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The Nature of War
"By th
e same
Attth
or
THE WAY OF PEACE
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THE WORLD SOUL
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THE PASSING OF EMPIRE
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THE HEARTS OF MEN
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London:
HURST S BLACKBTT LTD.
The Nature of War
:: :: And its Causes :: ::
By H. Fielding HalL Author of - The
Soul of a People,' " The Way of Peace, etc. :: ::
LONDON: HURST & BLACKETT, LTD.
PATERNOSTER HOUSE, E.G. .. 1917
CONTENTS
CnAP. PAGE
I. The Inevitability of War . . 5
II. The Fallacy of Ethics. . . 89
III. The Failure of Experience . . 71
IV. The Teachings of Religions. . 98
V. Conceptions of God , . . 119
VI. The Purpose of Evolution . .145
VII. The Phenomena of Life . . 177
VIII. The Struggle for Existence . 201
IX. The Objectives of Civilization . 229
X. A "Greater Freedom". . . 247
XI. The Prevention of War . . 259
CHAPTER I
THE INEVITABILITY OF WAR
THE NATURE OF WAR AND
ITS CAUSES
?^ every great trial that a man, a
' nation, or a civilization, passes
through, it makes two resolves, or rather
it cherishes two hopes, to help it through
the trouble, the first that it will win
through at all costs, and the second that
when peace has returned it will so arrange
the future that this particular trouble
can never occur again. And of these two
hopes, the first, though the most imme-
diate, is perhaps the lesser. For in a
great and stubborn war, the suffering
caused even to the victor is so terrible,
that the difference between those who win
and those who lose is only a diffArendfe in "^
7
The Nature of War and its Causes
degree. The horror and the suffering are
not confined to one side, and it is only
the hope that, taught by much sorrow,
we shall learn to avoid it for the future,
that makes us keep up our courage and
determination. So in the present terrible
war that has overtaken us, our vows
that we would fight the matter to a finish
are always followed by " and never again,
no, never again, shall this be possible."
So we resolve, but in fact we have no
idea how to set about it. That does not,
however, mean that we lack prophets.
We have plenty of them who have abso-
lutely certain cures. There are the
socialists, there are pacificists, there are
the various Churches. " Follow my
advice and war shall cease," they tell us ;
but I do not think that we much believe
in them. You won't stop war by de-
nouncing it as terrible, and proving its
horrors. Everyone knows them. You
The Inevitability of War
won't stop war by arbitration treaties,
because no nation will arbitrate in a
matter that it considers affects its honour
or its vital interests. It would tear up
any treaty and disregard any award that
affected it vitally. And, moreover, arbi-
tration does not apply to civil war. No
nation would allow itself to be " treatied "
or " awarded " to death. You won't
stop war by declaring that all war is
wicked, for that is not true ; the world
being as it is, wars of self-defence are not
wicked, nor even all wars of aggression,
and nobody knows which is which. You
won't stop war by an United States of
Europe, because United States and United
Kingdoms under stress become disunited
States and Kingdoms. You won't stop
war by building temples of Peace, and
offering prayers and hymns thereto in
the daily or weekly papers. You won't
stop war by proving that " it does not
9
The Nature of War and its Causes
pay." Belgium is not fighting for money.
And as for the Churches, were not most
wars under their segis and, therefore, holy
wars ?
And further, even if war could be
abolished and peace enforced upon the
world by some machinery, or some teach-
ing, would not that be worst of all ?
It is not so very long ago that the
rise of temperature in a fever patient
was regarded as the great evil. Men in
health have a normal temperature, and
when a man's temperature rose, and he
became flushed and heated, and perhaps
delirious, it seemed as if it were the heat
itself which caused the man's sickness
and perhaps death. Therefore, if the
fever could be subdued, the evil would
be exorcized. So it seemed. And when
the new drugs antipyrin and other drugs
that lower the temperature were dis-
covered, it seemed as if the cure were
10
The Inevitability of War
found. Yet it was not so, the patient's
temperature was brought down, but he
died all the more surely. And, in fact,
instead of decreasing mortality the '* cure "
increased it.
