so high into the air, and beyond the skies, that no arm on earth can reach to bring it down.*' The incalculable sums, now devoted to armaments and the destructive industry of War, would be turned to the productive industry of Art and to offices ot Beneficence. As in the dead and rotten carcass of the lion, which roared against the strong man of Israel, after a time, there was a swarm of bees and honey ; so would crowds of useful laborers, and all good works, take the place of the wild beast of War, and the riddle of Samson once more be interpreted ; " Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness."
Put together the products of all the mines of the world — the glistening ore of California, the accu- mulated treasures of Mexico and Peru, with the diamonds of Golconda, and the whole shining heap will be less than the means thus diverted from War to Peace. Under the influence of such a charge, civilization will be quickened anew. Then will happy labor find its reward, and the whole land be filled with its increase. There is no aspiration of knowledge, no vision of charity, no venture of enterprise, no fancy of art, which may not then be fulfilled. The great unsolved problem of Pauperism will be solved at last. There will be no paupers, when there are no soldiers. The social struggles, that now so fearfully disturb the European Nations,
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will die away in the happiness of unarmed Peace, no longer encumbered by the oppressive System of War; nor can there be well-founded hope of any permanent cessation of these struggles, so long as this System endures. The people ought not to rest ; nay, they cannot rest, while this system endures. As King Arthur, prostrate on the earth, with bloody streams running from his sides, could not be at ease until his sword, the vengeful Excalibar', was thrown into the flood ; so the nations, now prostrate on the earth, with bloody streams running from their shlos, cannot be at ease until they fling far away the wicked sword of War.
Lop off the unchristian armaments of the Chris- tian Nations ; extirpate these martial cancers — that they may no longer feed upon the life-blood of the people, — and society itself, which is now weary and sick, will become fresh and young ; not by opening its veins, as under the incantation of Medea, in the wild hope of infusing new strength, but by the amputation and complete removal of a deadly excrescence with all its unutterable debility and exhaustion. The energies, hitherto withdrawn from proper healthful action, will then replenish it with unwonted life and vigor, giving new expansion to every human capacit}7, and new elevation to every human aim. And society at last shall rejoice, like a strong man, to run its race.
Imagination toils in vain to picture the boundless good that will be achieved. As war and its deeds are infinitely evil and accursed, so will this triumph of Permanent Peace be infinitely beneficent and blessed. Something of its consequences were seen, 9
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as in prophetic vision, even by that incarnate Spirit of War, Napoleon Bonaparte, when, from his prison- island of St. Helena, looking back upon his mistaken career, he was led to confess the True Grandeur of Peace. Out of his mouth let its praise be spoken. "I had the project," he said, mournfully regretting the opportunity he had lost, " at the general peace of Amiens, of bringing each Power to an immense reduction of its standing armies. I wished a Euro- pean Institute, with European prizes, to direct, associate, and bring together all the learned socie- ties of Europe. Then, perhaps, through the uni- versal spread of light, it might be permitted to anticipate for the great European Family, the establishment of an American Congress, or an Amphyctyonic Council ; and what a perspective, at last, of grandeur, of happiness, of prosperity ! What a sublime and magnificent spectacle ! "
APPEAL FOR THE CAUSE.
Such is our cause. In its transcendant influence, it embraces human beneficence in all its forms. It is the comprehensive charity, enfolding all the charities of all. There is none so vast as to be above its protection ; there is none so lowly as not to feel its care. Religion, Knowledge, Freedom, Virtue, Happiness, in all their manifold forms, de- pend upon Peace. Sustained by Peace, they lean as upon the Everlasting Arm. And this is not all. Law, Order, Government, derive from it new sanc- tions. Nor can they attain to that complete do- minion which is our truest safeguard, until, by the overthrow of the War-System, they comprehend *t\9
Gom OUST, wealth of ^I*kJ**M» •
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And Sovereign LAW, the world's collected will,
O'er thrones and globes elate, Sits empress, crowning good, repressing ill.
In the name of Religion profaned ; of Knowledge misapplied and perverted; of Freedom crushed to earth ; of Virtue dethroned ; of human Happiness violated ; in the name of Law, Order, and Govern- ment,— I call upon you for union to establish the supremacy of Peace. Let no person hesitate. With the lips, you confess the infinite evil of War. Are you in earnest? Let confession be followed by action. Let all unite in endeavor to render the recurrence of this evil impossible. Science and hu- manity everywhere put forth their energies against cholera and pestilence. Let equal energies be di- rected against an evil more fearful than cholera or pestilence. Let each man consider the cause his own. Let him animate his neighbors. Let him seek, in all proper ways, to influence the rulers of the nations, and above all, the rulers of this happy land.
Let the old, the middle-aged, and the }*oung, combine in a common cause. Let the pulpit, the school, the college, and the public street, speak for it. Preach it, minister of the Prince of Peace ! Let it never be forgotten in conversation, sermon, or prayer ; nor any longer seek, by subtle theory, to reconcile the monstrous War-System with the pre- cepts of Christ ! Instil it, teacher of childhood and youth, in the early thoughts of your precious charge ; exhibit the wickedness of War, and the beauty of Peace ; let your warnings sink deep among those purifying and strengthening influences
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which ripen into a character of true manhood. Scholar ! write it in your books, so that all shall read it. Poet ! sing it, so that all shall love it. Let the interests of commerce, whose threads of golden tissue interknit the nations, enlist the traf- fickers of the earth in its behalf. And you, servant of the law ! sharer of my own peculiar toils, mindful that the law is silent in the midst of arms, join in endeavor to preserve, uphold, and extend its sway ! Remember, politician ! that our cause is too uni- versal to become the exclusive possession of any political party, or to be confined within any geographical limits. See to it, statesman and ruler ! that the principles of Peace are as a cloud by day, and a pillar of fire by night. Let the Abolition of War, and the overthrow of the War- System, with the Disarming of the nations, be your guiding star. Be this your pious diplomacy ! Be this your lofty Christian statesmanship !
As a measure at once simple and practical, obnox- ious to no objection, promising incalculable good, and presenting an immediate opportunity of labor, let me invite your cooperation in the effort now making, at home and abroad, to establish Arbitra- tion Treaties. If there is a tendency in this scheme to avert War ; if we may hope through its agency to prevent a single war, — and who can doubt that such may be its result? — we ought to adopt it. Make the initiative. Try it : and nations will never return to the barbarous system. They will begin to learn War no more. Let it be the privilege of our country, through its representatives abroad, to volunteer the proposal to all civilized governments.
WAR-SYSTEM. 101
Let it thus inaugurate Permanent Peace in the diplomacy of the world. Nor should it wait for other governments. In a cause so hoi}', no govern- ment should wait for another to make the first advance. Let us take the lead. Let our republic, the powerful child of Freedom, go forth, as the Evangelist of Peace. Let her offer to the world a Magna Charta of International Law, by which the crime of War shall be forever abolished.
While I thus encourage you in behalf of Universal Peace, the odious din of War, mingled with pathetic appeals for Freedom, reaches us from struggling Italy, from convulsed Germany, from aroused and triumphant Hungary. The populous North, at the command of the Russian Autocrat, threatens to pour its multitudes upon the scene ; and a porten- tous cloud, charged with " red lightnings and im- petuous rage," hangs over the whole continent of Europe, which echoes again to the tread of mus- tering squadrons. Alas ! must this dismal work be renewed ? Can Freedom be born, can nations be regenerated, only through the baptism of blood ? In our aspirations, let us not be blind to the teachings of history, or to the actual condition of men, so long accustomed to brute force, that, to their imperfect natures, it seems the only means by which injustice can be crushed. With sadness I confess, that we cannot expect the domestic repose of nations until tyranny is overthrown, and the principles of self- government are established ; especially do I not expect imperturbable peace in Italy, so long as foreign Austria, with insolent iron heel, continues to tread any part of that beautiful land. But what- 9*
102 WAR-SYSTEM.
ever may be the fate of the present crisis, whether it be doomed to the horrors of prolonged strife, or shall soon brighten into the radiance of enduring concord, I cannot doubt that the nations are gravi- tating, with resistless might, even through fire and blood, into peaceful forms of social order, where the War-System will no longer be known.
Nay, from the experience of this hour, I draw the auguries of Permanent Peace. Not in any interna- tional strife ; not in duel between nation and na- tion ; not in the selfish conflict of ruler with ruler ; not in the unwise " game " of War, as played by king with king, — do we find the origin of the present commotions, " with fear of change perplex- ing monarchs." It is to overturn the enforced rule of military power, to crush the tyranny of armies, and to supplant unjust government, — whose only stay is physical force, and not the consent Of the governed, — that t"he people have risen in mighty madness. So doing, they wage a battle in which all our sympathies must be with Freedom, while, in sorrow at the unwelcome combat, we confess that victory is only less mournful than defeat. Through all these bloody mists, the eye of faith discerns the ascending sun of permanent Peace — struggling to shoot its life-giving beams upon the outspread earth, already teeming with the powerful products of a new civilization. Everywhere the signs of Progress salute us ; and the promised land smiles at the new epoch. His soul is cold, his ej-e is dull, who does not perceive the change. Vainly has he read the history of the Past, vainly does he feel the irrepres- sible movement of the Present. Man has waded
WAR-SYSTEM. 108
through a red sea of blood, and for forty centuries wandered through a wilderness of wretchedness and error, but he stands at last on Pisgah : like the adventurous Spaniard, he has wearily climbed the mountain heights, whence he may descry the vast, unbroken, Pacific Sea ; like the hardy Portuguese, he is sure to double this fearful Cape of Storms, destined ever afterwards to be the Cape of Good Hope. . Let me not seem too confident. I know not, that the nations will, in any brief period, like kindred drops, commingle into one ; that, like the banyan-trees of the East, they will interlace and interlock, until there is no longer a single tree, but one forest,
A pillared shade
High overarcht, and echoing walks between;
but I am assured, that, without renouncing any essential qualities of individuality or independence, they may yet, even in our own day, arrange them- selves in harmony ; as magnetized iron rings — from which Plato once borrowed an image — under the influence of potent, unseen attraction, while preserving each its own peculiar form, cohere in a united chain of independent circles. From the birth of this new order will spring, not only inter- national repose, but domestic quiet also ; and Peace will become the permanent rule of civilization. The stone will be rolled away from the sepulchre in which men have laid their Lord ; and we shall hear the new-risen voice, saying, in words of blessed truth, " Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world."
