.MILITARISM 
 
 fill/// I / / f 
 
 H Contribution to tbe peace Crusafce 
 
 BY 
 
 GUGLIELMO FERRERO 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 L. C. PAGE & COMPANY 
 
 HLCQC9II1 
 
OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
 : ^UFORN^ 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 THIS translation of my book, " II Militarism," published in 
 Italy a year ago, is really almost a new work, because the 
 greater part of the Italian text has been entirely recast, and 
 profoundly modified, and whole chapters have been added. 
 The events that have occurred since its publication, continued 
 meditation on the great problems of which it treats, some 
 of the objections raised by critics during the animated dis- 
 cussions that broke out in Italy on its appearance, have 
 induced me to try to improve my work by making these 
 changes. 
 
 I have written the book in order to contribute my quota 
 to the grand work of pacifying civilized nations, entered 
 upon by so many enlightened spirits, and I agree with them 
 in holding that a general European war, especially a war 
 between England and France, would be a world calamity, and 
 would produce incalculable evils without recompense. 
 
 I venture to hope that my book may prove a useful 
 contribution to the noble crusade of peace. In this spirit 
 I have written it, and in this spirit I now offer it to my 
 English readers. 
 
 GUGLIELMO FERRERO. 
 
 TURIN (ITALY), January 31, 1899. 
 
 PUBLISHER'S NOTE TO THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION. 
 
 THIS being a translation from a Standard Italian work, it has been 
 thought best to leave the text exactly as in the original, without 
 attempting either to bring it up to the present date, or to correct the 
 occasional inaccuracies which are generally to be found in works written 
 from the foreign point of view. 3 
 
 October, 1902, 
 
 214420 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. PEACE AND WAR AT THE END OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 9 
 
 II. HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR . -53 
 
 III. THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS . . . .91 
 
 IV. MILITARISM IN THE ANCIENT WORLD . ... 117 
 V. THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 137 
 
 VI. NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS . .... 167 
 
 VII. MILITARISM AND C^ESARISM IN FRANCE . . 199 
 
 VIII. THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY , -239 
 
 IX. MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND GERMANY . 273 
 
 X. PAX CHRISTIANA 291 
 
PEACE AND WAR AT THE END OF 
 THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 
 
CHAPTER I 
 
 PEACE AND WAR AT THE END OF THE NINETEENTH 
 CENTURY 
 
 FREQUENTLY, when I have remarked in conversation, " War 
 is losing much of its pristine importance in modern civilized 
 life : whether it be that no longer such great odds depend on 
 it, or because the moral conscience of man is perfecting / 
 itself," I have been answered: "This is an illusion that 
 always arises on the eve of a great war. We are on the eve 
 of a terrible one which will transform Europe into a huge 
 battlefield. Man is born brutal, he is by nature a wolf : 
 how could you change him into a lamb ? Civilization only 
 renders the instruments of war more terrible in the 
 hands of man. So long as there shall be men on the earth 
 there will be wars, and the advance of morality can do 
 nothing against the inexorable law of force which domi- 
 nates the world." 
 
 We will not dwell on the fact that for the past twenty years 
 this same thing has been repeated that we are on the eve of 
 an universal war. If there is a fragment of truth in this argu- 
 ment, it is that the alarming ferocity innate in man has not 
 been one iota diminished by the civilization of the nineteenth 
 century. Without doubt customs have changed for the better 
 
; : v * { : >\ - JKILtTA RISM 
 
 since it rarely happens now that an ordinary individual 
 kills or injures his fellow ; indeed, it has become a rare 
 thing for a man to come to a violent death. Two or three 
 centuries ago, on the contrary, assaults and murders were 
 common occurrences, little more than everyday incidents 
 in high life no less than among the people ; and we can be 
 certain that had we lived in the seventeenth century, many 
 of us by this time would already have hacked the body of 
 some fellow with sword or dagger, or in some manner have 
 stained our hands with human blood. But the modifica- 
 tion of customs does not imply any diminution in the 
 innate ferocity of man. As dynamite can be stored in ware- 
 houses left dormant for years, transported from spot to 
 spot without danger, and yet retain its orignal power, if 
 ignited, to uproot mountains, so it is with human ferocity. 
 It lies dormant in the civilized man of our century, but 
 beware if a spark comes to kindle its terrible destructive 
 force. 
 
 It is not, therefore, rash to suppose that a diabolical 
 entanglement of violent passions and errors urges men to war, 
 since for so many centuries, in so many terrific combats, man 
 has exhibited so much ferocity and such a blind thirst for 
 destruction. But even admitting that this be true : what does 
 it prove ? The spirit of man is replete with bad passions 
 and exaggerated ideas, civilization is only a progressive 
 repression of these bad passions, and a progressive rectifica- 
 tion of these errors. The problem of existence for every 
 individual is the same : it can be summed up in these terms : 
 to seek pleasure, to avoid pain. Now the problem of existence 
 is the same for a society as it is for the individuals who form 
 it. The whole existence of society is an effort whether 
 profitable or futile towards the acquirement of happiness, 
 
PEACE AND WAR 13 
 
 which is the same as saying towards justice and truth, 
 every increase in the general happiness of a nation being 
 accompanied by some progress in justice and knowledge, 
 The whole history of man is but the history of the 
 attempts made to find a more complete solution of this 
 problem ; what we call the advances of civilization are simply 
 the successive and laborious approaches to a more and more 
 perfect and durable solution of this great problem : " to be * 
 happy" not each of us for himself, but altogether, in the 
 community of social life. Thus we see that civilization consists 
 principally in an increase of universal happiness which is only 
 to be reached through moral and intellectual progress, by 
 means of which so many evils born of passion and error are 
 mitigated and by degrees destroyed. Why should not war be 
 amongst these evils ? Certainly any one who considers war as 
 a form of struggle which is the negation of justice for in war 
 the morally superior and morally inferior have equal chances^ 
 of victory could not understand how the progress of justice 
 could fail to diminish or abolish it, for long periods at least, 
 from civilization. No evil, indeed, is capable of amelioration, 
 unless it has in it some element of good however slight this 
 element may be. But if it were possible to prove that war, 
 in its final results, does not absolutely deny justice, that the 
 ultimate victory belongs to the communities which have the 
 greater share of right and truth on their side, it would then be 
 evident that war is rather one of the many vehicles of truth 
 and justice than a negation thereof; that it tends rather to 
 increase than to diminish the sum of justice in the world, and 
 is therefore at times a factor of civilization and moral progress. 
 But for this same reason it is evident that war instead of being 
 eternal, tends at some time to disappear, when civilization 
 will have increased owing to multiple factors, war amongst 
 
14 MILITARISM 
 
 others so as no longer to tolerate the infinite evil which is 
 in war. If all this were true, war would almost be subject to 
 a law of self-annihilation. 
 
 II 
 
 But is this true ? 
 
 As a rule war is considered simply as a manifestation of 
 brute force an encounter between two armies, in which that 
 which is best armed and guided by the ablest general 
 conquers ; a true assertion, but an insufficient one one, how- 
 ever, with which most people content themselves, apparently 
 satisfied with the idea that the success of the issue depends 
 on the ability of the general, the quality of the armament, the 
 sum a nation can spend in arms, on the valour of the soldiers, 
 the superficial and frothy patriotic education provided in schools 
 and barracks. Instead of this, war is an encounter between 
 two States, and it is supported with less suffering and greater 
 probability of victory by the State which is governed with 
 greater justice, and in which the relations between men and 
 social classes lead to a greater degree of .loyalty. To some 
 countries war is a light-hearted matter, so to say ; to others 
 a sad one. It is a light or a sad undertaking to a country 
 according as its government is good or bad, according to 
 the degree of justice in its social system. Amongst civilized 
 and Christian nations to-day, the more unjustly a people is 
 governed that is to say, the more it is dominated by petty 
 and selfish oligarchies, and the more despotic and violent 
 is its administration so in proportion is war a ruinous and 
 dangerous undertaking for it. On the other hand, a people 
 governed more justly, that is, by a more liberal, economical 
 and honest government, is less in danger of the moral and 
 
PEACE AND WAR 15 
 
 economical oppression of one caste over another, whether 
 t'-'s be exercised by means of or outside of political power, 
 .-nd it is in a position to contemplate far more serenely 
 the dangers and hardships entailed by war. In other words, 
 the State which proves strongest in war is that in which 
 :- orals and life at ordinary times are the furthest removed 
 from the cruelty, egoism, and violence which during war 
 become the normal conditions of life and action. 
 
 Ill 
 
 A proof of the truth of this affirmation is to be found in 
 the last struggle between civilized and Christian nations 
 the Spanish-American War. 
 
 Can we consider the United States of North America as 
 a model of a society founded on justice ? It would certainly 
 be imprudent to answer with an unqualified Yes, because 
 his society is too unequal a conglomeration of good and evil, 
 of vice and virtue. How can one give an unreserved opinion 
 on a nation which possesses the most perfect penitentiary 
 institutions in the world for the shelter and education of 
 criminals, and which at the same time tolerates the arbitrary 
 punishment of crime by infuriated mobs ? A nation which 
 protects the rights of inventive genius so rigorously and 
 wisely by the law of patents, a society which has thus reached 
 a most perfect comprehension of this last and subtlest ideal 
 of property, whose immaterial essence so many nations still 
 fail to conceive, but which countenances also the public 
 organization of those associations of malefactors which are 
 allowed to impose the most monstrous levies on the popula- 
 tions of entire cities by means of intrigue and fraud ? A 
 nation where the laws punish duels as homicide, and where 
 
1 6 MILITARISM 
 
 year after year the massacre of tens of thousands of men by 
 railway accidents, due to the criminal negligence of rapacious 
 companies, is tolerated ? A nation whose Government retains 
 so much of the wolf nature inherent in the worst European 
 Governments, which allows the most colossal squandering of 
 public moneys, which practises those many administrative 
 artifices by which the true sense, theoretically so clear, of 
 meum and teum is obscured, such as that most ingenious of all, 
 protectionism ? 
 
 But the gravity of a social evil should always be measured 
 in proportion to the force of resistance of the society which 
 it afflicts. If there are many iniquities in American society, 
 if abominable and unavenged oppression of the strong over 
 the weak is not lacking, and if many means are known for 
 corrupting justice and robbery, and deceiving one's fellows ; 
 if certain of these evils appear to have grown there to a 
 formidable degree unknown in our countries ; nevertheless, 
 in American society is to be found a recompense far greater - 
 that of living amidst far happier natural, social, and historical 
 conditions. 
 
 The most essential social bond, which exists as a definite 
 standard of the degree of justice and therefore of civilization, 
 which a community has reached, is the remuneration of labour. 
 A country may possess one institution or another the family, 
 education, penal or civil justice better regulated than in other 
 states ; but the excellence of these institutions proves nothing 
 for the moral superiority of that nation, if its system of re- 
 muneration of labour is more iniquitous than in other states 
 where these social institutions are ruder and more imperfect. 
 In the United States, owing to the abundance of land, the 
 relative but not excessive scarcity of capital and men, human 
 work obtains magnificent remuneration ; and obtains it, at 
 
PEACE AND WAR I 7 
 
 least in certain parts of the Union, in the midst of a mar- 
 vellous and almost perfectly organized civilization. The 
 fabulous prodigality with which the earth pours from her full 
 bosom, after an accumulation of thousands of centuries, the 
 first abundance of her treasures ; the possession of the 
 elaborate culture of our civilization free from so many 
 atavisms, prejudices, and dead traditions which encumber 
 the foundations of our society ; the extreme freedom and 
 ease of the individual, not handicapped as we are in changing 
 occupations, habits, social caste, received ideals, and social 
 axioms by a social tradition, become almost sacred ; the 
 innumerable opportunities in the midst of such constant 
 material and intellectual change for the association of indi- 
 vidual talents and energies ; the prodigious rapidity with 
 which these combinations can be formed and dissolved ; the 
 frequent return of opportunities brought about by the rapidly 
 revolving wheel of fortune ; the instability of all things of 
 good but no less of bad ; the purely temporary nature 
 of all conditions ; the almost complete want of any definite 
 solutions ; of necessity imply that there is no defeat without 
 reconquest, no decay without rebirth. These conditions 
 prevailing in America, render it easy to any ordinarily intelli- 
 gent and energetic man to obtain for his work remunera- 
 tion which errs rather on the side of being beyond than 
 beneath his deserts ; never so low as to force him to live 
 without other satisfaction than that of not dying of hunger ; 
 without rendering possible, however, those fabulous remunera- 
 tions to be obtained in new countries, still in their infancy 
 and almost uninhabited demoralizing remunerations on 
 account of their liberality, which are only possible where 
 civilization is not yet fully organized. It is a matter of small 
 importance, then, if American industrial protectionism, for the 
 
 B 
 
1 8 MILITARISM 
 
 benefit of a few, renders many things unreasonably expensive ; 
 if the money collected by taxes is often spent badly and 
 frequently misappropriated ; if oligarchies of capitalists impose 
 levies on the population by means of monopolies. Many 
 may obtain enormous profits from these iniquities, but without 
 reducing the condition of others to such a point as only to 
 allow of their not dying of hunger. Vast industrialism 
 disciplines but does not degrade a nation. Indeed, the fact 
 that American capital is employed by preference in the 
 creation of aristocratic industries, like the mechanical ones, 
 which demand a great deal of instruction and a certain 
 intellectual superiority in the worker, and that the good 
 instinct of the whole people makes them give their preference 
 in the market to articles of the highest quality, both in material 
 and workmanship, has resulted in producing a working class 
 composed, not merely of rude weavers and spinners, of ignorant 
 labourers employed in the simplest trades, who exercise nothing 
 but brute force as happens in many European countries. We 
 find here, on the contrary, what I might be allowed to call an 
 aristocracy of labour, well educated, and used to an almost 
 luxurious standard of life, a class of workers, in consequence, 
 who cannot be too much imposed on by intrigues of capital 
 without risk of lowering the quality of the work demanded of 
 them. Brutal and degrading works devolve upon negroes, 
 Chinese, and Italian emigrants. It is true that the workers 
 of the United States are, like others, subject to periods of 
 enforced idleness, proportionate to the immense and rapid 
 advance of their industrial speculations, and consequently 
 more intense than similar European crises ; but the crisis and 
 misery are of short duration, for the workers who are super- 
 fluous in one trade rapidly turn to another which lacks 
 hands. 
 
PEACE AND WAR 1 9 
 
 The lot of the middle class, amidst considerable adversity, 
 is equally good. 
 
 Thanks to the almost complete lack of intellectual pro- 
 tectionism that is, of academical degrees which ensure the 
 monopoly of certain professions thanks, in consequence, to 
 the lack of a government curriculum of unprofitable and 
 obligatory studies, America is exempt from an intellectual 
 proletariat and from the declassds, the chronic disease of the 
 middle classes in Europe. Let him who can do a thing well 
 step forward and do it, no one will question where he learnt 
 it : such is the degree required of an American engineer, 
 barrister, clerk, or employe. And as the opportunities to do 
 well are innumerable, every one can develop the talents with 
 which Nature has endowed him, changing his occupation 
 according to circumstances and opportunity. Whereas for 
 a young man belonging to the middle class in continental 
 Europe, the choice of a profession is a solemn deed, entailing 
 practically the consecration of his whole future to one object 
 from that hour deemed immutable, and against which his 
 will from thenceforward will have but little force. For the 
 American this choice is always transitory and variable in 
 accordance with circumstances ; he is never a victim of the 
 tyranny of a choice made once for all for his whole life, often 
 whilst still immature ; and he rarely finds himself in either of 
 those two situations so ruinous to the middle classes in 
 Europe, more especially in the Latin countries : the absolute 
 uncertainty of success, and the utter despair of ever recovering 
 from a sudden ruin. Where all professions are handsomely 
 remunerated so as to allow to all a luxurious life, an 
 American is always ready to see the particular stream at 
 which he has been drinking dried up, and be prepared 
 to pack up his belongings and set off in search of another. 
 
2O MILITARISM 
 
 In recompense, he need never feel himself condemned 
 to the long-life misery of being tied down to a profession, 
 chosen badly but irrevocably, or to the wretched pursuit 
 of a dying industry ruined by competition or economic 
 evolution. The strong spiritual energies of this class, con- 
 stantly fostered by surrounding circumstances, occasionally 
 give rise to violent tempests, it is true, and bring the scum to 
 the surface, but they never rot in a state of pestilential inertia 
 from which exhale the vapours of dark pessimism and the 
 fevers of vain revolutionary ideas. The sight of the soul 
 remains always clear and unveiled, though it often be capable 
 of penetrating none but material objects ; the will remains 
 young and active, because constantly exercised by the simple 
 and healthy gymnastics of action. 
 
 And thus it is that work, the great trial that God, accord- 
 ing to the Bible, imposed on the human race, the servile yoke 
 which man has borne for so many ages, and to escape which 
 classes and nations have spilt so much blood, changes its 
 nature, and instead of degrading man, ennobles him. A new 
 passion, common to all the Anglo-Saxon races, has become 
 the mainspring of the morality of a civilization, new also, 
 itself the ardent passion for work, the ambition to reach by 
 its means an excellence hitherto unknown. Nothing is more 
 difficult to man than moderation. Instead of seeking happi- 
 ness in the wise exercise of his forces, and in the healthy 
 indulgence of divers pleasures which demand a certain effort 
 of will and self-control, he seeks it in the frantic pursuit of 
 one particular pleasure, which, though frequently unhealthy 
 and dangerous, gives inebriating joy for a minute, and dis- 
 penses with the necessity of tedious self-control. Thus hard 
 but not too exhausting work, alternated with sufficient repose, 
 would procure for man the most durable and pleasurable 
 
PEACE AND WAR 21 
 
 mode of life ; but he, on the contrary, is rather inclined to 
 yield to the seductions of the enfeebling pleasures of repose 
 prolonged beyond the period necessary for the recuperation 
 of his forces that is, of absolute laziness or of the sublime 
 and fatal voluptuousness to be obtained through the abuse of 
 his intellectual forces, in an attempt to multiply his efforts and 
 successes in the struggle for life. The excess of labour can 
 procure a voluptuous spiritual exaltation in which man feels 
 as though his energies were doubled, in which fatigue appears 
 delight, so easy and pleasant does work become to him : a 
 delight which few can resist by taking necessary repose, for 
 the exaltation of overwork cannot last indefinitely, and nearly 
 always terminates in painful physical and mental disease. 
 Thus whilst moderate labour may be healthily pleasurable, 
 absolute idleness or the abuse of work are morbid passions ; 
 and we find that in certain communities Turkey, for instance 
 absolute idleness is regarded as the supreme pleasure of 
 existence, and is led by those who are considered perfect and 
 happy the highest classes and in other countries, such as 
 England and. the United States, the greatest joy of life is 
 found in hard work, in the utmost exercise of the human 
 faculties within the bounds of possibility. 
 
 In the American the passion for work is combined with the 
 pride in doing his best, the ambition not to allow himself to 
 be overcome by any difficulties, and to reach an unsurpassed 
 grade of excellence. All men work with a view to some 
 reward ; but some are satisfied with pay, others, besides at 
 money reward, seek to satisfy their own amour-propre } and to 
 obtain the admiration of others. It is the same with the work 
 of nations, and indeed, from the reward generally sought 
 after, the quality of the work may be judged. Although 
 Americans are commonly accused of cupidity, their work 
 
22 MILITARISM 
 
 ranks among the most disinterested, because they aim not 
 only at accumulating money, but also, they display an in- 
 satiable thirst for perfection, which tends to idealize their 
 work ; and into nearly all they do they put extra labour, not 
 with the object of gaining more money, but of improving the 
 quality of the work. The decisive proof of the superiority 
 of American work was given by industrial protectionism 
 which, in continental Europe, has lowered the standard of 
 goods, because the manufacturers, content with the easy 
 profits obtained by protectionism, consider themselves exempt 
 from the trouble of perfecting their own goods. American 
 industries, on the contrary the mechanical ones more parti- 
 cularly have reached a marvellous degree of perfection, not- 
 withstanding protectionism, because the manufacturers were 
 stimulated, not merely by a desire to gain money, but also by 
 the ambition of displaying a degree of excellence in their 
 productions till then unknown to the world. American goods, 
 moreover, have notoriously the reputation of costliness and 
 high finish. 
 
 No doubt this passion for work and this ambition for 
 excellence, so deep-rooted in the American and English 
 mind, may be due to the fact that work is not too hard and 
 its remuneration good. The Americans are made of the 
 same clay as other white men, and great hardship in work 
 and very poor recompense for it would have created in them, 
 as in other civilized peoples, insupportable weariness of 
 labour and indifference to its quality. But as luckily for 
 them this is not so, the passion for work and its excellence 
 became the ruling force of their nation, and the moral 
 basis of their society, for to these two sentiments are 
 attributable the greatest qualities and the worst defects of 
 the American amongst their defects, the weakness of 
 
PEACE AND WAR 23 
 
 family ties, the inordinate admiration of success, and the 
 lack of scruples in the struggle ; amongst their good qualities, 
 their force of will, their courage, their strong spirit of social 
 solidarity and justice, the capacity to act on other than 
 directly personal motives and interests. 
 
 What power does not this sentiment give to American and 
 English society? The greatness of a nation depends on a 
 high standard of moral solidarity, and this is high only where 
 each respects in others the rights he himself claims, and 
 admits for himself the same duties which he would impose 
 upon others under similar circumstances ; it arises from the 
 recognition of the fact that if men differ from one another in 
 talent, culture, and wealth, they are nevertheless morally 
 equal, and that no one of them is morally bound to serve his 
 fellow without receiving just and equivalent remuneration. 
 Where this sentiment of the moral equality of men is most 
 deeply felt, every one resents the injustice done to others, and 
 in thought and action aims at social justice. But the con- 
 ditions most favourable to the development of this sentiment 
 are those under which no one depends for his livelihood on 
 the capricious benevolence of others, but like the American 
 and Englishmen, only on his own capacities to serve in some 
 way his fellows, receiving their services in exchange, and 
 these not measured arbitrarily by some power outside himself, 
 but governed by his own judgment. This liberty develops 
 in him the sense of moral dignity, which is the backbone of 
 the human character and of the sentiment of moral equality. 
 When, on the contrary, men depend for their livelihood on 
 the caprice of others, the patron claims for himself other 
 rights than he recognizes in his protege. When the protege 
 admits this, there is born the sentiment known as servility 
 the protege acquiescing in the fact that the patron on whom he 
 
24 MILITARISM 
 
 depends has the licence to commit iniquities and to be over- 
 bearing. These things may annoy him when he is the direct 
 victim, but do not offend his torpid sense of justice when 
 inflicted on others, and indeed in the long run he often 
 grows indifferent. But the man who is alive to the sense of 
 his moral equality with others does not bow to injustice, for 
 this sentiment becomes such a stimulus to his energies that 
 it generates in him an insatiable desire to perfect his own 
 conditions and those of others, and to free them from the 
 ever-diminishing degree of injustice which, to his refined 
 conscience, appear more intolerable the meaner they are 
 a desire which he satisfies in diverse ways, and which 
 maintains in a free society a continuous and lively circula- 
 tion of ideas, -and an interest in moral and social reform. 
 Indifference to injustice, on the contrary, renders man 
 apathetic and lazy, leading to aimlessness in life and 
 inertness of intellect, as we shall better demonstrate in speak- 
 ing of Spain, in societies organized, not in accordance with 
 principles of liberty, but of protection. 
 
 But in the American the sentiment of social solidarity is 
 strengthened by the proud ambition never to give way to 
 obstacles, and to aim always at the highest perfection in all 
 things. This introduces a new altruistic stimulus to life, 
 rendering man capable of acting from other than selfish 
 motives. If this stimulus, born of pride, cannot be considered 
 especially noble, it is nevertheless a precious one if we 
 consider the gross egoism of man. It is always a great thing 
 to raise man from his native selfishness, if only by means of 
 pride ; and still greater if his ambition to conquer is stimu- 
 lated, not with a view to obtaining the good opinion of 
 others, but of satisfying his own. Thus it is with the 
 American who has in him, in his pride to succeed well in all 
 
PEACE AND WAR 2$ 
 
 he undertakes, the chief incentive to raise himself from the 
 pettiness of private interest, and to labour not only for him- 
 self but also for a perfection in which he will find none but 
 ideal satisfaction. 
 
 In short, what has made American society appear to 
 Europeans in the light of an enchanted world, is that it 
 combines two qualities which seemed each naturally to 
 exclude the other by absolute contrariety : the refinement of 
 culture and morals only possible to a long-established 
 civilization, and the freedom of the individual from those 
 oppressive historical, political, moral, and intellectual tyran- 
 nies which the State accumulates and imposes on all our 
 anciently civilized countries. Hence arises the marvellous 
 range of moral energies in the individual, which, in the 
 United States, vents itself in an unmeasured ambition to do 
 great things, and to which the benignity of surrounding 
 Nature gives such full satisfaction. Who has not heard say 
 that in America the dimensions of .everything were designed 
 by men with double or triple sight? An aristocracy of 
 wealth served by an infinite mass of inanimate slaves, 
 animated by a soul of steam or electricity, which spare their 
 masters the trouble even of slight exertion : this is the ideal 
 of life to the American, to satisfy which his ingenuity 
 conceives and constructs every year a prodigious number 
 of machines to perform the greatest and the meanest 
 of services to convey electricity across continents, to squash 
 flies, and to clean shoes. Everything there is on a 
 gigantic scale : the newspapers print sufficient paper every 
 day to envelop the world ; their houses rival the tower 
 of Babel ; their great offices have the dimensions of cities ; 
 donations to public schools can be reckoned by tens of 
 millions of dollars, and the fortunes of the very rich by 
 
26 MILITARISM 
 
 thousands. This is the modern form taken by that instinct 
 of greatness which in the past gave rise to the mightiest 
 aristocratic creations of history, then directed towards art 
 and now to mechanical industry ; that same instinct which 
 led the Romans to create the Colosseum and the Baths, the 
 Venetians to create the Grand Canal, 'the Florentines Santa 
 Maria del Fiore, and which now leads the Americans to 
 create a world where real things have taken the proportions 
 we behold. These grandiose aristocracies so prodigal of 
 beauty, wealth, and grandeur pass away, because the 
 benignity of the natural and social conditions amidst which 
 they grow are rapidly exhausted ; and so also the day will 
 come when the population of the United States will have 
 multiplied a hundred-fold, and the earth will be a little tired, 
 and then the Americans also will have to be more economical. 
 Then our descendants, when recollecting the fabulous prodi- 
 gality of the past, will receive an impression analogous to 
 that which we receive when looking back on the princely 
 grandeur of Venice ; they will find in them both two 
 different forms of the same sentiment, the ambition for great- 
 ness, which at times takes hold of social communities and 
 entire nations, and whose first incentive in the Americans 
 was fundamental justice and the splendid liberality of the 
 remuneration given to human work. 
 
 Thus social iniquities in America are as cyclones that rise, 
 go their way, annihilating men and their work along the course 
 of their terrible progress, and then dissolve into nothing. 
 In a word, iniquity is one of the violent and intermittent 
 forms of evil, like fire, and tempests and earthquakes amongst 
 physical phenomena, and acute and mortal diseases amongst 
 the phenomena of organic life. The most terrible of all, I 
 hear some one exclaim. Indeed no: the most terrible in 
 
PEACE AND W 'A R 2j 
 
 appearance, perhaps, but the most innocent in reality. The 
 violent forms of evil wrench some fruit from the tree of life, 
 break a few branches, denude it of some beautiful leaves, and 
 this is the extent of the evil of which they are capable. The 
 really terrible forms of evil are slow and continuous : not 
 those which annihilate, but those which insidiously corrupt 
 life ; those which attack the root, and diffuse themselves 
 upwards from it, poisoning the purest lymph in the live 
 trunk. The terrible in life and nature is not the violent 
 outburst of evil in passing devastations, but the slow and 
 continuous spread of malignant essences, which continuously 
 distil in the secret recesses of being, and spread by means of 
 the most subtle natural influences through the veins of creation. 
 The fury of a storm destroys pastures, cattle, houses : many 
 people die in consequence of it, much property is destroyed ; 
 but calm returns shortly, and only a vague recollection of 
 the tempest remains. But in the countries which nature has 
 for centuries inoculated with the germs of fever, where man 
 finds himself attacked by an enemy always present and 
 invisible ; where he breathes the fever the earth exhales at 
 sunrise and sundown, and drinks fever dissolved in water and 
 in the juice of fruits ; where whole populations die slowly, 
 without having received any external shock ; the poison, 
 secreted and absorbed for centuries by the earth, destroys 
 their constitutions by slow degrees. 
 
 IV 
 
 This is the reason why Spain is so much less happy than 
 the United States. Iniquity does not burst forth there in / 
 transitory furies, but it exhales from the earth and slowly 
 poisons like a miasma. An old society leaning on pillars 
 of injustice, which has grown darker from century to century, 
 
28 MILITARISM 
 
 bolstered up by the dust of innumerable iniquities, from 
 this earth poisoned slowly, molecule by molecule, exhales a 
 malaria whence all the classes which build up Spanish society 
 must perish, unable to find the conditions necessary for 
 healthy development. 
 
 The main characteristic of Spanish society is that it is 
 formed, not on principles of liberty, but of protection, for the 
 greater number, more especially of the easy and educated 
 class, who form the morality and culture of a country, and 
 depend for existence not on their own labour, but on the 
 caprice of others. It is this which renders unjust the 
 remuneration of labour. Men find little opportunity to do 
 anything in Spain, because a few, protected by the State, 
 have usurped unjust reward, greater than is due to their 
 merit, thereby diminishing the recompense available to others 
 to a degree that renders work repugnant. Spain is apparently 
 ruled by a parliament ; but this regime covers a hidden caste 
 despotism, because the most essential condition to liberty as 
 demonstrated by a great Italian writer on political science, 
 Gaetano Mosca l the plurality of political forces in the govern- 
 ment of a society, is totally lacking. In other words, all the 
 classes or social groups who, owing to wealth or culture, are 
 in a position to direct or misdirect public affairs in Spain, 
 form part of or are interested in the Government, and by 
 means of it they grasp or seek to grasp an undue reward for 
 their services. The nobility, which consists almost entirely 
 of proprietors of arable land, is in need of Government 
 protection, by means of taxation, against the competition 
 of American grain. The great financiers accumulate wealth 
 principally by speculating in public finances. The great in- 
 dustrialists and merchants grow rich illicitly by the monopolies 
 * In his book " Element! di Scienza politica" (Turin, 1896), 
 
PEACE AND WAR 29 
 
 and protection conceded by the Government. The middle 
 class largely depends on public appointments and politics, for 
 parliament is composed of lawyers, journalists, and jobbers, 
 who live by defending the great financiers and speculators. 
 The prelates, endowed with State farms, can but be obsequious 
 to it. 
 
