Militarism and Democracy 245 



commercial purposes, for propagating special religious 

 views, for achieving philanthropic ends, etc.^ 



Spencer thus shows in a striking manner how 

 the questions of liberty and democratic govern- 

 ment are bound up with the problem of war and 

 the philosophy of force. The modern names for 

 what Spencer calls the militant and the industrial 

 types of society are militarism and democracy. 

 The terms are diametrically opposed. Democracy 

 is based on government by consent and the princi- 

 ple of voluntary co-operation, in which authority 

 proceeds from below. ' ' Government of the people, 

 by the people, for the people," is Lincoln's defini- 

 tion. Militarism is based on the principle of 

 government by force, on the principle of com- 

 pulsory co-operation in which authority proceeds 

 from above. It is no accident that the most 

 autocratic governments are found in those coun- 

 tries where militarism has most undisputed sway. 

 Both are logical results of the belief that society 

 is founded upon force and that authority proceeds 

 from above downward. The principle of both is gov- 

 ernment of the people, by the rulers, for the State. 



The profound distrust with which the demo- 

 cratic forces in the European countries have looked 

 upon the influence of the army and navy officers 

 in the councils of the autocratic Powers may be 

 considered to have been amply justified by the 

 course of events leading up to the outbreak of the 



' Principles of Sociology, vol. ii., chap, xvii., pp. 572-576. 



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