master its creator is a theme admirably treated by
Mr. Jacks in his second volume of essays " From the
Human End," a book which I would advise every
man to read.
It would be superficial to suppose the matter
ended there. There are wheels within wheels,
causes behind causes. What, then, is the cause
of large armaments ? Taking once more the
case of unaggressive nations, and recognizing the
principle that " self-preservation is the first law
of life," the cause is mistrust of one or more neigh-
bouring nations. " Fear," says John Galsworthy
ANOTHER LECTURE 265
(I quote from memory), " is the Dark Angel of
man's life which inspires ninety per cent, of his
cruelties." And Ignorance is its mother. Man
fears the unknown. Nations, like children, dread
the dark. Nourishers of that fear which causes
war are all things which raise barriers between
nations.
Reference has already been made to " Secret
Diplomacy," but there are a thousand other secre-
cies, and every one of these go to prevent that frank
understanding of aims, ideals, and needs which would
do so much to obviate war.
Let us now turn to the aggressor. " Unpro-
voked assault " is a thing which is not frequent
between men or nations, but we will suppose it.
We will suppose that for no reasons other than those
of pride, envy, hatred, lust, greed, and the love
of ferocity, a Government which is wholly and
thoroughly bad has declared war on another Govern-
ment. Now, I say without hesitation that, though
a Cabinet of twenty, and perhaps even a Parliament
of three hundred, might be one and all evil men,
dead to all dictates of conscience, yet it is utterly
impossible in human nature for a whole nation to
be so. It is insanity to suggest that nations of, say,
sixty millions are ready to go to war, sacrifice their
sons, their possessions, life itself, in order to gratify
such lusts. When, therefore, such a thing as " un-
provoked war " occurs ā if it ever does ā it is made
266 COMRADES IN CAPTIVITY
possible only by wholesale deception of a people
living politically in darkness. It is made not by the
nation, but by the Government, and it follows that
such a Government must be secret in execution,
undemocratic in design, and vmrepresentative in
character.
" I have seen knaves and fools ā many of both ā "
writes Stevenson, " and they all get paid in the end;
but the fools first." Nations foolish enough to allow
themselves to be ruled in such a manner are likewise
" paid in the end " ā with w^ar; and the cause of all
such wars is the permitting of any Government not
directly responsible to the people and under their
control. It is in their powder to remove this cause
of war, and few who have experienced the penalty
will again forget to do so.
When a people ā as distinct from a Government ā
goes to war, it is to satisfy some national need, aim,
or ambition not to be assuaged but by victory.
If the need is real, the aim just, the ambition right,
then they are justified in going to war, since there is
no other mode of arbitration. Whether it is wise,
whether they will win, is another matter. They
can at least die for their cause.
If they choose to do so who can blame them ?
But what, in such a case, can be said for their
enemies ? Wisdom (since they may not win) and
Justice (since they are opposing a legitimate cause)
both cry out against them. If they are mere tools to
ANOTHER LECTURE 267
their Government they may not hear. But if they
are a free people, able to see and hear, why should
they fight ? The answer is that just and unjust
causes of war have never been taught to them.
Patriotism is not to fight for one's country, right or
wrong; it is being able to decide when your country
is wrong or right.
What, then, are the legitimate causes which should
urge a self-respecting nation to fight ? To tabulate
these would go far to end war. Humanity is on the
whole good. Nations are on the whole just. Few
would fly in the face of conscience ā to say nothing
of public opinion ā by opposing those causes.
The first and foremost is undoubtedly the need
for expansion. When man has populated and
developed a certain portion of the earth, it is abso-
lutely necessary for him to be allowed ground else-
where. It is not as though there were no more
room. Over-population of the earth has never yet
been a cause of war. But, even if the world were as
well populated as a small island in the South Seas,
the matter could be quickly and eugenically settled
without war after the manner of many so-called
primitive tribes.
Note that this vital need of expansion is not at all
synonymous with the " need " of expandi 'g an
Empire. It is founded on the principle that the
earth is man's, and not the property of any particu-
lar people. The Imperialist who collects lands as a
268 COMRADES IN CAPTIVITY
boy collects birds' eggs ā not for sustenance but to
add to his collection ā is the worst enemy of peace.