104 WAR-SYSTEM.
MILITARY GLORY.
Here I might fitly close. But, though admonished that I have already occupied more of your time than I could venture to claim, except for the cause, I cannot forbear to consider, for a brief moment, yet one other topic, which I have left thus far untouched, partly because it was not directly connected with the argument, and therefore seemed inappropri- ate to any earlier stage, and partly because I wished to impress it with my last words. I refer to that greatest, most preposterous and most irreligious of earthly vanities, the monstrous re- flexion of War — Military Glory.
Let me not disguise the truth. It is too true that this vanity is still cherished by mankind ; that it is still an object of ambition ; that men follow War, and count its pursuit " honorable ; " that feats of brute force are heralded " brilliant ; " and that a yet prevailing public opinion animates unreflecting mortals to "seek the bubble reputation e'en in the cannon's mouth." It is too true, that nations per- severe in offering praise and thanksgiving — such as no labors of Beneficence can achieve — to the chief whose hands are red with the blood of his fellow-men.
Whatever may be the usage of the world, whether during the long and dreary Past, or in the yet bar- barous Present, it must be clear to all who confront this question with candor, and do not turn away from the blaze of truth, that an}' glory from bloody strife among God's children, must be fugitive, evan- escent, unreal. It is the offspring of a deluded public sentiment, and will disappear , as we learn
WAR-SYSTEM. 105
to analyze its elements and to appreciate its charac- ter. Too long has mankind worshipped what St. Augustine called the splendid vices , neglecting the simple virtues. Too long has mankind cultivated the flaunting and noxious weeds, careless of the golden corn. Too long has mankind been insensi- ble to that commanding law, and in not affecting that high example, rebuking all the pretensions of military glory.
Look face to face at this " glory." Analyze it in the growing illumination of history. Regarding War as an established Arbitrament, for the adjudication of controversies among nations — like the Petty Wars of an earlier period between cities, principalities, and provinces, or like the Trial by Battle between individuals — the conclu- sion is irresistible, that an enlightened civilization must condemn the partakers in its duels, and their vaunted achievements, precisely as we now condemn the partakers in those wretched contests which disfigure the commencement of modern history. The prowess of the individual is forgotten in dis- gust at the inglorious barbarism in which it waa displayed.
Observe this "glory," in the broad sunshine of Christian truth. In alt ages, even in Heathen lands, there has been a peculiar reverence for the relation of Brotherhood. Feuds among brothers, from that earliest "mutual-murdering" conflict be- neath the walls of Thebes, havebeen accounted dis- mal and abhorred ; never to be mentioned without aversion. This sentiment was revived in modern times ; and men sought to extend the circle of
106 WAR-SYSTEM.
its influence. According to curious and savage custom, valiant knights, wishing to associate as brothers, were bled together, that their blood as it spirted forth, might intermingle, and thus con- stitute them of one blood; and the common blood was drunk by each. So did the powerful emperor of Constantinople confirm an alliance of friendship with a crusading king. The two monarchs drank of each other's blood, and then their attendants, following the princely example, caught their own flowing life in a wine-cup, and quaffed a mutual pledge, saying, " We are brothers of one blood."
By such profane devices have men sought to es- tablish that relation, whose beauty they perceived, though they failed to discern that, by the ordi- nance of God, without any human stratagem, it justly comprehended all their fellow-men. In the midst of Judaism, whigh hated all nations, Christi- anity proclaimed love to all mankind, and distinctly declared that God had made of one blood all the nations of men. As if to keep this sublime truth ever present, the disciples were taught, in the simple prayer of the Saviour, to address God as Father in Heaven ; not in phrase of exclusive worship, as " my Father ; " but in those other words of peculiar Christian import, " Our Fa* ther;" with the petition, not merely "to forgive me my trespasses," but with the diviner prayer, " to forgive us our trespasses ; " thus, in the solitude of the closet, recognizing all alike as children of God, and embracing all alike in the petition of prayer.
Confessing the Fatherhood of God, and the
WAR-SYSTEM. 107
resulting Brotherhood of man, we find a divine standard, of unquestionable accuracy. No brother can win '• glory " from the death of a brother. Cain won no "glory*' when he slew Abel; nor would Abel have won " glory," had he, in strictest self- defence, succeeded in slaying the wicked Cain. The soul recoils from praise or honor, as the meed of any snch melancholy triumph. And what is true of a conflict between two brothers, is equally true of a conflict between many. How can an army win " glory," by dealing death or defeat to an army of its brothers?
The ancient Romans, ignorant of this comprehen- sive relation, and recognizing only the exclusive fellowship of a common country, accounted civil war as fratricidal. They branded the opposing forces — even under well-loved names of the Republic — as impious; and constantly refused " honor," " thanks- giving," or " triumph," to the conquering chief, whose sword had been employed against his fellow- citizens, even though traitors and rebels. As the* Brotherhood of Man becomes practically recognized,, it will be impossible to restrain the regard within any exclusive circle of country, and to set up an unchristian distinction of honor between civil war and international war. As all men are brothers, sor by irresistible consequence, ALL WAR MUST BE FRAT- RICIDAL. And can " glory " come from fratricide ? None can hesitate in answer, unless fatally imbued with the Heathen rage of nationality, that made the Venetians say, "• they were Venetians first, and Christians afterwards."
Tell me not of the homage yet offered to the milU
108 WAR-SYSTEM.
tary chieftain. Tell me not of the " glory " of War. Tell me not of " honor " or " fame " on its mur- derous fields. All is vanity. It is a blood- red phantom. They who strive after it, Ixion-like, embrace a cloud. Though seeming to fill the hea- vens, cloaking the stars, it must, like the vapors of earth, pass away. Milton likens the contests of the Heptarchy to the skirmishes of crows and kites ; but God, and the exalted judgment of the Future, must regard all the bloody feuds of men in the same likeness ; looking upon Napoleon and Alexander, so far as they were engaged in war, only as monster crows and kites. Thus must it be, as mankind ascend from the thrall of brutish passions. Nobler aims, by nobler means, will fill the soul. A new standard of excellence will prevail ; and honor, divorced from deeds of blood, will become the inseparable attendant of good works alone. Far better, then, even in the judgment of this world, to have been a doorkeeper in the house of Peace, than the proudest dweller in the tents of War.
There is a legend of the early Church, that the Saviour left his image miraculously impressed upon a napkin which had been placed on his countenance. The napkin was lost, and men attempted to por- tray that countenance from the Heathen models of Jupiter and Apollo. But the image of Christ is not lost. Clearer than in the venerated napkin, clearer than in the colors or the marble of choicest art, it appears in every virtuous deed, in every act of self-sacrifice, in all magnanimous toil, in any recognition of Human Brotherhood. It will yet be supremely manifest, in unimagined loveliness
WAR-SYSTEM. 109
and serenity, when the Commonwealth of Nations, confessing the True Grandeur of Peace, renounces the War-System, and dedicates to Beneficence the comprehensive energies so fatally absorbed in its support. Then, at last, will it be seen, that there can be no Peace that is not honorable, and there can be no War that is not dishonorable.
10
FINANCES OP WAE;
OR
(Sffkt 0f % Ifc-Sgstet on % Meitlilj anb
o
WAR TAXATION:
CONSEQUENT DIMINUTION OF NATIONAL WEALTH.
TEE following table, when analyzed, teaches a most impres- sive lesson of the fatal effects of -war on the well-being of na- tions : —
Taxes
Population. Debt. Taxes Levied. per
|
United States, |
capita. |
|||
|
1820, |
9,638,191 |
$91,015,566 |
915,005,612 |
$1.55 |
|
1865, est'd. |
34,500,000 |
3,000,000,000 |
350,000,000 |
10.15 |
|
G. Britain, |
||||
|
1821, |
21,280,887 |
£843,388,804 |
£55,530,073 |
13.05 |
|
1865, est'd, |
29,500,000 |
808,288,000 |
66,392,000 |
11.25 |
In this country we have long looked down upon the nations of Europe, especially upon their laboring classes, as inferior to us in intelligence and well-being ; but we never fully appre- ciated the real causes of our superiority. We shall probably ere long discover this by dear-bought experience, that great teacher of humanity. Our past prosperity was undoubtedly due mainly to our fertile lands, which could be had for little or noth- ing ; to our economical Government, consequent on having no war-debt of the past to provide for, and no large armies and navies to maintain for future wars ; and to the non-interference of the Government with the freedom of individual action. In 1820, every inhabitant of Great Britain was taxed for the main- tenance of the'Central Government, $13.05, while the American was taxed, for the same purpose, only $1.55, being a difference of $11.50 per capita in favor of the American, or per annum $1 10,839,196 ; considerably more than our entire national debt at that period. Is it surprising, then, that we were able rapidly to liquidate the moderate debt incurred by the wars of the Revo* lutionandof 1812?
To-day, on the contrary, our taxes are undoubtedly much greater per capita than those of Great Britain. The above table •hows a difference in our favor, estimating our peace expend!*
2 WAR TAXATION.
tures at $350,000,000, of $1.10 per capita ; but against this we must remember that we have to provide for the maintenance of our State Governments, which is an expenditure unknown in Great Britain, and that the British local and municipal taxes are much less than ours. In this city (N. Y.), the local and State taxes for the current year amount to $17,246,809 ; say, over $17 per capita, in addition to all the direct and indirect Federal taxes.
Thus we formerly contended in our race with other nations under most favorable circumstances, having to carry only feather weights, while our competitors were forced to .carry heavy weights. Men who have indulged in the sports of the turf, can appreciate the advantage we thus possessed. To-day we must contend in the race, carrying equal or heavier weights than our competitors. Most persons will pay « what is $11.50 increased taxation per capita? Such a trifle can make no difference in the long run.' But this is a great error ; $11.50 per capita to a laborer or mechanic, with an average family of five persons, is $57-50 per annum. This amount will purchase tools and in- struments that will greatly increase the product of his labor dur- ing tbe following year, and every increase of production fur- nishes additional means to economize and to increase future production. Besides, we must never forget the difference in its moral effect on the future efforts of a man, whether at the end of the year he finds himself no better off than at the commence- ment, or whether he finds he has accumulated $50 to his credit in a savings bank, or invested in tools or instruments that will aid his further progress. In one case a man goes to his work disheartened and discouraged, and is easily led to abandon all efforts for economy and progress. In the other, seeing the suc- cessful results of his previous efforts, he goes to his work with redoubled courage and vigor, and is led to economize in every way so as to insure increased means of further progress and ac- cumulation.