 Thus there does not exist, as in England, a middle class 
 independent of the Government, capable of controlling and 
 opposing it ; but only the ignorant and miserable masses 
 who are forced to contribute very largely through taxes to 
 the maintenance and enrichment of the governing oligarchy. 
 They must, moreover, play their part in the comedy of 
 universal suffrage by voting, that is to say, for the candidate 
 whom the coteries in power have already selected. And for 
 this it is necessary to keep them in ignorance. 
 
 In such a society the ideal object in life is naturally to 
 shirk any severe labour and responsibility. For some the 
 seductions of idleness are too strong, for others the difficulties 
 of work too great, so that, while some do little or nothing, 
 the rest are forced to overwork in order to do their share. 
 Hence they grow to regard happiness as consisting, not in the 
 liberality of remuneration and the satisfaction of work well 
 done, but in making the smallest effort possible. They take 
 no pleasure or pride in their work, and have no other aim 
 than to obtain, with the least possible trouble, some sort of 
 money remuneration. The ignorant and bigoted rich have no 
 regard for agriculture ; they live far away from their estates ; 
 the only interest they take in them is to draw their rents, 
 which they mercilessly extort from the peasants, in order to 
 spend the money in urban luxuries and dissipations, pro- 
 tected by iniquitous governmental taxations. And how 
 should the rude peasants who are forced to lead such hard 
 
3O MILITARISM 
 
 and laborious lives, for the pleasures of others, take more 
 interest in the land than their masters ? Not even the small 
 landed proprietors except in a few districts, such as Anda- 
 lusia possess the true love of agriculture, or cultivate the 
 ground with zeal and passion. They are only the unconscious 
 heirs of ancient practices and traditions which they have in- 
 herited from their fathers, and will bequeath to their sons. 
 Their ignorance is of the densest, and they have no incen- 
 tive to improve themselves. They are satisfied if, by means of 
 small frauds, usuries, and persistent usurpations, they succeed 
 in augmenting their property by a few acres. The Spanish 
 peasant does not trouble to better his system of cultivation. 
 Ignorant, superstitious, conservative, of the severest morals, 
 his whole spiritual existence consists in the most elementary 
 egoism. The artisan classes are equally ignorant, with the 
 exception of the few turbulent workers in the great Cata- 
 lonian factories. They are poor, bigoted, illiterate, lazy, and 
 consider work merely as a service to the Government and 
 wealthy classes. They have little moral sense, and no 
 character, and are a true hot-bed of the crime and mendicity 
 which infest Spain. Nor are the industrial and commercial 
 upper middle classes relatively superior. With the exception 
 of those engaged in certain industrial pursuits traditional to 
 the country, they show neither originality, enterprise, love of 
 perfection, or any passion for study or culture. The Catalonian 
 manufacturers aim only at accumulating large profits, and for 
 this reason Spanish industry ranks among the humblest and 
 roughest, despite the fact that it had once secured itself a 
 rich colonial market, on most advantageous terms, with high 
 productive tariffs in favour of the commerce and industry of 
 the mother-land. 
 
 The moral malady that afflicts the middle classes is more 
 
PEACE AND WAR 31 
 
 complicated and painful. If the middle class prospers in 
 America, because it knows how to preserve the equilibrium 
 between character and riches, exercising thought and will in 
 the healthy gymnastics of action, in Spain, on the con- 
 trary, the atavistic prejudices against industrial labour, the 
 degeneration of several very noble trades through the careless- 
 ness of the men who followed them, the difficulty of commerce 
 and industry proper to impoverished countries that lack 
 capital, prevent the middle-class youth from entering on this 
 healthy life, and leave him only the resource of liberal 
 professions and Government appointments. A youth belong- 
 ing to the lower bourgeoisie is thus set to study, at the cost of 
 serious family sacrifice ; he enters the military schools, which 
 he leaves as an officer at the age of 16 or 17, after having 
 learnt very little. He is thus fully equipped to form part 
 of the most ignorant class of officers in the world. Or he goes 
 to the University to swell the ranks of those poor and idle 
 students too numerous in all Latin nations, but poorer and 
 lazier in Spain than elsewhere. These University studies 
 are still simpler, more careless and incomplete, than in France 
 or Italy. The youths waste their time in dissipation, till 
 they find themselves at the end of their University education 
 as ignorant as when they started, and as incapable of rendering 
 any useful or becoming service to their fellows. It only 
 remains for them to gain, by means of baseness and servility, 
 the favour of some great family or political leader, and to 
 obtain through his influence some liberal profession, State 
 appointment, or political opening. Only a few cunning or 
 lucky men, however, succeed in reaching fame, fortune, or 
 honour through politics or appointments in a poor country, 
 where the circulation of wealth is as slow as a torpid and 
 muddy stream. To others there only remain the most 
 
32 MILITARISM 
 
 poorly paid employments, and the decently clothed squalor 
 of the petty bourgeoisie that tries to live like the easy 
 classes without possessing the means to do so. In recom- 
 pense for this, however, they obtain life appointments when 
 once they enter the ranks of the permanent functionaries ; 
 nor do they need, in order to obtain this, to give proof of their 
 aptitude to do a given work. A little influence suffices, and 
 the work is then light and free from responsibility to him who 
 does not care to work too hard. Thus he is able to satisfy to 
 the full the ideal of every Spanish middle-class youth : to be 
 an official at Madrid, to work little ; to be able well dressed 
 to take part in the prado promenade in the corridas and 
 theatre ; to be received amongst the minor guests in some 
 great family ; to go to bed late, get up late in the morning, 
 go to business late, and leave it early without having done much 
 work. Only the more fortunate and intelligent and the 
 least scrupulous, run any chance of shining in Madrid society ; 
 of attaining to well-paid posts where they can sell their in- 
 fluence at a high price ; of becoming celebrated orators to 
 whose lectures flock the ladies of Madrid, or the leaders of 
 political factions. The remainder are condemned to a poor and 
 obscure life, with only one advantage : that of being exempt 
 from the need of serious work or study. The Spanish 
 administration, which is composed of similar functionaries, is, 
 in consequence, the most ignorant in Europe, and its politics 
 the richest in talk and the poorest in deeds and ideas. 
 
 For all these reasons so contrary to what we observe in 
 American society according to the psychological process 
 demonstrated, the defect of Spanish society is the lack of 
 energy, the indifference of the upper classes, which oscillates 
 between extravagant pride and base servility, for the senti- 
 ment of justice, personal dignity and moral equality is feeble 
 
PEACE AND WAR 33 
 
 in all classes. The whole of society always finds itself in the 
 position of protector or protected, every one being in turn 
 the protege of some one and the protector of somebody else ; 
 and hence arises the universal indifference to the injustice of 
 those in power, and to the consequent social ills the harshness 
 of the relations between rich and poor, the apathy and fatalism 
 of the multitudes who do not heed the troubles of others, and 
 scarcely note their own. Thus it is in the natural order of 
 things that Jesuitism should have more weight in Spain than 
 elsewhere ; and that Catholicism this Proteus, which in 
 America and Belgium is becoming liberal, tolerant, and 
 active should remain here the religion of vanity, ignorance, 
 and sloth, fetes, ceremonies, and processions ; the luxury of 
 the great prelates ; bountiful charity to vagabonds ; flattery 
 to the vanity and idleness of women ; absolution for sins 
 born of laziness and egoism, such as libertinage, envy, avarice, 
 vanity, and calumny ; pitiless rigour against the virtues due 
 to labour and generosity, such as pride, compassion for social 
 evils ; the desire for culture and breadth of ideas ; moral 
 formalism and bigotism which deform the soul, arrogance 
 towards the State, and the ambition to be beyond its bounds. 
 This is a true picture of Spanish Catholicism : a formid- 
 able instrument for shattering the moral energies of man, for 
 reducing character to something limp and devoid of back- 
 bone. And thus the work of the Church tends to complete 
 the moral enervation of Spanish society, founded on the 
 unjust remuneration of labour. Hence all hedge themselves 
 round with petty individual and family selfishness, and remain 
 deaf to the demands of modern civilization, that incites men 
 to great and hardy deeds, rewarding then with liberal 
 recompense. 
 
34 MILITARISM 
 
 V 
 
 Now, the United States does not yet possess a standing 
 army. Till recent years they had a few old ships rather than 
 a fleet, and even now their fleet is but of some few years' 
 standing. Besides this, they have the established reputation 
 of being the least heroic and chivalrous, the most bourgeois 
 and mercantile country in the world. The Spaniards, on 
 the contrary, possess an army and fleet whose traditions are 
 ancient ; they possess militia and naval equipages raised 
 by conscription, generals and admirals by profession, and an 
 ancient reputation for national valour. 
 
 Might we not reasonably have concluded that of these two 
 nations the Americans would have regarded the possibility of 
 imminent war with terror, and the Spaniards, on the contrary, 
 with confidence ? But this was not the case : the American 
 people calmly faced the prospect of war with Spain. To 
 them it was a truly cheerful war. During three years a 
 portion of the American people watched with interest the 
 Cuban insurrection ; they openly provided the insurgents 
 with gold, iron, and dynamite ; they publicly proclaimed 
 that Weyler was a murderer who merited the gallows. Who 
 amongst them gave a thought to the war that might arise 
 from these popular and diplomatic interferences in the great 
 duel ? Doubtless, in this common courage, in this species 
 of public petulance, there was a considerable portion of the 
 light-mindedness and unconsciousness of a people who did 
 not consider all that war might imply, and who allowed them- 
 selves to be led away by their feelings. But, however rash 
 was the attitude of the people towards the probability of 
 war, in any case it was, in the eyes of Europe, one of the 
 principal forces of the American Government in dealing with 
 
PEACE AND WAR 35 
 
 the Cuban question. With practical foresight it was able to 
 combine the collective courage of the country, preparing their 
 forces for the inevitable conflict, and declaring war as soon 
 as these forces were sufficient to assure them victory. After 
 this they showed no hesitation. The declaration of war was 
 made with calm resolution ; and if it was not generally 
 considered an ordinary act of the national policy, neither 
 was it looked upon as particularly alarming, nor as the 
 universal calamity, the light in which so many people 
 in the more ignorant European countries regard war, that 
 matribus detestata. Beyond a slight burst of patriotic ex- 
 ultation, public feeling in America received no shock at the 
 news of the coming war, and industry in no way interrupted 
 its indomitable regularity throughout the continent. 
 
 On the other hand, the war against the insurgent island, 
 no less than that with America, was a fearful calamity for 
 the Spanish people. The army in Cuba was composed, for 
 the most part, of wretched peasants sent there by force, 
 while the flower of the educated classes, thanks to the con- 
 venient law of substitution, remained at home to cheer the 
 departing soldiers, and to receive on their return these 
 wretched shadows of the florid youths who had landed on 
 the beautiful but accursed island. The ardent patriotism 
 of the Spanish upper classes, more particularly during the 
 Spanish- Ameiican War, proved itself to be, above all else, 
 a literary and oratorical sentiment. The feud between the 
 petty parliamentary cliques never ceased ; indeed, they rather 
 grew more venomous. Few of the great families subsidized 
 the war, and there was presented the spectacle of a European 
 country collecting money, by means of theatre and corridas 
 benefits, to carry on war with one of the richest nations in 
 the world. Very few upper-class youths took part in the war 
 
36 MILITARISM 
 
 as common soldiers. Workers and peasants were sent to 
 fight in the ranks of the non-graduated soldiers the masses, 
 in short, who were the unwilling instruments of this bloody 
 deed so repugnant to them, not so much on account of their 
 breadth of ideas, as owing to their ingenuous and rude egoism. 
 They were mere blind instruments whose courage was only 
 maintained by the fear of punishment. So true is this, that 
 as the war by degrees grew fiercer in Cuba, the Spanish 
 Government was compelled to intensify the reign of terror 
 with which it habitually coerces Spain ; to multiply the 
 states of siege ; to increase the power of the police ; to 
 imprison pellmell, and under the most diverse pretexts, all 
 those who were suspected of too liberal dispositions, for fear 
 that the revolutionary parties might succeed in rousing to 
 rebellion the masses exasperated by the enormous tribute 
 of blood, money, and suffering demanded of them by the 
 Spanish Government. The final consequence of the Spanish- 
 American War was that the whole of Spain was placed under 
 martial law, a proof that the Government counted little on 
 the concurrence of the people in face of this struggle with 
 the enemy. Indeed, the truth is that a large portion of the 
 population, not concerned in politics, showed great in- 
 difference to the outcome of the war. It is well known that 
 the inhabitants of Madrid would not allow the corridas to 
 be postponed owing to the news of the battles of Cavite 
 and Santiago ; and whilst far away their brothers were being 
 massacred they continued their dissipations. 
 
 VI 
 
 Thus we see war conducted cheerfully on one hand, sadly 
 on the other ; and this not merely due to the difference 
 
PEACE AND WAR 37 
 
 between easy and difficult warfare. The mercantile American 
 Government, composed entirely of bourgeoisie, presided over 
 by a former tradesman, knew how to prepare for conflict, to 
 measure the forces necessary, and to deal the blow with 
 certainty at the proper moment. That their adversaries were 
 very poor and the American very rich detracts in no wise 
 from their merit, since eight years ago they were still weaker, 
 and possessed no naval force. Moreover, it does not suffice for 
 a nation to own riches ; it must know how to spend money 
 well, and to prepare itself properly and seriously for war. 
 The Spanish Government, on the contrary, which still has 
 military character and tradition, and which, in spite of the 
 country's poverty, spent during the last three years several 
 milliard dollars on the attempted suppression of the Cuban 
 insurrection, was unable to quell the uprising. It then 
 engaged in combat with the United States when totally 
 unprepared. Hence America was able to destroy two 
 Spanish fleets, with small loss of men on her side, and to 
 conquer Cuba, defended by 200,000 soldiers, by landing there 
 little over 20,000 men, after a somewhat haphazard assault on 
 Santiago. 
 
 This unreadiness was, indeed, at the bottom of all the 
 Spanish misfortunes. The Cuban rebels, as to whose number 
 various writers differ, were, at the outside, calculated at some 
 40,000 ; only a certain number were armed with guns, whilst 
 the majority possessed only common knives. They had 
 little ammunition or money, and what they had reached them 
 from America, across the line of the maritime blockade. 
 Consequently they never attacked the enemy resolutely, but 
 merely wore it out with little skirmishes. Against these poorly 
 armed bands the Spaniards sent in various relays 200,000 
 men, the greatest army that ever crossed the Atlantic, an 
 
38 MILITARISM 
 
 army led by generals educated in European schools, with the 
 open sea behind it, and a Government which could obtain 
 loans of millions of pounds from European bankers. How 
 was it, then, that after three years the insurrection was still 
 so little subdued that bands of rebels marauded in safety only 
 a few miles from Havana? Unfortunately for Spain, her 
 army consisted merely of armed and uniformed soldiers if, 
 indeed, they all possessed arms and uniforms but the other 
 apparatus necessary nowadays to an army were lacking : 
 waggons, beasts of burden, provisions, ambulances. The 
 result was that the soldiers could not leave the towns to 
 defend the country for more than two or three days at a 
 stretch, without the risk of dying of hunger or remaining 
 without ammunition, so that all the reinforcements sent to 
 Cuba were in the way rather than being of service. They 
 were distributed in the towns and fortresses throughout the 
 island, but they remained there idle, whilst the insurgents 
 became masters of the country. For this reason the Spanish 
 Government at last resorted to the cruel tactics of General 
 Weyler, of reducing the rebels by famine, by devastating the 
 country, thus compelling them to collect in the towns, to die 
 there of hunger, leaving the land uncultivated around them. 
 Then, when General Shafter laid siege to Santiago, it was 
 several times announced that a body of militia commanded 
 by General Pandos was to come from Havana to the assist- 
 ance of the besieged at Santiago ; and, indeed, it appears 
 strange that while 200,000 soldiers were on the island, 
 Santiago should have been left to be conquered by the small 
 American army. But the fact was that the Spaniards, 
 through lack of all the apparatus necessary to an army with 
 long country marches before it, had no means of overland 
 communication between the various Cuban towns, but could 
 
PEACE AND WAR 39 
 
 only communicate by sea, so that from the moment that the 
 Americans were masters of the coast, the great naval towns 
 were quite cut off from aid. If the Spanish Government had 
 equipped an army of 40,000 men for Cuba, provided with all 
 the necessaries for a modern army, so that, divided in columns, 
 they could leave the towns and fortresses and hold the country 
 for miles together ; if this army had attacked the rebels, the 
 insurrection would have been quelled in a few months, with 
 small loss of blood and at infinitely smaller expense. 
 
 v 
 
 But why was not Spain capable of organizing such an 
 
 
 army, whilst the United States, so far poorer in military 
 tradition, were able to create a fleet in a few years capable of S* 
 all that was required of it ? The cause of this must be sought 
 for in the character of the two Governments and the two 
 nations, in the moral strength of the one and the moral 
 weakness of the other. The Spanish Government is a slave 
 of routine^ little capable of reforming its institutions, even in | 
 face of grave and imminent danger ; because it is led by a selfish 
 oligarchy, outside of which, as we have shown, there exists 
 only a miserable and oppressed multitude who are its victims, 
 and not an intelligent and educated bourgeoisie capable of 
 opposing it ; because its administration is narrow, and chosen, 
 not in the interests of the good government of its country, 
 but with a view to finding employment for the prottges of 
 politicians, and of providing in some manner for the main- 
 tenance of the middle classes. This results in a lack of 
 any proper control over public opinion, which can only be 
 exercised by educated and intelligent people ; and in public 
 offices not being given to those who deserve them, but to 
 toadies to those in power ; and finally, in the Government not 
 acting for the public good, but in the hopes of pleasing this 
 or that portion of the reigning oligarchy. Under such 
 
40 MILITARISM 
 
 circumstances the ministers lose the faculty of making any 
 serious reform, and the Spanish ministry showed itself quite 
 incapable of warfare. A year's serious labour would have 
 been necessary to organize a proper Cuban army. But with 
 a set of officials whose appointment was due rather to the 
 intrigue of politicians than to their own merits directed by 
 old men, jealous of one another, who had raised themselves 
 by intrigue, and were only anxious not to allow themselves 
 to be outdone by the intrigues of rivals, not unfrequently 
 corrupt and bowed down under the weight of prejudices what 
 ministry could pass any serious or important measures of 
 reform ? A sense of the futility of making any attempt 
 disarmed the most resolute, and every one trusted blindly 
 to chance. Besides this, it appears that several shipping 
 companies and other large firms made a lucrative thing out 
 of the transport of soldiers to Cuba, so that it was to their 
 interests that great numbers should be sent there, as it was 
 also to the interests of the officers, for thus they went in 
 larger numbers to Cuba, where there was little fighting to 
 be done and much to be gained. These companies, having 
 great weight with the Government, urged it to multiply the 
 transports of soldiers, ruining thereby the public treasury, and 
 making greater confusion in Cuba, but enriching themselves 
 a monstrous iniquity deserving of heavy punishment, but 
 which was committed with impunity in Spain in the midst 
 of universal indifference, because justice lay dormant, and 
 because those who, through wealth or education, were in 
 a position to direct the moral conscience of the country, and 
 to prevent such scandals, were all attached to the Govern- 
 ment, and therefore interested in encouraging, or compelled 
 to tolerate in silence, these abominable crimes against their 
 native land. 
 
PEACE AND WAR 41 
 
 In the United States, on the contrary, the Government is 
 . not the sole representative of all that is strong in talent, 
 culture, or wealth in American society. Public functionaries, 
 and those concerned in politics, represent only a portion of 
 the educated classes, and they have no decided superiority 
 over the rest. The officials, moreover, do not consider their 
 posts as a mere sinecure, enabling them to live permanently 
 on the Treasury, without anxiety for the morrow. They 
 are for the most part men who carry on their business like 
 any other business, who go on with it as long as it is to 
 their interest, and give it up when they think they could 
 do better elsewhere. Thus the Government knows that it is 
 subject to the criticism of the country ; that it has to deal 
 with energetic opposition ; and that, if the nation is willing to 
 put up with many shortcomings in the administration because 
 they cause it no great inconvenience and would take too 
 much time to set to rights, it does not concede to the Govern- 
 ment absolute impunity. Wherefore a Government which 
 should engage in a war without having made sufficient pre- 
 paration would meet with condign punishment in universal 
 disapproval. Besides this, that pride to succeed in every 
 undertaking, which a free and adventurous life develops in 
 every American, also assists the statesmen. It pledges their 
 amour propre, and makes them deliberate ; while their Spanish 
 confrhes> used only to looking after their own interests and 
 those of their friends, remain indifferent to the results of 
 their politics so long as they do not themselves have to pay 
 for it, knowing full well that no one will demand of them 
 too exact an account of their failures. Lastly, the instability 
 of American official appointments renders it possible for the 
 Government, when it wishes an administration to do some 
 given work, such as organizing a fleet or preparing for war, 
 
42 MILITARISM 
 
 to seek and find the men capable of doing ft well men who 
 are also stimulated by the ambition common to Americans 
 to show off their own worth. Hence it was possible for the 
 American Government to provide a fleet at brief notice and 
 at a small cost ; and impossible for Spain, at the expense of 
 thousands, to get together an army. 
 
 The Spanish- American War was of such brief duration that 
 the United States only needed their fleet and their small 
 army : both of them composed of professional soldiers not 
 raised by conscription. The volunteers that is, the nation 
 itself in arms had not time to enter on action, except in very 
 small bodies. Is it to be believed that if the Americans had 
 had to rely entirely on their volunteer army, they would have 
 been beaten by the Spanish regiments raised by conscription 
 and educated in barracks ? Would the old European mili- 
 tary organization have conquered the disorganized American 
 energies ? 
 
 It is always difficult, and indeed vain, to attempt resolving 
 hypothetical historical problems. In any case, it seems to 
 me that any one a little familiar with the psychology of war 
 would doubt whether the Spaniards would have had better 
 fortune in dealing with a land army than with the fleets 
 at sea. 
 
 VII 
 
 To let 0116*8 self be killed is not pleasant in itself: we 
 cannot succeed in dominating, by a simple effort of will, the 
 instinct of self-preservation. Certainly, in a hand-to-hand 
 conflict between soldiers inflamed by passion, by cries, 
 volleys of shot, and all the frantic excitement, a man may be 
 carried away by a species of violent intoxication, under the 
 
PEACE AND WAR 43 
 
 sway of which he may even find pleasure in feeling his flesh 
 lacerated and cut, and in the sensation of being bathed in his 
 own blood. All spiritual exaltations combine pleasure and 
 pain, confounding them together in that convulsed state of 
 feeling which makes of pain a pleasure. 
 
 But a war does not consist solely in these brief moments 
 of supreme exaltations ; the real bitterness of a war is not 
 in the desperate tension of muscle and courage required of 
 a soldier at the decisive point of a battle efforts almost 
 invariably rendered easy by the state of mind in which 
 he finds himself at such a moment. The real hardships of 
 war consist in the long marches, in the long spells of hunger 
 and thirst to be suffered, in the nights passed sleeping in the 
 mud under the pouring rain, in the illnesses to be borne with- 
 out doctors or medicines, in the discouragement at feeling 
 one's self no longer master of one's own destiny, stripped of all 
 human worth, deprived of the absolute and unconditional 
 right to live. They consist, above all, in the fear which seizes 
 all, even the bravest, the first time they find themselves 
 face to face with the firing, and in the unexpected outbreaks 
 of the instinct of self-preservation, which instinct in the best 
 soldiers is like that of a capricious horse. He remains quiet 
 and docile, restrained by a strong will, in the face of tremen- 
 dous perils, and then, of a sudden, confronted often by some 
 slight danger, breaks bounds and takes to flight. The real 
 hardship of war, in a word, is in the effort of will a soldier 
 must make to fulfil his duty ; for to the humble foot-soldier, 
 who has no responsibility of command, fighting is only an 
 exercise of will. The impulsive faculties count for little in 
 war, everything has to be willed : resistance to fatigue, courage, 
 indifference to death. 
 
 Thus, as resolution is one of those faculties of the mind 
 
44 MILITARISM 
 
 most capable of education, if we except a few criminals and 
 maniacs in whom the instinct of self-preservation is obtuse 
 by nature, there are no born heroes ; intrepid soldiers are 
 not born, they become what they are by an effort of will. 
 Man is born as cowardly as he is born naked ; the soldier 
 who succeeds in annihilating in himself the instinct of self- 
 preservation is an artificial creation of society, just as a 
 dressed-up man is an artificial being for whose creation 
 many different means have been adopted in different ages 
 and communities. 
 
 One means was that adopted in the armies of the Roman 
 Empire, and in which Napoleon placed great faith : of 
 accustoming soldiers to danger by practice. This system, 
 however, can no longer be applied in civilized countries, for 
 wars have become such rare events that a man is seldom 
 called upon to fight more than once. Another method is 
 that of exalting the spirit of soldiers by some savage passion, 
 some fanaticism which drowns the instinct of self-preserva- 
 tion : this is the method which has met with such success in 
 the Turkish army, but which succeeds only with a barbarous 
 race, because civilization signifies reason and moderation in 
 all things. The third system is that attempted by the 
 Spanish Government with its Cuban army : that of placing 
 them between two dangers, of which war is the lesser, and of 
 keeping up their failing courage with the fear of punishment 
 and the threat of the penal code for deserters and cowards. 
 
 By one or other of these three systems have been recruited 
 and organized nearly all the armies which have ever fought 
 hitherto, with good or ill luck ; and this is easily explained 
 when we reflect that neither of these systems demands 
 much spiritual finesse in the human material to which it 
 is applied. From the most barbarous tribe of shepherds, 
 
PEACE AND WAR 45 
 
 and the rudest peasantry in the world, an army can be 
 formed by one or other of these systems. Thus the Roman 
 empire recruited from amongst the uncivilized populations 
 in its domains the best support of its decadent age ; thus 
 the feudal Russia of Alexander I. gathered from its rude 
 serfs and mujics the armies which destroyed Napoleon's 
 troops ; it was thus that modern Turkey furnished, from 
 among the most wretched Mussulman peasantry of Anatolia 
 and Syria, the battalions which caused such confusion to 
 the Russians at Plevna. And even in the legions of Napo- 
 leon I. were not ignorance and coarseness considered as the 
 distinctive qualities of authentic soldiers, the sign of their 
 superiority over the bourgeoisie ? 
 
 But another means much less common and more modern 
 by which a people can find the strength to face a great crisis in 
 war is this : that at least its larger portion lives normally under 
 such good material, moral, and intellectual conditions, that it 
 can rapidly adapt itself to the situation of war by a con- 
 scious effort of will directed by a moral motive. As Gaetano 
 Mosca aptly observes : l " War, like any other dangerous trade, 
 requires a certain degree of habit to be faced with calm and 
 sang-froid ; when this habit is lacking it can only be replaced 
 either by those moments of orgasm which occur rarely in the 
 life of nations, or by that sentiment of honour and duty which 
 in a small and select class can be roused and maintained by 
 special education." 
 
 How did it happen, in the American War of 1861-65, that 
 the armies collected in the Northern States so disorganized, 
 unbalanced, undisciplined, and liable to the panics of first 
 battles were transformed rapidly in the course of a few 
 months into armies so formidable for courage, discipline, and 
 
 1 Q. Mosca, "Elements of Political Science," p. 281 (Turin, 1896). 
 
46 MILITARISM 
 
 heroic resolution ? Hardly one of those agriculturists, workers, 
 merchants, advocates, and brokers who fought in the rival 
 armies especially the Northern knew what war meant either 
 in theory or practice ; and yet, at its termination, all military 
 critics were forced to confess that the ability of the heads 
 vied with the courage and resolution of the soldiers. What 
 force performed this miracle? Neither fear nor habit; the 
 one was out of the question, for the other there was not time. 
 Thus, more especially, the Northern States would have failed 
 to create any army at all if their citizens had not been 
 excellent raw material, easily transformable into good soldiers. 
 Already, in the year 1848, President Polk had observed, gran- 
 diloquently but with considerable insight, the excellence of the 
 material. " Our citizen soldiers," he wrote in a December 
 despatch, "are quite absolutely different from those drawn 
 from the population of the Southern States. They count in 
 their ranks men of all professions and trades : farmers, 
 lawyers, doctors, merchants, manufacturers, workmen ; not 
 only among the officers, but even in the ranks. From their 
 earliest youth they have been used to handling firearms ; 
 many of them are excellent shots. They are men with 
 reputations to be preserved by means of good conduct during 
 campaigns. They are intelligent, and they are developing an 
 individuality to be found in no other army. In battle, every 
 soldier, no less than every officer, fights for his country, and at 
 the same time with the object of obtaining glory and distinc- 
 tion among his fellow-citizens the day he returns to civil life." 
 Raw material, but capable of being moulded in the War 
 of Independence, more especially because the more select 
 portion of the army was composed of educated and well-to-do 
 men who till then had attended to their own business, and 
 who, failing other higher sentiments, were at least sustained 
 
PEACE AND WAR 47 
 
 by the pride of showing themselves in no wise inferior to 
 what was considered to be their worth ; who, with a conscious 
 effort of will, influenced by diverse ethical sentiments, 
 succeeded in becoming good soldiers in a short time, princi- 
 pally by contracting habits of discipline, and dominating the 
 instinct of self-preservation. 
 
 Is it rash to suppose that an army like the Spanish, composed 
 of ignorant and indifferent soldiers, righting only out of fear 
 of the punishments with which the military code threatened 
 deserters, could not hold out long against an army of better 
 educated soldiers, resolved to do their duty, through the . 
 pride of men who will not admit in themselves the weaknesses ] 
 of hesitation or fear ? Thus we are led, by another route, to 
 the same conclusion which is the leit-motif of this study, that / 
 in order to prevent the rich and educated classes of a nation I 
 from becoming so selfish by reason of their wealth and culture j 
 as to make use of their power to exempt themselves from the \ 
 fatigue and perils of war, and to palm it off on the ignorant } 
 and poor as happened in Spain and to make a profit 
 out of the ruin of their country ; that in order to preserve at 
 least an Mite class, who will take part in war without thought 
 to personal gain, putting all their energy into the under- 
 taking, thus diminishing its risk and fatigues ; that society 
 must be governed with a certain degree of justice, and be 
 founded on principles of liberty, not of protection. Where 
 a Government is unjust, and the upper classes who enjoy ^ 
 the fruits of injustice are selfish, the more selfish they are 
 and the less capable of that plasticity by which in certain 
 moving times a strong soldiery can be moulded out of a 
 quiet bourgeoisie, there also the army is composed of \/ 
 indifferent soldiers, disciplined by fear. 
 