Sooner or later he always comes up against a starving
man who wants food, and who means to get it or
die in the attempt.
Whether nationality is or is not a cause of war is a
question which has been discussed many times since
the days of Tolstoy. I do not think it need be.
Nationality is to a people what individuality is to a
person ā his chief interest and charm. It is im-
portant to remember that we are all the same,
sons of one human and Divine heredity. It is
equally important to remember that we are all
different. By being so, we bring so much the more
wonder, interest, and knowledge to the common
stock; and with nations as well as with men it takes
all sorts to make a world worth living in. Nation-
ality only becomes an evil when it is forced upon
others; which is to say that it is only evil when it
destroys nationality. " Deutschland (iber alles "
is a motto as intolerable as " Jones Uber alles." It
means the suppression of all the Smiths and the
Robinsons among the nations. Yet Jones in himself
may be a very good fellow, proficient in certain
crafts unknown to the others, and of the greatest
use to them. We cannot afford to lose him either.
Tolstoy's dream of world-brotherhood can only
come through national brotherhood.
We learn that man loves God because He has first
ANOTHER LECTURE 269
loved man. He loves man because he has first
loved a small circle of people related to him. A
man will come to love of the world- State only
through first loving his own particular State. The
terms " legitimate national aspirations," " national
destiny," and so forth, as they are used by politicians,
have in truth been the excuse for many wars, but they
have no connection with nationality. They are the
texts from Scripture which, as Shakespeare remarks,
may be quoted by the devil to further his own
purposes.
To believe in nationality is nothing against be-
lieving also in arbitration and, for that matter,
in federation. " Birds of a feather " will " flock
together "; and to suppose, for instance, a federation
of the English-speaking, or Anglo-Saxon, races is not
to suppose that England would cease to be England,
or America essentially the United States and " God's
Own Country." As this subject comes rather
under the heading of the Remedies we will pass on,
pausing only to restate the case thus : If the idea of
nationality could be stamped out and substituted
by that of a world-State, wars, as known, would
certainly cease : but wars might equally well cease
if they were looked upon throughout the world as a
detestable and self-inflicted curse, and humanity
might still retain its " individuality " by means of
nations.
There is no better first step towards doing away
270 COMRADES IN CAPTIVITY
with an evil than for everybody together and at
the same time to zvant to do away with it. It is
surprising how difficulties vanish in such a case.
It follows that persons whose influence is against
this must be considered as causes of its continuance.
The first two persons to come under this category
are: (i) "Our Great Leaders," and (2) "Our
Great Platitude-Mongers." Not infrequently the
terms are synonymous. " Our Great Leaders !"
I never sec that phrase applied to a politician by some
foolish journalist without a desire to rip up the news-
paper. If politicians are anything at all they are the
men appointed by us and paid by us to represent
in Parliament the whole body of the people and
carry their wishes into effect. That it is customary
to call them " Our Great Leaders " and not " Our
Great Servants " is typical of the state of mind of a
people who permit " secret diplomacy " and " secret
funds " (those who have read the book by Hilaire
Belloc and Cecil Chesterton entitled " The Party
System " will understand the significance of the
latter), men who gaily give over the liberty gained
by their fathers by the efforts of hundreds of years
into the hands of men theoretically responsible but
practically uncontrolled.
As to Platitude-Mongers ā there are two classes
of people in the world. God made them to worry
one another, and perhaps to instruct one another
in the virtue of Charity. There are those who are
ANOTHER LECTURE 271
content, for various reasons, to voice platitudes and
to think the thoughts of others ; and there are those
v^rho are not so contented, but who are determined,
for various reasons, to worry things out to the best
of their ability, and to speak as they find. This
one set of people having made up their minds, and
the other people having no minds to make up, they
decide to quarrel whenever they meet. We can
imagine the conversation being opened by any such
well-worn platitude as " The best way to insure
peace is to prepare for war " (in that case it is
hardly necessary to follow the subsequent discussion) ;
"War is an unfortunate but necessary evil"; or
" While human nature remains human nature war
will never be abolished." It may be worth while
to take a slice out of the conversation naturally
following these latter statements.
