j«6 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



the only way that enables them to draw her secrets from her 

 clenched hand. As in time of perfect peace and equilibrium the 

 grain of dust is said to precipitate a tornado, or a small vibration 

 to start a violent reaction in a previously torpid chemical 

 mixture, so may war flare up in a moment from a single spark. 

 What then are the reasons for this — and until we can find the 

 cause of a disease it is hopeless to talk about prevention? The 

 present war is a favourable case for the inquiry : because it is 

 not a war in which some superior civilisation imposes itself 

 upon an inferior one, as in many of the wars of Rome, Spain, 

 and Britain ; and it is not a war in which virile barbarians 

 sweep away the effete dregs of a decayed past, as at the end 

 of Rome ; but it is a war between nations which are for the 

 most part equal in civilisation and strength — belonging to very 

 similar races, having nearly equal opportunities for agriculture, 

 manufactures, trades, arts and sciences, and for the most part 

 obeying, or pretending to obey, the same great moral code. 

 Under these circumstances, what could one of these nations 

 expect to gain by flinging itself at the throat of others ; what 

 then would compensate for the dreadful tragedies which were 

 sure to ensue ; what praise of humanity could, under these 

 circumstances, ever be bestowed upon the victor ; or what god 

 would be ever likely to bless such a deed ? Yet in a moment 

 the tragedy has befallen us. 



Let us recount the story briefly. It begins from the date of 

 the last great world-cyclone and the crushing of Napoleon. 

 Then it seemed that a general peace was likely to fall upon the 

 earth for generations ; and indeed the peace was broken only by 

 smaller and shorter struggles between two or three peoples 

 quarrelling over some poor fleshless bone of territory. For 

 years, however, France, who had not yet found herself in 

 popular government, was the storm-centre. Napoleon III. 

 arose and threatened the surrounding peoples, and pretended to 

 military hegemony. Slowly, however, another nation, Prussia, 

 was seated quietly in the north, nursing a similar ambition, and 

 organising the arts by which she proposed to achieve it. War, 

 she said, is war ; its end is victory ; and its means are justified 

 by its end. Nor was her philosophy at that time without excuse. 

 She was surrounded by the great states of Russia, Austria, and 

 France, then her superiors in population and wealth. She had 

 often been attacked by all ; and had been crushed under the 