 
48 MILITARISM 
 
 VIII 
 
 \ The Spanish- American War, then, terminated in victory for 
 * the people governed with the least injustice ; whether this 
 was due to its own merit or chance, it matters little. This 
 war will result in the final pacification of the Antilles and the 
 Philippines, and relieve Spain at the same time from the 
 enormous military expense which their occupation cost her. 
 The Spanish Government, which by its stupidity and tardiness 
 showed itself so unfit to go through with the Cuban War, 
 nevertheless kept stirring up conflicts in Cuba and the 
 Philippines by means of rapacious, indolent, and unjust rule, 
 to which its military incapacity was principally attributable. 
 For the past fifty years insurrections have been periodical 
 occurrences in the two colonies, and it has been beyond the 
 power of the Spanish Government to restore peace ; indeed, 
 the military ferocity of its repression merely kept pouring 
 y oil on the conflagration. What fearful figures would be 
 reached if we reckoned up all the men who have perished in 
 this long and terrible war! 
 
 The intervention of a more civilized, and less military and 
 bellicose Government, has extinguished the long-smoulder- 
 ing fire, and from henceforward both the Antilles and the 
 Philippines will obtain a regular administration that will allow 
 of the natives living peaceably without being in a constant 
 state of insurrection. It is not difficult, therefore, to understand 
 how the work of pacification was accomplished, and how the 
 victory of a juster Government has for a long time liberated 
 that corner of the earth from the sufferings of war. 
 
 Now, this leads to the reflection that if the happy termina- 
 tion of the conflict, which had for so long stained Spain and 
 
PEACE AND. WAR 49 
 
 her colonies with blood, by the victorious intervention of a 
 more civilized and peace-insuring state between the two 
 enemies who had been so long at war without either of them 
 vanquishing the other ; if this were not an accidental and 
 solitary incident, which occurred once far away in the 
 Atlantic, but an incident which repeats itself through history, ' 
 in all places and ages, under one form or another ; if, in short, 
 it was a law of social life, could we understand then how the 
 great war-tempests which fill history are by degrees melting 
 away into a long period of peace ? The history of the world 
 
 would then follow this course : many societies, owing to their 
 
 \i 
 
 vicious constitution, would be led to an indefinite succession 
 of wars, injuring each other in turn without coming to any 
 conclusion ; until one or more states, better or more justly 
 organized, should interpose and introduce at the same time a 
 theoretically and practically superior Government. This equili- 
 brium might ultimately be disturbed by defects and vices 
 inherent in itself, and then would return another long epoch 
 of war, destined itself also to be finally resolved into peace. 
 
 If, moreover, it were possible to demonstrate that the 
 civilization of the Christian nations of Europe and America 
 were approaching this phase of pacific equilibrium ; that 
 there is a general truth, which the particular case of the 
 Spanish-American War has confirmed -viz. that the countries 
 which are superior to others in everything, war included, are 
 the most peaceful, whilst those in which warlike traditions 
 are greater, are decaying it would then be proved that this 
 desire for peace is not merely the idyllic dream of a world of 
 shepherds, lambs, nymphs, and other similar Theocretan and 
 Virgilian vapourings, a world in which men would be free 
 from the pain of wounds and the perils of violent death. 
 This would be too small and miserable a thing, born of the 
 
 D 
 
5O MILITARISM 
 
 petty psychological illusion that the physical pain of wounds 
 and death are the greatest misfortunes. Abolish wars, or 
 multiply them as you like, life will still remain full of bitter- 
 ness ; alter customs, and the physical sufferings of violence 
 between men and nations will be replaced by the moral 
 suffering of those wide contrasts of interests, passions, and 
 ideas. If the numberless ills with which humanity is afflicted 
 are each considered separately, with reference to the sub- 
 jective suffering they inflict on individuals, and not in 
 reference to their diverse final influence in the eternal game 
 of life, who will not affirm that physical torments are perhaps 
 more tolerable than moral ones ? that a dagger-thrust, which 
 kills in an instant, is not almost sweet in contrast to a delusion 
 which slowly consumes the soul ? The nineteenth century has 
 seen an increase in suicides, madness, and morbid maladies ; 
 in the injuries and deaths in what are called the bloody battles 
 of labour and civilization, and which, though they are blood- 
 less in the material sense of the word, are not for that 
 less lamentable than those fought with gun and cannon. 
 
 The modern significance of peace is therefore something 
 greater ; it is an advance towards justice, a desire for more 
 liberal and equitable, wiser and less tyrannical government. 
 The apostle of peace thus becomes one of the instruments 
 by which a great change in the internal structure of society 
 is being accomplished, which in certain countries has greatly 
 advanced, and in others has scarcely commenced a change 
 in which the real glory of the nineteenth century consists, and 
 which rapidly tends to strengthen justice in life. Through- 
 out the whole world there is a slow progress of moral ideas 
 which corresponds to a great transformation in all Asocial 
 relations, from the relation between the production and dis- 
 tribution of riches to the relation between men belonging to 
 
PEACE AND WAR 51 
 
 diverse religious sects a moral movement which tends to 
 express the ideal of life in this formula : " To be neither */ 
 coward nor bully." The peace movement, if the foregoing 
 suppositions are correct, is one of the phases of the general 
 progress towards liberty and justice in modern life. 
 
 The object of this book is to prove the truth of this his- 
 torical law, and to show that the actual condition of the A 
 world is such that these things really signify the present 
 desire for peace. 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN 
 OF WAR 
 
CHAPTER II 
 HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 
 
 I 
 
 WHAT was war originally ? The briefest and most com- 
 prehensive definition of its essence, to my mind, is the follow- 
 ing : " War, in the beginning, was an erroneous solution, 
 given by nearly all the different branches of the human race, 
 to the problem of individual happiness." 
 
 War took birth in a primitive and violent exaltation 
 of the desire for emotion. The most elementary and vital 
 principle in the human mind is the desire to live. But life 
 does not merely consist in opening one's eyes at sunrise and 
 shutting them again when darkness supervenes ; life consists 
 in strongly feeling our own being in all we perceive, feel, 
 will, and think. No man feels himself alive except in the 
 intimate workings of his own personality, that immortal flame 
 of the inner life which at times flickers and almost expires, 
 and then reasserts itself more brilliantly. Thus in the 
 moments when it is most animated, when the activities 
 of the conscience are more numerous and intense, man feels 
 himself more alive, and therefore, Spinoza would perhaps 
 too rashly conclude, happier. Sensations, sentiments, desires, 
 thoughts, even those that of average intensity continually 
 stimulate the human mind, without intermission feed the 
 fire of self, and sink into it, as innumerable fragments of 
 
56 MILITARISM 
 
 matter feed the fire of the sun. Not merely for the amuse- 
 ment and sterile pleasure of man, but to foster the circulation 
 of a marvellous vital process, does the elation of self, produced 
 by the conscience, excite a new and acute thirst for sensations, 
 sentiments, desires, and thoughts which in their turn serve as 
 stimulators ; and thus everything acts on man and exalts his 
 individuality, and he, thus stimulated, reacts by circumstances 
 with redoubled energy. Such is the normal and average life, 
 to escape from which man is urged by a fierce longing for 
 happiness, which, to a healthy and vigorous person consists, 
 at least in part, in those moments of intense feeling which 
 excite in him unusually strong and energetic thoughts and 
 sentiments, and kindle the inner flame of self, as a breath 
 kindles the embers which appeared half extinguished under 
 a thin layer of ashes. Thus the desire for life excites in men 
 an insatiable avidity for emotions, which, by reason of their 
 great intensity, augment the normal sum of life. 
 
 Innumerable are the ways by which man satisfies this 
 longing to augment the sum of his life. They may be 
 arranged in an ascending scale, according as their nature is 
 sensual or ideal, according as they demand a greater or lesser 
 effort of will. The rudest and simplest emotion is that which 
 can be obtained from inebriation, from violent and disorderly 
 bodily exercise, and from very intense sensations. A good 
 dose of haschish or alcohol, a wild dance, impetuous music, 
 create a passing but intense spiritual exaltation in which man 
 feels, thinks, desires, and therefore lives more intensely than 
 under ordinary conditions. This is why civilized men are so 
 fond of all those stimulants which, without trouble, help him 
 to augment the sum of life he is capable of living. Another 
 means of satisfying the thirst for sensation, and which 
 demands ,a certain effort of will and thought, is love ; 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 57 
 
 because the moral and physical satisfaction it yields exalt 
 the spirit and multiply the physical, intellectual, and moral 
 energy of man and woman. The great collective passions, 
 such as patriotism and religious ardour or fanaticism, belong 
 to a more abstract order, and demand a much greater 
 spiritual effort; and yet higher are the intellectual and 
 sesthetical passions, that arise in a great measure from the 
 desire for emotions and sensations which excite the mind. 
 
 But the most abstract manner of satisfying this passion for 
 intenser life, and one which demands the greatest effort in the 
 majority of cases, at least is to aim at_superiority over other 
 men and things. The knowledge of one's own capacity to 
 overcome obstacles gives the highest of all spiritual exalta- 
 tions, because the force of one's own being is felt stronger in 
 contrast to other conquered forces, whether human or brutish. 
 Life, then, in its highest form consists in an effort to assert 
 one's own superiority over men and things. In the majority 
 of men, however, this desire for life is mediocre, and easily 
 satisfied by slight efforts of will and thought. But in all 
 countries and in all ages there has existed a small minority 
 of men in whom this desire was a violent passion, who 
 wished to live a life more than humanly intense, almost, I 
 might say, the life of several men ; and who, as other men 
 suffer from the thirst for love, suffered from a desire to exalt 
 supremely their own being, and to place themselves above 
 the level of other men. 
 
 The few human groups, and the rare epochs in which such 
 men were lacking, have no history ; because wars, revolutions, 
 colonial adventures, the innumerable events of private life, 
 religions, sects, philosophies, the fine arts and the sciences, all 
 originated in the sublime discontent of these small minorities 
 who longed for unmeasured lives. These were as the yeast 
 
58 MILITARISM 
 
 which ferments the soppy and somewhat insipid dough of 
 which humanity is composed ; fermentation thus setting in 
 rapidly or slowly, succeeding or not succeeding, according 
 as the yeast suited the dough and the conditions of the 
 surrounding atmosphere. 
 
 The manner in which the greater number of these men 
 satisfied their thirst for life was in the conquest of power 
 and the accumulation of great wealth. If in the world's 
 history some few hundred prophets, artists, philosophers, and 
 saints have tried to rule the human mind by works of great 
 beauty, wisdom and goodness, millions of men, on the other 
 hand, have sought pleasure in power and riches. It is a 
 common opinion that man desires wealth and power to 
 procure more easily spiritual and sensual enjoyment ; but 
 this opinion proves, on closer analysis, to be insufficient. It 
 is proved insufficient, firstly, because power and riches were 
 never free from care and envy, and, in certain ages, also from 
 grave dangers, which were often stronger than the pleasure 
 wealth and power could give ; because in the most numerous 
 class of rich men misers the first condition for the enjoy- 
 
 |l 
 
 ment of wealth is the renunciation of all the pleasures it can 
 procure ; because the rich and powerful of all countries and 
 ages have tried /to distinguish themselves from the less rich 
 and poor by luxuries and special manners of life, all of them 
 tedious and wearisome ; and lastly, because, instead of using 
 riches and power to wisely increase their own liberty, they 
 have made themselves the slaves of tyrannical formalities and 
 ceremonies, and voluntarily passed the greater part of their 
 existence, not in great or good actions, but in the rigorous and 
 tedious observation of vain, puerile, and senseless social rites. 
 Riches are earnestly sought after by many men for the same 
 reason that power is sought after : because enriching one's self 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 59 
 
 and governing others is the easiest means of exalting one's 
 own being by the sentiment and exercise of personal superi- 
 ority and power. There are two essential pleasures in 
 the acquirement of riches and power : the solitary delight 
 which is felt by him who enriches himself or becomes 
 master of the State, and the social pleasure which arises 
 from showing his riches and power, and more especially 
 by the contrast between these and the inferior condition of 
 others. Although some rich men are indifferent to the social 
 enjoyment of wealth and power in some the attraction of 
 the former pleasure is greater, in others that of the latter 
 nevertheless, these two are generally the first elements of 
 cupidity and ambition. The solitary enjoyment of wealth and 
 power is the simple and immediate pleasure of feeling him- 
 self strong, which man experiences every time he succeeds in 
 bringing any undertaking to a successful issue. The social en- 
 joyment is the complex and indirect pleasure of feeling his 
 power over others, which arises from contrasting his own 
 strength with the lesser strength of others, his own power with 
 their impotence. 
 
 Ostentation or dominion : these are the two passions 
 essential to cupidity and ambition, and for this reason they 
 have generally displayed themselves in senseless tyranny and 
 the vanities of extravagant pride, and very rarely in acts of 
 wisdom, beauty, or goodness, and not rarely they have been 
 merged into a single passion. 
 
 II 
 
 But this insatiable thirst for strong and inebriating emotions, 
 though it is the chief stimulus to action, contains nevertheless 
 a terrible germ of error and ruin, which leads maii to 
 
60 MILITARISM 
 
 perdition whilst searching for happiness. The cause for this 
 must be sought in various vices of will and intelligence innate 
 in the human mind, and principally in the desire to follow the 
 line of least resistance. From this tendency to make the 
 smallest effort possible which is to be observed in all 
 human actions, but particularly in those of barbarians springs 
 the lack of power to discern and resist that which is perhaps 
 the most dangerous of illusions, and which is the origin of so 
 many of the evils of life. Thus in destroying or creating, man 
 can procure for himself strong emotions, and persuade himself 
 /of his own superiority over things. Two passions have 
 divided the human heart throughout the annals of history : 
 the divine passion for creation, and the diabolical passion for 
 destruction. But since it is easier to destroy than to create, 
 a terrible and universal illusion arose, of which too many 
 nations and men have been the victims, i.e. that happiness is 
 more easily to be found in destruction than in creation. 
 Creation, though in reality a benefit, presents itself under a 
 painful aspect, because of the effort it demands ; but when 
 this effort is made, healthy satisfaction and lasting happiness 
 follow. Thus the passion for creation can be compared to a 
 delicious fruit enclosed in a thin but bitter peel. Destruction, 
 on the contrary, is an evil which presents itself under a 
 pleasing aspect, because it can cause momentary satisfaction 
 in return for a slight effort, but it brings ruin and death in its 
 train. Hence the passion for destruction is like the nauseous 
 powder concealed in jam. 
 
 To a similar illusion of these passions can be traced the 
 origin of war. 
 
 Foresight, indeed, is the main virtue which deters modern 
 men from seeking happiness in destruction. The ideal of 
 happiness to a civilized man at this century's end includes, as 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 6 1 
 
 an essential requisite, foresight for the future. Civilized man 
 does not attach much importance to a lot, however attractive 
 it may be, whether moral or material, if it does not possess a 
 certain stability. Hence any condition, however favoured by 
 fortune, if exposed to the dangers of rapid change, is con- 
 sidered by all but a few fantastical and adventurous spirits, 
 as inferior to a humbler but securer state. Nineteenth-century 
 man may seek after violent and inebriating emotions that 
 permit him to assert his superiority over his fellows, still he 
 tries not to lose sight of the future ; and while attempting 
 to satisfy this desire, he is careful not to expose himself to 
 the danger of misfortunes which would vastly overshadow his 
 immediate satisfaction. To attain this end, he does not 
 hesitate to subject himself to a severe moral discipline, to 
 exercise a rigorous control over his passions, to bridle his 
 imagination, to fatigue his mind in trying to realize so 
 vague a thing as the future. We are so used to this mode 
 of existence that we fail to comprehend how men can be 
 happy otherwise. 
 
 But, unfortunately for man, foresight and the habit of 
 restraining his passions with a view to the future are virtues 
 which appear to him unpleasant, because they both imply an 
 effort of will and consequent suffering, lighter or intenser 
 according to the degree of effort made and the strength of 
 him who makes it ; whereas improvidence is an evil which 
 at first appears pleasant, because it exempts man from all 
 mental effort. Hence civilized man is constantly tempted to 
 return to improvidence as soon as the mental effort necessary 
 for providence becomes too great, or his mind is weakened 
 by disease. Is it not true that we are most capable of being 
 provident at a mature age, when in possession of our full 
 force, whilst children are improvident and old men become 
 
62 MILITARISM 
 
 so ? But even a young man may become improvident at 
 times, owing to a species of weariness that comes over him 
 when the difficulties against which he has to fight are so 
 numerous and various that his mental strength is not equal to 
 the exertion. 
 
 v^ At such times improvidence and fatalism may become so 
 exquisite a relief to the worn-out spirit that men have been 
 seen to risk throwing fortune, reputation, even life itself 
 unhesitatingly to the winds. In any case, civilized man is 
 constantly encouraged to control his passions in view of the 
 future, and by the thought of great advantages he would 
 otherwise lose. But uncivilized men who live by rude agri- 
 culture and pasturage, in a hut easily destroyed and easily 
 rebuilt, who accumulate little wealth, know few luxuries and 
 no intellectual refinement, yield more easily to the tempta- 
 tions of improvidence, and find it more difficult to be 
 constantly thoughtful of the future, since they value so little 
 what the past has bequeathed to them. But from the 
 moment that the usually small amount of forethought which 
 characterizes barbarous peoples is lacking, nothing remains 
 to restrain them from indulging in the pleasure of the maddest 
 and most extravagant destruction, because the momentary 
 satisfaction which constitutes or accompanies destruction is 
 no longer opposed by the thought of its future consequences. 
 .War can thus, for a moment, become the passion of a whole 
 nation, because war is a sort of vie de bohbne to uncivilized 
 man. 
 
 It is a sentiment of this character which accounts for the 
 first great bellicose movements of the still barbarous human 
 race, and for the formation of warlike hordes whose periodical 
 appearances fill history from time to time with the roar of a 
 huge tempestuous human sea. The single waves of this ocean 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 63 
 
 bear the names of the Cimbric or Teutonic hordes, of German, 
 Visigoth, Longobardian, Hungarian, Tartar, or Mongolian. 
 These hordes always consisted of great multitudes who 
 abandoned their lands, their work, and ancient modes of life, ' 
 and descended in tribes of men, women, and children into 
 countries inhabited by other nations. Any event was made 
 a pretext for such transmigrations : a dearth, an earthquake, a 
 pestilence, an eclipse, the predictions of augurs. But their 
 real incentive, at least at first, was the love for an adven- 
 turous life, free from thought for the future the charm of 
 that carelessness which loosens the control over passions ; 
 above all, that strongest of all human passions, idleness ; the 
 desire for wealth easily gained, and for the attainment by 
 means of the destruction of cities, and the extermination or 
 reduction to slavery of entire populations of the pleasure 
 born of believing themselves invincible and of domineering over 
 their fellows. 
 
 Ill 
 
 To thoroughly understand how this elementary warlike form 
 of society originated, it will be well to consider a modern 
 example, which we can study in detail from documents 
 provided by an eye-witness. Although hordes are no longer 
 formed in Europe, Africa and Asia still offer us living 
 examples of such associations more especially Africa, where 
 what to us is dead legend, remains there a still living 
 reality. Thus the Soudan has recently seen the formation 
 of a colossal warlike horde, whose rapid and adventurous 
 record is known to us through the recital of many Europeans 
 who witnessed its formation. I allude to the great Mahdist 
 revolution of 1884, known to us as the Dervish movement, 
 
64 MILITARISM 
 
 which for fourteen years interrupted Egyptian rule in the 
 Soudanese regions. 
 
 This uprising has been considered in the light of a religious 
 revolution, due to the fanaticism of certain barbarous 
 Mussulman tribes, incited by incendiary prophets. Religious 
 fanaticism certainly was one of the many factors which 
 contributed to the immense energy of the revolution at its 
 outset ; but its importance was perhaps exaggerated by 
 Europeans, as always happens when they attempt to judge 
 any great event in Mussulman society. Since religion 
 pervades the whole of Mussulman life, Europeans, who 
 observe that many things there bear a religious character 
 which are not religious with us, consequently attribute every- 
 thing to religion. In reality, however, religion only lends an 
 exterior aspect to events which are really the results of 
 more human and general causes. Thus the Dervish War, 
 which appeared to be merely the conflict of a new Mussulman 
 sect against an elder branch, was in reality a social revolution 
 produced by social and political causes, which determined the 
 formation of a warlike horde. 
 
 The Soudan is inhabited by Arabs, Nubians or Negroes, and 
 Berbers, the latter a race born of the crossing of Negroes with 
 Jews and Arians, who dwell between the first and fourth 
 cataracts of the Nile in the districts of Berber. Before the 
 revolution these peoples were a power that could not be over- 
 looked without peril. For example, certain very wealthy, intel- 
 ligent, and capable slave-merchants had become true military 
 commanders, conquerors, and almost founders of States, such 
 as Zubeir Pasha, lately deceased at Cairo, who, as a young man, 
 when advancing with bands he had enlisted for the purpose 
 of slave-raiding, came in contact with the Sultan of Darfur, 
 whom he conquered and deposed, acquiring thus, in the 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 65 
 
 course of his commercial undertakings, this immense tract of 
 Egyptian land. The Negro population represents the pariahs 
 of Soudanese society. Confined within the remotest regions 
 of the Soudan, they drag out a miserable existence by the 
 indolent pursuit of very primitive agriculture and pasturage. 
 In cities and big villages they perform the meanest services 
 and the most degraded work, both in the public or com- 
 mercial administrations, or in private houses. Their principal 
 function, however, before the revolution, throughout the 
 whole Soudan, was to furnish, together with the Berbers, the 
 chief material for the slave-trade. 
 
 Many were the causes of the violent upheaval of a society 
 so organized. The Soudan at that period belonged to the 
 Egyptian Government, who ruled it by means of functionaries 
 despatched from Cairo. These maintained a purely Oriental 
 administration : indolent, indifferent to the requirements of 
 their subjects, careless of justice, rapacious and corrupt. 
 Into this administration, to make matters worse, there had 
 entered of late years several Europeans and Christians, who 
 had been introduced in the hope of improving matters. 
 These officials, from the highest to the lowest, had no 
 other care than to enrich themselves by means of their 
 authority to extort money ; hence corruption was so deep 
 and universal that the energy of Gordon, sent there twice 
 as governor, if it managed to eradicate some partial abuses, 
 failed to renovate a condition so desperately vitiated. The 
 Egyptian Government, however, was not content to abandon 
 the Soudan to the rapacity of its functionaries ; it wanted 
 to do more, and, in its own interest at least, it wanted to do 
 worse. It wished to concede to itself, in the midst of the 
 general dishonestyI might almost call it the mortal sin 
 in which it lived the bizarre luxury of an honest scruple, 
 
 E 
 
66 MILITARISM 
 
 which became the cause of its loss. It wished to prohibit, 
 encouraged by English influence, the slave-trade in the 
 Soudan. The discontent aroused by such an edict can be 
 imagined when we reflect that the richest and most power- 
 ful portion of Soudanese society was engaged in this com- 
 merce ; that the prohibition, besides the other misfortunes, 
 which its sudden application entailed, threatened to ruin at 
 a blow this very wealthy class of merchants, and to reduce 
 to misery the numerous tribes who assisted in the trade. 
 Nor must it be thought that this abolition of slavery, which 
 displeased the rich merchants and their colleagues, brought 
 the Government into better favour with the negro population 
 from whom all the slaves were drawn. The negro tribes, 
 like all the Soudanese, detested the Egyptian Government 
 for the injustice of its functionaries, of whom they were the 
 victims ; neither could the probability of never again be- 
 coming slaves suffice to make them forget the oppression 
 of so rapacious and capricious a Government. Everything 
 liberty included has a changeful value ; of supreme benefit 
 to some, it may want much of its value to others. All 
 Soudanese negroes do not appear to have regarded slavery 
 as the greatest evil, since it actually happened that Gordon 
 liberated slave-convoys only to see the slaves returning 
 spontaneously to the dealers. 
 
 In any case, these good intentions proved as noxious to 
 the Egyptian Government as its guilty indifference to justice 
 and the dishonesty of its functionaries. The rich and power- 
 ful class of slave-merchants turned against the Government, 
 and its discontent, combined with that of all the Soudan, 
 against the oppressive Egyptian administration, prepared 
 a state of feeling and of things favourable to revolution. 
 Let us add to this religious and class hatred. The 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 67 
 
 Mussulmans were displeased to see so many Europeans and 
 Christians in the administration ; to know that in Cairo, at 
 the court of Ishmail, the Europeans were heeded better than 
 the Mussulmans ; that much of the money extorted from them 
 flowed into the hands of the numerous Christians, who were 
 working at Cairo with a view to putting into practice Ishmail's 
 dream, which was to make use of Oriental prodigality to 
 forward a sumptuous and innovating administration that 
 should introduce into his states the progressive benefits of 
 European civilization. It was in the midst of such an un- 
 quiet and vast society that Mohammed Ahmed, an obscure 
 youth from Dongola, proclaimed himself Mahdi, and started 
 to preach a sacred war. It does not appear that this 
 Mahdi was a mystic, it looks rather as if he was a rogue, 
 an ambitious man, covetous of wealth, an individual of the 
 most dangerous order, one of those born low down in the 
 social scale, but determined to rise at any cost. He was 
 thus an example of the man thirsty for emotion, whom we 
 always find preceding any stormy events in human history. 
 In Europe he would probably have been a successful political 
 intriguer, in the Soudan he became a religious reformer who, 
 with a certain amount of humbug, which took the form of 
 Divine revelation, and with the pretended performance of some 
 miracles, dared to fan the flame of universal discontent. The 
 effect of this preaching, which was begun timidly at first and 
 amidst poor tribes and the most wretched scum of Soudanese 
 society, was marvellous, owing to the universal discontent. 
 Several tribes readily embraced the occasion to hurl them- 
 selves blindly on the strength of a supposed divine revelation, 
 into the pursuit of an existence free from future care and full 
 of violent emotion. Life and the world were to be revivified, 
 according to the Mahdi's prediction, in the form most 
 
68 MILITARISM 
 
 seductive to these simple minds. The peasant was no longer 
 to cultivate his land, the shepherd was to leave his flock, none 
 were to pay taxes to the Government, or to be any longer 
 subject to the oppressions of omnipotent rulers. All were to 
 live together in the Soudan in a great nomadic tribe, with 
 songs and music to inspire them, fighting and pillaging. 
 
 The contagion of this illusion, this great passion, spread 
 like wild-fire amongst the tribes. No one asked himself how 
 long such an existence could endure ; the horde was rapidly 
 increased by contingents from all sides men, families, and 
 tribes. As happens in all revolutions, the first to hail it 
 were outcasts and vagabonds ; then families who wrung a 
 wretched livelihood from the soil, tormented by usurers, 
 burnt their huts and joined the prophet ; then the inhabitants 
 of entire villages abandoned their homes to follow in his 
 wake ; finally whole tribes arrived with their cattle, utensils, 
 and possessions. They came not as soldiers who leave their 
 homes temporarily to fight in a war of short duration, but 
 as emigrants setting out for some El Dorado whence to restart 
 life. In the course of a few months an immense horde 
 wandered about the Soudan in search of war and prey ; 
 whilst the quieter tribes, those who had resisted the universal 
 madness, continued patiently to cultivate the earth, with the 
 vague presentiment of a huge tempest brewing in the heavens 
 towards the horizon, which must burst sooner or later above 
 their heads. 
 
 It is difficult to imagine of what this horde of Dervishes, 
 collected to fight the holy war against Egypt and living by 
 war, could originally have consisted. It is difficult fully to 
 realize to one's self this dense torrent of human lava which set 
 fire to everything along its course. Is it possible to the Euro- 
 pean of the nineteenth century to imagine a multitude of 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 69 
 
 more than a hundred thousand souls, consisting of men and 
 women, old people and children, who have sacrificed their 
 whole existence to a moment of unutterable exultation, i 
 without giving one thought to the morrow a people of 
 madmen, whose frenzy lasts for months ? Yet this was the 
 spiritual condition of the Dervish horde in its initial stage : 
 absolute thoughtlessness, continuous excitement without 
 respite and without pause, fermented by every artifice. The 
 Mahdi and his chief followers never wearied of firing the 
 ardour of the faithful with inspired preachings. When 
 the preachers were mute, the crowd fed its own excitement 
 with wild songs, with dances, and above all with stirring 
 music ; for music, the art whence civilized men demand the 
 most delicate spiritual enjoyment, has ever been the ac- 
 complice of the maddest and most extravagant follies of 
 primitive man. The most intense and voluptuous frenzy 
 was obtained by the extreme violence of destruction, and 
 in the most unbounded extravagances of pride. The only 
 passions which surged in the souls of this terrible crowd were 
 those of ruin and destruction burning passions which 
 annihilated the slender principles, the fragile moral traditions 
 created by the work of ages, which, as the lava which boils 
 over from a crater raging along the mountain side, effaces 
 the works of man, his furrows and landmarks painfully traced 
 on the earth's surface. 
 
 A single example suffices to demonstrate the extent of this 
 madness. The Arab tribes of the Eastern Soudan had 
 followed the Mahdi, with their magnificent flocks, their 
 ancient wealth, the traditional pride of their tribes. When 
 near Khartoum, the Mahdi announced to them that it was a 
 time for fighting, not for pasturing cattle, and exhorted them 
 to kill their animals. These simple and primitive men were 
 
70 MILITARISM 
 
 immediately prevailed upon to destroy their flocks, and to 
 disperse in a few days the wealth accumulated by centuries 
 of labour, which for ages represented their greatest pride; and 
 this, with the sole object of providing the horde with an orgy 
 of meat for a few days. 
 
 Thus in the beginning, and after the first unhoped-for 
 successes, the battles consisted of a species of feasts to which 
 the crowds assembled, thirsting for blood and ruin, drunk 
 with pride, blind and deaf to all peril. A passion for violence 
 fermented in their midst, the courage of impulse proper to 
 crowds excited by fanaticism and the thirst for blood the 
 boldness of any army intoxicated with victory, and which 
 believes itself invincible. The Dervish horde was chiefly 
 composed of inexperienced soldiers, drawn from pastoral 
 and agricultural tribes, and consequently cowardly, like all 
 barbarians unaccustomed to the perils of war ; of soldiers 
 incapable of resisting the fear of shooting and the hardships 
 of war by a mental effort ; men of no worth, in short, but who, 
 taken together, blinded by fanaticism, intoxicated by a violent 
 and irregular life and by universal excitement, formed an 
 army devoid of fear, because it no longer reasoned a crowd 
 animated by a formidable impulse which nothing could at 
 first resist. 
 
