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REFLECTIONS AND COMMENTS

1865-1895

by EDWIN LAWRENCE GODKIN

TOCHARLES ELIOT NORTON

TO WHOM THE FOUNDATION OF "THE NATION" WASLARGELY DUE, IN GRATEFUL ACKNOWLEDGMENTOF A LONG FRIENDSHIP

CONTENTS

PEACECULTURE AND WARTHE COMPARATIVE MORALITY OF NATIONSTHE "COMIC-PAPER" QUESTIONMR. FROUDE AS A LECTURERMR. HORACE GREELEYTHE MORALS AND MANNERS OF THE KITCHENJOHN STUART MILLPANICSTHE ODIUM PHILOLOGICUMPROFESSOR HUXLEY'S LECTURESCIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCETYNDALL AND THE THEOLOGIANSTHE CHURCH AND SCIENCETHE CHURCH AND GOOD CONDUCTRÔLE OF THE UNIVERSITIES IN POLITICSTHE HOPKINS UNIVERSITYTHE SOUTH AFTER THE WARCHROMO-CIVILIZATION"THE SHORT-HAIRS" AND "THE SWALLOW-TAILS"JUDGES AND WITNESSES"THE DEBTOR CLASS"COMMENCEMENT ADMONITION"ORGANS"EVIDENCE ABOUT CHARACTERPHYSICAL FORCE IN POLITICS"COURT CIRCLES"LIVING IN EUROPE AND GOING TO ITCARLYLE'S POLITICAL INFLUENCETHE EVOLUTION OF THE SUMMER RESORTSUMMER RESTTHE SURVIVAL OF TYPESWILL WIMBLES

REFLECTIONS AND COMMENTS

1865-1895

PEACE

The horrors of war are just now making a deeper impression thanever on the popular mind, owing to the close contact with thebattle-field and the hospital into which the railroad and thetelegraph and the newspaper have brought the public of allcivilized countries. Wars are fought out now, so to speak, underevery man's and woman's eyes; and, what is perhaps of nearly asmuch importance, the growth of commerce and manufactures, and theincreased complication of the social machine, render the smallestderangement of it anywhere a concern and trouble to all nations.The consequence is that the desire for peace was never so deep asit is now, and the eagerness of all good people to find out someother means of deciding international disputes than mutualkilling never so intense.

And yet the unconsciousness of the true nature and difficultiesof the problem they are trying to solve, which is displayed bymost of those who make the advocacy of peace their special work,is very discouraging. We are far from believing that theincessant and direct appeals to the public conscience on thesubject of war are not likely in the long run to produce someeffect; but it is very difficult to resist the conclusion thatthe efforts of the special advocates of peace have thus farhelped to spread and strengthen the impression that there is noadequate substitute for the sword as an arbiter between nations,or, in other words, to harden the popular heart on the subject ofmilitary slaughter. It is certain that, during the last fiftyyears, the period in which peace societies have been at work,armies have been growing steadily larger, the means of destructionhave been multiplying, and wars have been as frequent and asbloody as ever before; and, what is worse, the popular heart goesinto war as it has never done in past ages.

The great reason why the more earnest enemies of war have notmade more progress toward doing away with it, has been that, fromthe very outset of their labors down to the present moment, theyhave devoted themselves mainly to depicting its horrors and todenouncing its cruelty. In other words, they almost invariablyapproach it from a side with which nations actually engaged in itare just as familiar as anybody, but which has f

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