WAR. 95 



tlierc risinp^ up af^ainst liim, and slicdding for the first 

 time lliat blood Avliicli the afFri^dited earth sliall drink, 

 and for a\ liich it sliall never cease to cry for vengeance. 

 I'ightings between races, and througli all society. In 

 those early days of the world's inlancy "there were 

 giants in the earth," the ''mighty men'' of their time 

 and the "'men of renown;'' and their outrages were 

 washed away in the Avaters of the great flood, only to 

 reapi)ear in other forms on this globe, this field of ever- 

 lasting battle. 



[III. From the very nature of the origin of war, one might 

 justh' conchide that it is likel}' to be perpetual in the bosom of 

 fallen humanity. The existence of war does not depend on cir- 

 cumstances external to human nature. It is not to be reckoned 

 among those imperfections of society which may be expected to 

 disappear in the progress of reason and morality. It is one of th 

 permanent effects of original sin.] 



Universal peace, proceeding from the indelinitc de- 

 velopment of human nature, and from what people call 

 by a great name, used often without meaning — Prog- 

 ress — such universal peace is, then, a chimera. True, 

 it is a chimera of noble minds and generous hearts ; but 

 they have not taken into their calculation either Chris- 

 tianity or facts. 



Speak to me of the progress towards x^eace, of ideas, 

 of morals, and even of the institutions of Christian 

 society, tending to render the chances of war more 

 and more difficult, and I can understand this lan- 

 guage, and applaud it. I do not belong to that school 

 of Catholics who make war to be a sort of divine idejil. 

 War is the ideal of sin, as I have just been saying — the 

 ideal of the brute and the devil. Peace, on the con- 

 trary, is the ideal of Christianity. But we do not reach 

 our ideal on earth, nor even approach it except in so 