 In the attack on El Obeid, an army of Dervishes, armed 
 only with lances and swords, assailed a fortress defended 
 by guns and cannon. The obstinate assaults are described by 
 Rudolf Slatin in these words : 
 
 " On Friday morning, September the 8th, the seething mass 
 of human beings, armed only with swords and spears, rolled 
 like the waves of the sea towards the town. . . . The rifle-fire 
 of the defenders soon began to play with deadly effect on the 
 crowd, who, utterly undeterred, and seeking only for blood 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 71 
 
 and plunder, continued their advance, swarming into the 
 ditches and up the parapet, and entering the town. At 
 this critical moment Major Nesim Effendi told his bugler 
 to sound the advance ; and the signal being taken up by the 
 other buglers, the soldiers, clambering up on the tops of the 
 walls and houses, brought a murderous fire to bear on the 
 assailants. Slowly the surging mass, under this hail of lead, 
 was driven back, leaving behind them thousands of killed and 
 wounded. Once more they rallied and attempted again to 
 storm ; but again they were driven back with still greater 
 slaughter." 
 
 And what frenzies of satisfied pride after the victory ! The 
 Dervishes, like the Huns and Tartars, believed themselves to 
 be, and were believed, for a moment, to be indomitable. 
 Even the humblest and least of the soldiers thus participated, 
 to a slight extent, in the pleasure of having overcome their 
 foes, and of thinking themselves above the common herd, of 
 feeling themselves a little superior to others an exquisite 
 moral reward for warfare which every member of the horde 
 could procure for himself with little fatigue. To this sense of 
 satisfaction the material spoil must also be added. Plunder, 
 with all its accompanying excitement the unexpected dis- 
 covery of treasures, the easy acquisition of great wealth, the 
 capricious waste of superfluity, the piquant pleasure of search, 
 and the oppressions over the vanquished became the ardent 
 passion of the multitude. Everywhere the Dervish horde 
 destroyed what fell into their hands : the Government stores, 
 the possessions of those tribes who had remained neutral, 
 the private treasures of the rich. And since in the Soudan, 
 as in all barbarous countries, the earth is the bank to which 
 men confide their treasures in stormy times, no sooner was 
 a village or a city seized than searches were begun for 
 
72 MILITARISM 
 
 hidden treasures ; and the conquerors subjected to cruel 
 tortures all those suspected of having concealed wealth. 
 What horrors were witnessed in the Soudan on this account ! 
 After the seizure of El Fasher, amongst the many prisoners 
 subjected to torture on suspicion of possessing concealed 
 treasures, was an officer in the Egyptian army, a certain 
 Hamada Effendi. Instead of revealing the hiding-place where 
 his treasures were concealed, he amused himself, even whilst 
 under torture, by insulting his torturers, until the Emir, 
 infuriated by his conduct, ordered him to be flogged until he 
 confessed. For three days he was given a thousand blows, 
 but in vain ; for every time in reply to the demand, " Where 
 is the money?" he answered, "Yes, I have hidden some 
 money, but my secret will be buried with me." After three 
 days of flagellation the executioners were forced to yield 
 before such indomitable determination, and to suspend their 
 tortures, for fear of killing their victim. Major Hamada, 
 whose body was now one huge wound, was then consigned 
 as a prisoner to the Arab tribe, Mina, who, unwilling to 
 relinquish all hope of exacting the secret, subjected him to a 
 new torture, less violent but more ingenious and of longer dura- 
 tion, that of bathing his wounds with a solution of salt water 
 and Soudanese pepper. Slatin, who had known Hamada in 
 happier times, was moved to compassion by his heroism 
 and martyrdom. He wished to come to his assistance, and even 
 managed to persuade the Emir, in whose power he was, to 
 give him into his care. The Emir consented to Slatin's 
 request, but on one sole condition : that if Hamada confided 
 to him the hiding-place of his treasure, he would reveal it. 
 Slatin acquiesced. He had the wretched man carried to his 
 tent, and washed and oiled his wounds. But he soon perceived 
 that his help had arrived too late, and that the victim could not 
 
CRSITY 
 
 V OF 
 
 %*UF 
 HORDE'STOR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 73 
 
 long survive. Indeed, after four days had elapsed, Hamada 
 lay dying. Then, having dismissed the servants, he called 
 for Slatin, and in an expiring voice whispered in his ear 
 
 " ' My hour has come. May the Lord reward you for all 
 your kindness to me ! I cannot do so, but I will show you 
 that I am grateful. I have buried my money.' ' Stop ! ' said 
 I. ' Are you going to tell me where you have hidden your 
 treasure? ' 'Yes/ he murmured, 'it may be of some use to 
 you.' ' No,' I answered, * I will not and cannot use it ; I 
 secured your release from your tormentors on the one condition 
 that, should I learn where your money was hidden, I should 
 tell your enemy. You have suffered greatly, and are paying 
 with your life for your determination not to let your treasure 
 fall into your enemy's hands ; let it lie unknown in the 
 ground, it will keep silence.' Whilst I was talking, Hamada 
 held my hand ; with a supreme effort he murmured, ' I 
 thank you ; may you become fortunate without my money. 
 Allah Karim (God is merciful).' Then, stretching out his 
 limbs and raising his forefinger, he slowly uttered, ' La ilaha 
 illallah, Mohammed Rasul Allah,' closed his eyes, and died." 
 
 Vagabondage, rapine, violence, thoughtlessness for the 
 future, a blind indulgence of all the most savage and im- 
 petuous passions : this was the condition in which the 
 Dervish horde lived until the taking of Khartoum. But this 
 state of excitement could not endure when the conditions which 
 it caused ceased to exist ; that is, the possibility and hope of 
 fresh victorious wars and of gigantic plunderings possibilities 
 and hopes which could not continue indefinitely. Although 
 the Mahdi dreamed of conquering Egypt and Syria as far as 
 Constantinople, he could not fail to perceive, unless he had 
 gone raving mad, that his empire had reached its furthest 
 limits, and that victory could not follow him into the heart of 
 
74 MILITARISM 
 
 Egypt. Anyway, shortly after his triumph at Khartoum 
 Mohammed Ahmed died of typhoid fever, in the flower of his , 
 years and in his full glory as the fortunate conquerer of a 
 vast empire. His death rendered easier and prompter an 
 internal change in the Dervish horde, then very necessary. 
 The Mahdi's successor, the Caliph Abdullahi, a man prudent 
 and little bellicose, realizing the mistake of tempting victory 
 too far, brought the era of great warlike undertakings to a 
 close, and started to inaugurate a new epoch in the confused 
 material of the horde. 
 
 At this point that which is the fundamental phenomenon of 
 war began to determine itself in the Dervish horde, the 
 phenomenon which demonstrates how the purely moral argu- 
 ments against war are far more serious and important than 
 sceptics imagine. He who opposes war on the ground of 
 the purely moral principle which prohibits man to kill or rob, 
 even to-day .at the end of the nineteenth century, runs the risk 
 of being looked upon as an imbecile or at best a mere 
 visionary ; because even those who live morally place little 
 faith in the practical value of moral principles, while the great 
 majority of men are always ready to worship vice and crime, 
 when these present themselves with the attributes of power. 
 That morality, even when it appears defenceless, possesses an 
 intimate and organic force of its own ; that vice, even when it 
 is supported by the greatest human force, is in reality hope- 
 lessly feeble, this is a truth which men have rarely really 
 believed. Success and power still represent to the poor 
 human mind the justification of the most odious crimes, so 
 ready is man to deny morality the moment vice and crime 
 appear to have gained an instant's victory over virtue in the 
 infinitely varying game of life. 
 
 But in reality the words cf the Gospel, " He who conquers 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OP WAR 75 
 
 by the sword shall perish by the sword, 1 ' express in simple 
 form an elementary vital law which can be almost literally 
 applied to the history of war, because war contains in itself 
 its own moral sanction, and develops outside of itself the 
 punishment of the injustice which is its essence. Thus it 
 happens in the history of hordes that a war, which begins by 
 destroying other societies, ends with the ruin of the tribe which 
 gave it birth. By a rapid transformation its deleterious force 
 towards vanquished societies turns on itself, acting upon the 
 structure of the victorious society, which undergoes in the end 
 the same fate as its victims. 
 
 The Soudanese revolution was the work of a horde com- 
 posed of individuals, families, and tribes who had altered 
 their lives from those of shepherds, agriculturists and labourers 
 to champions of a holy war. It had been indirectly favoured by 
 many tribes, who, though discontented with the actual condi- 
 tion of things, did not join it. Its victims were the armies and 
 property of the Egyptian Government and the tribes which 
 remained faithful to Egypt, whose riches formed part of 
 the great booty obtained in the war. This prey was, up to 
 the taking of El Obeid, divided with fair justice among all the 
 soldiers, who thus derived no mean benefits from the conflict, 
 more especially as they had always been used to poverty. 
 If the Emirs and the friends of the Mahdi apportioned to 
 themselves a larger share, no one considered this unjust. 
 And as the spoils were sufficient at the beginning to satisfy 
 the greed both of the horde and its chiefs, the new Govern- 
 ment had no need, and indeed little time, in the midst of the 
 disorder of war, to impose regular tributes on the tribes who, 
 without taking any direct part, had favoured the revolu- 
 tion. Hence these tribes, liberated from paying tribute 
 to the Egyptian Government, and for the moment under no 
 
76 MILITARISM 
 
 obligation to pay imposts to the new, were able to delude 
 themselves with the idea that the age of tax-paying had 
 passed for ever. 
 
 But of how short duration is human delusion! The 
 Mahdi once dead, power fell into the hands of a ferocious, 
 hard, and greedy oligarchy, which soon converted the con- 
 quering army, the horde which governed the Soudan, the 
 faithful who had expelled the impure Turks, into a multitude 
 of wretched slaves, the victims and at the same time the 
 tools of the most humiliating and cruel tyranny which the 
 human mind could conceive. 
 
 From the moment that Caliph Abdullahi came into power 
 \/he had only one object in view : to use every one for his own 
 enrichment and to aggrandize his family. Abdullahi was, 
 indeed, born and educated to be an implacable tormentor of 
 his species. Sprung from poor parents, he displayed no 
 desire to work in his youth. Thus his first life experiences 
 had been bitter : that is to say, those of a poor man who lives 
 in a rude society where there are few rich, but where, through 
 universal hardness of heart, there is little compassion among 
 the poor ; where he who possesses a little likes to increase 
 the small pleasure of possessing by despising the very poor, 
 and impressing upon them their inferiority ; where he who 
 possesses nothing has no rights whatsoever, and is generally 
 ill-treated, the victim of all the contempt and the ferocious 
 caprices of human wickedness. Now, where the rich are 
 malignant the poor are rebellious ; and still more rebellious 
 must have been a poor man like the future Caliph, who cared 
 little for work and possessed great vanity and a desire to 
 enjoy. This poor, ambitious, and covetous vagabond was 
 one of the first to follow the prophet of Dongola. He knew 
 how to curry favour, became one of his intimates, and ended 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 77 
 
 by being appointed Caliph, which signifies in a Mussulman 
 country the successor to power. His greed, suppressed so 
 long by poverty ; his vanity, embittered by so many years of 
 humiliation ; the indescribable exaltation of his egoism and 
 pride, inebriated at a stroke by such a fabulous piece of good 
 luck, which made of the derided beggar knocked about the 
 streets the master of an immense empire and the arbitrator 
 of the fates of so many who had seen him clothed in rags 
 these combinations of events naturally made of an innately 
 bad man that which he became, to the sinful sorrow of the 
 Soudanese, i.e. one of the cruellest, most insolent, rapacious 
 and madly proud tyrants who ever in the history of humanity 
 mounted a throne to torment and chastise mankind. Greed 
 and ambition divided his soul, as they did those of the most 
 powerful members of the horde who shared his empire ; hence 
 the characteristics of his Government were rapacity and 
 tyranny. 
 
 IV 
 
 Abdullah! and his Government were the scourge of the 
 Soudan ; the terrible expiation which the Soudanese popula- 
 tion were condemned to make for their direct or indirect 
 participation in the violence and rapine of the Holy War. 
 No accidental chastisement, let it be clearly understood, which 
 descended by chance on these peoples' heads because ill luck 
 would have it that the Mahdi's first successor should be an 
 inhuman brigand, but an expiation which was in the 
 natural and necessary sequence of events, whose advent 
 was inevitable, through the moral and social condition in 
 which the Dervish horde found itself at the close of the 
 Holy War. 
 
78 MILITARISM 
 
 Owing to a very general but little heeded psychological 
 phenomenon, which it is important to keep in view, those few 
 years passed in the midst of war and rapine had left the 
 Dervishes in such a mental condition that they were forced 
 to become, in their turn, the victims of rapine and oppression 
 on the part of a few bolder, more cunning, and crueller men. 
 The fighting over, the half-religious, half-brigand excitement, 
 which had made soldiers of these peasants and shepherds, 
 began to abate by degrees for want of fuel. But the abate- 
 ment of the fever did not bring back the flocks destroyed in 
 the heat of delirium ; nor did the beautiful cultivated fields 
 return, which the fanatics had left behind in order to follow 
 the Mahdi. The Dervish horde, though formed of uncultured 
 and uncivilized peasants, possessed nevertheless a rudimentary 
 morality which had made of them hitherto a useful element 
 in Soudanese society, owing to their peaceful habits. But, 
 torn from their land and their cattle, they had abandoned their 
 industrious habits, and degenerated into a multitude of armed 
 vagabonds whose only moral impulse was fanaticism. What 
 could possibly become of such when their excitement was 
 passed ? They were as leaves which a tempest had torn from 
 the branch, whirled for a moment, and then, the storm over, 
 left scattered here and there, withered and dried. In the 
 moral world, as in the material, all creative forces are gradual 
 and slow, whilst those of destruction are rapid and instan- 
 taneous : they arrive in a moment, and annihilate without 
 allowing time for defence. Does not a forest fire destroy in 
 a few hours the vegetation of centuries ? The habit of regular 
 work, the accumulation of the instruments necessary to do 
 this work, the traditions and principles of primitive morality, 
 all these, the creations of centuries, the fruits of the labour 
 of generations, were thus destroyed in a few years of idleness 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 79 
 
 and excitement. Nor could they be recreated in a day ; as 
 little could a magician replace in the burnt forest the trees 
 which only time could produce. He who has tasted the violent 
 pleasures of a disorderly life, full of factitious excitement, 
 cannot easily re-accustom himself to a dull and monotonous 
 existence. And even those members of the Mahdi's horde 
 who wished to rectify their error, by returning to their former 
 mode of life, were unable to do so, having destroyed or dis- 
 persed their means of gaining a livelihood. Besides this, they 
 no longer made any wealth out of the war, because after the 
 taking of Khartoum the Mahdi prohibited the soldiers from 
 appropriating any part of the booty under severe penalties, 
 compelling them to consign it to the beib-el-mal, or tax- 
 exactor : that is to say, to himself and his friends, who 
 divided everything among them. In a moment of madness 
 they had voluntarily made outcasts of themselves, and out- 
 casts they were to remain to the end of their days ; and, what 
 was worse, they were no longer animated by the fanaticism 
 which inspired them during the war ; their barbarous selfish- 
 ness and cowardice were no longer sustained by any sentiment, 
 however brutal, neither by religious delusion, by the hope of 
 plunder, or by the pleasure men find in a life of adventure. 
 
 A multitude of uncivilized men, who possess nothing, who 
 have no longer either trade or laborious habits nor the first 
 rudiments of morality, who have lost the ardour of common 
 enthusiasm, which, however ferocious, is capable of com- 
 municating a certain degree of strength to the soul, and thus 
 replace ideals ; a multitude of outcasts, with heads yet heavy 
 from an orgie of blood and rapine, they had not the moral 
 strength to resist an oppression exercised by means of 
 systematic terror. They were therefore the easiest victims of 
 a tyrannical oligarchy. There is a great difference between 
 
80 MILITARISM 
 
 the blind impulsive courage of a crowd, due to an enthusiasm 
 which drowns the instinct of self-preservation, and the con- 
 scious and reflective courage of men who unite to oppose a 
 common peril, and combine with a view to the general good, 
 repressing by a conscious effort of will the selfish instincts 
 which urge each to look after himself without giving any 
 thought to future dangers. The lowest class, that which 
 lives in the extremest moral misery, is capable, on certain 
 occasions, of this first form of courage ; but only men whose 
 moral conscience is well developed are capable of the latter. 
 Thus it came about that those multitudes, armed with spears 
 and swords, intrepidly assailed fortresses defended by rifles 
 and cannon, and then, like so many calves, allowed them- 
 selves docilely to be coerced by the Caliph and a few Emirs. 
 The process was most simple by which this tyranny 
 was established over the warriors who had taken part in 
 the Holy War, the ancient Dervish horde, as also over those 
 tribes who had not abandoned their former life, and who had 
 thus formed the non-military portion of Soudan society 
 posterior to the revolution. The Caliph summoned to Om- 
 durman, the capital of the new empire built on the banks of 
 the Nile near the ruins of Khartoum, the Arab tribes of 
 Baggara, pastoral nomad tribes who inhabited Kordofan, 
 and were adapted by their life and customs to fulfil the 
 work Abdullahi apportioned to them. The Caliph, like all 
 founders of tyrannies, understood that it was necessary to 
 have round him a small but select and faithful body-guard ; 
 he felt the need to have janissaries and praetorians ; and in a 
 society where tribal organization is so strong, on whom could 
 he depend better than on his own tribe ? Indeed, he was a 
 member of one of the Baggara tribes, the Baggara Taisha, 
 and these, like the rest, had taken small part in the Holy War. 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 8 1 
 
 He persuaded the Baggara to change their rude pastoral life 
 and to become his body-guard ; he ordered them, men, 
 women, and children, to go to Omdurman ; he assigned to 
 them good quarters, handsome salaries, and many privileges ; 
 he gave them almost absolute power over the population, 
 and made of them a troop of several thousand well-chosen 
 soldiers, personally devoted to himself, and interested in main- 
 taining his rule. With this tool he managed to command 
 the remainder of the army, the multitude who had formed 
 the Dervish horde, and which, the Holy War over, he forced 
 to continue in arms, not for the defence of the faith, but for 
 his own defence, and what is worse, not recompensing them 
 in any way. He thus made of these fanatics and warriors 
 who had enlisted voluntarily to fight for or under the pre- 
 text of a religious war, a permanent, army- assigned to the 
 service of his greed, who were under the obligation of life- 
 long and gratuitous service : in short, a multitude of armed 
 slaves of whom he was the head. How, then, were these 
 soldiers to exist without pay, and excluded, moreover, from 
 any participation in the booty of war ? The Caliph did not 
 care ; he needed them to make up for the generosity he was 
 forced to show to the faithful Baggara. By means of pilfering 
 and exploiting the population, they could not fail to draw 
 an existence, a miserable one, it is true, but which enabled 
 them to live and carry out the expeditions imposed on them 
 by the Caliph. When discontent at this hard and wretched 
 life urged them to revolt, he crushed them down with terrific 
 cruelty by means of his faithful Baggara. 
 
 Thus a single harsh and unscrupulous man, assisted by 
 a few Emirs and some thousand praetorians, was able to 
 oppress for several years nearly a hundred thousand armed 
 men ; was able to compel them to render perpetual service 
 
 F 
 
82 MILITARISM 
 
 without recompense ; could employ them constantly in 
 fatiguing and dangerous expeditions ; and yet these men, 
 who were still the same soldiers who had conquered the 
 Egyptian troops, never dared turn their arms against their 
 tyrants. Does this appear strange ? Those who under- 
 stand the true nature of courage and cowardice will under- 
 stand how a wretched and embrutened multitude like the 
 Dervish horde were unable to resist, when the excitement 
 of fanaticism was ended, the Caliph's oppression. The 
 Caliph, his Emirs and praetorians, were like a single body 
 moved by a single will to fulfil one fixed idea, which was to 
 maintain their own rule by terror. They recognized their 
 power, and this rendered them even more daring. On the 
 other hand, the hundred thousand soldiers were a morally 
 disintegrated mass, each degraded in his own misery, only 
 feeling his own individual impotence against the implacable 
 power of the ruling oligarchy. They ought to have united 
 together in a common defence ; but they retained too little 
 of their ancient impetuous courage, and what little remained 
 only found expression in partial rebellions, the fury of which 
 soon gave way to make room for abject submission. And 
 thus this army of tens of thousands was compelled to serve 
 for several years a single man supported by a few Emirs and 
 chosen soldiers a clear proof that the habit of arms and the 
 perils of war can be combined with great moral cowardice, 
 and that an army which can subdue entire unarmed popula- 
 tions may easily be subdued in its turn by a handful of 
 more resolute ruffians. 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OP WAR 83 
 
 V 
 
 If the armed soldiers of the horde allowed themselves to 
 be reduced to such a wretched state of servitude, how could 
 the non-military population defend itself from the oppression 
 of those tribes who had favoured, but taken no direct part 
 in the revolution all that population which continued to 
 labour, and which therefore, whether rich or poor, was the 
 victim of the tyrant's greed? They all found the Caliph's 
 Government, born of the revolution which they had so in- 
 cautiously favoured, so harsh and covetous a master, that 
 the detested Egyptian in comparison could be looked upon 
 as a regime of paternal benevolence. The Caliph substituted 
 for the wars of conquest against the Egyptians, expeditions 
 against the internal or frontier tribes, whose produce went 
 to his benefit ; for their flocks and household goods were 
 confiscated, their peoples were enslaved, sold, or employed 
 to cultivate the stolen land for their conqueror's advantage, 
 while their most beautiful women were distributed in the 
 harems of the rich. This treatment was meted out equally 
 to those tribes who favoured the Caliph's Government and 
 to those who opposed it, only the pretext for aggression 
 varied in the two cases ; though any pretext, however, sufficed 
 to exploit even the tribes who would have willingly acquiesced 
 in a regular regime of taxation : a strange administration 
 whose one object was to reduce all the riches of the Soudan 
 to the patrimony of the Caliph and his Emirs. These latter 
 were, however, only allowed to enrich themselves in order that 
 the Caliph might kill them when they were very wealthy, 
 and confiscate their property. Thus, to give an example, 
 the Jaalin and Dangola Arab tribes lived on their trade 
 
84 MILITARISM 
 
 as boatmen, possessing nearly all the boats which navigated 
 the Nile. The Caliph, who wished to appropriate the boats, 
 remembered that in the first days of the revolution, when 
 he was still at Kordofan, almost all the boatmen had re- 
 fused to follow the Mahdi, or to favour his attempt. He 
 therefore consulted the Council of the Kadis, a sort of 
 supreme judicial court, to ask whether the boats should not 
 be considered as " ghanima," or spoils of war subject to 
 confiscation. The judges were not of this opinion ; but after 
 lengthy consideration they concluded that the boatmen were 
 " mukhalafin," or unconvertible people, and their boats 
 therefore were liable all the same to expropriation. The 
 confiscation was made without previous warning, and thus 
 suddenly the wretched boatmen were reduced to mendicity, 
 and all died of hunger. One of the chief sources of revenue 
 to the Soudan was the trade in what we call gum-arabic, 
 gathered in the great forests of the Kordofan by the Gimeh 
 Arab tribe, and transported by them by means of their 
 numerous herds of camels. The Caliph one day took it 
 into his head to appropriate these herds under the pretext 
 that the Gimeh had disobeyed his command to make a 
 certain pilgrimage. The Gimeh, deprived of their camels, were 
 forced to abandon the gum-arabic commerce, which totally 
 decayed in consequence, and no other means of existence 
 remaining to them, they organized themselves into bands of 
 brigands. 
 
 The ultimate result of these tactics was the rapid social 
 decomposition which threatened the very existence of Sou- 
 danese society, prior to the Anglo-Egyptian re-conquest. 
 These continued confiscations led to an enormous destruction 
 of wealth which, though accumulated in the treasuries of the 
 Caliph and his Emirs, nevertheless got widely dispersed, 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 85 
 
 whilst the precariousness of general conditions led to a 
 rapid diminution in the number of men capable of work 
 or producing new wealth. Why work when the only recom- 
 pense for labour was the danger of being robbed, and perhaps I/ 
 killed ? Better become beggars, soldiers, thieves, and brigands. 
 Meanwhile the waste of wealth increased day by day in 
 a regime of such violence ; production diminished, thus pro- 
 ducing an ever-greater disproportion between production 
 and consumption. This, again, was accompanied by fearful 
 famines which exterminated by thousands the superfluous 
 mouths, like the terrible famine of 1889. Thus the power 
 of the Dervishes, which twelve years ago appeared to 
 threaten Egypt, decayed rapidly, attacked by precocious 
 old age, whose principal symptoms were depopulation and 
 the rapid disorganization of labour. The districts formerly 
 so populous became deserted ; the fields once so well culti- 
 vated were abandoned, and nature slowly reasserted her 
 rights ; wild beasts, no longer decimated by men, multiplied 
 and invaded the villages, venturing at times even into the 
 streets of Omdurman, devouring women, old men, children, 
 and even adult men ; work slackened throughout the Soudan, 
 because none felt assured that he would taste the fruits of 
 his labour. Only those professions which depend on the 
 destruction, and not on the production of wealth flourished : 
 brigands, usurers, slave-merchants, soldiers. Every energetic 
 man became by necessity either an Emir or a brigand. The 
 soldiers degenerated into wild and famished beasts, who 
 fought partly out of fear, partly in the hope of eating a little 
 better during the days following the battle, but who retained 
 no permanent traces of their old courage. 
 
 This is the typical history of a horde as mirrored in this 
 religious movement of the Dervishes, which succeeded in 
 
86 MILITARISM 
 
 establishing an immense empire in the Soudan ruled by a 
 narrow military oligarchy of Emirs who collected round that 
 strange adventurer, the lately dethroned Caliph. Rarely has 
 history witnessed so ferocious, selfish, and greedy a tyranny, 
 nor one so implacable in plundering the riches of those 
 territories that fell into his hand. Forty or fifty families 
 managed to devastate a district so enormous that a whole 
 army would have been deemed insufficient to accomplish 
 the task. 
 
 Entire tribes were despoiled of their flocks and chased 
 from their land ; industries which provided for hundreds of 
 tribes, that might have been a source of revenue to the Govern- 
 ment, were destroyed for the base greed of selling as slaves 
 the men who formerly lived quietly by their work ; the 
 population diminished in an alarming manner in the most 
 florid districts, and the Soudan, devasted by Emirs and 
 brigands, slowly degenerated into a desert populated by 
 skeletons. Terror was the only social bond remaining to 
 prevent the total dissolution of society. The gibbets erected 
 in every village were the only emblems of authority. Having 
 thus consumed their strength, the Dervishes were unable to 
 resist the Anglo- Egyptian army. A society almost ruined by 
 the rage of injustice that flourished in its midst was natu- 
 rally conquered by an army organized and led by a highly 
 civilized community. The rough and bestial Dervish hordes, 
 no longer sustained by the blind fanaticism of the Mahdi's 
 followers, but fighting merely out of fear of being punished 
 with death, could not long resist the solid Egyptian battalions 
 commanded by superior English officers. The most civilized 
 society conquered, and peace has returned to the Soudan. 
 
 At the same time we perceive the reason, or one of the 
 reasons, at least, which explains that terrible phenomenon of 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 87 
 
 history known as tyranny. Why amongst the men called 
 upon to govern their fellows were there so many in whom 
 the passion for emotion expressed itself in greed, in such 
 violent and selfish ambition as to lead an entire society to 
 ruin ? This is one of the many-sided aspects of the great 
 problem of evil. Is it possible that so much wickedness 
 should have no other effect than that of tormenting men 
 uselessly and undeservedly ? Considering the fate of all the 
 hordes with whose history we are acquainted, how they all 
 terminate in detestable tyrannies, we are able to conclude 
 that the establishment of a tyranny is the inevitable result of 
 the moral degeneration of the majority of society which is 
 the effect of war, and is a secondary evil which springs from 
 the first. But as the debasement of the tribe results from the 
 abandonment of their previous laborious life, from the habits 
 of vagabondage, thoughtlessness, rapine and cruelty con- 
 tracted in war, thus the tyranny in which it terminates is the 
 punishment of the neglect of certain fundamental duties : an 
 expiation which fatally follows on the sin. The tyrant is an 
 unconscious arbitrator of justice ; his triumphs, which appear 
 its supreme negation, are only one of the most complicated 
 processes by which justice is fulfilled. The tyrant drags his 
 society to ruin by his extravagances ; and also rushes to ruin 
 himself. Never was this justice carried out so rapidly, 
 entirely, or exemplarily as in the Soudan. 
 
 VI 
 
 Thus, in its most simple and primitive form, war is only 
 an outlet for the instinct of destruction inherent in man, and 
 has no other function than to destroy material things, the 
 established habits of social life and men themselves. 
 
83 MILITARISM 
 
 Hordes are a form of society which live in the illusion that 
 the greatest human happiness is to be found in destruction. 
 The masses allow themselves to be induced to abandon 
 modest and monotonous occupations for the greed of wealth, 
 for the pleasures of recklessness, for the vanity of forming 
 part in a body of warriors who terrorize multitudes, and who 
 are considered far and wide as an invincible force of destruc- 
 tion which leaves nothing but ruin on its tracks. All this is 
 entered on in the hope of a life full of emotions and sensual 
 pleasures. The improvidence of primitive men prevents them 
 from recognizing that such a life can but be of short duration, 
 ^because the material on which to vent their passion for 
 destruction comes to an end, and the inevitable crisis brings 
 painful disillusion. Then follows the tyranny of a few, who, 
 owing to the general state of degradation, are able to use the 
 horde for their own benefit, and to enrich themselves by 
 robbery and exploitation, and rule, not by benefiting but by 
 tormenting others. Greed and ambition become their sole 
 passions, and they satisfy them to the ruin of the entire society. 
 The horde, whose existence is based on this great illusion, 
 traverses a brief period of great prosperity on the way to its 
 perdition. 
 
 In horde-life man found for the first time how full of error 
 and peril was the terrible delusion that happiness could be 
 found in destruction ; how much which appears at first to be 
 pleasant proved to be full of pain and bitterness because, 
 after giving a passing satisfaction, it led to permanent un- 
 happiness. This illusion first taught man that life was like 
 an enchanted wood, full of sweet deceits, of beautiful and 
 fatal things. Woe to him who, in the deepest labyrinths of 
 the wood, falls a prey to the intoxicating delights which 
 tempt him on all sides ! Hidden among the trunks he finds 
 
HORDES, OR THE ORIGIN OF WAR 89 
 
 delicious honeycombs ; but woe betide him if he yields to 
 the temptation to taste this poisoned honey ! The shade of 
 the fair trees is refreshing and cool in the fierce midday heat ; 
 but he who, unable to resist its invitation, lies down in it to 
 sleep, awakes diseased, for fever lurks unseen in that innocent 
 shade. All the trees bend down their branches laden with 
 delicious fruit within reach of his hand ; but alas ! he who 
 tastes them falls victim to an intoxication which does not pass, 
 and which deprives him in the end of reason. Who can 
 hope to traverse this wood without yielding to its thousand 
 seductions, apparently so full of pleasure ? The austere man 
 who never indulges in voluptuous repose ; he who searches 
 under the surface for the few hidden roots of simple taste, 
 which, in the midst of these noxious delights, can alone 
 increase his strength, intelligence, and health. 
 