" War is an unfortunate but necessary evil.^^
" Is it necessary ?"
" Sometimes it is."
" Why ?"
" You may be unjustly attacked."
" Then couldn't the other side refuse to fight ?"
" Yes, but they don't."
" No, because they don't know that it is an unjust
war. Wouldn't education solve that problem ?"
" Sir, war is a punishment for sin. The vicar
said so in his sermon last week. I thought it very
sound."
272 COMRADES IN CAPTIVITY
" Yes, it is God's punishment for sin. But what
sin ? Is it necessary that we should commit it ?
A few years ago cholera was considered a visitation
of God for sin. And so it was. A few people,
Charles Kingsley among them, came along and said
" the sin of bad drains." People had never heard of
such a thing. They laughed. But so it turned
out. And the event is typical. Man is constantly
discovering that he has to blame himself for events
which he has always been accustomed to attribute
to God. It is a quaint idea to attribute evil to God
and call it a visitation."
" Sir, God's ways are inscrutable. ' He moves in a
mysterious way His wonders to perform.' "
" So, sir, does the devil ā ably assisted by man;
and I will swear he is the author of all such calamities?
including war."
" Young man, you are blasphemous and insuf-
ferable." {Curtain)
*
" While human nature remains human 7iature war
will never he abolished.''''
" But is not human nature always changing as a
result of experience ?"
" Human nature never changes."
" That, sir, is a supposition highly unflattering
to yourself, for it puts you on a level with the latest
discover)' in yonder burial barrow.
ANOTHER LECTURE 273
" Be as insolent as you please, young fellow, but
there will always be quarrels."
" True, aren't we quarrelling now ? But I do
not take a club and hit you on the head as I might
have done a million years ago. And if you had done
me an injury ā which you have not ā I should not
do so, since there are law-courts."
" Ah ! that is where I have vou. Between nations
there are no law-courts. War is the only means of
settlement, and as such it is inevitable."
" Then why not substitute a court of arbitration
similar to that appealed to in such cases by individuals .^"
" It is impossible. Arbitration is bosh ā a Utopian
dream."
*' That, sir, is a statement which your Grand-
father-Platitude-Monger-to-the-f/th degree told to
mine when he suggested that there might be a better
way of settling personal differences than that of
hitting your adversary on the head with a club."
"If it is possible why has it not been done ?
Do you, young man, claim to be so much wiser than
your fathers as to succeed where they have failed
through thousands of years ?"
" Sir, all progress in the history of the world is
the result of man doing things which were ' im-
possible.' That is man's work in the world. It
was impossible for man to settle his differences other
than with a club. It was impossible for him to kill
his enemy from afar oft\ It was impossible for him
274 COMRADES IN CAPTIVITY
to travel at sixty miles an hour. It was impossible
for him to fly. As to succeeding where my fathers
have failed, that is what I am here for."
" You are a conceited young pup. Your fathers
were better men than you will ever be."
" That I do not care to dispute, for they had their
problems and solved them, which their fathers ā
who had solved other problems ā had failed to do.
As for being a conceited young pup, perhaps I am.
But your humility is a more damnable thing than
my conceit, for it is nothing more than self-satisfied
laziness and lack of imagination."
The Platitude-Monger might continue to argue
for a long time, but sufficient has been said to show
his method and to lead us directly into the third
portion of our subject ā namely, the remedies, many
of which have been foreshadowed.
The Remedies.
It goes almost without saying that there is no
immediate magic available for the cure of war.
Life is no fairy story, and beneficent changes do not
come to us by the wave of a wand, but by a whole
scries of effort. Little by little the thing which
seemed so wonderful to the dreamer of it becomes
more and more obvious as a possibility; and when
the people at the pinnacle of their fathers' efforts do
what their ancestors dreamed, they do it as a matter
ANOTHER LECTURE 275
of course. The thing has become a matter of
common sense.