We know now that a high temperature
is Nature's method, the only method, of
killing the bacteria in the blood which
would otherwise kill the patient. The
fever was Nature's cure for a secret and
deadly poison. Fever can be prevented
by not allowing the poison to enter the
blood, but once it has done so fever is
Nature's cure.
So it may be, so we think it is, with war.
It is Nature's mode of curing a hidden
disease that might otherwise be mortal,
and could we by artificial means stop war,
the patient would die.
Therefore, all these specifics for curing
war cause in us more doubt and alarm
than confidence. They are based on no
II
The Nature of War and its Causes
true knowledge of human nature and on
no true diagnosis of the evil. They would
do, we fear, far more harm than good.
For by stopping war we might kill civili-
zation, and even life itself. If we are to
have peace, let it be a real peace and not
a pretence, a natural peace and not an
artificial one, a free and living peace, not a
dead letter enforced upon us.
It seems to us that all our prophets
are no better than quack doctors, bent on
advertising their own goods and that
only. They explain nothing to us either
of the nature of war, of peace or of
humanity, nor do they explain how their
patent medicines could act. We are to
have faith, shut our eyes and do as we
are told.
But we do not care about that. We are
tired of this wild empiricism. We do
not believe in patent medicines. We
want not prescriptions but knowledge.
12
The Inevitability of War
We want to know more about war, its
causes and effects, before we undertake
any treatment. And when we ask for
this we get nothing.
Yet, if we are really to prevent war,
we must have this knowledge. We must
not go catching at straws and deluding
ourselves with vain hopes. We must
know what we are about.
Let us therefore consider this matter,
and see what we can discover.
In the first place, what is war ?
The answer is simple. War means
destruction. It is the destruction first
of laws, conventions, institutions, morality,
and next the destruction of life and pro-
perty. War creates nothing, it merely
destroys. It is true that many people deny
this and claim for war that it brings
out qualities of courage, self-denial, disci-
pline, endurance, enthusiasm, that are
atrophied in peace time, and so war is a
13
The Nature of War and its Causes
creative force ; but that is nonsense.
These quahties are inherent in mankind.
If during peace time they are stifled by
civihzation that is the fault of civilization.
If war releases them from the lethargy
in which civilization has buried them,
it is because war destroys a false civiliza-
tion and allows these qualities to come
again to the light of day War does not
create them ; it frees them by breaking
their bonds. A true civilization would
be made for man and allow due exercise
to all his faculties. Civilizations into
which men can only be fitted by atrophy-
ing the best part of their natures are
false civilizations. War destroys them.
War is therefore a destructive agency
and nothing else. Let us never forget that.
And now let us consider the cause of
war.
The usual process is to look for the
causes of a war in previous events. For
14
The Inevitability of War
instance, it is usual to say that the reason
we are fighting Germany is because Ger-
many in her attack on France is violating
Belgium, whose neutrality we have
guaranteed as did Germany also. But
why does Germany attack France, and
why, if she must attack France, must
she do so through Belgium ? And why
did we guarantee the neutrality of Bel-
gium ? And if we considered it vital
to keep that promise, why did we not
have an army strong enough to enforce
it ? And why now must we stake our
national existence on maintaining that
guarantee ? And when you have com-
pletely answered these questions if you
can ^you will find that you have only
answered them by raising others.
There was one war that I, for many
years, quite thirty years, studied most
carefully, not only in books but from
actors, not only on one side but on both
15
The Nature of War and its Causes
and that was the Indian Mutiny. There
are many books that profess to explain
its causes. Here are some alleged causes :
The annexation of Oude, the depletion of
the English garrison, the greased car-
tridges, the English attitude to the people,
each or all " caused " the war. But the
annexation of Oude was inevitable. If
Oude had not been annexed the situation
would have been impossible, so the an-
nexation of Oude did not " cause " the
mutiny, but the situation that necessitated
the annexation. And this situation
followed naturally on . . . and so on,
going back to before Clive. Again, the
depletion of the English garrison followed
on the Crimean war, and that on events
in Syria, and those so we go on again.