 But this wisdom and self-control, as we shall see later on, 
 are only the slow work of a long civilization. The Christian 
 legend of the sinner who sells his soul to the devil in order 
 to enjoy the brief delights of this life, symbolizes well the 
 history of the human race, since at every moment we see 
 men paying for an hour's joy with ages of misery, and one 
 thoughtless and ignorant generation destroying, in order to 
 satisfy some caprice, the happiness of their children and 
 children's children. 
 
THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT 
 CIVILIZATIONS 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 
 
 I 
 
 ANCIENT civilizations appear to us as an immense battle- 
 field, a vast cemetery of peoples. Tribes, nations, great 
 empires and small states only emerge in order to destroy 
 the tribes, peoples, empires and states that preceded them, 
 to be in their turn destroyed by other rivals. Nations seemed 
 only born to die a violent death ; their lives generally began 
 with a victory and ended with a defeat which entailed, in 
 most cases, not merely the effacing from history of the 
 name of a state, but the physical destruction of an entire 
 society. Every work of art, of science, of politics appears to 
 have had no other object in the distant past than that of 
 fostering war, of covering the earth with costly ashes. 
 
 But since these ancient societies were nearly all capable of 
 creating a civilization, an industry, a commerce, a philosophy, 
 an art, it is not rash to claim for the frequency and violence") 
 of war that it served some purpose, that it had some influence^ 
 on life and thought. In other words, it is difficult to admit 
 that war in this case was nothing else but, like with the , 
 hordes, the outlet for an instinct of destruction ; that it had not 
 a more profound cause is an effect at least partially beneficial. 
 What were its causes, what its object and influences ? Let us 
 attempt to solve this question by studying some of the general 
 
94 MILITARISM 
 
 characteristics and weaknesses inherent in the constitution of 
 ancient civilizations which appear to us to rank among the 
 chief causes of the warlike spirit of former times. 
 
 There were four distinct types of ancient society. The 
 rudest were the nomad or semi-nomad tribes, composed of 
 barbarians who, though possessing the first rudiments of 
 agriculture, lived chiefly as shepherds, an unsettled life 
 which rendered it easy for them to unite into hordes for 
 warlike purposes. The tribes were usually ruled under an 
 aristocratic constitution, by a nobility composed of the richest 
 and most courageous families, those who possessed most 
 cattle, lands, slaves, and precious metals. Sometimes a king 
 presided as chief. The best known of these ancient societies 
 were the Gallic tribes previous to the Roman conquest. 
 These possibly represent the highest degree of civilization 
 and stability to which such societies could attain before 
 evolving into that form of society which is really repre- 
 sentative of ancient civilization. 
 
 Amongst these the most prosperous in Asia were the 
 military empires, such as the Assyrian, the Babylonian, the 
 Egyptian, and the Persian. These empires extended over 
 vast territories, but their chief seat of government was 
 generally centred in a town built on the banks of a river and 
 situated in the centre of a continent. They derived their 
 I/ power principally from their dominion over the land ; the 
 greater number of their soldiers were drawn from the 
 peasant class. It was, therefore, to the interest of these states 
 to encourage agriculture by fostering those great public and 
 especially hydraulic works which ranked among the chief 
 glories of Oriental monarchies, and to which are due the first 
 great attempts at irrigating the Nile, the Tigris, and the 
 Euphrates. The social constitution of military empires was 
 
THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 95 
 
 in some cases aristocratic, in others democratic. In the first 
 case as, for instance, in the Assyrian Empire the high civil 
 and military posts were reserved by legal and hereditary 
 privilege to a certain number of families who formed the 
 nobility ; in the second case, as we see from the eleventh 
 Egyptian dynasty, they were bestowed by means of examin- 
 ations and promotion, without regard to birth, to professional 
 functionaries ; men of all social conditions being admitted 
 even to the highest places. A sovereign almost always 
 hereditary presided over the administration and nobility. 
 He lived in a magnificently luxurious court, he was resplendent 
 with precious gems and metals, and governed his nation 
 despotically with the help of the great functionaries. The 
 army, composed chiefly of peasants and vanquished popula- 
 tions, was generally recruited by force, and kept together by 
 terror. The empire consisted of vast lands cultivated by the 
 peasantry, and a few big cities, sometimes one only, grandiose 
 according to the taste of the period, in which were accumu- 
 lated riches, provisions, and luxuries ranging from precious 
 metals to the books of the wise, from industry to the fine arts. 
 Industry and commerce, not agriculture, were the chief 
 sources of the prosperity of such mercantile towns as Tyre, 
 Sidon, and Carthage. These were situated on the sea-coast, 
 and were governed by a rich oligarchy, who were at one 
 and the same time capitalists, ship-owners, and merchants, 
 possessing large fleets but no armies. These vessels they 
 used ordinarily for commerce, but in case of need they 
 employed them also for warfare turning their commercial 
 fleet into a military fleet. 
 
 These oligarchies did not aim at conquering lands, but at < 
 possessing the knowledge that should enable them to be the 
 masters of distant markets. 
 
96 MILITARISM 
 
 The agrarian-commercial states of the Italo-Graecian 
 
 /order, where a class of landowners and merchants contested 
 
 and divided power, were more complex and original. Power 
 
 was exercised by magistrates elected by the citizens. The 
 
 militia was no compulsory service, to enter it was regarded as 
 
 \/ 
 
 a high privilege of citizens ; and whether peasants, rich pro- 
 prietors, artisans, or merchants, they alone had the right to 
 take part in war. The cities were ruled now aristocratically 
 when only the richer portion of the population were in 
 power ; now democratically when all, or the greater part of 
 the citizens, participated in the Government ; in both cases, 
 however, the Government was an oligarchy, for the citizens 
 were only a portion of the population, outside of which there 
 existed numerous clients foreigners and slaves who had no 
 v political rights. ,. 
 
 II 
 
 These various forms of society, both barbarous and 
 civilized, had one great defect which prevented them from 
 rising above a certain level of ferocity and brutality, 
 although able to conceive moral philosophies of extraordinary 
 perfection. This defect was the principal cause why ancient 
 civilizations were so unstable and wars so frequent : i.e. the 
 difficulty they had in finding new productive employment for 
 V accumulated capital, a condition of things which was partly 
 the cause and partly the effect of the unlaborious habits of 
 the population. 
 
 The facility of productive investment for capital is quite a 
 recent development, due partly to the great scientific and 
 technical progress of our times, partly to the abundance of 
 accumulated riches and of men ready to work, also to the 
 
THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 97 
 
 vast unexplored and uninhabited territories that have come 
 into our possession. Owing to these fortunate conditions, out- 
 lets for human energy are varied and multiplied daily, for 
 since, as there is an excess of supply, men are able to turn 
 their vigour to the production of new things, with the result 
 that an unprecedented abundance has been rained into the 
 earth, rendering it possible for all to produce and consume. 
 These conditions have altered our mode of life, and introduced 
 the habits of continued and methodical daily work. The love 
 of labour is always proportionate to its difficulties and to 
 the liberality of its recompense. Hence in our civilization, 
 where work is easy and fruitful, it tends, with the increase of 
 population, of consumption and civilization, to become every 
 day more universal and intense. The characteristic type of 
 our age is the busy man, always anxious to produce and 
 consume as much as possible. In this wise the productiveness 
 of work increases, as it were, geometrically. 
 
 This was not the case with ancient civilization. The only 
 productive employments for capital either in the hands of 
 individuals or the state were the following : 
 
 1. The construction of cities, roads, bridges and hydraulic 
 works which served for agriculture and communication. 
 
 2. The acquisition of lands, tools and slaves, to plough and 
 cultivate the same. 
 
 3. The acquisition of slaves required for domestic work, 
 to serve their masters, wear his clothes, make his furniture 
 and build his house ; to do all the roughest work and to serve 
 as sailors, stablemen, and crews. 
 
 4. The construction of land and water vehicles and the 
 acquisition of goods for trading. The most profitable 
 commerce in the ancient world was done by sea, and 
 speculated upon the great differences of price that prevailed 
 
 G 
 
98 MILITARISM 
 
 in countries between which communication was difficult and 
 in which the degree of civilization that profound factor in 
 the value of goods was so diverse. In fact, the object of 
 commerce anciently was to buy objects from barbarians who 
 / could not appreciate them, at a low price. 
 
 5. The acquisition of the simple instruments used in the 
 industry of the period for weaving, mechanical work, etc. 
 
 Population was never very dense in ancient times. This 
 rendered the cultivation of the land more difficult ; great 
 J expanses of land had to be abandoned owing to scarcity 
 of hands, or on account of the solitude and wildness of their 
 situation, rendered impracticable through forests, marshes, 
 and wild beasts. The very limited agrarian development 
 which resulted indirectly restricted the progress of industrial 
 labour, for many industries cannot exist without a large class 
 of agriculturists to provide the raw material in exchange for 
 the products of industrial work. Industrial employments 
 were only practicable for small capitalists, because they were 
 always exercised by free artisans who provided themselves 
 with their own inexpensive tools. Any extensive industry, 
 carried on by great capitalists with the aid of numerous 
 workers, was an unknown thing in the old world, excepting 
 in the mining industry. Mines worked by great capitalists 
 with multitudes of slaves were common things, but other 
 more refined industries, such as the mechanical and manu- 
 facturing, carried on by capitalists in large offices, with 
 numerous employees, whether free or serfs of this we only 
 find some trace in the history of Athens in the fifth century. 
 Commerce offered the possibility of medium gains, greater, 
 that is to say, than industry and smaller than agriculture. A 
 man who owned sufficient money to build himself a ship, buy 
 a few goods and some slaves, could try his luck in trade. We 
 
THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 99 
 
 read in Plautus that commerce was the resource of young 
 men who had ruined themselves with excesses. When they 
 found themselves on their last legs they collected what little 
 money remained, bought a ship, and tried their fortune. 
 But it was not usual for a merchant, who had once enriched 
 himself, to invest his gains in new ships in order indefinitely 
 to extend his business. Commerce in those times was too 
 risky a matter ; besides, the development of trade was not 
 rapid enough to justify this course. An enriched merchant 
 bought land, houses, etc., and sought to become a rentier. 
 
 In short, the only good investment for large capitals was 
 in agriculture, though even this, in comparison to modern 
 civilization, was very restricted. 
 
 Ill 
 
 The consequence of all this was that the ancients lived in 
 small communities, and contented themselves with working 
 and consuming little. If some fine morning an ancient 
 Egyptian, Assyrian, or Greek, were suddenly reanimated in 
 Oxford Street, preserving recollections of the world in which 
 he lived, at the sight of so many people hurrying in the same 
 direction he would imagine that something extraordinary was 
 happening in London : a catastrophe, a festival, a procession, 
 the return of some victorious king. It would never occur to 
 him that all this bustle was a daily occurrence, representing 
 the urgent desire and need of numbers to reach in time their 
 day's work, which rarely lasts less than six or seven hours. 
 The ancients, with a few exceptions such as the slaves in 
 the mines, who were overburdened till they nearly died of 
 exhaustion worked little, both the higher and lower classes. ~ 
 
 The rich and powerful (whose riches were derived 
 
100 MILITARISM 
 
 principally from lands and cattle), when they were not busy 
 with state affairs, had no other care than to pass their time 
 in the midst of dissipations : hunting, feasts, balls, spectacles, 
 gallant adventures ; consuming the rents of their estates, 
 which they left in the hands of agents and rarely visited. 
 Thus the chief characteristic of the higher classes in these 
 societies was idleness, the lack of any profound and serious 
 habit of work : such can be observed even in their particular 
 kind of work, politics and war. What deliberateness in 
 ancient combats and politics ! Sieges and wars lasted for 
 years, months were wasted in bringing about some small 
 state reform, or concluding simple diplomatic treaties. 
 Their administration and diplomacy resembled very closely 
 that of modern Turkey. The men at the head of the state 
 were good fellows, who wanted to enjoy their lives like every 
 one else, consequently matters of great urgency were fre- 
 quently postponed in order that they should not interfere 
 with some festival or other entertainment. Only in the 
 extremest moments, when face to face with imminent danger, 
 did the habitual indolence of these regimes give way to a 
 frenzy of activity capable of immense efforts. In ordinary 
 times it was hopeless to expect of them the continuous 
 alacrity, always on the watch, of the well-governed states 
 of our day, because in the habits and character of the ruling 
 classes of that period there was a little of that indolence 
 which nowadays we only find in viveurs. In ancient states, 
 even those at the head of the social hierarchy were cha- 
 racterized by the indifference of men who work little and 
 abuse pleasure, like our dissolute rich, who, in the opinion 
 of contemporary morality, are the most despicable portion 
 of the modern upper classes. 
 
 Antiquity does not afford the phenomenon of the busy 
 
DEFECTS OF ANCIENT Cli'luXttoN$* * 
 
 man. Great and small merchants, ambulating vendors, and 
 shopkeepers were more anxious then than now to pass their 
 time lounging about their shops, gossiping with their cus- 
 tomers and passers-by. A merchant's work in olden times 
 had nothing in common with the drudgery of our modern 
 tradesmen, who every day has to conceive new projects, 
 direct the execution of contracts, and resolve the innumer- 
 able difficulties which continually present themselves. The 
 merchant of old was capitalist and privateer in one, who 
 invested his moneys in ships, and generally navigated his 
 own vessel when he set forth to exchange his goods in various 
 ports. His life was thus hard physically, but not mentally, 
 He had to put up with the fatigues of travel in an age which 
 ignored sleeping-cars and transatlantic liners ; he had to 
 face the perils of seafaring in a fragile boat, and the dangers 
 of commerce with barbarians in an epoch which knew neither 
 consuls nor state protection in foreign lands. But the nature 
 of his business scarcely ever varied, or did so very slowly. 
 He had to deal with scant competition ; his commerce 
 demanded little culture the result of study and fatigue 
 but considerable cunning, which is a natural gift, and he 
 had not to worry his brain further than to find some new 
 trick for deceiving his clients. 
 
 The populace willingly followed the example of their 
 betters. Factory inspectors were not needed then to insure 
 artisans and peasants against overworking or unsanitary 
 conditions. Unwittingly they applied the most perfect 
 hygienic rules to their work, exercising that precaution not 
 to exhaust their strength, which is displayed by primitive 
 men, when working, not under a severe master, but under 
 the stimulus of their own zeal. Virgil describes, in his 
 " Georgics," the life of the small Latin proprietor, which he 
 
102 MILITARISM 
 
 holds up as an example of austere industry to the proletariat, 
 who idly lounged about the theatres and forums of Rome. 
 And yet how sweet was that life in comparison with that 
 of a modern workman ! The small proprietor only had to 
 apply the traditional agrarian practices which descended 
 from father to son, no inventive effort was demanded of him 
 to better his technique. All the agriculture which Virgil 
 describes is so simple that the peasant could easily achieve 
 it with ordinary industry during the spring and autumn 
 months. The heaviest work consisted in sowing and reaping 
 the corn, and even this was done by the peasant, not under 
 the harsh direction of a master, but under the far sweeter 
 stimulus of his own zeal and the consciousness of his own 
 interests. Autumn, moreover, ended in the vintage festivals, 
 and winter was nothing but one long repose, an uninterrupted 
 merrymaking and hunting season. 
 
 " Mutuaque inter se laeti convivia curant ; 
 Invitat genialis hiems curasque rcsolvit." 
 
 (i. 301, 302). 
 
 Still idler, perhaps, was the life of the town worker, men 
 whose laziness was encouraged by the numerous amusements 
 and attractions the city offered. Political and religious 
 festivals were innumerable in ancient society, and they all 
 formed an excellent excuse for both rich and poor to pass 
 their time in lounging about, and in amusements of all 
 kinds. For certain peoples such as the Athenians poli- 
 tics were an extra distraction, because when the tribunals 
 sat, or assemblies of citizens were convoked, shoemakers, 
 iron-founders, dyers, and carpenters left their work or shops 
 to take part in the meeting of one or other party ; to attend 
 some noisy trial in which the speeches of celebrated rheto- 
 ricians of the hour were to be read. In any case, as ancient 
 
THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 103 
 
 industry was chiefly composed of artisans who worked in 
 their own homes and then sold their goods to wholesale 
 merchants, their labour was necessarily far less hard than 
 that to which modern factory workmen are condemned, 
 because it was much less disciplined. A free artisan works 
 when he likes ; he varies his working-hours every day accord- 
 ing to his inclination ; he is not obliged willy-nilly to slave 
 a certain number of hours, and to overcome his weariness. 
 Those days when he feels disinclined for work, he is not 
 subjected to the tedious discipline of time-tables and over- 
 seers charged to convert all his energy into a useful product. 
 What a difference there exists, in hardship and productive- 
 ness, between ancient and modern labour, even considered 
 independently of the instruments which served in the two 
 cases ! 
 
 IV 
 
 Consumption and production were alike small. Ancient 
 living was poor and simple in comparison with ours. The 
 ancients were not acquainted with tobacco, coffee, tea, sugar 
 nor alcohol. They were used to simpler food than we are, 
 excepting when they viciously abandoned themselves to 
 inexcusable orgies. They dressed much less, so that neither 
 hats nor shoes were objects of ordinary use, even in the most 
 prosperous periods ; they lived in small houses, and had 
 most imperfect means of transporting goods and com- 
 municating thoughts to distant countries ; their technique 
 was simple, and therefore inexpensive. Ancient life was 
 totally lacking in comfort, in all those numerous little objects 
 that render modern existence so expensive, and which have 
 became so necessary to men who have to work as hard as we 
 
104 MILITARISM 
 
 do. Subject, as we are, to continuous mentally exhausting 
 work, we need to ^recuperate every evening the nervous 
 energies spent during the day ; we could not exist in dark 
 unheated houses, go out semi-nude, abstain from all nourish- 
 ment which stimulates the nervous system, nor sleep on 
 hard beds like the Romans under the Empire. The house 
 of a well-to-do London merchant of our times consequently 
 contains more comforts than did that of a Roman senator. 
 The houses of the rich, more especially the Roman, used to 
 be true works of art, with their ebony ceilings inlaid with 
 ivory, with their fine marble pavements ; their frescoed walls 
 and halls adorned with splendid statues, either original or 
 copied from the Greek masterpieces ; their rich and precious 
 furniture, their silver or gold plate. Even the kitchen utensils, 
 pans and saucepans, in grand houses were frequently articles 
 de virtu worked and engraved by skilful hands. And yet 
 these sumptuous dwellings were badly illuminated, because 
 that ingenious arrangement of windows and skylights, to 
 which we owe our good lighting, was lacking in Roman 
 houses. The means of defence against cold were still more 
 meagre ; the richest Romans might eat at a silver table 
 from a golden service, but they did not possess any machine 
 resembling those comfortable stoves which a modest bourgeois, 
 living in town, possesses to-day. Noctural illumination was 
 practically not existent. It appears that Rome under the 
 Empire was the only city of the ancient world where any 
 attempt was made to light the streets, the custom being for 
 every one to carry lanterns. As to the illumination of houses, 
 if an ancient millionaire were to come to life again now, he 
 would consider even the little petroleum lamps as something 
 magnificent. The Romans conquered the world, and built the 
 Coliseum, but they did not know how to make artificial light. 
 
THE DEFECTS OF AMCtE'NT CIVILIZATIONS 1 05 
 
 The following little fact is even more curious. The 
 Roman senators only began to mal*e use of cushions in 
 theatres in the era of Caligula. Till his time they had sat 
 on bare and hard wooden benches. Therefore these masters 
 of the world, these rich men of the Empire, did not attend 
 spectacles in greater comfort than the workmen of our time 
 who frequent the gallery. 
 
 Wealth in olden times, in short, was generally combined 
 with a large degree of slovenliness: personal slovenliness, 
 slovenliness in the houses, slovenliness in the streets, sloven- 
 liness in towns. 
 
 Washing appears to us to be an elementary principle of 
 life ; and yet a long time passed before men took to the 
 habit sufficiently to feel its need. It is true that in some 
 societies bathing was a universal practice ; but bathing with 
 the ancients was quite another matter to what it is now : it 
 was rather a voluptuous passion than a cleanly habit a vice 
 which, in a certain degree, corresponded to our modern vice 
 of smoking, unknown in those times. People did not bathe 
 themselves then for the sake of cleanliness, but as a means 
 of passing the time, for the pleasure of splashing about in 
 tepid water, and of artificially varying the temperature of 
 their bodies ; sometimes with the object of complicating the 
 lasciviousness of love. So true is it that cleanliness had very 
 little to do with this passion for baths, that it frequently 
 happened in the Thermae for several people to bathe 
 together in not very large tanks, where the water necessarily 
 soon became very dirty. The bath was as much a voluptuous 
 gratification as dancing, music, wine, or women ; conse- 
 quently, at that period, when sensual enjoyments so easily 
 became morbid passions, there was a true sybaritism of bath- 
 ing, and there were people who abused bathing, as others 
 
106 MILITARISM 
 
 abused wine and women, taking five, six, seven, eight a 
 day, eating, reading, or sleeping in their tubs. 
 
 This is proved by the modest Cinderella station held in the 
 world of toilette in all military civilizations by soap, which 
 now reigns supreme. Formerly the post now occupied by 
 soap was held by perfumes, substances capable of affording 
 sensual pleasure. Both men and women always scented their 
 entire bodies ; they perfumed their clothes, their beds ; they 
 burnt incense in their rooms ; they even scented their food 
 and drink. The number and variety of their perfumes, 
 almost all imported from the Orient, were infinite, wherefore 
 the modern world would strike a man of that period as a 
 world without perfume. Thus odours formed a great article 
 of commerce in the ancient world, whilst of the industry of 
 soap making there is scarcely a trace. It would seem that 
 the Romans were acquainted with soap in the days of Pliny 
 the Elder, deriving their knowledge from the barbarian 
 peoples of the North. 
 
 V 
 
 The three principal vices of ancient civilization were : the 
 small opportunity for increasing the riches and productive 
 power of capital, the universal lack of industry, the poverty 
 and simplicity of life cause and result of the previous factors. 
 On the other hand, habits of simple and poor living where 
 little is consumed generate a species of resistance and 
 psychological aversion to augmenting the products for 
 consumption. Men nowadays augment these products 
 and easily contract fresh habits because they are used to 
 this constant change, and find pleasure in it. But this is a 
 custom artificially acquired, for man is naturally a misorieist, 
 
Till-: DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS IO/ 
 
 and tends to persevere in habits once formed. Thus the very 
 simplicity of living, which was partly the effect of the small 
 productiveness of capital, rendered the development of labour 
 in its turn, more difficult. 
 
 Neglect also has its torpid pleasures, its inert delights, 
 which men addicted to hard work cannot understand, as a 
 lazy man cannot appreciate the keen satisfaction of activity. 
 What represents supreme happiness to one, appears to the 
 other as intolerable tedium and suffering. The principal 
 difference between ancient and modern civilization is, perhaps, 
 to be found in this diversity in the ideal of happiness. But 
 although in the ancient world the possibility and desire to 
 multiply the products of labour were small, the commonest 
 form taken by the thirst for emotion greed was not lack- 
 ing. In ancient times, as in modern, there were always a few 
 thoughtful and learned men amongst those who ruled states, 
 but the majority then as now consisted in men who 
 sought to satisfy the strongest human passion, that of power, 
 by accumulating and increasing wealth. It is a common 
 observation that the desire for riches grows with the posses- 
 sion thereof; that wealthy men are never satiated, because 
 acquirement facilitates further acquisition, and this facility is 
 a new incentive to covetousness. 
 
 What is true of the modern man is true of the ancient, 
 with this variation, however, that owing to the different 
 constitution of society, these indefinite possibilities of greed 
 were formerly a great factor in the dissolution and ruin of 
 society. In an age like ours, where productive investments 
 are innumerable and always on the increase, those minorities 
 anxious to enrich themselves who are at the head of society 
 can find satisfaction, not by diminishing but by increasing 
 the wealth of the whole community, employing their money in 
 
lo8 MILITARISM 
 
 speculations, in industrial, commercial, and banking schemes, 
 all of which, with the exception of a few of which we shall 
 speak of later on, are beneficial to all. This possibility of in- 
 vesting to good advantage results in the rich using only a 
 small portion of their wealth in display, the bulk is put to 
 better use. In other words, the increase in individual wealth 
 is derived from and promotes the prosperity of the entire 
 community. 
 
 But in a society in which the development of industry was 
 very slow, and productive investments for capital few, the 
 enrichment of minorities could only proceed at the cost of 
 society. As the sum-total of riches remained stationary for 
 long periods at a stretch, the enrichment of one man was neces- 
 sarily accompanied by the loss of another. Nor was this 
 all : owing to the difficulty of finding investments for large 
 capital, the accumulation of wealth depressed its productive- 
 / ness, and consequently the enrichment of a few not only 
 impoverished a few, but the whole of society, by diminishing 
 production. And this happened in various ways, 
 
 VI 
 
 The rich men of antiquity must necessarily have wasted a 
 great part of their wealth, owing to the difficulty of finding 
 good investments for large capital. 
 
 Nowadays, thanks to the great facilities for investing 
 money at interest, even millionaires own a relatively small 
 amount of bullion. 4 " They invest all their fortune in lands, 
 edifices, industrial, banking, and commercial undertakings. 
 But in an age in which fertile land was limited in amount, 
 commercial and industrial investments few, and when the 
 general conditions of society were much less secure than they 
 
THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 109 
 
 are at present, men naturally desired to hold metal more than 
 they do now. Of all those desirable things which do not 
 satisfy the elementary requirements of life, gold and silver 
 are the most desirable ; because they do not wear out, because 
 they can easily be hidden, saved from fire, kept intact under- 
 ground for centuries together, or transported from place to 
 place. Also, if so desired, they can be made a show of. In 
 short, they easily provoke that sentiment which we have 
 named the " social satisfaction of wealth." True, these metals 
 are of little utility when locked up in safes or converted into 
 plate, true that besides satisfying the sentiment of vanity 
 they are only useful as a reserve of wealth in case of necessity. 
 But at a period when even the needs of the wealthy were 
 few, the very rich were able to invest a part of their property 
 in precious metals without depriving themselves of any of the 
 material satisfactions offered of their age. Hence the ancient 
 world was travailed by a perfect thirst for gold and silver. 
 Commerce was not carried on, as nowadays, almost entirely 
 by the exchange of certain goods and services for certain 
 other goods and services, but by exchange of the precious 
 metals. The poorest and rudest men loved to decorate 
 themselves with shining metals ; barbarous tribes exchanged 
 their wares for gold wherewith to mount their arms or make 
 bracelets and trinkets. The Gauls walked the world semi- 
 nude, but they never would forego the gold necklace, which 
 the Greek sculptors of the Rhodian school never failed to 
 reproduce in their statues. The emblem of power and 
 position in their chiefs was the amount of golden ornaments 
 and vessels they possessed. While the barbarians were thus 
 in the habit of accumulating metal, the houses of the rich 
 in more civilized societies overflowed with splendours difficult 
 for us to realize. The temples were frequently depositories of 
 
I IO MILITARISM 
 
 gold and silver, whether in money, bullion, or objects. The 
 whole of Athens in the time of Pericles was probably not 
 worth one parish of London for wealth, and yet its temples 
 and public monuments were full of gold and silver-plated 
 statues, some indeed of them of solid metal, for the like of 
 which we should search London in vain. Oriental monarchs, 
 however, were the chief accumulators, compelling their subjects 
 and vassals to pay the greatest portion of their tributes in 
 precious metals, which they horded in vast quantities in their 
 palaces. 
 
 Had they not withheld from circulation a great part 
 of the capital necessary to the maintenance of civilization, 
 these stores would have been useful because they would have 
 implied a good reserve of capital in case of need. But the 
 greed of the rich, especially in an era when social experience 
 was limited, did not apprehend, and therefore could not 
 respect, their subtle limit ; so that at times the states of the 
 ancient world decayed for want of the capital accumulated 
 
 in idle treasures or vain pomp in the houses of the wealthy. 
 \j" 
 
 ./ i Commerce languishes and loses its agility if forced to return 
 I u to the practice of barter, the value of goods diminish, as also 
 
 v. K. 
 
 the wealth of those who depend on the products of the land 
 and industry. Agriculturists, small proprietors and artisans 
 are impoverished through no fault of their own ; there is a 
 falling-off in all those more delicate branches of work which 
 require a convenient medium of exchange only usurers and 
 the owners of precious metals thrive. One of the most deep- 
 seated causes of the internal decay of the Persian Empire at the 
 time of Alexander's conquest was the stagnation of precious 
 
 metals stored at the court, which had deprived industry of a 
 
 considerable part of the necessary capital, sown misery through- 
 out the nation, and disorganized the public administration. 
 
THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS III 
 
 The .scarcit^otcirciilating -.capital was a constant drag. This 
 was felt more acutely in moments of crisis, as for example 
 during the two last centuries of the Roman Republic. The 
 rich Romans accumulated gold extorted from all parts of 
 the empire. This they converted into objects of luxury and 
 squandered in all manner of ways, till the wretched peoples 
 they had vanquished found themselves without the where- 
 withal to pay the tributes and taxes imposed on them, and 
 saw the value of their harvests and produce diminishing in 
 consequence. One of the chief drawbacks to the economical 
 progress of the ancient world, moreover, was the scourge of )/ 
 usury, the rapid increase in the value of the metals that 
 formed their medium of exchange, which originated in the 
 scarcity of capital. But this scarcity was not due to any } 
 inadequacy in supply to meet demand, but to the fact that 
 the rich horded the precious metals for the satisfaction of \ ' 
 their vanity and love of pomp. 
 
 VII 
 
 Precisely the same thing happened with the lanji The 
 minorities who governed ancient states, and who desired to 
 increase their wealth, naturally aimed at possessing much 
 land, more especially as agriculture was the only investment 
 then possible to large capital. Thus we constantly observe 
 in the ancient world that the system of small properties (the 
 most productive regime then known) was always of short 
 duration, being rapidly ruined by a greedy set of land mono- 
 polists, who cunningly or violently concentrated them into a 
 few large holdings. Sometimes the method adopted to attain 
 this end was violent : a minority acquired political power, 
 and arbitrarily expropriated the small agriculturists. But 
 
I I 2 MILITARISM 
 
 usury was the usual instrument An easy-going life without 
 much hard work frequently led the small proprietor into 
 habits of extravagance. They took to dissipation, games of 
 chance, intrigues with the courtesans of neighbouring towns. 
 Opportunities for getting into debt were not lacking, nor 
 temptations to neglect business. A man could consider him- 
 self lucky when he had only spent his all, so long as he did 
 not get into debt. But if he was overtaken by a war, a 
 famine, a flood ? He then found himself reduced to beggary, 
 and had to raise loans, at a heavy interest, since capital was 
 not abundant. And since he was frequently incapable of 
 augmenting the products of his land by his own zeal, and 
 thus of repaying the loan, one debt followed on another 
 until the proprietor found himself expropriated by his debtor. 
 Thus the usurers became the big proprietors. 
 