Beside all this, Europe was formerly cursed with most vicious systems of taxation, which were made doubly onerous by the great expense of collection, and by the vexatious interference they created with the beneficial operations of industry and com- merce, while we were entirely free from all taxation, except moderate duties on our foreign imports. To-day Great Britain lias discarded her most oppressive excise and customs duties, which are now levied on only 14 art eles in all, and her income tax is only 6d on the pound, or 2 1-2 per cent. We, on the contrary, now impose average duties of 45 per cent, on our en- tire foreign imports ; we levy oppressive excise and license taxes on everything that man manipulates with a view to contribute to his well-being, beside imposing stamp taxes on every possible contract and instrument he executes ; and our income tax (18C5) is five per cent, on incomes of $5,000 and under, and ten per cent, on incomes over that amount. No nation on the fa<?e of
WAR TAXATION. 8
the globe has ever attempted to impose taxes so universal and BO oppressive, the -injurious effects of which on our industry and commerce cannot yet be foreseen.
The army of government officials tbat will be required to enforce and collect these taxes, were formerly prod ucerst but are now mere burdens on the industry of the country. The in- creased government patronage thus created, will vastly aggra- vate the main cause of the demoralization of our government officials. The first effects of our enormous excise and customs duties, will be to offer a premium for frauds on the revenue. This will throw the business of the country into the hands of unscrupulous and dishonest men ; and the only way to repress these frauds, will be to organize, as was formerly the system in Europe, an immense corps of government spies and public in- formers. It is not easy to imagine the fatal effect this will pro- duce on individual freedom, and in individual happiness and well-being. The innocent will suffer for the acts of the guilty, and in a few years, if our present system be continued, men of intelligence and energy will flee the country, as was formerly the case in Europe.
But fully to comprehend all the evil effects of war, we must remember that every dollar unproductively employed or squan- dered, is not only an injury to the present generation, but a still greater injury to all future generations, whose well-being and progress depend mainly on the accumulations and progress made by the generations that preceded them. Every dollar we waste or squander, every progress we fail to achieve, is an irreparable loss inflicted on our children, on their descendants and all future generations. By their exertions they may supply our defi- ciencies, and rep lir our waste arid errors ; but our waste and our deficiencies, nevertheless, will prevent them from attaining the position and the well-being they might otherwise attain ; for the efforts they must make to repair our omissions and com- missions, could be applied to the achievement of new progress, and to the attainment of increased \\ ell-being and enjoyment, all of which will be greatly increased by all that we discover, invent and economize.
If we reckon the total war expenditures of the North and South at $5,000,000,000, a very low estimate, and the diminu- tion of production and the destruction of property in the shape of railroads and railroad equipment, manufactories, houses, en- closures, cattle, etc., etc., at $3,000,000,000, we have a grand total of $8,000,000,000 as the loss occasioned by the war. Capi- tal in this country doubles at compound interest in about ten years ; but let us eay in fifteen years. Could we have been paved our late contest, the United States would possess, in excess of what she will possess, —
In 1880 $16,000,000,000
In 1895 .\ 32,000,000,000
4 WAR TAXATION.
In 1910 $64,000,000,000
In 1925 128,000,000,000
In 1940 256.000,000,000
In 1955 512,000,000,000
In 1970 1,024,000,000,000
Who can estimate the progress and well-being which this enormous amount of wealth would represent? This, too, with- out taking into consideration the loss of life consequent on the war. Every full-grown man is one of the most fruitful sources of production that exists, and it takes twenty or thirty years to bring him to his full development. What, then, must we esti- mate the loss occasioned by the destruction of 600,000 men, who have died from disease and wounds in the hospitals, and on the battle-fields during the war? Let any one reflect fully on this terrible subject, and he cannot fail to agree with us, that war is the greatest crjme, and the source of the most terrible evils that have ever afflicted humanity. When will men eradicate this fruitful source of cri ..e and evil? — N. Y. Com. Adv., Aug. 7, 1865.
The above estimates, however astounding, do not, after all, tell the whole truth. We can hardly conceive how far the war-system eats up a nation's resources. It has ever been the world's chief impoverisher, and may yet become our own. Al- ready does Congress vote annually scores of millions merely to pay pensioners ; and there is now pouring upon the gov- ernment such an avalanche of claims for damages as threatens to equal our entire national debt ! Such has the war-system ever been. It hangs to-day upon Christendom as a mammoth incubus. It is her master-evil. The money and moral power she spends in its support might evangelize the world, might erect a church in every village, and put a Bible in every family. Look at her twelve or fifteen thousand million dollars of war-debt, her nearly thousand millions lavished every year in preparing for war, and her four or five millions of standing warriors, all withheld from productive industry, and preying like moths or vampyres upon the people ; and can you conceive how much it does to impoverish and curse mankind ? Must, then, an evil so vast continue forever? Is there no remedy, none even in our religion of peace? If there is, why has it sot been applied, or why at least do not Christians ap- ply it now ? With such a divinely appointed remedy in their hands, will not the God of Peace hold them responsible to L.8 bar for the continuance of this terrible evil ?
AMERICAN PEACE SOCIETY, BOSTON.
No. XXIV
WAR-DEB TS.
WE propose to sketch the war-debts, not of the whole world, but of Europe alone. Their exact amount it is impossible to as- certain, first, because its governments often conceal the sum total of their obligations ; next, because the debts, even when reported, are frequently made up of items resembling the treasury-notes of Sweden issued without computation or limit ; and, finally, because the provincial debts, which form so large a part especially in the south of Europe, are often omitted entirely from governmental re- ports. We can, therefore, make only an approximation to the truth; and, while quoting official estimates that are sometimes studiously false, and generally underrated, we must leave the reader to make such allowances as the foregoing considerations may seem to require.
• I. GREAT BRITAIN. — Charles II., 1660, commenced the British debt by granting life-annuities for money furnished to support his habits of extravagance and profligacy ; but it reached, at the abdication of James II., 1688, only $3,300,000. William III., passionately fond of war, and deeply interested in the intrigues and contests of Europe, not only multiplied taxes, but augmented the debt more than $100,000,000. The Spanish War under Anne, 1702-13, added $187,500,000, and that of nine years, 1739-48, under George II., $157.500,000 more. The Seven Years' War, 1756-63, added to the taxes of England $175,000,000, and to her debt $357,500,000. Her first war with us extorted from her in taxes $240,000,000, and in loans $515,000,000 ; in all, $755,000,- 000 ! Nine years of war with France, from 1793 to 1802, added $900,000,000, to her taxes, and $1,460,000,000 to her debt ; while her subsequent wars with Napoleon, 1803-15, cost her in loans $1,680,000,000, and $1,130,000,000 in taxes, carrying her entire debt in 1815 up to $4,325,000,000 !! *
* We subjoin a brief table of the British national debt from its origin to 1838 5 estimating a pound sterling in round numbers at five dollars : 1660-1689. Debt contracted under Charles II. and James II., $3,300.000 1689-1697, Contracted in the Revolution under William III., 105,000,000 1702-1713. In the war of the Spanish Succession under Anne, 187,500,000
Total Debt in 1713, 270,000,000
1739-1748 In the war with Spain, and the Austrian Succession, 157,500,000 1756-1763., In the Seven Years' War. ' 357,500/'00
Total Debt in 1763, 732,500,000
1775-17tJ3. In the American War, 515,000.000
Total Debt in 1783, 1,1 95,000 1000
1793-1802. In the war of the French Revolution, . . . . 1,460,000,000
Total Debt in 1802, 2,630,000,000
1803-1815. In the peace of 1802-3, and war with Napoleon, 1,695,000,000
Total Debt in 1815, 4,325,000,000
Total Debt in 1838, 3,960,000,000
P. T. NO, XXIV
2 WAR-DEBTS. 194
It is surprising that any nation on earth should be able to stand under a debt so enormous. No other one could ; nor could Eng- land herself, if nearly the whole sum were not due to her own citizens. Sooner or later, however, a day of reckoning must come ; and a terrible day will that be to England, or at least to her monied aristocracy.
What enormous taxes must such a debt impose ! nearly $150,000,000 a year to pay simply the interest and management ! " Taxes," says the Edinburgli Review, " upon every article which enters the mouth, or covers the back, or is placed under the feet ; taxes upon every thing which it is pleasant to see, hear, feel, smell or taste ; taxes upon warmth, light and locomotion ; taxes upon every thing on the earth, and in the waters under the earth ; taxes on every thing that comes from abroad, or is grown at home ; taxes on the raw material, and upon every fresh value that is added to it by the industry of man ; taxes on the sauce that pampers man's appetite, and the drug that restores him to health ; on the ermine which decorates the judge, and the rope which hangs the criminal ; on the poor man's salt, and the rich man's spice ; on the brass nails of the coffin, and th*e ribbons of the bride. Taxes we never escape ; at bed or board, couchant or levant, we must pay. The school-boy whips his taxed top, the beardless youth manages his taxed horse, with a taxed bridle, upon a taxed road ; and the dying Englishman, pouring his medicine which has paid seven per cent, into a spoon that has paid fifteen per cent, flings himself back upon his chintz bed which has paid twenty-two per cent, makes his will on an eight pound stamp, and expires in the arms of an apothecary who has paid a license of a hundred pounds for the privilege of putting him to death. His whole prop- erty is immediately taxed from two to ten per cent. Besides the probate, large fees are demanded for burying him in the chancel ; his virtues are handed down to posterity on taxed marble ; and then he is gathered to his fathers — to be taxed no more."
There is, however, one important benefit resulting from the British debt. It makes England reluctant to engage in war ; and well were Canning and Brougham wont to say, she was under bonds of eight hundred millions sterling to keep the peace. Even she, with all her wealth, could not sustain another series of wars like those she waged against Napoleon and the French. There is now no alternative for her but peace, or bankruptcy and ruin.
