Peace and War

the distinction between the two human activities, the utilitarian or vital and the moral, throws light on the ideas of war and peace. It might seem that, if reality is at every moment an indiscerptible rhythm of peace and war, it is impossible theoretically to distinguish the two states, since they are mutually indispensable. They are so, but in virtue of our fundamental distinction they can be distinguished empirically, since in a state of war the utilitarian or egoistic principle is dominant and in peace that of morality. From this it follows that in itself the nature of war is not immoral but amoral, and hence the vanity of expecting to judge or define or mitigate its methods on moral principles. Even when a ban is laid on certain weapons, and is actually respected in warfare, neither is done out of respect for the moral law, as many would like to persuade us and we might like to believe. The motive is still that of domination, which hesitates at certain actions, since, though they may bring some momentary advantage, they would excite reprisals or perhaps moral indignation. And morality is a spiritual force always to be reckoned with, though it does not touch the hard hearts of those whose only aim is to annihilate the enemy. But. the courts, trials, convictions, punishments which are often threatened for enemies accused of moral or legal crimes have the essential defect that they impute responsibility in a sphere where morality has no place and legal ordinance is either suspended or completely wanting, so that a necessary condition of responsibility is absent. In fact such threats are seldom carried out; and when they seem to have some fulfilment it is not a manifestation of legal or moral justice but of passion, uncontrollable anger and 118revenge. The conqueror has, no doubt, the right and the duty to adopt all the technical means necessary for securing his victory and founding the new order firmly, but only so far as that is done from considerations of prudence and as the means to a higher standard of morality. If he departs from this rule, as has been often seen, he only sows the seeds of new wars, which will soon bear fruit. The complementary truth is that in peace the principle of force, which in war is dominant, has no place. Here its only function is to defend the recognised moral order; and this is the condemnation of all so-called coercive governments, which provide no real peace since, as the saying goes, you can do everything with bayonets except sit on them. Even the absolute governments which we have to recognise in history relied on some moral prestige—such as the sacred or priestly character of a king, the cult of the divine emperor, reverence for ancient custom, or worship of a man of genius—rather than on sheer force of arms, and only so could they win consent. When such moral forces, whether beliefs, worship or confidence, failed, such governments failed too. It is hardly necessary to remark that our fundamental distinction between peace and war, as two elements inherent in reality, each giving birth to the other, excludes the idea of ‘perpetual peace’ ¹ which is self-contradictory as are all ideas that similarly attempt to break or alter the rhythm of life. Man’s nature, and indeed that of the universe, necessitates both together, as was already seen in antiquity by Heraclitus. It is more useful here to recognise that, beneath all the illogical formulas and the ill-fated efforts of propaganda and international associations for peace, there breathes, mixed with sentimentality and rhetoric, a generous aspiration worthy of more systematic formulation and more promising political methods, In times of peace, warlike passion, which is always chafing in men’s bosoms, is curbed and mastered, though not stifled or suppressed, by the moral or ethico-political forces and by vigorous minds. Such minds have learnt from experience that the surest course to avoid the shipwreck of civil war is the course of liberty. They let these latent conflicts fight it out under the ægis of the constitution, and so permit the attainment of all the needs or ideals which can be 119satisfied or realised, more or less readily, in changing historical situations. The same course is followed by a wise ruler in his foreign policy; in his desire for peace he of course tries to satisfy the needs of his own people but is careful not to shut the door to those of others. He is a supporter of peace in so far as he must study how to make his foreign policy more moral, more consistent in its operation, more effective and far-sighted than in the past, embodying it in institutions, varying from time to time, but more solid than before. In such an enterprise, for which our times now call on Europe and the whole world, the cold calculation of interest will certainly not suffice, though that is a secondary motive; we must have the abundantia cordis of a human and a Christian heart. Such a heart will feel the baseness and deceitfulness of the pharisaical attitude to other states which was at one time assumed to be proper. Every state then vindicated the enjoyment of liberty and prosperity for itself and left its neighbours free to be enslaved or ground down by poverty; its monstrous hypocrisy was to behave morally to its own people and egoistically towards others, at once civilised and tolerating or abetting barbarism, utterly careless of any sufferings but its own. Such obstinate egoism endangered even its own boasted position of privilege, which could not maintain itself when enclosed, jeopardised and stifled by the surrounding misery and rebellion and barbarism. Even the individual man cannot be moral if he tries to live for himself alone, cultivating either a cloistered virtue, which is nothing but pride, or a narrowly restricted benevolence. Morality is only real when it is a relation to all men, collaborating and striving with them for common humanity. Only by this daily increasing civilisation can peace be long maintained and continually restored on ever firmer foundations. It will not be a perpetual peace indeed, but at least it will not be an empty dream; it will be practicable and real peace, the only kind which the world-spirit allows and ordains, a peace which tames war but cannot absolutely prevent it from erupting now and again in fits of its native savagery if such is God’s will.