 By this means the two finest systems of small agricultural 
 holdings known to the ancient world were ruined. Greece, 
 in the fifth and fourth centuries B.C., was almost entirely 
 divided into small properties growing principally corn, barley, 
 and olives. The population was at its densest at this period, 
 the country at its richest epoch, and the intellectual and 
 political life of Athens in its full glory. Aristotle arrived in 
 time to find Greece in this condition, which he with reason 
 considered as the best possible ; he observed that, wealth 
 being well divided, there were few people absolutely destitute. 
 But the social decadence of the third and second centuries 
 was accompanied by the total ruin of small properties. 
 Frequent wars had devastated Greece : these, combined with 
 the improvidence of the landowners, had reduced the whole 
 rustic population to an almost inconceivable state of debt and 
 misery. Debtors were innumerable in Thessalonia, Etolia, 
 the Peloponnesus and Attica ; a few usurers who had known 
 
THE DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZA TlONS 1 1 3 
 
 how to accumulate capital were expropriating the majority. 
 The population was rapidly diminishing, decimated by misery, 
 whilst vagabondage daily increased. The disputes about 
 debt were of such gravity that they formed the basis of all the 
 political struggles of the century. The enemies of Rome, 
 more especially Persius, attempted to make themselves 
 popular with the masses in Greece by raising hopes of a 
 general abolition of debt. 
 
 The same thing occurred in Rome after the destruction 
 of Carthage. The enrichment of Rome, the extravagant 
 manner of life adopted, the hopes of great gains to be made 
 in war, the passion for gambling and dissipation, resulted in 
 the agriculturist abandoning'the land on which his forefathers, 
 during the intervals of peace, had long led a rough but 
 laborious life, according to the austere ideal of Virgil. With 
 the new requirements came the passion for distant expedi- 
 tions ; the relaxing of the duties entailed by marriage and 
 paternity, debts, and with debts the expropriation of the small 
 proprietors by usurers. Moreover, Rome was falling into the 
 hands of powerful factions who in turn dominated the state, 
 whose chiefs, covetous of riches, espoused this opportunity of 
 expropriating others and enlarging their own latifondir~ 
 
 Still large properties were much less productive in the 
 ancient world than small ones. This was another reason 
 why these accumulations were noxious to the development 
 of society. A large capitalist possessed no perfected 
 machines and instruments to apply to his land, he could not 
 augment his produce in comparison with a small proprietor, 
 without capital or machines, like a rich farmer of our times. 
 Indeed, these properties were less productive, because their 
 owners with the indolence and indifference of the age 
 entrusted them entirely to bailiffs or slaves, who profited by 
 
 H 
 
114 MILITARISM 
 
 the absence of their master to work as little and rob as much 
 as possible. The only object of landlords was to draw their 
 rents whether large or small. They did not wish to be 
 troubled about their property, living far distant from it in 
 large cities, there to idle away their time, occupied in politics 
 or literature, or indulging in libertinage. Thus we understand 
 how it was that all the great writers, from Aristotle to Pliny, 
 were in favour of small holdings ; how the land, robbed from 
 these small owners, rapidly degenerated; how the country 
 depopulated and decivilized, making of it a convenient 
 haunt for brigands another of the scourges of ancient 
 civilizations. 
 
 VIII 
 
 The mania for accumulation had another result : the 
 / diminution of the third factor of production men. With the 
 increasing difficulty in exchange and diminution of work, men 
 found it more and more difficult to live up to the standard of 
 life to which they were accustomed, and hence they resorted 
 to the first economy which civilized man attempts when 
 ( - society is impoverishing : abstention from children. The 
 a-iraiS'ia due to infanticide and celibacy was a scourge of 
 ^ancient civilization in times of crisis. We find it in Greece 
 in the third and second centuries B.C., in Rome after the fall 
 of Carthage when the great fecundity of Roman families 
 suddenly ceased, in Gaul in the time of Caesar, when in- 
 fanticide was a common practice. But this diminution 
 aggravated matters instead of improving them, because 
 diminishing the number of producers and consumers in a 
 society which nominally did not possess too many, ended by 
 the force necessary for production and restricting 
 
Til E DEFECTS OF ANCIENT CIVILIZA TIONS I I 5 
 
 still further, for the survivors, the possibility to live and 
 work. 
 
 Owing to these three fundamental vices, ancient society 
 was unable to maintain an equilibrium between the three 
 factors of production : capital, land, and men. Several 
 societies managed for a brief period to maintain a sufficient 
 poise ; and this was their brief moment of greatest glory and 
 power. But this equilibrium rapidly broke down : capital 
 stagnated, land accumulated in the hands of a few and became 
 less fertile, population diminished. The impossibility of 
 augmenting productive investments, owing to the poorness 
 of their technique, to scientific ignorance, to the universal 
 prevalence of indolent habits and content with poor and 
 simple life, caused those efforts made by energetic minorities 
 to increase their wealth invariably to terminate in the ruin 
 and progressive decomposition and disorganization of society. 
 
 We shall see, in the following study, that the. chief reason 
 for wars in ancient times is to be found in this law of rapid 
 and periodical decomposition, to which all old civilizations 
 were subject owing to their very constitution. 
 
MILITARISM IN THE ANCIENT 
 WORLD 
 
I"? 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 MILITARISM IN THE ANCIENT WORLD 
 
 I 
 
 FOR various reasons war \vasjie_ccssary to the development 
 and progress of ancient civilization, and this must account for 
 the numerous and terrible conflicts of antiquity. 
 
 Civilization does not develop beyond certain bounds unless 
 it possesses a fair quantity of circulating capital in the form ^/ 
 of metallic coin. Precious metals when coined, or used as 
 coin, have the virtue of facilitating the most complicated 
 exchange, regardless of distance or time ; of increasing the 
 efficacy of human work, and of endowing it almost without 
 men's knowledge with a broader object than the immediate 
 benefit of individuals. So, if it is going too far to say that 
 civilization could not develop without the use of precious 
 metals as money, it is anyway certain that, after fire and the 
 alphabet, it has been man's best friend since the beginning 
 of his history. 
 
 In the ancient world the essential function of war was to \ 
 provide civilizations, which were on their road to progress, 
 with sufficient capital. 
 
 We have seen that these precious metals, owing to a vice 
 innate in ancient civilizations, were periodically withdrawn 
 from circulation to stagnate in the houses of the wealthy, 
 where they served no other purpose than that of vain display. 
 
120 MILITARISM 
 
 Wars served to force this capital into circulation and to send 
 
 \' 
 
 it where it could be of _ some profit. Nowadays, when 
 capital is only accumulated in order to find a profitable 
 investment for it in some portion of the civilized world pro- 
 tected by laws, customs, and international ideas, a nation 
 desirous of raising its standard of civilization can easily 
 procure the necessary money by borrowing it from richer 
 nations, so that financial difficulties are among its least 
 important drawbacks. They were, on the contrary, the 
 gravest difficulties in the ancient world, where a people could 
 not procure this capital without plundering, in a fortunate 
 bellicose undertaking, the riches hoarded by other nations in 
 their temples, wealthy houses, and palaces, 
 
 II 
 
 Thus the wars between civilized states and nomadic, or 
 semi-nomadic tribes, were in the ancient world essentially 
 ^ struggles for the conquest of capital and for its better employ- 
 ment. These were among the most terrible wars of ancient 
 history. Civilized states were like oases in the desert of bar- 
 barism. How many attacks from the Gauls Rome and Greece 
 had to resist ! Carthage had fallen, and yet Rome mistress 
 of a vast empire again saw Italy threatened by the Cimbric 
 and Teutonic hordes, from which it could only free itself by 
 a ruthless extermination. But Oriental states were more 
 subject than others to such wars. Assyria was constantly at 
 war with the Cimmerii and Scythians in the north, with the 
 Medes and Persians in the east, with the Arab tribes in the 
 region of the lower Euphrates and Southern Syria. The 
 Egyptian state was constantly threatened by the Asian and 
 Nubian nomad races. The fragments of Oriental history 
 which have come down to us strike us as the history of an 
 
MILITARISM IN THE ANCIENT WORLD I 2 I 
 
 interminable chase that was far more terrible than the lion 
 and tiger-hunts partaken of by the Assyrian kings, so 
 splendidly represented on the bas-reliefs in the British 
 Museum. When empires were young and strong, they 
 endeavoured to forestall the danger by bearding the ferocious 
 tribes these human tigers in their dens, in the wilds of the 
 Steppes, and in their mountain gorges. The Asiatic 
 Empires exterminated large numbers with their arrows, 
 while the remaining clans lurked in inaccessible retreats. 
 But empires grew weary of chasing these innumerable and 
 indomitable beasts ; the hunter aged, and at the return of 
 the hunting season began to lose his interest in penetrating 
 into the heart of the forest in order to decimate these human 
 animals. Then they multiplied in their lairs, took fresh 
 courage, and finally turned out in vast hordes, invaded the 
 land and attacked the hunter's flocks. Hearing their cries, 
 the hunter would arouse, and in an impulse of fury, he once 
 more found his original vigour, left his tent and seized his 
 bow and arrow. But it was too late. The tigers had 
 become too fierce and numerous, the hunter's arm too weak 
 he fell, and was torn to pieces by the beasts. 
 
 The periodic attacks of these tribes were probably caused 
 by the same motive excluding religious fanaticism which 
 led to the formation of the Dervish horde in the Soudan, 
 amongst which the strongest was the greed for precious 
 metals. Gold and silver were more desirable for their own 
 sake than as a means of exchange to the ancient barbaric 
 tribes, whose requirements were small even in comparison 
 with the modest ones of ancient civilized peoples. But the 
 barbarians' desire for the possession of these metals greatly 
 exceeded their capacity to procure them by trading, because 
 they were lazy and ignorant, producing, and consequently 
 
122 MILITARISM- 
 
 selling, little. Moreover, a thoughtless, adventurous and 
 uncontrolled warlike existence was attractive to their primi- 
 tive and violent minds. Tacitus has described the Germans 
 as passing from periods of abject indolence to attacks of 
 savage excitement. Thus from time to time the combina- 
 tion of various nomad tribes formed great hordes which 
 attacked the wealthy cities of civilized states, appropriating 
 furniture, carpets, cloths, and above all precious metals. 
 Some of the gold and silver was divided amongst the 
 soldiers, but the greater part was appropriated by the 
 strongest and most cunning warriors, who thus became 
 the tyrants of the swarm. 
 
 Civilized states were led, in their turn, to counter-attack 
 these barbarous tribes, partly in order to forestall future 
 assaults, partly to become masters of their wealth. Even the 
 poorer clans possessed relatively large quantities of wealth 
 lying idle. On the battlefield where the barbarian warriors 
 had fallen, and in the villages razed, the conquerors were 
 able to collect large booty of precious metals. Thus the wars 
 of barbarians against civilized states aimed at accumulating 
 capital for ostentatious display, and those of civilized nations 
 against barbarians, to replace this gold and silver in circulation 
 for a higher object. Much of the progress of Roman civiliza- 
 tion was rendered possible by spoils thus taken ; the first great 
 aqueduct, for instance, which after a more modest attempt 
 initiated the great Roman hydraulic constructions, was built 
 in 272 B.C. with the booty taken in the Pyrrhic wars, while 
 the first public library was founded in Rome by Asinius 
 Pollio with the spoils taken in 40 B.C. from the Dalmatian 
 tribes who lived by piracy. 
 
 The same thing, on a smaller scale, happened in Athens. 
 By wrenching it forcibly from less civilized peoples, who 
 
MILITARISM IN THE ANCIENT WORLD 123 
 
 would have used it merely for show, the Athenians procured 
 the capital necessary for creating the splendid Periclean 
 civilization, for constructing the Parthenon, and for re- 
 munerating Phidias. Athens was able, moreover, to construct 
 the Salaminian fleet with the silver of the Laurian mines ; 
 and by means of these vessels, and the glory of their Persian 
 triumphs, they forced the Ionian cities to conclude the Delic 
 confederation, and to pay them a tribute sufficient to main- 
 tain a great army capable of defending the coast against Persia. 
 This tribute, later on, served not only in part to construct the 
 navy, it also helped in a great measure to beautify Athens, 
 to maintain artisans, painters, and sculptors, to increase the 
 pay of the Athenian workers in State service. The tribute 
 was at first fixed at 460 talents ; but this was by degrees 
 increased, until, in the time of Pericles, it formed more than 
 half of the Athenian revenue, so that in the end it was no 
 longer so much a voluntary contribution to a military ally as 
 an obligatory tribute to a work of civilization, whose remains 
 we still venerate as almost divine. The sailors of the Athenian 
 fleet, who obliged the Ionian cities, weary of the league, to 
 continue paying their tax, were unconscious collaborators 
 in the architecture of the Parthenon, in the works of Sophocles, 
 Aristophanes, and Socrates, because they contributed to main- 
 tain artists and writers on the one hand, and on the other 
 that happy class of citizens who, without being rich, were 
 intelligent, and had a passion for beauty and discussion : 
 men whose chief office was to form an appreciative and 
 encouraging public to that extraordinary generation of 
 artists and thinkers who existed in a unique moment in 
 the intellectual history of the world. Strength, beauty, and 
 wisdom had united to found together the reign of intellect 
 in a small Grecian town. 
 
124 MILITARISM 
 
 III 
 
 We have seen that the equilibrium between the three 
 factors of production land, men, and capital was of short 
 duration in ancient civilization, owing to the difficulty of, 
 finding productive investments for capital, and that wealth 
 had a tendency to stagnate uselessly when the moment of 
 highest prosperity in a civilization was over. War, by re- 
 placing capital in circulation, imparted new life to decadent 
 societies. 
 
 The social work of Alexander the Great was to conquer 
 by arms the immense treasures lying dormant in the Persian I 
 and Egyptian courts. With this money, which was thus 
 made to move, he founded cities, opened roads, organized 
 states and stimulated the energy, the inventive genius, and 
 the greed of innumerable Greeks. In short, he provided 
 Greece with the funds necessary to conquer Asia, to organize 
 fresh fields for commerce, to found new centres of study, 
 and to prepay the Orient for the coming of Christ. 
 
 The chief results of the Roman conquests were not only 
 to replace in circulation the wealth accumulated, by the 
 semi-barbaric Alpine, Gallic, Spanish, and Illyrian peoples, 
 but also that of the civilized Asian states, which, since the 
 days of Alexander, had had time to re-accumulate and stag- 
 nate, using them for the advance of a new type of civilization. 
 From the conquest of Carthage up to the time of Julius 
 Caesar, Roman politics were directed by a crew of financiers 
 whose sole object was to appropriate, by fair means or foul, 
 the wealth lying dormant in the provinces. These were the \ 
 publicans, who belonged to the order of knights, and formed 
 a high financial bourgeoisie, a class of rich bankers, who 
 
MILITARISM IN THE ANCIENT WORLD 125 
 
 organized commercial societies similar to those of our time, 
 in which any one in Rome who possessed a little money 
 a soldier on his return from some campaign, or a rich senator 
 could buy paries or shares. The societies had a director 
 called a magister, a sort of administrative council, offices, 
 and employees ; they supervised the collection of taxes in 
 the provinces, the working of State mines, military transports, 
 and the construction of public works. Their paries were sold 
 at prices varying from day to day. Well-provided with money, 
 counting among their shareholders the most powerful persons 
 in the empire, these societies were practically masters of the 
 State, and could be as overbearing and violent as they chose 
 in the provinces, in order to extort money from their victims 
 to carry to Rome and divide among the shareholders. At 
 critical moments, moreover, they did not lack the support 
 of high-placed politicians and celebrated orators to defend 
 their interests with the State, just as is the case in our own 
 days where big financial schemes are concerned. Cicero's 
 speech,/;^ Lege Manilla, is a warm defence of the shareholders 
 of the Asian publicans when threatened with ruin by th e 
 war of Mithridates, who had invaded the tract in which the 
 society extorted tribute. The great orator exhorts the people 
 to provide quickly for war expenses, describing the anxiety 
 of the shareholders, who feared losing capital and interest. 
 
 Even Augustus, who commenced the work of consolidating 
 the empire, used Cleopatra's treasures as a capital for the 
 foundation of his imperial civilization. This was, perhaps, 
 the last great reserve of wealth remaining in the Orient / 
 after the Roman depredations, which accounts for the zeal 
 the latter displayed in subjugating Egypt after the battle of 
 Azio. Augustus did not merely desire to conquer the future 
 granary of Rome ; long wars had exhausted his treasure, 
 
125 MILITARISM 
 
 and Rome at that moment suffered from a scarcity of cir- 
 culating wealth. The accumulating greed of the Ptolemies, 
 their uncontrolled passion for luxury, had unconsciously pre- 
 pared the remedy. Augustus obtained Alexandria and the 
 royal treasures of Egypt. He carried them to Rome ; he 
 coined a great part of the metal ; he employed this money to 
 found new colonies with his veterans, to re-organize the army, 
 to make roads and bridges, to provide, in short, the most 
 urgent requirements for the restoration of that civilization 
 which was his work. 
 
 IV 
 
 Another motive for war in the ancient world was the 
 accumulation of land, which reason we have already traced. 
 This amassing frequently conjoined with the stagnation of 
 capital by decreasing agricultural production, reduced a 
 portion of the rural population to forced idleness, and in- 
 directly impoverished the town labourers. Thus the ancient 
 world, like the modern one, was tormented by the evil of 
 the unemployed, with the difference, however, that men then 
 refused to use certain hard but salutary remedies which we 
 have proved to be efficacious ; and the remedy was sought, 
 instead, in war. 
 
 It was a difficult matter, then, for the expropriated small 
 proprietor, or the unemployed, to make a living by other 
 work, because antiquity was poor and did not know how to 
 augment and vary men's labour and consumption. To this 
 cause we must add the unlaborious habits of the age. The 
 people's requirements were few : a handful of olives for dinner, 
 a little material for clothing purposes, a ray of sunshine for 
 warmth, any sort of shelter for the night, a friend to chat with, 
 
MILITARISM !N THE ANCIENT WORLD HJ ' 
 
 some gratis entertainment, and the Athenian or Roman ple- 
 beian was content. These elementary needs could easily be 
 satisfied by beggary or theft when work was short. It was an 
 age of improvidence and lightness of heart, because there was 
 not present that gaoler who now watches day and night over 
 society, over offices, fields, and workshops, rendering the 
 multitudes docile to the hard discipline of modern work 
 i.e. hunger. The ancients were in danger of periodical 
 attacks of universal famine ; but in periods of abundance no 
 one not even professional vagabonds needed to go without 
 a piece of bread and a handful of olives or figs. It never 
 happened, as it does now, that in the midst of great and 
 continuous abundance an improvident or unenergetic man 
 risks dying of starvation. This fact explains the co-existence 
 of lazy multitudes and slaves. Slave labour, as Cairnes 
 demonstrates, costs more and produces less than free labour. 
 How was it, then, that in such poor times, when lack of 
 work was so prevalent, free men were not employed for the 
 work generally performed by slaves ? Because for very 
 tiring work, such as mining, transporting heavy weights, 
 turning grinding-mills, ploughing uncultured land, for work 
 which interfered seriously with personal liberty, such as serving 
 in rich houses, free men could not easily be found, and it was 
 necessary to coerce by force. Free men preferred mendicity 
 to such hard work, or parasitism on the rich, a feature highly 
 developed in the ancient world ; or, when occasion offered, they 
 chose rather to impose themselves forcibly on others. Hence 
 the reason why ancient colonizations so frequently assumed 
 the character of military conquests. Emigrants did not 
 contemplate inhabiting new countries and ploughing the 
 land ; they only submitted themselves to such hard and 
 ungrateful work when absolutely forced by circumstances. 
 
128 MILITARISM 
 
 They rather sought to conquer land already cultivated, and 
 to disperse its original possessors. Some have tried to ex- 
 plain ancient colonization by increase of population ; but this 
 is only possible by supposing a greater analogy than really 
 existed between ancient and modern civilization. Population 
 could not increase rapidly in those days, especially in nations 
 of a certain civilization who countenanced infanticide, since, 
 besides this artificial means of destruction, there existed 
 others not less efficacious : wars, epidemics, famines, and the 
 absence of hygiene so fatal, more especially to children. 
 But even without supposing a rapid increase of population, 
 it is easy to explain the prevailing desire to conquer new 
 countries. The instability of small properties must have 
 been one of the primary factors. Even in moments of great 
 prosperity (for reasons we have already explained) a certain 
 number of small proprietors got into debt and were expro- 
 priated. When they were overtaken by a crisis, debts and 
 expropriation combined ended in the complete ruin of the 
 small rural class, to whom all hope was thus lost of living 
 by work in their native land. The acquisition of other 
 cultivated lands on which to settle, or some way of existing 
 by means of war, was their only resource. 
 
 Thus we see Athens, even in the height of her glory under 
 Pericles, sprinkling with cleruchies, or colonies, many islands 
 of the archipelago, the shores of the Chersonese, the Black 
 Sea, and even the coast of Italy : colonies whose object was 
 to occupy land already cultivated by getting rid of its original 
 owners. Many of these emigrants were Greeks from various 
 regions, but Athenians were not numerous in these colonies 
 because, at that period, the prosperity of the small Attic pro- 
 prietors and Athenian artisans was at its highest, and work was 
 abundant for all. But in the years of Athenian and Greek 
 
MILITARISM IN THE ANCIENT WORLD 1 29 
 
 decadence the third and second centuries B.C. when the 
 great ruin of small holdings occurred, innumerable Greeks 
 emigrated as artisans, merchants, soldiers, counsellors, writers, 
 artists, tutors and priests into the Asian states founded by 
 Alexander the Great. 
 
 Greece became depopulated and impoverished, its culture^ 
 declined, the land became massed into a few immense proper- 
 ties, capital lay idle. Side by side of a few insolent and 
 extravagant rich men, there lived a nation of debtors and 
 mendicants who dragged out a wretched and angry existence. 
 Fortunately, a military genius had thrown open to the Greeks 
 the fabulous expanses of Asia. He had made accessible 
 immense territories, occupied by gigantic states, abounding 
 in wealth, blessed with a grandiose but formless and stationary 
 civilization which had for long alarmed and disquieted the 
 Greeks, habituated to their small poor country, their tiny states, 
 and to the exquisitely harmonious proportions of their civili- 
 zation. Had it not been for the Greek social crisis of the 
 third and second centuries H.C., the conquests of Alexander the 
 Great would have lost much of their importance. Thanks to 
 this, the Greeks emigrated to Asia by the road the Macedonian 
 arms had opened to them ; and here their genius lost much of 
 its equilibrium and serenity, replacing its loss by the gain of 
 an ardent energy. 
 
 Expropriated proprietors also played a great role in Roman 
 history. Rome's more ancient wars against the populations 
 of central Italy aimed at seizing their enemies' cultivated 
 lands. In the same manner the main object of the conflicts 
 waged during the two last centuries of the Roman Republic 
 was to provide for the ruined class of small landowners. 
 After the conquest of Carthage, small Italian farms went 
 down under the pressure of hard times, the expropriated 
 
 I 
 
130 MILITARISM 
 
 owners moved to Rome, became soldiers, lived by elections, 
 or passed into the provinces to fight or become usurers lending 
 at high rates of interest the moneys acquired from their share 
 of the booty. Now this class of professional speculators on war 
 required a constant supply of such conflicts, more especially as 
 they rapidly squandered in times of peace the money then 
 gained. Hence the small expropriated landowners formed in 
 the Roman assemblies a public opinion always favourable to 
 war. When towards the middle of the first century B.C., 
 through the multiplication of foreign and civil wars, the world 
 was much impoverished, and that definitive crisis which was 
 the beginning of the empire, was imminent, the land question 
 became a stimulus to war in yet another fashion. The poor 
 Roman plebeians flocked round the standards of the heads of 
 factions, not through enthusiasm for the contending ideas, but 
 because they hoped to receive cultivated lands in return for 
 their services, lands on which they could live, helped by some 
 slave, without the fatigue of labour. The lands which the 
 veterans hankered after were already prepared to give fruit 
 and harvests, so that the heads of parties, more especially 
 after the death of Caesar, were compelled to proceed to those 
 expropriations of small Italian proprietors, which threatened 
 the total ruin of Roman society. When Augustus came into 
 power, in order to restore peace he bought, instead of robbing, 
 the lands to distribute to the veterans, who, establishing 
 themselves in the various cities, were thus enabled to satisfy 
 the principal desire for which they had taken up arms, i.e. to 
 live without working, like a modern rentier on the income of 
 the lands received. 
 
 The last motive for war in the ancient world is to be found 
 in slavery. We have already seen why slavery was necessary ; 
 but irthe slaves were procured in small numbers by legal 
 
MILITARISM IN THE ANCIENT WORLD 13! 
 
 artifices, such as the sale of children and the loss of liberty 
 to insolvent debtors, they were obtained in much larger 
 numbers by violence. Man-hunting was a regular trade. 
 No sooner did the State relax a little of its vigilance on the 
 coast, than remote creeks became the haunts of pirate ships, 
 forests and mountains the resort of brigands ; the first 
 attacked navigators, the second travellers, whom they then 
 sent, by means of merchants, to distant markets, more 
 especially to Delos, which for many centuries was the great 
 slave-market of the Graeco-Roman world. How numerous 
 were those whom this fate overtook in the ancient world ! 
 Many great men Ccesar not excepted ran this risk. But 
 countries in a state of war were able to carry on this 
 commerce on a larger scale. The prisoners who to-day are 
 an expense and nuisance to the victors, then formed part and 
 no mean one either -of the booty. They were sold as use- 
 ful merchandise for industrial purposes, and to serve the rich 
 in diverse countries ; and the results of the sale largely repaid 
 the conquerors for the expenses of war. 
 
 War was consequently a necessary factor in the progress 
 and spread of ancient civilization ; it was able to provide 
 nations, who desired to develop with the requisite capital, 
 land and men by seizing them from barbarians or from 
 civilized states in decadence. Hence war was a struggle 
 for civilization, because without it nations could not emerge 
 from barbarism, or raise themselves from periodical decline, 
 owing to their ignorance and lack of industry. This explains 
 how it came about that great warriors were regarded 
 with an admiration that almost amounted to worship, 
 
MILITARISM 
 
 and why Alexander was considered of superhuman greatness. 
 The warrior was not merely a soldier, he was also the 
 capitalist of the ancient world, the administrator of past and 
 future wealth, the great architect ; the protector of religion, of 
 art, of literature, of knowledge ; the arbitrator of the future in 
 the decisive moments of history. The means massed in his 
 hands were immense, his power unlimited, his practical 
 responsibility nil, his historical responsibility was enormous. 
 He had to understand, or at least to divine, the necessities 
 of the future, because for centuries to come men would 
 inhabit, pray, and study in the places and manner indicated 
 by him, would travel along the paths he traced. A single 
 error on his part might become a calamitous matter for ages. 
 
 And yet war, even in the ancient world, though so necessary 
 to civilization, contained such an active element of destruction, 
 that its services were always accompanied by grave perils. 
 In this respect it was similar to fire, which is man's best and 
 most useful servitor, but woe betide him if its destructive 
 forces once break loose ! Now, the destructive qualities of 
 war in the ancient world were much more difficult to control 
 than those of fire. Man is stimulated to every action by 
 some need or reason, but in the performance of this, certain 
 sentiments and passions arise which may, in their turn, have 
 great influence on his life. Though war originated in the 
 causes given, it generated pride, overbearingness, ferocity, 
 and all the desires of destruction in the people. These 
 passions, and above all pride, became a fresh and terrible 
 incentive to war ; while greed, on the other hand, its first 
 stimulus, developed a larger appetite after every nourish- 
 ment, and grew in ancient oligarchies as their fortune in war 
 increased. 
 
 For this reason it was impossible to ancient states to keep 
 
MILITARISM IN THE ANCIENT WORLD 133 
 
 war within those bounds which alone would have enabled it 
 to be useful to civilization. And even when reduced to its 
 purely beneficial essences, it was an expensive matter, because 
 the capital and land, seized by force, cost the ancients much 
 more than it costs us to borrow money, buy land, and 
 remunerate men for their services. War cost then as it does 
 now : it cost directly for the arms and apparatus required, and 
 for the men and property it destroyed. It cost indirectly, 
 through the immense waste it caused, the destruction of 
 harvests and the devastation of fields, the burning of villages 
 and cities, the dispersion and loss of funds. 
 
 It is therefore easy to understand how ruinous war became 
 when some ruling oligarchy allowed itself, blinded by the 
 pride of victory and greed, to multiply wars, provoking 
 enemies on all hands, consuming all their reserves, so that 
 their first defeat fatally entailed ruin. 
 
 Such is the history of nearly all ancient states, which were 
 incited by a first military victory to be more and more master- 
 ful with others, to increase their plunder, augment their armies, 
 until ruin almost unexpectedly overtook them. For instance, 
 the empire of those Assyrian kings of whom one was able 
 to write : " I passed like a devastating hurricane. I trans- 
 ported to my country Su-Zub, king of Bab-Ilu, him and 
 his family. I destroyed his city and his palace, from its 
 summit down to its foundation I delivered it to the flames ; 
 I devastated the ramparts, the altars, the temples, all the 
 works in brick in his empire I ruined at a blow." As an 
 immense tower which reaches nearly up to heaven is suddenly 
 flung down by an earthquake and reduced to a mountain 
 of ruins, so Athens, after she had killed the Persian giant 
 with her short sword and her light armour, grew covetous 
 and overbearing when seated on the throne of Greece and 
 
134 MILITARISM 
 
 mistress of the sea. By her pride and cupidity she provoked 
 a conflict with Sparta, in which she obstinately persevered, 
 always attempting new military undertakings, till after the 
 Sicilian campaign she found herself ruined and undone. 
 Alexander uprose shortly after, and led Greece to the con- 
 quest of Asia ; but at the height of his might he lost his reason 
 and heaped madness on violence. After his death the empire 
 was divided into large kingdoms, whose heads for two centuries 
 waged terrible wars in the hope of gain. Another nation mean- 
 while was rising in the west : Rome, a strong, bellicose, and 
 austere people, who for centuries waged long and wearisome 
 wars with the other inhabitants of Italy, and engaged in a 
 protracted and terrible duel with a city of proud and greedy 
 capitalists, Carthage. But having conquered Carthage, the 
 vices of her enemies seemed to enter into the soul of Rome. 
 All the treasures of the Orient no longer satisfied her greed, 
 the world seemed scarcely big enough to contain her un- 
 measured ambition and her appetite for plunder. Then 
 Rome herself fell, ruined in her turn by war, and became 
 involved in the most alarming anarchical disorder. Woe to 
 her, if in the last century before the Christian era, a strong 
 military nation had survived ! 
 
