WAR HOW JUSTIFIABLE. 345 



of duty, this readiness to sacrifice life at its 

 cal^ one of the redeeming circumstances of 

 war ? calling out the heroical spirit like that of 

 the martyrs, which makes light of all that 

 worldlings most value ; and acts as a check to 

 that softness and effeminacy which peace, 

 ease, wealth, and indulgence are so apt to 

 engender, and by engendering, conduce to the 

 decline and fall of nations. 



PISCATOR. I would fain hope it may be so ; but 

 I am not sure that it is so. I doubt very much 

 that war improves the individual character, and 

 if not the individual, I do not see how it can 

 the national character. Its evils are tremendous. 

 When it is entitled to the quality for which 

 you give it credit, I apprehend it must be 

 experienced by those who engage in it on justi- 

 fiable grounds, and with unquestionable mo- 

 tives pro arisetfocis for what is most dear 

 and honoured, for religion and liberty, in which 

 great risks are run, great sacrifices are made ; 

 such wars as the ennobling struggles of the 

 Netherlander against the Spaniards ; of the 

 United States of America that earned them 

 their independence ; of our own country in the 

 instance of the " Great Kebellion," when the, 