II. FRANCE. — The history of her debt, written in the blood of her revolutions, it would be very interesting to trace ; but it must suffice here to say, that in 1830, it was 4,515,605,834 francs, and in 1840, was slightly reduced to 4,457,736,996.
III. RUSSIA. — The resources of this empire are small in com- parison with its vast extent, its annual revenue being rated at 380,000,000 rubles, or only about $75,000,000. It is impossible to learn the precise amount of the Russian debt. McCulloch puts it at 956,337,574 rubles ; but the Conversation's Lexicon says it amounted in 1840 to 869,411,191 rubles.
195 WAR-DEBTS. 3
IV. HOLLAND. — The Dutch are, if possible, worse off than the English. The debt of Holland in 1840 amounted to 800.000,- 000 German dollars, and that of Belgium to 120,000,000. ' The solvency of Holland is very doubtful ; for her expenses since 1830 have almost invariably exceeded her income, and thus her debt has been constantly increasing. The Dutch have tried every ex- pedient to extricate themselves, reducing the perquisites of royalty so low as to make their king little more than a burgomaster, and paring down their protective duties so as to secure the largest pos- sible amount of revenue ; yet, after all, bankruptcy is staring them in the face. What a catastrophe for a nation that once stood at the head of the commerce of the world !
V. SPAIN. — The profligacy of Spain in repudiating or evading her obligations, renders it impossible to tell how much she now owes ; but, according to semi-official statements, her entire debt, in October, 1841, was $775,000,000. This sum is divided into an internal and an external debt The latter is near $316,000,000, chiefly due to English capitalists ; but even the interest has not been paid for a long period.
VI. PORTUGAL. — The financial condition of Portugal resembles that of Spain. Her whole debt amounted in 1840 to 144,500,000 German dollars; and her income the game year was rated at 8,000,000 Spanish dollars, while her expenses were estimated at $11,000,000.
VII. DENMARK. — Of the Danish debt, we can form no certain estimate ; but, at the close of 1839, it was put at 62,786.804 rix dollars unfunded debt, 5,390,385 funded debt, and 1,423^841 annuities, with an internal debt of 69,601,031 ; in all, 134,202,061.
We have not space to give in detail the debts of other coun- tries. The different principalities of Germany owed in 1840, a sum total of 650,000,000 German dollars; Austria, 733,200,000 convention florins ; Prussia, 130,000,000 rix dollars ; Bavaria, 126,550,907 florins; Naples, 108,000,000 ducats, and Sardinia, 87,000,000 crowns.
The sum total of European debts exceeds ten thousand millions of German dollars ; and, if we make due allowance for tne coun- tries omitted, and for estimates below the truth, the whole in 1840 would probably not be less than the same number of Spanish dol- lars. Ten thousand millions ! What an amount of war-debts for Europe alone ! Five times as much as all the coin on the globe ; the bare interest, at six per cent, $600,000,000 a year, almost two millions every day ! the simple interest nearly as much every day as all Christendom is giving annually for the spread of the gospel !
These liabilities we call tpar-debts. So they are ; they were contracted almost exclusively for war purposes ; had there been no Tvar, there would have been no debt ; and, were the war-system now discarded, all Europe could in fifty years, most of her states in far less time, pay off the last farthing of her enormous obliga- tions, and thus start, unfettered and unclogged, upon a new, un- paralleled career of prosperity
WAR-DEBTS.
196
We subjoin a general view of European debts in German dd airs, equal to about eighty-two cents each.
|
Country. Debts. |
Inhabitants. |
Aver, to each inhab |
|
Holland, $800,000,000 |
3,000,000 |
$266.67 |
|
England, 5,556,000,000 |
25,000,000 |
222.24 |
|
Frankfort, 5,000,000 |
55,000 |
90.91 |
|
France, 1,800,000,000 |
33,000,000 |
54.55 |
|
Bremen, 3,000,000 |
55,000 |
54,55 |
|
Hamburg, 7,000,000 |
155,000 |
45.16 |
|
Denmark, 93,000,000 |
2,100,000 |
44.57 |
|
Greece, 44,000,000 |
1,000,000 |
44.00 |
|
Portugal, 144,000,000 |
3,800,000 |
38.63 |
|
Lubec, 1,700,000 |
45,000 |
37.78 |
|
Spain, 467,000,000 |
13,000,000 |
35.92 |
|
Austria, 380,000,000 |
12,000,000 |
31.67 |
|
Belgium, 120,000,000 |
4,000,000 |
30.00 |
|
Papal States, 67,000,000 |
2,500,000 |
26.80 |
|
Hesse-Hamburg, 587,000 |
25,000 |
23.48 |
|
Saxe-Meiningen, 3,000,000 |
140,000 |
21.43 |
|
Anhalt-Kothen, 800,000 |
39,000 |
20.51 |
|
Brunswick, 5,QpO,000 |
260,000 |
19.23 |
|
Bavaria, 72,350,000 |
4,250,000 |
17.00 |
|
Naples, 126,000,000 |
7,600,000 |
16.58 |
|
Saxe-Weimar, 3,000,000 |
240,000 |
12.50 |
|
Hanover, 19,000,000 |
1,700,000 |
11.47 |
|
Prussia, 150,000,000 |
13,500,000 |
11.11 |
|
Nassau, 3,700,000 |
370,000 |
10.00 |
|
Russia & Poland,545,000,000 |
60,000,000 |
9.09 |
|
Baden, 11,000,000 |
1,250,000 |
8.80 |
|
Wurtemburg, 14,000,000 |
1,600,000 |
8.75 |
|
Parma, 3,700,000 |
430,000 |
8.60 |
|
Hesse-Darmstadt, 6,250,000 |
800,000 |
7.81 |
|
Modena, 3,000,000 |
403,000 |
7.44 |
|
Sardinia, 32,000,000 |
4,500,000 |
7.11 |
|
Saxony, 11,000,000 |
1,700,000 |
6.47 |
|
Saxe-Altenburg, 700,000 |
120,000 |
5.83 |
|
Norway 4,125,000 |
1,000,000 |
4.13 |
|
Mecklenburg, 2,000,000 |
600,000 |
3.38 |
|
Saxe-Coburg, . 1,600,000 |
|
. |
|
Hesse-Cassel, 1,256,000 |
700,000 |
1.79 |
|
Schwarzburg, 150,000 |
116,000 |
1.29 |
|
$10,499,710,000 |
201,053,000 |
$52.23 |
P. S. — For farther information on this subject, see McGregor » Commercial Legislation , McCuflbch's Statistical^ Dictionary, Hunt's Merchants Magazine for 1843, Conversation' 9 Lexicon der Gegenwart.
AMERICAN PEACE SOCIETY, BOSTON, MASS
No. XXVI.
NECKAR ON PEACE,
OR rlk.4 CALAMITIES OF WAR, AND THE BLESSINGS OF PEACE.
BY M. NECKAR.*
WITH what impatience have I wished to discuss this subject! How irresistibly has my heart been led to expatiate on the evils which are ever attendant on this terrible calamity ! War, alas ! impedes the course of every salutary plan, exhausts the sources of prosperity, and diverts the attention of governors from the happi- ness of nations. It even suspends, sometimes, every idea of justice and humanity. In a word, instead of gentle and benevolent feel- ings, it substitutes hostility and hatred, the necessity of oppression, and the rage of desolation.
The first idea that occurs to me when reflecting on the origin of most wars, is, that those great combinations of politics which have so often kindled the torch of discord, and occasioned so many ravages, have very seldom merited all the admiration that has been so lavishly bestowed upon them. I have also been forcibly struck with this consideration, that most governments appear satis- fied, if at the conclusion of a bloody and expensive war, they have made an honorable peace ; but each should consider what would have been its situation at the period when the treaty was con- cluded, if war had not interrupted the course of its prosperity.
Let us suppose France obliged to alienate from fifty to sixty million francs of its annual revenue for the prosecution of a given war ; and let us next take a cursory view of the different uses to which such a revenue might have been applied, not only for the advancement of the national happiness, but for the augmentation of the military force. With eighteen millions of that annual reve- nue, the regimental companies might have been completed to their full complement, and the army augmented by fifty thousand in- fantry, and ten or twelve thousand horse. Two millions of that revenue would pay the interest of a loan of forty millions, which would have added to our navy thirty men-of-war, and a propor- tionate number of frigates ; and this augmentation might have been maintained by four millions yearly. Thus we see twenty- four millions of that revenue devoted solely to the military service.
Let us now apply the surplus to the various parts of administra- tion, and consider the result. With eighteen millions yearly, the price of salt might have been rendered uniform throughout the kingdom, by reducing it one-third in the -provinces of little gabels (the excise on salt,) and two-thirds in those of the great, and not
* Formerly Minister of Finance. From his celebrated work on the Fi- nances of France.
P. T. NO, XXVI.
2 NECKAR ON PEACE. 202
increasing the charges of the privileged provinces. With from four to five millions annually, the interior parts of the kingdom might have heen freed from all custom-house duties. With 2,500,000 livres, all the necessary canals might have been exe- ctited, that are still wanting in the kingdom. With one million more per annum, government might be enabled to bestow suf- ficient encouragement on all the establishments of industry that can advance the prosperity of France. With 1,500,000 livres, the Bums annually destined to give employment to the poor, might be doubled; and, while great advantages would thus accrue to the in- habitants of the country, the neighboring communications might be multiplied. With the same sum,' the prisons throughout the kingdom might in a few years- be improved, and all the charitable institutions brought to perfection. And with 2,000,000 annually, the clearing of the waste lands might proceed with incredible vigor. These distributions amount to thirty-one millions, which,, joined to twenty-four millions for military expenses, make together fiie annual revenue of fifty-five millions employed as above ; a sum equal to that which I have supposed to be alienated for the disbursements of the war.
Nor is this all ; for, if we estimate the diminution of commerce which results from a war of five or six years' duration, it will be found that the kingdom is deprived of a considerable increase of riches. In fine, war, and the loans which it occasions, create a very sensible rise in the rate of interest. On the contrary, peace, under a wise administration, would lower it annually, were it only in consequence of the increase of specie, and of the influence of the stated reimbursements. This- successive redaction of interest is likewise a source of inestimable advantages1 to commerce, agri- culture, and the finances-.