 In this wise, ancient history was one great chain and 
 succession of wars, a panorama of contending nations. An 
 equal degree of civilization, the similarity of religion, race 
 relationship, did net suffice to maintain peace. 
 
 War was necessary to civilization, and it ended by destroy- 
 ing civilization. To this contradiction is due all the 
 tragic grandeur of the ancient world. It scattered every- 
 where haphazard the germs of life and death in almost 
 equal proportions, so that the two combined were at the root 
 of many things, and much which appeared strong and full of 
 
MILITARISM IN 7 HE ANCIENT WORLD 135 
 
 life was destined to be of short duration. War introduced 
 that element of fragility to the older society which renders 
 its remains so pathetic. Its greatest monuments have only 
 reached us in a ruined state, despoiled of their marble facings 
 and artistic friezes ; their sculpture appears to be the field of 
 a terrible battle, strewn with mutilated bodies, with head- 
 less and limbless trunks ; their books have many of them 
 been lost or reached us in fragments, damaged by fire from 
 which they only escaped by chance. Not even genius could 
 subdue the element of decadence in ancient society which 
 originated in war. Under the ruins of Rome the master- 
 pieces of Phidias, the greater part of Aristotle's books lie 
 buried ; and those few things which have survived this 
 universal ruin, only cause us to realize the better what an 
 immense conflagration of precious things was entailed by the 
 ending of the ancient world, and what innumerable treasures 
 were then reduced to ashes. 
 
 And yet this decay was a necessary coefficient of greatness. 
 In the ancient world it was not possible to live well except 
 by living briefly. A great life was fatally a short one : a 
 tragic law essential to the fundamental vices of ancient 
 civilizations. It is possible for us moderns to realize with 
 precision to what interminably long and shameful decadence 
 ancient states were subject, if no great wars came to re- 
 animate their sinking life, when they had reached the period 
 of concentration of capital, land, and depopulation. We can 
 realize this, because barbarous tribes to this day furnish a 
 mirror for the past history of civilized races. There still 
 exists a nation whose slow death shows us what life too 
 much prolonged signifies to a society in which exist the 
 vices proper to ancient civilizations : I refer to Turkey. 
 
THE DEATH -THROES OF A 
 NATION 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 
 
 IN many respects Turkey resembles ancient societies, because 
 in it we find their three cardinal vices : lack of industry, 
 simplicity of life, and ignorance, with the accompanying 
 difficulty for the productive investment of capital. The 
 Turkish people consume little and work little. Turks do not 
 find happiness in the morbid activity of Europeans and 
 Americans, which appears madness to them. Their ideal, on 
 the contrary, is a quiet life of absolute repose, idleness com- ' 
 forted by coffee and tobacco, chief. Europeans have only 
 managed to introduce their goods into Turkey on a small 
 scale. Tobacco to the whole nation, coffee, and a comfort- 
 able harem to the rich, are their goals of luxury. The Turks 
 are conservative in their mode of living, and slowly alter or 
 augment their requirements. Great industries, business and 
 capitalism on a large scale, are unknown quantities to them. 
 Europeans trade;vvith Constantinople that is to say, they buy 
 there the many things required in Europe but the Turks and 
 Mussulmans, who form the ruling class, only desire to be 
 agriculturists, soldiers, officials, or priests ; they only wish to 
 exercise those traditional professions which demand neither 
 hard nor long work. To cultivate the earth in accordance 
 with accepted precepts, to idle in barracks, to smoke and 
 
140 MILITARISM 
 
 snooze in offices and mosques, writing a letter once a week, or 
 occasionally murmuring a prayer this appears to the Turk 
 as the only life worth living. To live in this manner he is 
 frequently forced to put up with poverty, to practise every 
 possible economy ; but this is of little moment to him, because, 
 like the ancients, the Turk prefers the pleasures of idleness 
 to those of an active existence. In this sense, Islamism is 
 still the best representative of the ancient spirit, for this 
 reason it is vain ever to hope to introduce great capitalistic 
 industries and modern civilization into Mussulman countries. 
 The result is that in Turkey ambitious minorities seek to 
 satisfy their desires by plunder, as happened in the ancient 
 world. Turkey finds herself at present in a period of 
 stagnation. We may presume that the Persian and Egyptian 
 empires found themselves in an analogous condition before 
 Alexander's conquest. Only as the Turkish Empire is suffer- 
 ing from this disease at the end of the nineteenth century, 
 in the midst of universal peace in an era when no Alexander 
 turns up to put a stop to this stagnation of wealth, this decay 
 slowly continues, corrupts society, lowering the people to a 
 state of odious barbarism, ruining everything in the vast 
 empire. Without periodical wars, or the possibility of in- 
 vasion by some outside nation, this society, which represents 
 the old world in so many of its characteristics, is decaying, 
 and exhales miasma like stagnant water. 
 
 II 
 
 Turkey presents four distinctive symptoms of decay, viz. 
 
 1. The dispersal and concentration of capital, and the 
 uncultivated state of the land. 
 
 2. The dissolution of the bureaucracy. 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 141 
 
 3. The mania for persecution displayed by the government. 
 
 4. The social dissolution consequent on usury. 
 
 The present crisis in Turkey is largely due to the waste 
 and concentration of capital which culminated during the 
 reign of Adbul Azis, the uncle of the present Sultan, who was 
 deposed and assassinated in a domestic revolution in 1876. 
 From the beginning of his reign a demoniacal mania for 
 waste characterized the ruling oligarchy of the empire. The 
 enormously increased taxes no longer satisfied their greed ; 
 and the Turkish government got into debt to the extent of 
 120,000,000, negotiating the famous Turkish loan, of such 
 painful memory to all European bond-holders. Public funds 
 were squandered, not for the public good, but to maintain 
 senseless court extravagances and large swarms of parasites 
 who, on various pretexts, managed to live in luxury. It is 
 calculated that in the Sultan's palace there were 1200 
 odalisques, 6000 servants and 800 cooks, and that 1200 oxen 
 were provided for the Sultan's kitchen every day. "All the 
 sultans," writes Kesuin Bey, 1 " have a passion for destruc- 
 tion. The European is dumbfounded at the sight of these 
 immense palaces, modest enough in their exterior, but mar- 
 vellously luxurious inside. All these palaces are deserted and 
 so neglected that they are all falling into decay. They were 
 built to satisfy some caprice, but the caprice died with the 
 builder, and sometimes even before his death. All along the 
 shores of the Bosphorus are sprinkled these chiosques (from 
 the Turkish word kieuchy). The whole country is rich in 
 imperial residences, which prove, on inspection, to be all in a 
 state of ruin. Nothing is more funereal than these splendid 
 buildings, which stand out solitarily in the midst of desert 
 plains, half ruined, like the relics of some ancient civilization." 
 
 1 Kesuin Bey, " Le mal d'Orient," Marpon e Flammarion, p. 10, 
 
142 MILITARISM 
 
 The high officials imitate the example and luxury of their 
 sovereign ; they bleed the treasury so as to make a grand 
 display, to collect a select harem, to accumulate gold and 
 maintain large retinues of servants, who form a proof to the 
 public of their power and wealth. A Turk who desires to 
 grow rich has no other means than that of preying on the 
 state, with all the violence or cunning of which he is capable, 
 It is a well-known fact that many pashas amassed great 
 wealth during their time of office, that the Sultan is one of 
 the richest sovereigns in the world, and his court a vast store 
 of precious metals. It is said that he possesses gold, silver, 
 jewels and lands to the value of over ,40,000,000 ; but whether 
 this calculation be correct or not, it is anyway certain that 
 Abdul Hamid is as great a hoarder of precious metals as 
 the Oriental sovereigns of old. Thus in Turkey, as in the 
 ancient world, the small ruling minority, covetous of wealth, 
 accumulates capital and withdraws it from circulation. 
 
 III 
 
 This evil naturally leads to others, amongst which the most 
 serious is the agrarian crisis. 
 
 Asia Minor, the ancient seat of so many civilizations, the 
 granary and orchard of Europe, from which came corn, 
 peaches, prunes, apricots, myrtle, and a thousand other 
 necessities and luxuries, appears to-day to have lost all its 
 former fertility. Turkey no longer produces sufficient grain 
 for its own consumption, and Constantinople would be 
 reduced to a state of famine if the export of corn from 
 Russia and Hungary were suspended for a few days. The 
 country where the splendid Syrian race of horses was 
 bred, now only pastures a wretched, mangy breed, so that the 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 143 
 
 Government has to provide the army with steeds from 
 Hungary. The land is rich in pasture, and yet the breeding 
 of cattle is almost unknown ; a considerable number of 
 beasts for slaughter are imported from abroad ; milk is 
 expensive, and butter is sent over from Italy. Asia Minor 
 was very rich in trees, and possessed fifty-two varieties of 
 oak alone ; but now combustibles have become so scarce 
 that the peasants burn manure to warm themselves. Im- 
 mense areas of land lie uncultivated, and supply every day 
 grows less adequate to demand, so that Turkey could not 
 exist without the produce of poorer countries. This un- 
 productiveness increases so rapidly, that the Mussulman 
 peasant, thick-headed and apathetic as he is, is beginning 
 to feel a vague sense of alarm. He can remember hearing 
 his old people say that the increase of the sowing was twenty 
 times, while now it never renders more than seven. 
 
 And yet this land, which every day becomes poorer, is 
 nearly all possessed by the Government, and tilled by the 
 Turkish-speaking Mussulman population. With the excep- 
 tion of a few Armenian districts, the land is never cultivated 
 by Christians ; they practise professions and engage in com- 
 merce, whilst the possession of the land, participation in the 
 government, the wielding of arms, and propagation of the 
 official religion are the four signs of Turkish supremacy. 
 But though the Turks have conquered by force a great 
 variety of nations, their pride has been curbed by this 
 obstinate caprice on the part of the land constantly to 
 diminish its produce. The earth has rebelled against its 
 masters; it renders life in the conquered regions every 
 year more impossible, making vain the conquests of 
 these marvellous regions. The disciples of Mahomet 
 have forced by the sword the gates of this paradise, full of 
 
144 MILITARISM 
 
 all the magnificence and sweetness of nature, which should 
 have been reserved for the most elect members of the human 
 race, and lo ! the paradise is slowly degenerating into an 
 uninhabitable desert, in which the conquering nation cannot 
 exist. 
 
 Now, all this indicates, and at the same time punishes, 
 the iniquity and injustice of a nation. In the most terrible 
 moments of history, man has always asked himself this 
 question : "What will happen when the cup of iniquity over- 
 flows ? " He has pictured sudden chastisements which 
 descend on the human race like thunderbolts hurled by some 
 superior power, which readjust at a blow the unstable 
 equilibrium of justice ! In his Infantile simplicity and im- 
 patience, he has always allowed himself to be seduced by 
 the image of these resolving catastrophes, and has not 
 realized that not from above, but right in front of him, was 
 a slow but infallible Nemesis, a force capable of re-establishing 
 justice in the relations between men: the very nature by which 
 he lived. To keep the destructive forces of nature within 
 bounds, to cultivate the earth without ruining or exhausting 
 it, is a delicate work which all manner of men have 
 attempted, but in which only men of refined customs and 
 long-standing civilization have succeeded. The warlike 
 1 Ottoman race, in its life of brigandage and strife, was 
 J certainly not best prepared for this sacred work ; but what 
 | could happen when the Mussulman peasant, already unfit 
 / for this mission, was still more barbarized by the oppression 
 of a scoundrelly Government ? 
 
 The dishonesty of the high officials, anxious to enrich 
 themselves, necessitated a foolish increase in taxation. The 
 taxes on agriculture were so raised as to reduce to misery 
 a large portion of the laborious population; whose distress 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 145 
 
 was embittered by arbitrariness and caprice in the methods 
 of exaction. Even to-day the Turkish peasant, after having 
 paid the tithe of his produce to the tax-collector, has been 
 forced to submit to the exaction of the vali or governor, 
 those of the mutusarif, or prefect, of the caimacanor, sub- 
 prefect ; and if anything escapes the rapacity of all these 
 officials, the wretched peasant may yet come in for a 
 regiment on march through the country, to whose nutriment 
 he has to contribute. The agriculturists, ruined by taxes 
 and usury, finally go to swell the ranks of mendicants, who- 
 form the base of town populations, or they seek the post of 
 servant or parasite in some rich house, whilst ;the boldest 
 become brigands in the wildest and most deserted regions. 
 For some time past brigandage has flourished in Turkey, and 
 has been one of its greatest scourges. It has grown so much 
 in strength and audacity, that the brigands now venture 
 under the very gates of Smyrna and Salonicus, and plunder 
 the environs of Constantinople. But the brigands, like the 
 usurers and officials, are a class who live in a great measure 
 by extorting taxes from the peasantry. 
 
 Exploited by publicans, brigands, officials, and usurers, 
 the Turkish peasant gradually degenerates, without resistance 
 or complaint, into a state of careless resignation. Of wonder- 
 ful sobriety, he contents himself by producing that little which 
 suffices to keep himself and his family in existence, and to 
 procure an occasional pound of tobacco, smoking which, he 
 is able to indulge in the voluptuous inertia of kief. Kief, 
 which signifies absolute idleness, the entire inertia of body 
 and soul, represents to him the height of human bliss. He 
 avoids, therefore, every species of effort ; he does not work 
 hard, but barely scratches the earth, and has reached such an 
 incredible degree of indifference and improvidence, as to have 
 
 K 
 
146 MILITARISM 
 
 quite forgotten the use of manure. The Mussulman peasant 
 appears to ignore the fact that the fertility of land diminishes 
 with long cultivation, and so he does not trouble to enrich 
 his soil : he uses manure as a combustible. 
 
 With the falling-off in the productiveness of the soil the 
 population decreases. From time to time, as happened in 
 1876 and 1878, terrible famines overtake the land and make 
 fearful gaps in the Turkish peasantry ; in normal times, 
 chronic hunger and disease silently decimate this people, 
 destined to disappear.- Entire villages have vanished in the 
 interior of Anatolia. Turkey is not a nation given to statis- 
 tics, and so it is impossible to calculate with precision this 
 decrease in the population ; but there is no denying the 
 truth of the fact, in face of the unanimity of all writers who 
 affirm that the rustic population of Turkey decreases every 
 day decimated by chronic poverty, famines, administrative 
 ill-treatment, and no less by the burden of military service, 
 which weighs on the Mussulman peasantry to the entire ex- 
 clusion of Christians. Christians take no part in war ; and 
 thus wars, whether fortunate or not, have one certain result : 
 that of diminishing a class of men, who, owing to the extreme 
 misery in which they exist, are never able entirely to recover 
 from their continual losses. 
 
 Thus the conquerors and rulers, whilst oppressing the 
 people of whom the fortunes of war have made them master, 
 accomplish a slow suicide. In these military countries, which 
 remind us of ancient societies, war ends by destroying the 
 \victors with the vanquished ; it mingles their ashes under 
 the earth once vainly defended by one, vainly conquered by 
 the other, and, summoning another race to live there, it 
 settles for ever the disputes of ages. Do I hear Rome named 
 the Eternal ? Her walls certainly, if not eternal, have made 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 147 
 
 a long resistance ; not so her men. In the century of the 
 Antonines not a single pure Roman, perhaps, existed ; not 
 a single descendant, that is to say, of a single family of those 
 which had combated the Samnites. The true Rome which 
 founded the Empire perished centuries before, while the 
 Rome which benefited by the Empire was composed of the 
 descendants of the conquered. The first wore itself out in 
 the gigantic efforts of dispersing and destroying so many 
 races, so that at the moment when its work neared con- 
 summation it went to join, in the void of things that have 
 been, Carthage and its other victims. 
 
 IV 
 
 The other symptom of decay, the dissolution of the bureau- r 
 cracy, is another effect of administrative wantonness. The 
 Turkish treasury was unable to withstand such wholesale 
 robbery, and in the end was forced to stop payment. The 
 State, in consequence, could not remunerate its functionaries, 
 more especially the middle and lower ones. 
 
 This is the condition of the Turkish bureaucracy of to-day ^ 
 only the high functionaries are regularly paid, the others 
 are only paid when the Government finds it convenient. 
 Thus it is calculated that on the average an official, captain 
 or major in the Turkish army, does not receive regularly and 
 directly more than one month's salary a year, or at the best 
 two months'. The arrears frequently accumulate for years. 
 The arrant selfishness of the court and bureaucracy, who, 
 being hard up, think only of their own interests, and abandon 
 the lower and medium officials to their own devices, has 
 made of them a body of blackmailers who live by oppressing 
 and exploiting the population. 
 
148 MILITARISM 
 
 All those who have visited or written about Turkey : 
 journalists, travellers, English consuls, repeat the same com- 
 plaint regarding the corruption of the high Turkish officials- 
 one of the plagues of Turkey, as it has been named. Judges 
 sell their sentences, police officials imprison innocent men, 
 and make them buy their liberty at a high price by means 
 of threats ; the tax-collectors raise or lower the duties at their 
 own discretion, gaining on the concessions they graciously 
 make to debtors ; the officials who have to deal with Govern- 
 ment contracts make profit out of them ; those charged with 
 any sort of supervision take bribes from the supervized ; 
 all, in short, make use of the small amount of authority con- 
 ceded to them, to terrify their subjects and extract money. 
 No remedy for this evil is possible, because the small officials 
 have no other means of living, and the higher ones set the 
 worst possible example. A governor, Bahri Pasha, who till 
 recently was vali at Van, in Armenia, reached such a depth 
 of villainy as to excite the Kurds to attack, rob, and burn 
 the harvests of the Armenian peasants, so that corn should 
 not sell too low in the markets of his vilayet, and he be able 
 to make a larger profit on the tithes which every peasant 
 is compelled to pay the Government. 
 
 Indeed, State disorder has reached such a degree that 
 corruption is no longer so much an evil as a vital force, 
 without which the Turkish executive would collapse ; it never 
 moves in any matter except when the officials see some 
 possibility of making bakshish. To give an idea of the 
 incredible impudence and audacity displayed by the Turkish 
 Government, it will suffice to recount the affair of the railway 
 which was to have been constructed between Brussa and 
 Mudiana. The Turkish treasury assigned about 6,000,000 
 for this purpose, nearly the whole of which sum it disbursed ; 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 149 
 
 but not a single yard of the railway was constructed, because 
 the money was all swallowed up in bribes. The funds col- 
 lected, the Minister of Public Works hastened to order in 
 Europe the locomotives and material necessary, in order that 
 the big officials could make considerable sums out of the 
 contractors, and this ready, it became necessary for the 
 engineers to get out plans for the proposed line, out of 
 which job no tips could be extracted. The engineers, in 
 consequence, did nothing at all ; the goods which had been 
 bought were allowed to rust at Mudiana, in the vicinity of 
 the spot where the railway was to commence, and for long 
 after, nothing remained of the railway but a report in which 
 the Minister of Public Works informed the Sultan that the 
 line was nearing its completion, and in which he described 
 the construction, route, and stations. 
 
 Later on, indeed, the railway was entirely constructed, the 
 rails laid down, the stations built ; but only to be left severely 
 alone, as no train was ever run there. To-day the stations 
 are falling to ruin, the rails are rusting, the locomotives sleep 
 in their depots. The neighbouring peasants rummage amongst 
 the ruins for unconsidered trifles ; and Angoran goats " with 
 splendid fleece, calmly browse on the long grass which grows 
 in the waiting-rooms of the stations." l 
 
 V 
 
 Having finished with the recent symptom of decadence in 
 a military empire, the dissolution of the bureaucracy, we will 
 now consider the third: the mania for persecution. When a 
 great man is at the head of a decaying state, the gravity of the 
 
 1 Kesuin Bey, op. cif. t p. 59. 
 
1 50 MILITARISM 
 
 danger may rouse him up to heroic defence. But it is almost 
 an historical law that for every sovereign of superior mind 
 and heart, there are always ten weak, inane, and selfish ones. 
 Now, only very superior minds are able to maintain their 
 balance in face of serious peril ; weaker ones are often roused 
 to great egoism by fear. Fear has the most possible influence 
 on a weak character ; it frequently happens that men, not 
 bad by nature, but merely weak and stupid, are led under its 
 sway to acts of cruelty which the most inhuman of tyrants 
 would not have committed. 
 
 Such is the state of things prevailing in the royal palace 
 at Constantinople. Abdul Hamid, according to those who 
 have known him, is a weak and consequently selfish man 
 rather than a downright bad one, whose natural egoism has 
 been increased by the life of unbounded pleasure which a man 
 in his condition is almost forced to live ; he is a man in whom 
 the instinct of self-preservation is so strong as to raise in him 
 at times paroxysms of fear and outbursts of fury, vain fears 
 and mad rages. His counsellors, the better part of whom 
 are astute and cunning, but currupt, greedy and ambitious, 
 instead of trying to correct these painful terrors in their 
 lord, make use of them to augment their authority. " The 
 imagination of the courtiers," writes Kesuin, " never wearies 
 of inventing new alarms and plots, and of multiplying 
 espionage. Even the great men of the empire are not in- 
 sured against these calumnies. . . . Such and such a pasha 
 is growing too powerful ; . . . another has relations with 
 Europeans ; . . . a third receives papers from Paris, the hot- 
 bed of universal socialism. ... By means of these alarms 
 they succeed in keeping the Sultan in a continual state of 
 factitious excitement, which paralyzes him for any good." 1 
 1 Kesuin Bey, p. 91. } 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 
 
 Thus to the Sultan's ears the buzzing of a fly sounds 
 formidable as the crash of an earthquake. 
 
 What a torment such an existence of terror must be ! 
 Only Shakespeare, perhaps, could adequately describe it. 
 The Sultan lives at Yeldiz Kiosk, in a monumental palace 
 resembling a rock surrounded by granite ramparts, guarded 
 by huge barracks, in which reside an army ready at any 
 moment to rush to the assistance of their master. And yet 
 in the heart of his fortress, protected by an army, the Sultan 
 trembles night and day ; and in company with his friends he 
 constantly plans new schemes of defence, now violent and 
 tragical, now puerile and absurd. Thousands of spies swarm 
 everywhere in Constantinople. All importation of explosives 
 is prohibited by the Government, so that the peasant cannot 
 even buy sulphide of carbon to protect their vines from 
 phylloxera. Telephones are prohibited, so frequently are 
 fireworks. Some years ago, in consequence of the Sultan 
 receiving several threatening letters posted in Constantinople, 
 the internal post of the town was completely prohibited. 
 The Sultan scarcely ever dares leave his palace on the plateau 
 of the Yeldiz ; but even so, he does not escape the torments 
 of fear. Yeldiz, a few years ago, was still a solitude overrun 
 by weeds on which a royal, and many other superb, palaces, 
 were erected, thanks to the water conveyed there by means 
 of an aqueduct constructed by a French company. But this 
 company risked having to abandon the work, and being 
 ruined, because a zealous functionary insinuated to Abdul 
 Hamid that his enemies would be able to use it as a mine in 
 order to secrete dynamite. The Sultan, terrified like a child 
 at this idea, ordered the immediate suspension of the work, 
 and nominated a commission to inquire into the facts of the 
 case. The commission, composed of high court officials, made 
 
15^ MILITARISM 
 
 an examination, and, thanks to the astute corruption of the 
 society, concluded that there was no danger. 
 
 A trifling anecdote, but one which reveals well the mental 
 state prevailing at the Turkish Court, determining the 
 internal politics of the Ottoman Empire in its minor acts, 
 no less than in those infinitely tragical episodes known to us 
 as the Armenian atrocities that horrified Europe during the 
 last few years. The Sultan and his environment constantly 
 see the sovereign's life and the welfare of the empire 
 threatened by internal foes. To defend themselves from 
 these, they multiply cruel and futile persecutions, and, while 
 neglecting all real dangers, create new ones for the State. 
 
 One of the worst forms taken by this oppression is seen 
 when a province, considered tainted with dangerous agitation, 
 passes from the Ministerial Government to that of the Sultan. 
 The provinces are governed in ordinary times by the Sultan's 
 ministers, to whom he delegates his power. But it does not 
 appear that he places much confidence in his representatives, 
 possibly because he has learnt from his country's history that 
 all former plots against his predecessors were originated by 
 their ministers. Consequently when the Sultan is more than 
 usually disquiet, he orders that some province, which appears 
 to him in an exceptionally threatening state, should be 
 placed under his direct supervision. From that moment only 
 those orders which come straight from the palace are valid, 
 and the officials act under the Sultan's direct orders, and 
 to them any complaint against the functionaries must be 
 directed. It can easily be understood how, under these 
 circumstances, any control over the officials, however feeble, 
 is lost, how the law forfeits even the small influence it 
 boasts in normal times, while the people are entirely 
 abandoned to the caprice of unscrupulous bureaucrats. For 
 
THE DEATH-THROWS OF A NATION 153 
 
 instance : the police arrest a man as a suspect, or as being 
 concerned in a political offence. The provincial court before 
 which he is brought absolves him, but the police keep him in 
 prison as long as they choose, because he is considered to be 
 imprisoned by the Sultan's orders, so that no provincial 
 court has power to order his release. The complaints of the 
 victim never reach the Sultan, who, after throwing thousands 
 of families on the mercy of a tyrannical and unscrupulous 
 administration, abandons them to their fate, callous to the 
 injustices and iniquities committed in his name, and satisfied 
 with the thought that he has thus averted an imminent peril 
 from his throne. 
 
 VI 
 
 Arrests en masse, the secret execution of suspects and those 
 accused of conspiracy, the Government of terror, in short, as 
 arbitrary and ferocious as it can be in a country like Turkey, 
 such are the tactics of this oligarchy of madmen and scoun- 
 drels. These oppressions are the work of the bureaucracy ; 
 but besides these, there is another infamy in which the 
 whole Mussulman population is accomplice. I allude to 
 the Armenian massacres, whose consideration leads us to the 
 study of the fourth phenomenon of Turkish decadence. 
 
 The " Armenian atrocities " have been very widely discussed 
 during these last years. The European press had described 
 its most terrible episodes, and the general opinion seems to 
 be that their sole cause lay in the innate brutality of the 
 Turkish population. And yet even Turkish ferocity is not 
 without some incentive, motive, or at least excuse : even a 
 Turk, unspeakable as he is, does not amuse himself by wallow- 
 ing in Christian blood as a mere pastime. The Armenian 
 
154 MILITARISM 
 
 massacres are not merely a new chapter in the history of 
 fanaticism, a religious war ; they are the convulsions of a dying 
 nation, a last desperate and ferocious struggle between two 
 societies, embittered by all degrees of cruelty ranging from 
 fanaticism to greed. 
 
 The Armenian crisis is connected with a phenomenon 
 common to the decadence of all military empires : usury. 
 The usurer, that shady character who in modern times has 
 degenerated into the hidden accomplice of the dissipated sons 
 of rich families, used to be an historical force, and he fulfilled 
 at certain moments the solemn and terrible office of social 
 executioner to a corrupt society. 
 
 This is now happening in Turkey. The bureaucracy, drawn 
 for the most part from the Mussulman population, lives on 
 what it can extort from the workers, and, though forming the 
 highest class in Turkish society, is by no means rich. If we 
 except the high State dignitaries, the majority of the officials 
 live poorly, are badly paid, and display no aptitude to save. 
 The economy of a family of Turkish functionaries, whether 
 situated high or low in the hierarchy, is as follows : When 
 there is money, to spend it recklessly ; when funds are low, to 
 live as circumstances best permit. To save or accumulate 
 are two things of \\hich a Turkish functionary is incapable. 
 Thus no one knows how to make use of those strokes of 
 fortune which, in the midst of such general administrative 
 chaos, befall many officials, and which would enable him to 
 put by a little store. Everything is rapidly dissipated in 
 luxuries, presents, and generosities, because a well-to-do Turk 
 is fond of spending liberally, not only for his own satisfaction, 
 but for that of others. A little pleasure which a Turk with 
 some money to throw away always allows himself, is that of 
 buying small loaves to distribute among the innumerable 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 155 
 
 dogs which haunt the streets of Constantinople. A great 
 part of the bureaucracy live in very straitened circumstances, 
 enlivened occasionally by some orgy or dissipation, the result 
 of some more than commonly generous bribe. 
 
 The Armenian, on the contrary, who has abandoned his 
 native plains and mountains because unable to cultivate them, 
 is an industrious man of business, gifted with sobriety, provi- 
 dence, and those miserly habits which go to build up large 
 fortunes. Whilst the Turk spends, the Armenian hoards ; a 
 conflict ensues between the pair, in which the former represents 
 reed and the latter money, arms^and usury. The Armenian 
 merchant in large Turkish towns is generally by necessity a 
 usurer, whether on a larger or smaller scale, whether avowed 
 or dissimulated. The Turkish Government, by administrative 
 depredations, systematically reduces the wealth of society 
 and contracts to the minimum the productive investment of 
 capital ; it discourages any industrial enterprise by heavy 
 taxation ; it renders commerce impossible by the utter 
 neglect of public works in the provinces. Under these con- 
 ditions the Armenian's capital, which in a more industrious 
 and productive society would be accumulated in banks and 
 help to develop the immense latent natural wealth of the 
 empire, has to seek a usurious investment, which, owing to 
 the indolent habits of the Turkish population, proves far 
 more profitable than any industrial or seriously productive 
 speculation. 
 
 To illustrate how far the Armenian, in his character as 
 money-lender, aids in the dissolution of Turkish society, and 
 fattens and prospers on its ruin, as the bacilli of phthisis 
 flourish by the slow death of the being upon whom they live, it 
 suffices to cite a single one of these usurious speculations, which, 
 in the Ottoman Empire, are a purely Armenian monopoly. 
 
156 MILITARISM 
 
 This is the speculation of the seraf, or money-changer. 
 We have seen that the Turkish civil and military officials 
 rarely receive more than one month's salary in the course of a 
 year. It might therefore be supposed that the Turkish army, 
 administrated with such a rigorous system of economy, would 
 cost but little to the Government And yet the Turkish army 
 costs as much in proportion as any other European regularly 
 paid force, because the Turkish Government disburses, how- 
 ever tardily, the sum fixed for the salary of its officials ; 
 but the greater part of this sum, instead of reaching these 
 officials, finishes in the hands of the rich Armenian serafs. 
 