It was the English temperament that
made the conquest of India possible to
us, and anyhow our temperament cannot
be changed. It is innate.
i6
The Inevitability of War
And the greased cartridges were merely
an excuse. In normal times they would
have attracted no attention whatever.
The causes of war, as of anything else,
are not to be found in events. No event
is, or could be, related to another event
as cause and effect. Events are caused
by forces, and the events of history are
caused by men, who in their turn are
governed by their minds. The causes of
events are therefore in men's minds.
I will take an instance.
A tower falls ; why ? It is blown down
in a gale or shaken by an earthquake, or
gravity pulls it down. That is the final
cause, a natural force. But had its
foundations been secure, it would have
withstood these natural forces, so the
real cause of its fall is faulty foundations.
Now the cause of the faulty foundations
was either bad plans, bad material, or
bad work, and all these come from a
17 2
The Nature of War and its Causes
defect in the mind of the architect, the
builder, or the contractor. Thus the real
cause that the tower fell was in the mind
of a man or men, want of foresight,
want of ability, want of honesty, or so
on. So it is with all men's institutions ;
their causes are in the mind.
What then are the causes of war ?
If we look at the history of Europe
for the last two thousand years, it is,
with a short respite of the Pax Romana,
a history of incessant wars. What is the
history of these wars ?
Now the general history of all wars is
the same. It is a fight for freedom, and
in the end freedom always wins. I will
give you a few examples.
Rome conquered the European world.
She was able to do so and to maintain
her conquest for a time because her
rule meant freedom. Her civilization and
her ideals were so much truer than that
i8
The Inevitability of War
of any of the surrounding peoples that
her conquest and rule meant a real
progress towards freedom. The peoples
she conquered one after another were
sunk in superstition, were ruled without
any semblance of justice ; and Rome
brought a real advance to all these peoples.
They were wars for freedom, and freedom
won.
When several hundred years later these
conquered peoples rose against Rome and
cast off her rule, they were again at war
for freedom, because Roman rule had
degenerated into a rigid and lifeless sys-
tem and choked all further development
of her conquered peoples. They rebelled
and they won their freedom.
And this is what happened time after
time. It is the history of all wars.
Take the wars of the French Revolution
and Empire. The Revolution was an
intestine war for freedom to throw off
19 2*
The Nature of War and its Causes
the unbearable bonds of Kings by divine
right, of nobles by divine right, of churches
by divine right. It succeeded. The sub-
sequent external wars were to maintain
that freedom they succeeded. The in-
vaders were defeated and destroyed.
Then came a change. Wars still con-
tinued and against the same enemy, but
the roles were reversed. France sought
to dominate and enslave Europe and the
European states fought for freedom. The
Coalition won.
Take for a final example Germany from
1864 and since. The wars of Prussia
in 1864, 1866 and 1870 were wars for
freedom. Germany had to be freed of
Austrian dominance ; she had to reach
the sea ; she had to free herself from
the French threat. Germany won. She
gained her freedom and became a great
nation and free from foreign danger.
But in 1914 the roles are reversed.
20
The Inevitability of War
It is the AUies who are fighting for free-
dom, not only our own but Germany's
also, and it is the Prussian aristocracy
which wishes to enslave the world. The
issue may be long deciding, but the
issue is not in doubt. Freedom will
win.
Freedom always wins in the end. I
know of no conflict between peoples
which has not in the end been won by
freedom. This is the case even more
markedly in those instances which at
first sight would seem contradictions.
There is, for instance, the Boer War.
It seemed a war in which we tried to
deprive a people of their freedom, and
yet we won. But, in fact, the war re-
sulted in the defeat of a small and ignorant
oligarchy and the Union of all South
Africa in a free dominion. It essentially
gave freedom which could have come no
other way.
21
The Nature of War and its Causes
As I have said, every war in the end
results in an advance in freedom, and
I know of no exception.
There then arises the question why,
if this be the case, and it is the case,
after several thousands of years of almost
incessant wars Europe is not yet free.
Why has she continually to fight anew
for freedom ? The answer is inevitable.