Let these effects be now compared with the advantages which a fortunate war (and all wars- are not so) would secure; and it will be found that ten seeds have been sown, in order to gather the fruit of one. A government may humble its rivals, and extend its dominions; but to employ its resources for the happiness of its subjects, and command respect without the assistance and dan- gers of an ever restless policy, is a conduct which alone can cor- respond to the greatness of Hs situation, or secure all the advan- tages to be derived from it It is not war, but a wise and pacific administration, that can procure all the advantages of which France may be yet in- want. The quantity of specie in the king- dom is immense; but the want of public confidence very often* occasions the greater part of it to be hoarded up. The population of the kingdom is immense; but the excess and nature of the 'taxes impoverish and dishearten the people. The revenue is im- , mense ; but the public debt consumes- two-fifths of it. The con- tributions of the nation, in particular, are immense; but it is only by the strengthening of public credit, that government can suc- ceed in finding sufficient resources in extraordinary emergencies^ Finally, the balance of commerce in favor of the kingdom is EB immense source of riches ; but war interrupts the current
S03 NECKAR ON PEACE. 3
What, then, would be the case, if we join to all these consider- ations, the calamities inseparable from war ? How would it ap- pear, should we endeavor to form an estimate of the lives and sufferings of men ? In the midst of a council convened to in- fluence the opinion of the sovereign, the most upright of his servants might address him in this language : —
" Sire, war is the source of so many evils, it is so terrible a scourge, that a gracious and discerning Prince ought never to undertake it but from motives of justice that are indisputable ; and it behoves the greatest monarch in the world to give that example of the morality of kings which assures the happiness of humanity, and the tranquillity of nations. Do not give way, Sire, to vain anxieties, or to uncertain expectations. Ah! what have you it fear, and what can excite your jealousy? You reign ovcx 26,000,000 of men. Providence, with a bountiful hand, ha? dif fused the choicest blessings through your empire by multiply mfi the productions of every kind. The war proposed will cost you e'fihil or nine hundred millions ; and, were even victory every when) tu follow your arms, you will devote to death, or cruel sufferings, sci great a number of your subjects, that were any one, who could read futurity, to present you this moment with the list, you would start back with horror. Nor is this all ; your people, who have scarcely had a respite, you are going to crush with new taxes. You are going to slacken the activity of commerce and manufac- tures, those inestimable sources of industry and wealth ; and, in order to procure soldiers and seamen, the men accustomed to the cultivation of the earth, will be forced from the interior provinces, and a hundred thousand families deprived of their supporters.
"And when crowned by the most splendid success, after so many evils, after so many calamities, what may you perhaps obtain ? An unsteady ally, uncertain gratitude, an island more than two thousand leagues from your empire, or some new subjects in another hemisphere. Alas ! you are invited to nobler conquests. Turn your eyes to the interior parts of your kingdom. Consider what communications and canals may still be wanting. Behold those pestilential marshes which ought to be drained, and those deserted lands which would be cultivated on the first tender of support from government. Behold that part of your people whom a diminution of taxes would excite to new undertakings. Look, more especially, on that other truly wretched class, who stand in immediate need of succor in order to support the misery of their situation. In the mean time, in order to effectuate so many bene- fits, a small part of the revenues which you are going to consume in the war to which you are advised, would perhaps be sufficient. Are not the numerous inhabitants of your extensive dominions sufficient to engage your paternal love ? And is not their happi- ness equal to the greatest extent of good which it is in the power of a single man to perform ?
"But if you are desirous of new subjects, you may acquire them without the effusion of blood, or the triumphs of a battle ; for they will spring up in every part of your empire, fostered by the benefi-
4 NECKAR ON PEACE. 204
cent means that are in your hands. A good government multiplies men as the morning dews of the spring unfold the buds of plants. Before you seek, therefore, beyond the ocean, for those new sub- jects which are unknown to you, reflect that, in order to acquire them, you are going to sacrifice a greater number of those who love you, whom you love, whose fidelity you have experienced, and whose happiness is committed to your protection.
" What personal motive, then, can determine you to war ? Is it the splendor of victories for which you hope ? Is it the ambition of a greater name in the annals of mankind ? But is renown con- fined to bloodshed and devastation ? And is that which a monarch obtains, by diffusing ease and happiness throughout his dominions, unworthy of consideration ? Titus reigned only three years ; and his name, transmitted from age to age by the love of nations, is still introduced in all the eulogies of princes.
" Do not doubt it, Sire, a wise administration is of more value to you than the most refined political system ; and if, to such re- sources, you unite that empire over other nations which is acquired by a transcendent character of justice and moderation, you will enjoy at once the greatest glory, and the most formidable power. Ah! Sire, exhibit this magnificent spectacle to the world; and then, if triumphal arches be wanting, make the tour of your prov- inces, and, preceded by all the good you have diffused, appear surrounded by the blessings of your people, and the ecstatic ac- clamations of a grateful nation made happy by its sovereign."
Such would be the language of an honest minister ; nor can I believe that such reflections would be foreign to political deliber- ations. At first, they would be thought extraordinary, and the minister who should argue thus, would not be allowed the views of an enlightened statesman. -But the minister who, devoid alike of fear and every selfish view, should dare to advance great truths, might perhaps force his way through prejudice, or habitual ideas.
Ideas of this kind have a most extensive influence. I cannot re- member without shuddering, to have seen the following statement, in an estimate of the money requisite for a war : Forty thousand men to be embarked for the colonies . . . 40,000 To be deducted one-third for the first year's mortality . . . 13,333
Remainder 26,667
A clerk in office makes his calculation in cool blood. A minis- ter, on the perusal, has seldom any other idea than of the expense, and turns with unconcern to the next leaf for the result of the whole. How can one here refrain from indulging very melancholy sen- sations ? Alas ! if by any law of nature unknown to me, mankind deserved so much indifference, I should be very wrong to write-, and to be so earnestly solicitous for their welfare. I should be myself but a vile heap of dust, which the wind of life agitates for a moment. But I entertain a more exalted idea of our existence, and of the spirit that informs it.
Mankind, say apologists for war, have in every age been accus- tomed to it. Certainly ; and, in every age also have storms de-
205 NECKAR ON PEACE. 5
stroyed the harvests; the pestilence has spread around its en- venomed breath ; intolerance has sacrificed her victims ; crimes of every kind have desolated the earth. But reason has also obstinately fought against folly, morality against vice, art against disease, and industry against the rigor of bad seasons.
But I hear it stated, as a last objection, that men delight in haz- ards, and often seek them of their own accord. I allow it ; but, admitting that some men have voluntarily placed themselves in a situation which they know to be exposed to calamities, will the nature of these calamities be changed by that consideration ? The ignorance of the vulgar is a protracted minority ; and in every sit- uation in which they may be impelled by circumstances, neither their first choice, nor their first impulse, is to be considered in this argument. We must study their sentiments in those moments when, distracted by a thousand excruciating pains, yet still linger- ing in existence, they are carried off in heaps from the fatal field in which they have been mowed down by the enemy. We must study their sentiments in those noisome hospitals in which they are crowded together, and where the sufferings they endure, to preserve a languishing existence, so forcibly prove the value they set upon the preservation of their lives, and the greatness of the sacrifice to which they had been exposed. We ought also to study their sentiments in those moments in which, perhaps, to such a variety of wo, is added the bitter remembrance of that momen- tary error which led them to such misery. We ought, more especially, to study their sentiments on board those ships on fire, in which there is but a moment between them and the most cruel death ; and on those ramparts where subterraneous explosion an- nounces, that in an instant they are to be buried under a tremen- dous heap of stones and rubbish. But the earth has covered them, the sea has swallowed them up, and we think of them no 'more. Their voice, extinguished forever, can no longer arraign the calamities of war. What unfeeling survivors are we ! While we walk over mutilated bodies and shattered bones, we exult in the glory and honors of which we alone are the heirs.
Let me not be reproached with having dwelt too long on these melancholy representations. We cannot exhibit them too often ; so much are we accustomed, in the very midst of society, to be- hold nothing in war, and all its attendant horrors, but an honorable employment for the courage of aspiring youth, and the school in which the talents of great officers are unfolded ; and such is the effect of this transient intoxication, that the conversation of the polite circles in the capital is often taken for the general wish of the nation. Oh ! ye governors, do not suffer yourselves to be de- ceived by this mistaken voice. For my part, far from regretting that I have opposed, to the best of my abilities, those chimeras which are subversive of the happiness of mankind, and of the true greatness of states ; far from believing that I have displayed too much zeal for truths that are repugnant to so many passions and prepossessions, I believe these truths to be so useful, so essential, and so perfectly just, that after having supported them by my
B -NECKAR ON PEACE. 206
feeble voice in the course of my administration, and endeavored even from my retirement to diffuse them wide, I could wish that the last drop of my blood were employed to trace them on the minds of all.
This subject is of importance to every nation ; and the spirit of the reflections I have made, is applicable not merely to the nations whose interests are regulated by the pleasure of an individual. I address myself equally to you, Great Nation (England) to whom the spirit of liberty communicates all its force. Let the energy of your soul, let that abundance, or that community of knowledge which results from it, lead you to those sentiments of political humanity which are so well connected with elevated thoughts. J3e not influenced by a blind avidity for riches, by the pride of confidence, or a perpetual jealousy of others ; and, since the waves of the ocean free you from the imperious yoke of disciplined ar- mies, recollect that your first attention is due to the preservation of that precious government you enjoy. Tremble, lest you one day become indifferent to it, if from the excessive taxes which war accumulates, you expose to the dreadful conflicts of private in- terest, that public and patriotic sentiment which has so long been the source of your greatness and your felicity.
And may you, young and rising Nation (United States of America,) whose generous efforts have released you from your European yoke, make the rights you have acquired still more respected through the world, by employing yourselves constantly in promoting the public happiness. Sacrifice it not to vague no- tions of policy, and the deceptive calculations of warlike ambition. Avoid, if possible, the passions which agitate our hemisphere ; and long may you preserve the simplicity of the primitive ages.
