COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



warfare ever less easy to sustain, and therefore 

 continually, though slowly, diminishes the fre- 

 quency and shortens the continuance of wars. 

 The statement that in early times a community 

 is, on the whole, better able to endure protracted 

 warfare than in later times, may be illustrated by 

 a comparison between the Punic Wars of Rome 

 and the War of Secession in our own country. 

 The horrible destruction of life and property 

 occasioned by the first and second Punic Wars 

 is minutely described in Mommsen's " Roman 

 History." The first of these desperate strug- 

 gles lasted twenty-three years, during the five 

 severest of which the census of Roman patri- 

 cians was diminished by one sixth of the whole 

 number, — a fact terrible to contemplate when 

 its full significance is realized. After twenty- 

 three years of comparative quiet began the still 

 more deadly struggle against Hannibal, which 

 lasted seventeen years. During this war the 

 total loss of life in all the communities engaged 

 — Italian, Spanish, Sicilian, and African — can- 

 not be estimated at less than 600,000 persons 

 actually slain ; a Iqss which I believe somewhat 

 exceeds that of the Northern and Southern 

 States in the American war. But to make a fair 

 comparison, we must include the circumstance 

 that the population of these ancient communi- 

 ties was not more than one sixth as great as the 

 population of the United States ; and that in 



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