Because she does not know how to use
freedom ; because in peace there are
influences that destroy freedom ; be-
cause, no sooner is freedom in one way
acquired by war than a new slavery
arises. For freedom is not an end in
itself, it is only a means to an end. It
is liberty to raise up a new civilization,
to acquire new ideas, new methods, new
objectives. Freedom is only valuable
when you use it to do right. If you do
wrong your freedom rapidly disappears
again.
22
The Inevitability of War
Now that has always been the case.
No sooner was freedom acquired by war
than a state of civilization was set up
that became, in time, unendurable, with
the inevitable result of a new war, foreign
or intestine. No civilization we have
made has been true, based on true ideas,
directed towards a true end. Every
civilization we have seen has become a
slavery and could find its solvent only
in war. When nations are involved in
war it is because their civilization has
proved a failure. This is true not only
of the aggressor but of the defenders.
Consider our state in the summer of
1914.
We called ourselves a democracy, that
is to say, a State in which the will of
the people obtains. Our method of
ascertaining that " will " was by the
election of members into a House of
Commons which we declared was re-
23
The Nature of War and its Causes
presentative of the majesty of the people,
and expressed its wisdom. That was our
theory.
In fact, the House of Commons had
sunk into disrepute with all classes, and
with it the system of election that produced
it. The House itself was widely de-
nounced as a windy humbug, and its
members were so far from being held
to be representative that they were
generally said to have succeeded in their
elections by misrepresentations, and when
elected, to be mere puppets of a secret
caucus.
Ulster was openly preparing to resist
its orders by force, and the rest of Ireland
as openly prepared to attack Ulster.
The labouring classes were discontented
not only with their lot in life, but with
representative institutions, and openly
talked of following Ulster's lead. Even
those who supported the decisions of
24
The Inevitability of War
the present House were dissatisfied with
the system.
We had no real Second Chamber and
none in sight.
Practically everyone condemned our
form of democracy, but no one had any
alternative to propose. Neither France
nor the United States offered us sys-
tems that were any improvement, or
gave a wider satisfaction. On the
contrary.
For there is this further difficulty,
that, even assuming we could discover
a form of government which did give
expression to the considered will of people
on important matters of policy, how could
you secure that the will would be right ?
If the " wise " men have no basis on
which to form a judgment, will the foolish
find one ? As a matter of fact the great
majority of people have neither time,
nor opportunity, nor education, nor wish
25
The Nature of War and its Causes
to form opinions on far-reaching questions,
hke education, or foreign poUcy. They
are quite aware of this themselves, and
they despise a government which consults
them. " Shall we pay dogs to bark and
then bark ourselves ? " they say. So
they either vote blindly or one minor
local question, which they do understand,
decides how they will elect a representa-
tive to deal with Imperial affairs. While
evolution tended to make us more and
more democratic no one had any hope
from democracy, the demos least of all.
So it sought new " cure alls " in Socialism
and Syndicalism.
Civil and industrial war was imminent.
So much for our political edifice.
Our social edifice was not more satis-
factory. Our systems of law, criminal
and civil, and of education and of religion
were widely condemned by all who had
studied them. The gap between classes,
26
The Inevitability of War
instead of decreasing under democracy,
increased.
And most significant, because most
dangerous of all, there was a widespread
sex war.
I am not alluding to the exploits of
the militants, though they were signifi-
cant enough, but to a sex antagonism
that was more or less universal.
The whole relation of man and woman,
in marriage and out of it, was arraigned.
The present laws and conventions are,
on the whole, even worse for men than
for women, and they are the outcome not
of men's wishes or ideas, but of ecclesias-
ticism, whose main supporters have been
women. Yet women have blindly visited
the shortcomings of law and convention
on the men, and under this pretext have
claimed a preponderating voice in the
direction of the state. They have even
hoped, if they got the vote, to change
27
The Nature of War and its Causes
their natures and cease to be women,
and so rob the world of half its organism.
While men have become more and more
dissatisfied with the suffrage as a real
way of ascertaining the will of the people
or obtaining their desires, women have
imagined that if only they could get it,
the millennium would follow. It was a
fight for power, and it was caused by
the intolerable nature of the relationship
of the sexes enforced by conventions and
laws that had no truth in them. The
cause was manifest enough and real
enough, but the cure was not apparent.