So it will be with war. The first step towards
doing away with it was taken long ago, when
dreamers first saw its possibility. Our endeavour to
find a practical remedy is only a continuation of
their work, the completion of which is possibly
for our sons, possibly for men who will be born in
another century. Our duty is to bring the end
nearer.
Study of the causes of war is a signpost which will
guide us in keeping direction. But the first and
most important condition of travel, without which
one will not move at all, is a sincere and ardent
desire that the end should be reached. To this
state of mind we of the twentieth century are
specially incited by two things : (i) recent experience,
(2) the fact that future wars will be even more
terrible and probably also larger.
The popularity of such a recruiting phrase as
the " war to end war " shows that the most ardent
volunteers were at heart conscientious objectors.
They fought not because they liked fighting, but
because they hated it. They fought that their sons
should not have to fight.
This universal conviction as to the utter unde-
sirability of war is a great thing. It is the energy
to walk forward. Without it there would be no
hope of arriving, and the fact that it is more wide-
276 COMRADES LN' CAPTIVITY
spread throughout the world to-day than ever before
gives us a unique opportunity of moving forward
in the right direction. This age may not and prob-
ably will not solve the problem of war, but at least
it has better opportunities and keener incitements
to do so than any other in the history of the world.
I have referred to the causes as signposts; speaking
more accurately, they are danger-signals. They
do not point out the right way to go except by im-
plication : except by pointing out the right way not
to go. The right way to go is a matter of speculation.
The best, and by far the most popular, speculative
remedy for war is that which is known as Inter-
national Arbitration: and it is not purely speculative,
since it is founded upon an analogy. The extending
of principles from the individual to the community
is a modern tendency which has manifested itself
of late to such an extent that it is perhaps the most
notable feature of to-day's literature.
Arbitration is possible between individuals, and
the tendency of the age is to ask, " Why is it im-
possible between nations ?" It is a question which
is being asked with increasing emphasis throughout
the world to-day : and it is a question to which there
is no answer, for the plain truth is that it is not
impossible. (That it has not been done is another
matter.) The idea requires small elucidation. I
will put the case as I always think of it myself, and as
I first thought of it when I was a law-student, com-
ANOTHER LECTURE 277
pelled to defend an honourable profession against the
attacks of irreverent acquaintances. " You may curse
law as much as you please," I would shout back. " You
may say ā only I shall deny it ā that injustice results
more often than justice; that wrong, when repre-
sented by a clever counsel, will always triumph over
right ā a thing which occasionally does happen when
laymen are foolish enough to conduct their own
cases; you may say that law is slow and inhuman,
and lawyers costly and unscrupulous. I will not
argue such points, I will simply say, ' Imagine both
law and lawyers abolished. What have you got
then ?' "
" Heaven !"
" That is perhaps witty, but it is not true.
The right answer is not Heaven, but the other
place ā or something very like it to any civilized
man. You have the Age of Savagery. No
longer will you possess any way of settling your
differences but by beating your opponent with a
club, or piercing him with a spear. You, Jones,
are a big man; you are also hot-tempered and rather
stupid " (struggle with Jones) ; " it might suit you,
but sooner or later you would meet your master,
and the case would go against you however tight
you might happen to be. You, Smith, are a misera-
able weakling" (short struggle with Smith). " The
fact that you are less hot-tempered than Jones would
not protect you. You too would perish."
19
278 COMRADES IN CAPTIVITY
The argument was a bantering schoolboy's, but
nevertheless it was, I think, a sound one. Perhaps,
as Wilde asserts, " Men become older but not
wiser," and I among them. Certainly I think
to-day on that matter as I thought then; only to-day,
following the spirit of my time, I am tempted to
carry the idea a little farther ā to push it, in fact,
to its logical conclusion; to extend the principle
from the individual to the community.
What, when all is said and done, is war but that
same old savage, stupid mode of settling differences
which was abolished and replaced by law in the case
of the individual ? The reason why it was not
abolished and replaced by International Law Courts
long ago is that there exists between nations of the
world barriers which have long since been broken
down between individuals. To-day some of those
barriers are crumbling, yet I do not say it will be
easy to break them down.
These barriers or differences are not always
realized as being so great and so powerful as they
really are.
