78 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



growing feelings of humanity and mercy in the conduct of warfare 

 which, commencing with the Peace of Westphalia, has been ever 

 more and more effective in securing the evolution of a better usage. 



The Brussels Rules. — So, too, with reference to the rules gov- 

 erning the conduct of armies in the field the work of the confer- 

 ence represents a sound and healthy evolution. 



It may be remarked, by way of preface, that the old idea of 

 war regarded hostilities as working the absolute interruption of 

 all relations between belligerents, save those arising from force; 

 it also regarded the enemy as a proper object of violence and depre- 

 dation. Even in the time of Grotius the universal usage permitted 

 the putting to death of all persons found in the enemy's territory, 

 and in the terrible struggles of the Thirty Years' War in Germany 

 and the Eighty Years' War in the Netherlands the story of the 

 fate of men, women, and children at the hands of a conquering 

 soldiery forms one of the darkest chapters in human history. 



But while Grotius declared this to be the usage, he also took 

 care to point out that considerations of justice and mercy dictate 

 a better course, and he made a distinction between certain classes, 

 declaring that justice requires the belligerent to spare those who 

 have done no wrong to him, especially old men, priests, husband- 

 men, merchants, prisoners, women, and children. This merciful 

 distinction was eagerly seized upon by his successors, who gradually 

 developed out of it different rules for the treatment of the " com- 

 batant " and " non-combatant " portion of the enemy inhabitants. 

 After the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which marked the close 

 of the great struggles that had so long convulsed Europe, the older 

 and more brutal customs fell into disuse, and the theory that only 

 so much stress should be put upon an enemy, and primarily upon 

 the combatant portion, as was sufficient to destroy his power of 

 resistance was substituted for it. Along with this new usage grew 

 the ever-increasing rights of neutrals, among them being that of 

 trade and commerce with the non-combatant portion of belliger- 

 ent states, which has done so much to lighten the hardships of war 

 suffered by those devoted to peaceful pursuits in the enemy's 

 territory. 



The next important step in this evolution belongs to the pres- 

 ent century, and is due to the enlightened initiative of the United 

 States. This step consisted in the preparation of a manual con- 

 taining a code of rules for the conduct of land warfare. Keenly 

 alive to the inevitable sufferings incident to the great civil conflict 

 then being waged, Abraham Lincoln commissioned Erancis Lieber 

 to prepare a series of rules for the conduct of the armies of the 

 republic in the field which should set bounds to the passions of 