What more can be said ? Here I should stop, for my feeble voice is altogether unequal to so important a subject ; nevertheless, I venture once more to solicit a moment's attention. It is in con- siderations of public good, and just conceptions of true power, that I have hitherto sought motives to deter sovereigns from war ; but I should imperfectly perform my task, if I did not endeavor to in- terest them in truths, the defence of which I have undertaken, by urging on them the close connection of these truths with their personal happiness.
How much has ambition, however dazzling and renowned, dis- quietude and remorse for its attendants ! In the midst of battles and of ruins ; in the midst of heaps of cinders, where the flames have destroyed flourishing cities ; from the graves of that field where whole armies are buried, without doubt a name is raised and commemorated in history, even that of a sovereign who, to satiate his thirst for glory, has commanded these ravages, has willed these desolations. I will depict to myself this prince in the zenith of his glory and his triumphs, and imagine him listening to the flatteries of his courtiers, and feeling intoxicated with their praises, then retiring alone, holding in his hand the details of a battle. He reads attentively the recital, not as a mere curious inquirer who, having nothing to reproach himself with, calmly
207 riECKAR ON PEACE
takes a view of the events, but as the author of such an accumula- tion of wrongs, and of which there is not one, perhaps, for which, in the inmost recesses of his soul, his conscience does not reproach him. He is at the same time on the point of giving orders for a fresh effusion of blood, of increasing the weight of the taxes, of aggravating the misfortunes of his people, of laying his conquering arm heavily on them. What distressing reflections must present themselves to him ! At this moment he would fain recall the crowd that had surrounded him. ' Return,' he would spontaneously ex- claim, 'return, and repeat to me all that has even now intoxicated me. Alas! you are far off, and I find myself in a frightful desert, in solitude. I no longer discover the traces of my former senti- ments ; the light which dazzled me, is extinguished ; my joy ia departed, and my glory vanished ! '
Such is nearly the train of reflections that would present them- selves to the monarch when alone. In the mean time night comes on, darkness and silence cover the earth, peace appears to reign every where except in his breast. The plaintive cries of the dying, the tears of ruined families, the various evils of which he is the author, present themselves to his view, and disturb his imagination. A dream, the noise of the wind, a clap of thunder, are sometimes sufficient to agitate him, and remind him of his own insignificance. ' Who am I,' he is impelled to say, * who am I, that I should com- mand so many ravages, and cause so many tears to flow ? Born to be the benefactor, I am the scourge of mankind. Is this the use to which I should appropriate the treasures at my disposal, and the power with which I am entrusted ? Hereafter I shall have to de- liver up an account ; and what will this account be ?' It is then in vain for him to attempt to prop up his pride, and exculpate himself in his own eyes, by presenting to the Supreme Being his successes and his triumphs ; he feels an invisible hand repulsing him, and apparently refusing to acknowledge him. Disturbed with these cogitations, he endeavors at last to bury in sleep the mo- ments which thus annoy him, impatient for the dawn of day, for the splendor of the court, and the concourse of his servants, to dissipate his anguish, and restore to him his illusions.
Ah ! what a different picture does the life of a beneficent king present ! He finds in the inclination of his soul a continual source of pleasing sensations. The shadows of the night, by gathering around him consoling recollections of the past, enliven his retire- ment ; the concussions of agitated nature, far from disturbing his imagination, awaken in him ideas which sweetly harmonize with his feelings; the love of mankind with which he is smitten, the public benevolence with which he is animated, that order which he has been desirous to maintain, recall to his mind the most de- lightful recollections. In such a career, the beneficent king sees "his days pass away ; and, when warned that the period draws nigh in which his strength must give way, he surveys with tranquillity this inevitable hour, and satisfied with the wise use he has matfe of his power, resigns himself to those hopes of which virtuous and sensible souls alone are capable.
8 NECKAR ON PEACE, £08
How different is the closing scene of that sovereign whose views were influenced only by ambition and the love of war ! How often does this last moment appear terrible to him, and of what avail are his most glorious exploits ? Weighed down by age and sickness, when the shades of death surround him with melancholy reflections, does he then command his attendants to entertain him with a recital of his victorious battles ? Does he order those tro- phies to be spread before him, on which he might discern the tears that watered them ? No ; all these ideas terrify and distract him. / have been too fond of war, was the last speech of the most power- ful of kings ; such were the words he addressed to his great grandson. Too late regret ! which certainly did not suffice to calm the agitations of his soul ! Ah ! how much happier he would have been, if, after a reign similar to that of Titus and Antoninus, he had been able to say to the young prince, ' I have experienced all sorts of pleasures ; I have been acquainted with g.11 kinds of glory : believe a dying king ; I have found no real content but in the good I have been able to do. Tread in my steps ; entertain for your people the same tender affection I have felt for them. Instead of destroying the establishments I have formed for the prosperity of the state; instead of rejecting my principles of order and economy ; instead of abolishing the laws I have promulgated for the benefit of the lower class, and the comfort of the wretched, proceed still farther, and let our names, blended together, be equally blessed. The only just opinion of us, is that which we leave be- hind ; the only glory, that which remains attached to our memory.
' My task is now at an end, and you are going to begin yours. Yes, a moment longer, and those courtiers who surround me, will attend on you ; a moment longer, and the drums of the guards will announce your accession, and all the splendor of the throne will be displayed before your eyes. Do not suffer yourself to be dazzled by these brilliant seductions of the supreme rank ; but more especially resist those wrong ideas of the greatness of kings, which ambitious or interested men will endeavor to' inculcate on vou. You will be rendered envious of the power of other nations, before you have time to be acquainted with your own ; you will be urged to destroy their felicity, before you have time to reflect on the good you may do to your own subjects ; you will be solicited to overturn the peace of the world, before you have secured the maintenance of order within your own kingdom; and you will be inspired with the desire of increasing your dominions, before you have even ascertained what cares and informations are necessary to govern with prudence the smallest of your provinces. Mistrust all those measures with which they attempt to make sovereigns forget, not only the limits of their faculties, but the shortness of their life, and every thing that they have in common with other men. Stay by me a little longer, my son ! to learn that the sove- reign of a most powerful empire vanishes from the earth with less noise than a leaf falls from the tree, or a light is extinguished.'
AMERICAN PEACE SOCIETY, BOSTON, MASS.
JVo. XIV.
WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR.
THE value of property can be estimated only by the pur- noses it may subserve. It supports life, procures comforts, nnd furnishes means of improvement, happiness and salva- tion. These uses measure its value ; and in this view it has been made, by writers on political economy, an index to the prosperity of a nation, and a criterion of its capacity for enjoyment and usefulness.
War is the grand impoverisher of the world. In estima- ting its havoc of property, we must inquire not only how much it costs, and how much it destroys, but how far it prevents the acquisition of wealth ; and a full answer to these three questions would exhibit an amount of waste beyond the power of any imagination adequately to con ceive. Such an answer we shall not now attempt, but merely glance, first, at the prevention of wealth by war, next its incidental havoc, and finally its direct expenses.
I. Consider, then, how war prevents the accumulation of property. Its mere uncertainties must operate as a very serious hindrance ; for, while every thing is afloat, and no forecast can anticipate what changes may take place any month, men will not embark in those undertakings by which alone wealth is rapidly acquired. They shrink from the risk, and wisely wait to see what is coming ; and thus the main-springs of a nation's prosperity, — its capital, its en- terprise, and its best facilities for making money, — remain comparatively idle and useless. This cause alone, an inva- riable attendant upon war, is sufficient to paralyze the ener- gies of business in all its departments.
Still worse, however, are the sudden cnanges of war These precede its commencement, accompany its progress, and follow its close, baffling the utmost precaution, keep- ing business unsettled, and actually wasting, as well a? preventing, a large amount of property. They discourage enterprise, defeat the best plans, and produce a vast multi- tude of failures. They may, here and there, make a for- tune ; but, where they make one, they ruin or mar a hun- dred. The mere dread of such changes must paralyze,
P. T. NO. XIV.
2 WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR. 114
•
more or less, every department of business, and cripple nearly all efforts for the acquisition of wealth.
Hence ensue a general derangement and stagnation of business. Nearly all its departments are either thrown into confusion, GJ»-ought entirely to a stand ; and thus the main energies ol a people, even if not absorbed in war, must either rust in idleness, or be frittered away in baffled schemes, and fruitless exertions.
Mark the inevitable result in the disuse or unprofitable employment of capital, industry and skill in commerce and manufactures, in agriculture, the various arts, and all departments of labor and enterprise. These are the great fountains of wealth ; but in war they are either dried up, or forced into new and unproductive channels. Capital, as in the case of Holland during the late wars of Europe, (1793-1815,) is locked up, or sent out of the country, be- cause there are at home so few opportunities of profitable or safe investment. Enterprise is checked, because there is so little reward or demand for its products. There is no foreign market for the fruits of agriculture ; and land ceases to be tilled with care and success. There is no out- let for manufactures; and the shop and the factory are closed, 01- kept at work with little vigor and less profit. In- tercourse between nations is almost suspended ; and com- merce stands still, vessels rot at. the wharves, and sea-ports, once alive with the hum of business, are cut off from the principal sources of their wealth, and sink into speedy, per- haps irrecoverable decay. All the main-springs of national prosperity are broken, or crippled, or kept in operation at immense disadvantage. An incalculable amount of capital in money, and ships, and stores, and factories, and work- shops, and machinery, an* tools, and raw materials, and buildings, and inventions, and canals, and railways, and industry, and skill, and talent, is withdrawn from use, and, for want of profitable employment, goes more or less to waste. How much is thus lost, it would be vain even to conjecture ; but we should be safe in supposing that in these ways war might, besides all it spends, and all it destroys, reduce for a time the value of a nation's entire property from thirty to fifty per cent. !
But the most direct influence of war on national pros- perity, comes from the sudden withdrawal of men in the vigor of life. In such men are found the mines or labora- tories of a nation's wealth : but what multitudes of these
115 WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR. 3
does the war-system require for its support ! The standing warriors of Europe are (1844) about three millions even in a time of peace, and exceeds four millions and a half in war, with large additions to meet occasional emergencies. Not a few. of these millions may have been the main-springs of business ; and their removal can scarcely fail to derange and cripple every one of its departments. All of them must possess an unusual share of strength for labor, since no others would be equal to the hardships of war ; and the sudden abstraction of such men by thousands from every part of a 'country, and from every kind of employment, must paralyze the entire industry of a nation. Agriculture, trades, manufactures, all kinds of business must receive a severe and lasting shock.