The demanded cure would only make
things worse.
Science, which, fifty years ago, was
sure that it had discovered the essential
truths of evolution in natural and sexual
selection, has now abandoned these
explanations almost entirely, and seeks
another explanation in Mendelism, but
28
The Inevitability of War
I think we have given all hope up of
help from scientific men. Even if Mendel-
ism be truer than natural selection, it is a
method, not a cause. Even if you could
discover all the means by which evolution
proceeds, that would not explain the cause
nor the objective of evolution. Science
plays with words no less than theology
and has its priests as theology has.
Even medicine has become bankrupt.
It can diagnose but it cannot tell, except
in a very few cases, the cause of disease.
And it admits it cannot cure. Nature
can cure, but how it cures is not known.
There is no theory of life beneath modern
medicine. So in those cases where it
cannot prevent disease by sanitation, it
is reduced to the simple but deadly
expedient of either giving the patient
the disease by inoculation or of mutilating
the victim by cutting off the diseased
organ. It does even more than this
29
The Nature of War and its Causes
sometimes, it destroys a perfectly healthy
part for fear that sometimes it might
become diseased and then be incurable.
It makes a practice of mutilation. Could
there be a sadder confession of failure
than the state of the medical profession
to-day.
Literature and art were by all admission
in a bad way for want of ideals, and
music had become a chaos.
And worse than all, the general cry of
all but the very young, was that life
was really not worth living. It had
become banal. Everything had been said
and done, and life was dull. The most
significant proof of this is the enormous
interest taken in games, especially in
watching them. Games are an excellent
change for all, but when the interest in
games becomes excessive it means that
life and work have become insipid or
distasteful.
3Q
The Inevitability of War
Materially, our well-being increased by
leaps and bounds, but our civilization
was fast being found out for the failure
that it was.
War was inevitable. We expected civil
war ; we got foreign war.
Now, though we say, and say truly
enough, that in the last resort this war
was forced upon us and we did not desire
it, that does not mean that we were
not in a measure responsible for it. A
nation in the state that we were, is a
danger not merely to itself, but to its
neighbours. It not only cannot fill its
proper place in Europe, but it demoralizes
others. For instance, we knew that the
neutrality of Belgium was necessary to
us. We had guaranteed it. We had
set our hands to a bond we could not
keep. We had incurred a liability we
could not meet. We had no sufficient
army. And if the reason for this were
31
The Nature of War and its Causes
not that our poHticians did not see the
danger, but that the country could not
be made to understand the necessity
for an army large enough to meet our
obligations, it makes no difference. The
intelligence of the people is according to
the education given it. Our civilization
is to blame. Had we had a true civilization
we should have been ready to meet our
obligations, and had this country been able
to make up its obligations on the spot,
this war would not have happened.
And the same remark applies to all
the other countries involved, except
Belgium, who is the victim. Look at
France. Ever since 1870 she has been
only two thirds alive. Her population
has not increased but decreased. She
has not found life worth living and
therefore not worth increasing. Her civil-
ization is played out and she feels it. If
she has not dissolved, it has been external
32
The Inevitability of War
pressure that held her together and not
internal cohesion.
And as to Germany, does she not declare
that life has for long been so intolerable
that she must throw herself into a mad
effort for universal dominion, or perish ?
The utter failure of her own civilization,
which is only our civilization raised to
a higher degree, drives her on, and the
manifest failure in the civilization of her
neighbours gave her hope of winning.
And if she lost well, she only lost what
was not worth keeping life.
War, therefore, comes from a failure
of civilization, not in one Power but in
all. We are involved in a common failure,
for all our civilizations are much the
same. The differences are slight, and
not differences of principle but of method,
degree or detail or race.
We are all to blame and are all to
suffer.
33 3
The Nature of War and its Causes
And after the war what ? How shall
we prevent war in future ?
The war will end in giving us all freedom
in one form. Germany will be freed of
her military caste, France, Belgium and