Take the difference of language. Even among
the minority ā the tiny minority ā of well-educated
people ā and our politicians are not all drawn from
that class ā many speak but one living language and
few more than two or three. Internationally the
remainder of the nation is, for all practical purposes,
dumb. It is not difficult to imagine how almost
ANOTHER LECTURE 279
impossible it would be for men who had not yet
invented speech to live amicably together. The
inventions of the telephone, the telegram, and daily
newspapers are now crumbling this barrier. Travel
also makes for understanding. But the nation is
not yet in so fortunate and so favourable a position
as the individual. Again, men quarrel or agree with a
known person, and generally while in company with
him. Nations, from one side of the world to the
other, quarrel and agree with total strangers, and it
is a fact that the agreement is in such circumstances
frequently as disastrous as the quarrel. Tempera-
ment, and in a narrow sense nationality, are likewise
in their nature barriers, and there are others which
it is unnecessary to mention. Nevertheless it is
true that all such racial barriers crumble, and already
have done so to a degree, under influences of wider
education, travel, and scientific discovery, which
open up communication and exchange of values
both material and mental. That such barriers
will in this generation be razed to the ground is a
thing which the youngest of young dreamers can
hardly hope to see. That does not rid us of our
responsibility to posterity who shall see it. Unless
we wish to identify ourselves with the person ā
probably a politician ā who demanded, " What, I
ask you, has posterity ever done for us ?" (and I
venture to say even if we are of that state of mind)
the duty that lies plainly before us is to assist the
28o COMRADES IN CAPTIVITY
crumbling, and to drag down anything which goes
to support those barriers or build them. The dark
angel of Fear and his mother, whose name is
Ignorance ā these are they whose hands pile up
barriers and support them with the props of Secret
Diplomacy, vast armament, democracy subservient
to " Great Leaders " and " Great Platitudinists,"
and that perverted patriotism whose crest is a bloody
sword and whose motto is " My country, right or
wrong." These sinister powers will not be dis-
armed at a blow, but it is our hope and firm belief
that Man, whose destiny has been to achieve the
impossible, to harness to his chariot unharmed of
their beating hooves the great forces of Nature,
and to throw scornfully aside all things sinister and
insulting to the divinity that is within him, will not
at the last fail to achieve between nations what his
forefathers achieved between individuals.
International arbitration vnll come; that is as
sure as it is that there is a war on now, or that the
sun will rise to-morrow. It may not come in our
generation, but it is nearer than it has ever been in
the world's history, and perhaps it is nearer than any
one of us imagines. We have more opportunity
and more inducement than ever had our fathers,
and I repeat that when men want a thing, want it
intensely, and want it altogether, Satan and all the
host of hell are insufhcient to prevent its ultimate
attainment.
ANOTHER LECTURE 281
I have endeavoured in the ridiculous space of half
an hour ā which is all the time at our disposal ā
to make an outline round my subject. The task
of filling in this outline and of altering it where
necessary must be left to others, yourselves included.
Personally I have nothing more to do but to thank
Chichester for writing out my thoughts so that I
could read them, and you for your attention to a
paper necessarily inadequate. It is not altogether
my fault. The difficulty of finding references in a
prisoner camp is aptly illustrated by the fact that
with the one exception of Ballard's book, all I was
able to discover on the subject of open diplomacy,
except within my own mind, was this cutting, taken,
if you please, from the Continental Times. It is a
fragment from the writings of Walter Bagehot,
the celebrated Victorian essayist, and this is what
he says :
" I am disposed to deny entirely that there can be
any treaty for which adequate reasons cannot be
given to the English people, which the English people
ought to make. A great deal of the reticence of
diplomacy had, I think history shows, much better
be spoken out."
In conclusion, the points I put before you to
debate and consider are these :
(i) That war is an unnecessary evil which it is
the duty of all civilized men to prevent for the
sake of those who come after.
282 COMRADES IN CAPTIVITY
(2) That practical steps in this direction are ā
{a) Steps leading towards sound Democratic
Control.
(b) Open Diplomacy.
{c) Reduction of Armaments. (This, of course,