Still worse is the influence of war on the habits indis- pensable to the thrift of a people. It mars the character necessary for the acquisition of property. It debases their minds, corrupts their morals, and undermines almost every species of excellence among them. It renders them idle, dishonest and profligate. It fills the land with persons who prey upon society like moths or gangrene. It destroys the habits needed to enrich a people, and introduces others fa- tally calculated to impoverish any country. It represses almost every thing good, and gives fresh and fearful activity to whatever is bad. It is a hot-bed of evils. Idleness and vagrancy, fraud, theft and robbery, the lowest vices, and the blackest crimes, are both the nurses and the offspring of war.
Such considerations as these we might pursue to almost any extent ; but enough has been said to show, that all the enormous expenses of war would not equal the loss of prop- erty occasioned by the combined and permanent influence of such causes alone as we have here specified. Take an illustration. When our population was some fifteen or six- teen millions, an eminent statesman of our own estimated the annual production of the United States at $1,400,000,000, or nearly ninety dollars to each inhabitant ; and, if we sup- pose war to prevent only one fifth of all this, the loss would be no less than $280,000,000 a year! Reckoning our present population (1844) at twenty millions, the annual sacrifice would be about $350,000,000. But, supposing the amount of annual production to average only fifty dol- lars to each inhabitant, then Christendom, with a population of 250,000,000, would lose $2,500,000,000 a year ; and the whole globe, with 1,000,000,000 people, would sacrifice
4 WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR. 116
the enormous sum often thousand millions ! ! Such a result seems incredible ; and yet the calculation for our own country is probably below the truth, and may serve as a clue to the boundless waste of property by war even in ways which are generally overlooked.
II. Glance next at the immediate, incidental havoc of pro- perty by war. Such havoc must, from the nature of the case, be immense. Follow an army, ancient or modern, savage or civilized ; trace the course of the French under Napoleon in Russia or Portugal, setting fire in one case to every house for one hundred and fifty miles ; look at even British troops in Spain or India ; see them trampling down harvests, and burning villages, destroying towns, ravaging entire provinces, and pillaging city after city ; and can you conceive the amount of property thus wasted ? Bring the case home, and say, if Boston contains property to the amount of more than one hundred millions, and New York two or three times as much, how many millions either city would lose from capture, or a close and protracted siege.
We can ascertain more nearly, yet very imperfectly, what is destroyed on the ocean. The sum total of our own exports and imports may have ranged, for the last ten years, from two hundred to two hundred and forty or fifty millions of dollars a year ; nearly as large an amount may perhaps have been interchanged along our immense coast ; and no small part of both would be liable in war to be seized by our enemies. The imports into one of our cities amounted in a single quarter of 1836, to thirty-six millions ; and a war, suddenly occurring, might have found afloat on the ocean an equal amount destined to the same port, and scores of millions belonging to the whole nation. The nature of the case forbids accuracy of calculation, yet shows that commerce is liable to losses beyond the power of computation or even conjecture. Since the close of our revolutionary struggle, we have been engaged in foreign war less than three years ; but it would probably require some hundreds of millions to cover all the losses we have sustained from depredations on our commerce.
Another source of loss to a nation's wealth, is found in the waste of life by war. It takes men at the very age when their labor would be most productive, and shortens their life more than twenty years in war, and some ten or fifteen in peace ! The statistics of mortality among men devoted to this work of blood, are truly startling. Soldiers, though
117 WASTE OP PROPERTY BY WAR I
in the bloom and vigor of life, live on an average only about three years in a time of war, and die even in peace twice as fast as galley slaves, and more rapidly than men ordinarily do at the age of fifty and sixty !
What a loss of property must such a waste of life occa- sion ? Let us suppose it costs an average of $500 to raise a soldier, and reckon his labor for the ten years of his life shortened in peace, and twenty years in war, at $150 a year. If the standing armies of Europe are three millions in a time of peace, she sustains, at this rate, a loss of $1,500,000,000 for their training, $450,000,000 a year for abor, and $4,500,000,000 for the shortening of their life ten years ; an average in peace of $840,000,000 a year from this source alone ! ! Reduce these estimates one half, and you still have, even in peace, the enormous sacrifice of $420,000,000 a year. In a time of war, the armies of Europe, when full, are supposed to be some four millions and a half; but, putting them in round numbers at four millions, the loss would be for their training $2,000,000,- 000, for their labor $600,000,000 a year, and for cutting short their life twenty years, $12,000,000,000 ; an average loss in war, if we suppose a soldier's life then to be only three years, of $5,266,000,000 a year!! Such a result, how- ever incredible, comes fairly from the premises ; and, should you reduce these estimates even eighty per cent., you would still make out a loss of more than $1,000,000,000, every year of actual war from this source alone ! If we extend our calculation to the five millions of persons in the army of Xerxes, to the millions of Ninus, and Semiramis, and Jenghiz-khan, to all the armies from Nimrod to the present time, we should find, from the mere waste of life, an aggre- gate exceeding our utmost conceptions. We have not taken into account the superior value of officers ; and still the result proves the loss of property in this way alone to be much greater than all the Direct expenses of war.
III. Look, then, at the actual cost of tear. Even in peace, it is enormous. The amount of money wasted on fortifications and ships, on arms and ammunition, on monu- ments and other military demonstrations, it is impossible to calculate with precision or certainty. The expense of the wall round Paris was estimated (1840) at 250,000,000 francs, or nearly $50,000,000 ; a single triumphal arch in that city, only one among the hundreds scattered through Christendom, cost 10,000,000 francs ; and we know not how
6 WASTE OP PROPERTY BY WAR. 118
many millions more were expended in the pageantry of re- moving Napoleon's remains from St. Helena to their present resting-place. The palace of Versailles, mainly the fruit of war, is acknowledged to have cost 1,000,000,000 francs, or $200,000,000, a sum sufficient to build the whole city of New York, or four such cities as Boston. Go to Green- wich or Chelsea, and there see what immense sums are spent on the diseased, crippled and worn-out servants of war. Survey the grand arsenal of England at Woolwich, and imagine how many millions have been wasted on its twenty-seven thousand cannon, and its hundreds of thou- sands of small arms. Millions of dollars have been expended on some single forts in our own country; and still the highest authority assured us in 1835, that thirty millions more would hardly suffice to put our entire coast and fron- tiers in even a tolerable state of defence.
But the original cost of these materials of war is not the only expense they occasion ; immense sums are required every year to keep them in repair. Here lies the chief care of the war-system in peace ; and, should you go through Europe, or even our own country, you would find a vast number of shops, and foundries, and ship-yards constantly at work for this purpose. This single item of expense can- not, for all Christendom, be less than $100,000,000 a year !
Still more expensive, however, is the maintenance of an army either in war or in peace. Thiers, the distinguished historian of France, and once a leading member of her cabinet, reckons the expense of supporting a soldier to be in Austria about $130, in France $146, in Prussia nearly $200, in England still greater ; and it would be a very low estimate to suppose, that every soldier in Christendom costs an average of $150 a year. It is impossible to tell the exact -number of standing warriors in Christendom ; but they cannot be less, and may be more, than 3,000,000 in peace. Aside from naval foiyes, the army of Spain has been 120,000, that of England 100,000, with the addition of 200,000 in war, and an indefinite number for emergen- cies in her eastern possessions ; thafbf France from 350,000 to 400,000, and in 1840 even 900,000; that of Austria 750,000 in war, probably not less than 400,000 in peace ; that of Russia 850,000 in peace, and reckoned by some aa high as 1,000,000. If we put the peace establishment of Christendom as low as 3,000,000, and suppose them all to require for their annual support an average of only $150
119 WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR. 7
each, .he result would be $450,000,000 a year for their sustenance ; and reckoning one officer to ten soldiers, and awarding to each of the latter an English shilling a day, or $87 a year for wages, and to the former an average salary of $500 a year, or less than six shillings a day, we should have, for the pay of the whole, no less than $385,000,000 a year, or a grand total, for both sustenance and pay, of $835,000,000 ! ! Reckoning the annual cost of their suste- nance only $100 each ; and, with the paltry compensation of one shilling a day for officers as well as privates, we reach the enormous sum of $561,000,000 a year !
We cannot well conceive how much the leading nations of Europe waste upon their war-system even in peace. The annual charge of Great Britain for her war-debt alone has been some twenty-eight or thirty millions sterling a year, not less than $140,000,000 ; exceeding, by more than one- third, all the taxable property in the state of Ohio in 1836. The war-departmciit of France in 1819, a year of peace, cost twenty times as much as her whole civil list. In 1827 England paid in peace $220,000,000 for war-purposes, and for all her civil offices only one-fortieth part of that sum. In 1825, another year of peace, her entire expenses amounted to $256,000,000, more than half the wealth of the whole state of New York as estimated in 1835, while her civil list for the same year was only $4,698,000; a proportion of one to fifty-six !
Few suspect how much our own country spends upon the war-system even in peace. If we suppose our annual income for the last fifteen years to have averaged only $24,000,000, we shall find, that not less than $18,000,000 have been lavished upon our army and navy ; three dollars for war to one for the peaceful operations of government ! Still more expensive in fact is our militia system. If one person in ten among us is liable to military duty, the whole number would now be nearly 2,000,000. If we suppose that four trainings every year are necessary to keep the system in full vigor ; that the yearly expenses for equip- ment are only three dollars for each man, and incidental expenses barely fifty cents a day ; that every training ab- sorbs one day and a half, each worth $1.50, less than the fine usually imposed for not training; that the number of spectators is equal to that of the soldiers, allowing to each one dollar a day for time, and fifty cents for expenses ; that
- officers together incur half as much expense as all the
8 WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR. 120
privates ; we should make out a total of $45,000,000 a year for the above items alone ! Add the cost of splendid regi- mentals, and fine clothes, and standards, and music, and cavalry, and artillery, and arsenals, and magazines, arid the incidental destruction of property, and all the injury arising from the suspension and derangement of business, and vices contracted on such occasions ; and we shall not wonder, that one of our ablest and most candid writers (Hon. Wil- liam Jay,) should have reckoned " the yearly aggregate expense of our militia," even when their whole number was only 1,500,000, "not much, if any short of fifty millions!" At this rate, the present number of our militia would cost us more than $66,000,000 a year ; but, if we deduct even one half of this sum, and then add our yearly expenditure of eighteen millions for the army and navy, we should make the expense of our own war-system more than fifty millions a year in a time of profound peace !
We boast of our pacific policy and habits ; yet war has ever been the burden of our national expenses. In 1817, our war expenses were about nine times as large as those for all other purposes. To give some details, we expended, in 1832, for civil offices, $1,800,758 ; for intercourse with foreign nations, $325,181 ; for miscellaneous objects, $2,451,203; for the army, $5,446,035; for the naval ser- vice, $3,956,320 ; for revolutionary pensions, a war charge, 81,057,121 ; for various other pensions, $127,301 ; for the Indian department, $1,352,420 ; for the national debt, the fruit of our last war, $17,840,309; in all, more than thirty millions and a half in one form or another for war, seven- teen times as much as for the whole civil list, and about ten times as much as for all the other purposes of our govern- ment ! From 1791 to 1832, a period of forty-one years, the aggregate of our expenditures, with some two years and a half of actual war, was $842,250,891 ; and of this sum at least eight-ninths were for war-purposes, and merely $37,158,047, or about one twenty-third part of the whole, for the civil list ; one dollar for the support of government, to twenty-three dollars for war ! During our revolutionary struggle, we borrowed of France $7,962,959, expended from our own resources $135,193,703, and issued of paper money $359,547,027; in all, $502,703,689, besides an indefinite amount of contributions from individuals and states. From 1816 to 1834, eighteen years, our national expenses amounted to $463,915,756; and of this sum,
125 WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR, 9
nearly four hundred millions went in one way and another for war, and only sixty-four millions for all other objects ! Here then we have, even in a time of peace, twenty-two millions a year for war, and about three millions and a half, less than one-sixth of the whole, for the peaceful operations of a government that plumes itself on its pacific policy ! If we take into account all the expenses and all the losses of war to this country, it will be found to have wasted for us, in sixty years, some two or three thousand millions of dollars ! !
But look at the direct expenses of war. A single first- rate ship of the line is supposed to cost us, in active service, full half a million of dollars a year ; and the number of war-ships in Christendom, though few of the first class, has been estimated at more than two thousand. Our last war, though cheap in comparison with most wars, required simply fox its prosecution more than fifty millions a year. England expended in our revolutionary war nearly $700,000,000, the wars consequent on the French Revolution, cost her more than $5,000,000,000 ; and the wars of all Christen- dom, even of Europe alone, from 1793 to 1815, a period of only twenty-two years, wasted barely for their support, some $15,000,000,000 ; — a sum so far beyond all ordinary calculation or conception, that a person, beginning at the birth of our Savior, and counting thirty a minute for twelve hours every day, would not finish the whole even at the close of the present century !
Take from an English writer a glimpse of England's ex- penditures for some of her great wars. From 1688 to 1815, a period of 127 years, she spent sixty-five in war, two more than in peace. The war of 1688 continued nine years, and increased her expenditures $180,000,000. Then came the war of the Spanish succession, and absorbed in eleven years more than $300,000,000. Next was the Spanish war of 1739, which cost in nine years $270,000,000. Then came the seven years' war of 1756, in the course of which Eng- land spent $560,000,000. The next was the American war of 1775, which lasted eight years, and cost $680,000,000. The French Revolutionary war of nine years from 1793, occasioned an expenditure of $2,320,000,000. During the war against Bonaparte from 1803 to 1815, England raised by taxes $3,855,000,000, and by loans $1,940,000,000; in all, $5,795,000,000, or an average of $1,323,082 every day, and more than a million of it for war-purposes alone ! In the war of 1688, she borrowed $100,000,000 ; in the war :f
10 WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR. 122
the Spanish succession, $162,500,000 ; in the Spanish war, $145,000,000 ; in the Seven Years' war, $300,000,000 ; in the American war, $520,000,000 ; in the French Revolu- tionary war, $1,005,000,000. During seven wars, lasting in all sixty-five years, she borrowed $4,170,000,000, and raised by taxes $5,949,000,000 ; making a total expenditure of $10,115,000,000!* It has been estimated, that England spent about ten thousand millions merely in wars under takect first to humble the Bourbons, and then to restore them to the throne which Napoleon had usurped.
Glance at the financial history of such a warlike nation as England, and mark the unbounded prodigality of war. Her average revenue during the reign of the Norman kings, was ,£300,000 ; under the Plantagenets, or Saxon line, £133,017 ; under the house of Lancaster, only ,£80,026 ; during that of York, £100,000; under that of Tudor, £510,000. During the entire reign of George I., there came into the treasury of Great Britain only £79,832,160, or a very little more than in the single year of 1815 ; during that of his successor, £217,217,301, of which he spent £157,000,000 in three wars; and during that of George III., there was expended no less than £1,386,268,446 more than $6,000,000,000, three times as much as all the coin on the globe at the time of its greatest abundance in 1809. From 1797 to 1817, twenty years, England bor- rowed $2,160,000,000, and raised by taxes $6,192,866,066; in all, $8,352,866,066, or an average for the twenty years of $1,143,444 every day, and more than a million of this for war !
War has loaded all Europe with debts. It is impossible to ascertain their precise amount ; but in 1829, that of Prussia was said to be $133,000,000 ; that of Russia, $158,000,000; that of Spain, $315,000,000 ; that of Aus- tria, $351,000,000 ; that of Netherlands, $668,000,000; that of France, $874,000,000 ; while that of England in 1815 was $4,395,000,000. We do not know how nearly the above sums exhibit the present war-debts of these coun- tries ; but the sum total now resting on Europe alone, can- not be much, if any, less than ten thousand millions of dol- lars, or five times as much as all the coin in the world !
What a maelstrom to engulph the riches of the world ! All the public property of England was estimated in 1833
* We have here multiplied pounds by five to turn them into dollari ; i little mere than their real value.
123 WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR. 11
at ,£138,715,571, less than one-sixth part of her war-debt ; and her entire resources, private as well as public, were reckoned the same year at ^£5,547,484,5 17, only a little more than six times as much as her debt in 1815. Its in- terest alone, if left to accumulate, would in the lapse of a few ages, consume her whole wealth. Her war-expenses even in peace would in less than seventy years exhaust all her property at home, and consume in one century all her resources over the globe ! If we consider all the ways, direct arid indirect, in which the war-system destroys prop- erty, it will be found even in peace to waste for Europe alone nearly two thousand millions every year, and we should be quite moderate in putting the sum total at fifteen hundred millions !
How much, then, must war have wasted in five thousand years over the whole earth ! Look back to the time when it was the all-absorbing business of nations, every other pur- suit its handmaid, and intervals of peace only resting-places to recruit for this work of blood ; imagine one-eighth, in some cases one-fifth and even one-fourth part of the popu- lation to be soldiers, all trained to war as the leading object of their life ; think of Bacchus and Sesostris with millions of warriors at their heels ; of Ninus and Semiramis with two millions of soldiers, and more than ten thousand armed chariots ; of Cyrus and Cambyses, of Alexander and Caesar, with their ferocious successors; of Turks and Tartars, Saracens and Crusaders ; of Tamerlane, and Jenghiz-khan, and Napoleon ; conceive these countless millions of robbers, marauders and incendiaries, not merely consuming for their own support an amount altogether incalculable, but burning villages and cities, laying waste empires, and ravaging the whole earth age after age with fire and sword ; and it would seem a low estimate to suppose, that the entire course of war has wasted fifty times as much as all the property now on the globe ! !
But for this curse of curses, what a world might ours have been ! Give it back all the property that war has cost, and prevented, and destroyed from the first ; and the bare interest would suffice ere-long to make the whole earth a second Eden ; to build a palace for every one of her nobles, and provide luxuries for all her now famished and suffering poor ; to spread over the entire surface of our globe a complete net-work of canals and rail-ways ; to Ueautify every one of her cities, beyond all *ncien or
13 WASTE OF PROPERTY BY WAR. 124
ern example, with works of art and genius ; to support all her governments, and give a church to every village, a school to every neighborhood, and a Bible to every family.
Take an estimate or two. With the eighteen millions a year from our own treasury for war, or the fifty millions more from the pockets of the people for our militia system, how much good might be done in a multitude of ways. Eighteen millions ! — this alone is more than twice the origi- nal cost of the Great Western Canal from Albany to Buffalo, which has added hundreds of millions to the value of our western country ; three or four times as much as our whole population pay yearly for the support of the gospel at home, and nearly a hundred times as much as the average amount of annual contributions from all the Christians in our land, the last thirty years, for evangelizing the world ! What then might have been accomplished for the good of mankind by the hundreds and even thousands of millions wasted by ourselves upon this custom during and since our revolu- tionary war !
Glance at all Christendom. The bare interest at five per cent, on her entire war-debt would be $500,000,000 a /ear ; and with this sum we might every year make a rail- way nearly round the globe, or pay the necessary expenses of all its governments without war, or support a minister of the gospel for every five hundred of its inhabitants ! Take the fifteen hundred millions annually wasted in time of peace; and, in fifty years, it would suffice to make, at $30,000 a mile, no less than 2,500,000 miles of rail-road ; enough to encircle the globe more than a hundred times ' !
Would to God that the lessons taught by fifty centuries of blood, might be duly impressed at length upon a warring world ! Take them, ye heralds of the cross, and proclaim them aloud to the multitudes that hang upon your lips. Let the press send them forth on the wings of steam all over the earth. Ponder them well, ye who hold the helm of state. Come hither, ye millions of oppressed and starving poor, come, and learn the chief cause of your woes. Ye are all the victims of war. His brand is on your brow ; his mana- cles on your limbs ; the blight of his withering curse upon all your pursuits and interests. It is the master-tyrant of our world ; and every one that loves God or his country, his species or himself, should unite to sweep from the earth a despotism so bloody and baleful.
AMERICAN PEACE SOCIETY, BOSTON, MASS.
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