 Here is the strange administrative process through which 
 this is accomplished. The Turkish functionary who is 
 embarrassed and has saved nothing, and who is consequently 
 in need of money every month to send to his family, sells the 
 payment-orders for his salary to a rich Armenian seraf, who 
 buys it at a rebate of 60 or 80 per cent. When he has bought 
 for ;8oo or ;icoo several payment-orders to the value of 
 4000, he goes to the minister on whom the functionaries 
 depend to the Minister of War if he has been dealing with 
 officers where he has friends in the highest ranks, and by 
 the distribution of bribes he manages to get his orders 
 paid at a reduction of 20 or 25 per cent., thus making 
 an enormous profit out of the transaction. Thanks to this 
 state of things, a large part of the revenue goes to enrich 
 Armenian speculators and the ministers in league with 
 them, and together they manage to make money out of the 
 universal ruin of the Turkish Empire. They find, indeed, that 
 there is so much to be made out of this business that they do 
 their best to prolong the conditions which render it possible : 
 the delay in payment. It oftens happens that the treasury 
 has money in hand to pay the salaries punctually, but the 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 157 
 
 ministers delay just the same in order to force the poor 
 officials to treat with the Armenian usurers, who later on give 
 them their share of the profits. If to-morrow a reforming 
 Sultan wished to re-establish punctuality in the payment of 
 functionaries, he would be met with violent opposition, more 
 especially on the part of the higher dignitaries. 
 
 This is a typical example, but the entire commerce of the 
 Armenians is of this order usury exercised on the careless " 
 and indolent Turkish population. An improvident Turkish 
 peasant finds himself in need of funds. An Armenian 
 merchant from the neighbouring village will lend him money 
 at an exhorbitant rate of interest, for which the Turk always 
 has to deliver the better part of his harvest to the Armenian. 
 An official, after a brief period of good luck, finds himself 
 forced to sell his furniture and jewellery. An Armenian 
 immediately turns up to buy them for a mere nothing. In 
 every conceivable manner, in short, the Armenians accumulate 
 capital in their hands, withdraw it from circulation, hide it 
 away as a reserve, arid employ it, not to enrich society, but 
 to expropriate the population by usury, collaborating with 
 the higher functionaries to produce that stagnation of wealth 
 which, by slow degrees, is disorganizing and ruining the 
 Turkish nation. 
 
 Putrefaction is the laboratory of life, said Karl Marx. Now, 
 putrefaction is the work of microbes, who are thus life's most 
 active agents, because death is a necessary condition prior to 
 life. The Armenian usurer is a microbe of putrefaction, the v 
 most active agent of the decay which, by degrees, destroys 
 the corrupt body of the Turkish nation, and prepares, by 
 dissolution, the materials for a new and better society. 
 
MILITARISM 
 
 VII 
 
 The financial power of a small group of Armenian usurers 
 is, moreover, only the expression of a more general pheno- 
 menon : a continual increase in the number of Christians 
 in the Turkish Empire. Masters as they are of commerce, 
 more capable of capitalizing, exempt from military service, 
 and therefore from war, they multiply and constantly increase 
 their social power, under cover of the humble servility of 
 subjects. They exploit the poverty of the poor and the vices 
 of the rich ; in a certain sense they keep the executive under 
 their thumb, preying on the salaries of the lower officials, 
 dividing the spoils of their villainy with the highest, who thus 
 become their accomplices. They are contractors to the 
 Government, and can teach both Turks and Europeans a thing 
 or two in the matter of fraud, thus working towards the ruin 
 of the Ottoman Empire more effectually than any army. 
 
 They do not derive this power from the fact of being 
 Christians, but from having exercised certain qualities under 
 oppression and in servitude stinginess, industry, and thrift ; 
 from having excelled in ingenuity and cunning ; from their 
 Job-like patience ; from having lost, moreover, in the course 
 of their terrible struggle with their oppressors, the last vestige 
 of moral scruple. The Turk, on the contrary, is always 
 liberal, improvident, and idle, and, when he has not been 
 J demoralized by bureaucratic life, is a simple and good-natured 
 man. He only wishes to be priest, soldier, official, and 
 agriculturist because he naturally prefers repose and pleasure 
 to work. As agriculturist he confides in the benignity of his 
 land ; in the character of official he smokes and idles in his 
 office ; as priest or soldier he snoozes in his mosque or 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 159 
 
 barrack. Thus the power acquired by the Christians is merely 
 the victory of ingenious energy and greed over indolent 
 thriftlessness ; a victory which was inevitable, and which no 
 human power could prevent, as nothing can prevent the fine 
 point of a diamond penetrating the softer rocks. 
 
 This tyrannical military bureaucracy, in the midst of its 
 slow consuming disease, is subject to attacks of fury, during 
 which it thinks to save itself by resorting to the prime instru- 
 ment of its power : force. It is difficult to imagine the state 
 of mind in which a Turk finds himself when watching nearly 
 his whole salary disappearing into the safes of a rich Armenian 
 banker this interested assistant of his misery. Everything 
 induces him to regard the Christian as his enemy and 
 exploiter, the cause of his poverty. And since hatred is the 
 most communicative human sentiment, and the one most 
 easily generalized, hatred against the Armenian usurer, by 
 a very common psychological process, of which history affords 
 many examples, easily develops into hatred of Armenians 
 and Christians in general ; not only of the city Armenian 
 merchant, but also of the Armenian peasant in Armenia a 
 poor wretched being dragging out a miserable existence, who 
 neither enjoys nor, frequently, knows anything of the wealth 
 accumulated by his lucky compatriots in distant towns. Thus, 
 through fear and the spirit of imitation and solidarity which 
 exists in evil, this hatred passes from the bureaucracy, the 
 principal victim of Christian usury, to the whole Mussulman 
 and Turkish-speaking population : it becomes a national and 
 religious hatred. 
 
 This does not explain, however, why this hatred has 
 expressed itself of late years in periodical massacres, almost 
 overtly the work of the Government, and perpetrated with the 
 sanction of the authorities. It appears that this fearful 
 
l6o MILITARISM 
 
 tragedy is due to the encounter between the popular Mussul- 
 man hatred embittered by the sufferings of which they are 
 the victim with the sanguinary mysticism of the man who 
 is now Sultan and Chief of the Faithful. 
 
 Abdul Hamid is not the frivolous, indolent sultan, cruel at 
 moments through the impulse of passing caprice, so frequently 
 met with in Islam history. Unusual as it may appear in 
 a Turk, he is a methodical and highly persistent worker ; a 
 most diligent administrator of his own wealth, who both 
 accumulates and spends freely. Always shrewd, and with 
 a distinct object in view, he supervises and controls every 
 detail. He is a tyrant whose cruelty is not impulsive but 
 reflective, arising, not from passing caprices of mood, but 
 from well-considered and matured determination. This man, 
 however, who has the solid temperament of a merchant, is 
 governed at the same time by the demoniacal power of a 
 mystical and atrocious dream, through which he has yielded 
 to the fascination exercised by great violence over the 
 imagination. This dream is not exclusively his own. Many 
 years ago a governor of Aleppo, desirous of ingratiating him- 
 self with the Sultan, sent him some rare gifts chosen among 
 the most precious Syrian curiosities : otto of roses, ostrich 
 feathers, exquisite coffee. To this he wished to add a still 
 more bizarre curiosity : a dervish (a species of Mussulman 
 monk, addicted to mystical practices) of the name of Abul 
 Huda, who lived in Aleppo as astrologer, prophet, miracle- 
 worker, and preacher. 
 
 Shortly after his introduction to the Court, the Aleppo 
 mendicant held the keys of the Sultan's heart ; he became 
 more than the sovereign's friend ; he was the master of his 
 mind, already so well prepared for the seductions of gigantic 
 pan-Islamistic schemes, through the education received at 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION l6l 
 
 the hands of the Cadrish dervishes, who had habituated him 
 to lengthy meditation on Mussulman greatness. Abul Huda 
 tempted and mastered that proud and fantastical man, 
 metaphorically raising him by the magic of his ardent mys- 
 ticism to immense heights of imaginary greatness, informing 
 him that one of the greatest kingdoms ever offered to man 
 lay at his feet, that the infinite multitude of Mahomet's 
 disciples, reunited and animated by a pan-Islamite propaganda, 
 were prepared to worship him as the head of Islam, restored 
 as in the grand times of Omar. The poor astronomer told 
 the sovereign that the stars had destined him to be the 
 greatest of caliphs ; he persuaded him to use his treasures 
 for the pan-Islamite propaganda fanned by the Senussi, of 
 which he was a member, a society which tried to rouse in 
 Mussulmans, all the world over, from Sudin to Africa, an 
 ardent fanaticism. 
 
 Overcome by giddiness, on the edge of the abyss of great- 
 ness to which the magician had transported him, Abdul 
 Hamid persuaded himself that he was the champion of 
 pan-Islamism. "The bed-rock desire of this man," writes 
 the anonymous author of an article in the Revue des Revues^ 
 " so modern in his business dealings but who spiritually lives 
 in the seventh century, is that of reconstructing the Mussul- 
 man Empire as it was in the age of Omar an empire, that 
 is to say, divided into two classes : the believers, who form the 
 government and army, and the rahai (plebs) who by manual 
 work maintain the former in luxury. . . . The rahai can rise 
 from their servile state by becoming Mussulmans, but if they 
 
 1 " Le Matre et les serviteurs d'Yeldiz " (Revue des Revues, I5th August, 
 1st September, 1897). These two articles, published anonymously by a 
 man who must be well acquainted with Turks and their ways, are a vivid 
 picture of the Turkish court. 
 
 L 
 
1 62 MILITARISM 
 
 attempt to raise themselves on their own account by their 
 own effort . . . they must be crushed down by massacre." 
 
 The Armenian massacres appear to have sprung from this 
 political conception, matured;;by Abul Huda and communi- 
 cated by him to the Sultan. Abul Huda, indeed, at Trebisonde, 
 personally recruited and maintained the emissaries charged with 
 preaching massacre in the Armenian districts. The Armenians 
 are the most numerous and powerful Christian population in- 
 habiting Turkey, taking a first rank as regards number, 
 tenacity, and fortune. Thus the victims of the sanguinary 
 attempt of the Aleppo beggar, and his slave and lord, were 
 directed against those who, being absolute subjects, were more 
 defenceless than other Christian populations, such as the 
 Greeks, who are protected by special international treaties. 
 The Armenian massacres are the execution of a political 
 programme, whose object is brutally to thrust back into the 
 degradation and poverty, from which they escaped by patience 
 and ingenuity, a people who, in the midst of Turkish 
 decadence, grows every day more powerful, to cow them by 
 the terror of slaughter, and impoverish them by systematic 
 robbery. To effect this work, the emperor has summoned as 
 chief collaborator a sanguinary brute, Nazem Pasha the son 
 of a Kurdish brigand and a Syrian mother who, having in- 
 herited his father's instincts, was best suited to the post he 
 now occupies as head of the police. Nazem organized two 
 years ago the terrible massacres in Constantinople that 
 lasted three days, during which he accumulated ; 160,000 
 worth of booty : spoils found in the ransacked shops and on 
 12,000 Armenian corpses. He has made an instrument of 
 the police by which to receive by force from the Armenians 
 the money they had extracted by cunning from the Turks. 
 Armenian merchants, professional men, and artisans are 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OP A NATION 163 
 
 arrested by the thousand every year, and kept in prison until 
 the police have succeeded, by various means, in extorting 
 from them all they possess : then they are sent back into the 
 world as poor as when they entered it. 
 
 Fearful convulsions of a dying society ! Abdul Hamid and 
 this Aleppian have been able to conceive and perpetrate 
 these horrible things because they happen to have been born 
 in the decline of the Ottoman Empire. They are the ex- 
 pression of a social necessity, the impersonification of an 
 epoch in history ; of the epoch in which a nation of believers 
 feels that its power, established by arms, is giving way, and 
 attempts to rebuild it by multiplying violences ; a society 
 which feels that European civilization is threatening it, and 
 turns recklessly back to the past which gave it birth. 
 
 For this reason the man whom Gladstone named " the 
 great assassin," will long live in the memory of the faithful ; 
 he will be regarded by them as the last hero of Islamism, the 
 worthy descendant of the great Caliphs, who attempted to 
 preserve by the sword what his predecessors had conquered 
 by the sword. The European philosopher, on the contrary, 
 sees in this tardy saviour of I slam and in his counsellor, who 
 let'loose in Turkish society the extreme violence of fanati- 
 cism, two terrible agents of dissolution. To burn, plunder, 
 and massacre, all signify to destroy^ and it is not by destruc- 
 tion and ruin that a decaying nation can be reconstituted. 
 As the writer in the Revue des Revues says : " Such a regime 
 necessarily leads to anarchy. The Oriental Empire might or 
 might not be a harmonious combination of Mussulmans and 
 Christians. The oppression of the Christians re-kindled the 
 religious war, the death of 300,000 Armenians ruined 
 commerce, industry, and agriculture. The official sanction 
 of theft, espionage, and the sale of Government appointments, 
 
164 MILITARISM 
 
 has broken all social bonds between individuals. All the 
 conditions necessary to the maintainance of a state have 
 ceased to exist. Nothing remains but armies ; when these 
 are crushed by a Christian power, Turkey must perish. If 
 they continue to conquer, the present anarchy will increase." 
 This means that Turkey will continue to live in the midst 
 of fanatic convulsions and violence, of massacres and atrocious 
 hatreds ; wealth will diminish, administrative disorder will 
 increase ; the small remains of Christian honesty will perish 
 with all that survives of Mussulman good sense ; the earth 
 will daily grow more niggardly, and men will be decimated 
 by natural and social scourges : famines, epidemics, earth- 
 quakes, chronic misery, wars, murder, rapine, madness, and 
 the spread of unnatural vices. No human power will be able 
 to stay this inevitable chastisement, and then the Sultan's 
 conduct will be revealed in all its senseless folly. He tries, 
 by multiplying outrages, to re-animate the worn-out vanity of 
 the Mussulman empire ; but in vain. The sacrifice of human 
 blood cannot give life to dead things, as certain barbarous 
 superstitions suppose ; the Turkish crisis, born of the funda- 
 mental vices inherent in Mussulman and ancient societies, 
 will end in the extermination of a people. When the Turks 
 shall have succeeded in extirpating the Armenians, will they 
 be freed from the financial oppression of a more ingenious 
 and industrious people, will they be able to acquire and pre- 
 serve a social superiority which is beyond them ? The place 
 of the Armenians will be filled by the Greeks ; the Greeks 
 exterminated, the Germans and English will step in, because 
 wherever in a society that has few productive investments 
 there exists a class of rich merchants beside a parasitical and 
 indolent bureaucracy, the former will always rule and exploit 
 the latter. 
 
THE DEATH-THROES OF A NATION 
 
 VIII 
 
 " Quam brevis est risus quam longa est lacryma mundi !" 
 Thus wrote an English copyist of the fourteenth century on 
 a manuscript of the Magna Charta, preserved in the National 
 Library of Turin. The Turkish crisis, which originated in 
 the stagnation of capital, the decay of agriculture, and de- 
 population, is similar in its general features to all crisis 
 that periodically tormented and ruined ancient societies, and 
 especially those founded on hatred of work, simplicity of life, 
 and ignorance. The Turkish crisis is terrible because that, 
 thanks to the almost universal state of peace, it may last 
 a very long time ; it may resemble a slow disease, which 
 does not kill its victim, but allows him to drag out a 
 miserable and stunted existence. If the end of the nineteenth 
 century were an era of great and frequent wars, the Turkish 
 Empire might be destroyed by some younger state whose 
 Government was more civilized. This would possess itself 
 of the Sultan's treasures and the wealth of the mosques in 
 order to repair streets and bridges, to improve the executive ; 
 in short, to give fresh life to the dying state. Asia Minor, 
 indeed all the Turkish territories, suffer from the lack of war 
 and the absence of conquering nations. They are perishing 
 because peace abandons them to the gradual aggravation of 
 the ill-being, from which they suffer, without any hope of 
 a probable recovery. Left to its own devices, there is no 
 future for this nation ; the Christians will not destroy the 
 Mussulmans, nor the Mussulmans the Christians, and so long 
 as the Mussulmans are in command, Turkey will remain 
 what it is : poor, simple, idle, conservative in habits, the prey 
 of usurers and powerful pashas. European civilization will 
 
1 66 MILITARISM 
 
 be unable to penetrate. Only a war, by abolishing the 
 oligarchy now in power and substituting another more 
 desirous of progress and civilization, could remedy the 
 
 v 7 present evils and rehabilitate that portion of Asia in the 
 history of the world. 
 
 We shall see, in the following pages, that frequent wars 
 would be a great impediment to the progress of European 
 
 v civilization. Turkey, on the contrary, is slowly decaying 
 owing to the long peace which now reigns over such a large 
 portion of the world. This fact demonstrates the main 
 difference that exists between Christian and Mussulman 
 civilization, which is at the same time the essential difference 
 between the modern and the ancient. Without war, ancient 
 civilization could not have existed, the Iliad would never 
 have been composed, Plato would not have philosophized, 
 
 the Roman jurisconsults would not have elaborated the law. 
 <$-' \ 
 
 We shall sec that modern society, on the other hand, would 
 be destroyed by war. 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 
 
 ON the threshold of this century stands a figure of colossal 
 grandeur : Napoleon. He is certainly the man of our age 
 about whom most has been said, written, and investigated. 
 Many believe him to be the greatest personage of the century, 
 and attribute to him the miracle of having created much out 
 of nothing the victories of his armies, his own extraordinary 
 career, the glory, power, and wealth of France, the end of the 
 feudal system, the inauguration of a liberal movement in 
 every European state. 
 
 Napoleon is certainly the greatest problem which presents 
 itself to him who would study the causes and functions of 
 war in this century. Was he in reality the greatest man of 
 our times, the last of the great ? Does his career resemble 
 those of the warriors of old ? and was he, by the power of his 
 works, an Alexander or a Caesar ? 
 
 None would deny that he was a man of genius ; but that 
 his importance raised him to the rank of a demi-god, I do not 
 believe. He possessed great gifts and energy ; but chance 
 led him to perform a vaster work than that which 'he had 
 consciously intended, nor were there wanting in his character 
 many weaknesses and a terrible lack of balance. He resembles 
 too closely a great barbarian, Attila, to be the greatest man 
 
1 70 MILITARISM 
 
 of the nineteenth century. In fact, between the two warriors, 
 Attila, as described by the historian Priscus, who saw and 
 spoke to him, and Napoleon, described by the many who 
 knew him, there is a curious resemblance ; that is to say, they 
 resemble each other in their personal character as men, not 
 for the part they took in history. They are alike because the 
 fundamental trait in their characters is the same : selfish and 
 unmeasured pride, an inextinguishable thirst for eminence, 
 an insatiable desire for superiority and dominion over their 
 fellow-men. As the central nerve branches out in a leaf and 
 sustains the whole structure connecting the various parts, so 
 in every human character one single sentiment connects 
 various qualities, and stamps the man. Pride was the back- 
 bone of these two characters. Thus these two leaves which 
 grew on the tree of life at such very different epochs, and 
 under conditions so diverse, almost seem to belong to the 
 same year. Wrathfulness was common to them both, violence 
 and insolence of manner, as well as the desire to domineer 
 over other men, more especially by ill-treating them, some- 
 times with genuine anger, sometimes with feigned. Napoleon's 
 rages were of terrific violence. On one occasion, for instance, 
 he kicked the Senator Volney in the abdomen ; at Campo- 
 formio, impatient of the delay of an Austrian ambassador, he 
 smashed a porcelain vase of great value. When in anger, he 
 behaved with extraordinary brutality towards dependants, 
 whether simple servants, clerks, or the highest functionaries, 
 and at such moments he was wont to give such extravagant 
 commands, that his entourage were at a loss to know how to 
 induce him to withdraw them. This irascibility in part 
 assumed he preserved even in his relations with the punc- 
 tilious diplomatic world. During a treaty at Dresden, in 
 1813, when his power was already on the decline, he brutally 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS i;i 
 
 asked Metternich how much he had been paid by England 
 to play his part. At Wilna, in 1812, whilst in conversation 
 with the Russian envoy, BelatchefT, he abused Alexander's 
 counsellors, calling them the worst names he could think of 
 vauriens, debauchees, and viles personnes. 
 
 Now it is curious to read in Priscus, that Attila's diplomacy 
 was equal to Napoleon's for ceremony. The embassy to 
 which Priscus belonged wished to negotiate with Attila about 
 the Hun deserters, whom the emperor declared to have all 
 returned, but of whom Attila maintained that many still 
 remained in the Roman's power, which matter seemed to 
 highly irritate the Hun king, to judge from the manner in 
 which he received the ambassadors. When these had saluted 
 him with the greatest deference, "May all that the Romans 
 wish me, befall them," answered Attila, and turning to Vigilus, 
 the head of the embassy, he called him an impudent fool, 
 asked him how he had dared come before him, knowing as he 
 did what the terms of the peace were when he accompanied 
 the preceding embassy from Anatolius ; and added that no 
 other ambassador would have dared to make his appearance 
 before all the hostages had been returned. Vigilus attempted 
 to make some reply ; but Attila, growing more and more 
 enraged, loaded him with abuse, and, howling with fury, told 
 him that it was only thanks to his quality of ambassador that 
 he refrained from crucifying him. 
 
 As anger and violence were common to the two men, so 
 also were obstinacy of ideas, insufferance of advice, the desire 
 to be surrounded by mental dwarfs reaching no higher than 
 their knees. Priscus recounts a conversation held with the 
 members of another embassy, sent this time by the western 
 emperor, who for a long while had tried to persuade Attila to 
 renounce certain of his absurd pretensions. He asked them 
 
1 72 MILITARISM 
 
 whether they had any hope of success. " No," they answered ; 
 "it is impossible to make Attila change his mind." And 
 Romolo, one of the ambassadors, added, " Fortune has given 
 him a great empire, and he has become so proud in con- 
 sequence that good counsel no longer has any influence with 
 him, so that he only believes his own caprices to be right." 
 
 Fourteen centuries later Chaptel repeated nearly the same 
 words, in speaking of the Attila of the nineteenth century. 
 " From the moment that he had formed some idea on political 
 matters, whether right or wrong, Napoleon consulted no one. 
 He wished for servants, not counsellors." And Mollien 
 added, "Napoleon considered himself as a superior being, 
 created to govern and direct every one according to his 
 own ideas." 
 
 This similitude can be observed also in small details which 
 might appear valueless to too serious a psychologist. One of 
 the ways in which proud spirits seek to satisfy their ambition, 
 is by despising all that is prized by others. By remaining 
 unmoved by what is generally sought after, a man displays 
 an essential difference from his fellows ; he flatters himself 
 that he shows himself superior to the common horde. This 
 is the reason why the nobility always affects contempt and 
 scepticism, and consider it vulgar to enthuse too much, even 
 over anything well meriting enthusiasm. 
 
 Napoleon, partly by nature and partly by affectation, was 
 a past-master in the art of magnifying himself in the public 
 eye by paying no attention to what most men loved. His 
 face always appeared absorbed and impassive to the public ; 
 it was difficult to amuse or distract him at theatres ; he was 
 bored and yawned at court fetes, and at Fontainebleau he 
 appeared abstracted, a colossal being whose head reached the 
 clouds, and whose thoughts were intent on other things far 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 173 
 
 removed from the little men who grovelled at his feet. He 
 spoke little, as though fearing to appear too familiar. On one 
 occasion at Saint Cloud, in the midst of a distinguished circle 
 of gentlemen, Varnagen heard him repeat some twenty times 
 this single phrase : " It is hot." So that the court was "silent 
 and cold," as Madame de Renuisat put it ; adding picturesquely, 
 " Both intentionally and by inclination he never relaxes from 
 his royalty." 
 
 Attila also was of a nature that " never relaxed from his 
 royalty," not even in the midst of the barbaric freedom of 
 court banquets. Priscus recounts a solemn feast which the 
 ambassadors attended. After the dinner two bards sung war- 
 songs, which moved the auditors to tears ; then a fool cracked 
 a lot of jokes and comicalities which made every one laugh ; a 
 Moor made a long discourse in a mixture of Latin, Gothic, 
 and Hun. But in the midst of all this merriment "Attila 
 alone," writes Priscus, " preserved always the same counte- 
 nance. He remained grave and immovable ; he did and said 
 nothing to reveal the slightest desire to laugh or amuse 
 himself. Only when they brought him his youngest son, 
 Irnach, did he look at him affectionately and pat his 
 cheek." 
 
 Again, in speaking of this official banquet, Priscus gives 
 another curious particular : that Attila distinguished himself 
 from the others, not only by the gravity of his manner, but 
 also by his sobriety in eating and simplicity in dress. 
 Amongst all the court magnates, he was the most moderate 
 eater, and donned the simplest attire. " He had prepared for 
 the barbarians and for us," writes Priscus, "all manner of 
 viands, which were served on silver platters, but Attila ate 
 nothing but meat on a wooden dish. He displayed great 
 simplicity in everything. Whilst the guests drank out of gold 
 
174 MILITARISM 
 
 and silver bowls, Attila used a wooden mug ; his clothes 
 were simplicity itself, and distinguishable from those of the 
 other barbarians by being of one colour and without orna- 
 ments ; his sword, his shoe-laces, the reins of his horse, 
 nothing about him was adorned with gold and precious 
 jewels as in the other Scythians. 
 
 Even in this simplicity of taste Napoleon and Attila were 
 alike. Napoleon always dressed unobtrusively, like a fairly 
 well-to-do officer, without displaying any of those showy 
 ornaments which amongst soldiers are still in favour. It is a 
 known fact, moreover, that he was wont to chaff Murat on his 
 pompous clothing, on his plumes, decorations, damascened 
 weapons, for his love 6*f glitter. 
 
 II 
 
 Simplicity and pride : an apparent contradiction by which 
 we must not allow ourselves to be deceived. This external 
 modesty is only the surpreme form of pride, which, in its 
 most intense degree, finds no other satisfaction than in the 
 contempt of the outward attributes of power. Attila and 
 Napoleon despised display because they believed themselves 
 to be, and wished to appear, so infinitely superior to the rest 
 of humanity as to have no need to excite admiration and 
 respect by all those material vanities whereby mediocre men 
 attract attention. 
 
 Thus Napoleon's chief characteristic was pride : the pride 
 of an Oriental sovereign, of an Assyrian king. But whence 
 did Napoleon derive this pride, and how did he nourish it ? 
 In part it was certainly innate, A military conqueror is 
 always a man born to command others. We already find 
 germs of this pride in the young officer who, poor and obscure, 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 175 
 
 dreamed of offering his services to the Sultan to undertake 
 great Oriental wars ; the vague romanticism of an active and 
 ambitious spirit, in which the insatiable avidity for greatness 
 that was to torment him all his life, was fermenting. But 
 only the first grandiose and unexpected successes of his Italian 
 campaign gave form to these vague, ambitious dreams ; con- 
 verting these youthful fantasies of future might into a virile 
 pride, conscious and unlimited. Napoleon himself confessed 
 that the flame of his ambition burst forth after the battle of 
 Lodi ; that before then he only thought of becoming a 
 fortunate soldier. After it, " the idea struck me," he himself 
 writes, " that I might become an important actor on the scene 
 of politics." 
 
 This psychological phenomenon, moreover, is so simple that 
 it does not demand elaborate explanations. None of the 
 men whom fortune has raised to the summit of power have 
 ever begun their career without entertaining wild shapeless 
 hopes ; none of them have been gifted from the beginning 
 with the superhuman lucidity of foresight and self-confidence 
 necessary to specify exactly the degree of greatness to which 
 they would attain, nor the exact date for the said elevation. 
 The youth destined to become the boldest and most self-con- 
 fident of men is easily discouraged ; he vaguely mistrusts 
 himself, as can be observed in the indecision of his ambitious 
 dreams. Notwithstanding his extraordinary latent force of 
 character, Napoleon, still young and obscure, had not the 
 courage to believe what turned out to be the truth : that he 
 should become the general of a conquering army at twenty- 
 six years of age ; he scarcely ever dared to dream that one 
 day he would be a great Oriental warrior, perhaps the head 
 of one of those distant empires. Maturity of character 
 cannot be measured by the extent but by the precision of its 
 
176 MILITARISM 
 
 ambition, hence the young officer who dreamed of distant 
 glory whilst walking the streets of Paris had to experience 
 victory before his ambition could conceive the plan of making 
 himself master of Europe and crowning himself emperor. 
 
 Victory was necessary to give shape to the ambition of one 
 who was already inclined to consider himself made of other 
 clay than that of the common mass of humanity, and well- 
 established good luck to definitely persuade him that he 
 was a unique man, destined to succeed in everything, and to 
 rule mankind. Men are so easily overcome by the intoxica- 
 tion of power : how could this man, so proud by nature, 
 resist, when raised to immense Himalayan heights, from 
 which he could see half the world at his feet and nothing but 
 the heavens above his head ? But if war roused Napoleon's 
 innate pride into madness, pride rendered his passion for war 
 still acuter. The pleasures of pride are perfidious, the more 
 we drink the thirstier we grow, till we can drown even our 
 reason without finding satisfaction. As the mental and 
 physical vigour of the general who had fought the Italian 
 campaign declined, Napoleon's desire to re-taste the violent 
 emotions of victory, to re-animate in himself the inebriating 
 consciousness of his superiority, increased little matters it 
 whether this be in part illusive the immensity of his 
 power, which had no other limit than in his own will and in 
 the materiality of things, not in the will of other men. 
 
 . 
 
 Ill 
 
 But as Napoleon's faculties got more and more absorbed 
 by war, and as his pride by degrees increased, we observe a 
 transformation in his intelligence, wherein lies one of the 
 most curious phenomenon in his history. 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS I 77 
 
 Every man who lives in society, and has friendly or hostile 
 relations with his fellows, should be capable of understanding 
 external life, of comprehending men and the world in which 
 he lives and moves; more particularly if his relations with 
 others are close or difficult. Now the chief phenomenon in 
 the moral history of Napoleon, that to which the principal 
 events of his life are attributable, and on which the political 
 history of Europe for fifteen years depended, is this : that by 
 degrees, as he advanced in years, the work of war absorbed 
 and exhausted him ; as his pride fed by victory grew more 
 extravagant, he progressively lost count of the realities of life, i/ 
 until in the end he became involved in a world of imaginary 
 chimeras. 
 
 Napoleon's intelligence possessed from the beginning a 
 great quality and a great defect : extraordinarily active as it 
 was, capable of immense efforts of prodigious variety, it was 
 much less capable of perseverance and continuous effort. 
 This explains why he was such a great general and such a 
 poor politician. Taine has splendidly analyzed the prime 
 quality of Napoleon's intellect : the unmeasured ensemble of 
 such diverse things which he could conceive in a single 
 thought ; the lucidity with which he perceived the minutest 
 details in a moment. This quality made him a great leader 
 in his early years, when his mind was still fresh, because of 
 his facility to realize, with precision of detail, those minutiae 
 which a general, directing the operations of a campaign, '' 
 has to keep in mind. But he possessed in a very minor 
 degree the genius for slow synthetic creation ; the capacity 
 to understand a complex matter in its aggregate by studying 
 its particulars one by one, by a persevering and patient effort 
 of mind to reconstruct the whole body, so to speak, from its 
 separate parts. Thus, for instance, although he had so long 
 
 M 
 
1 78 MILITARISM 
 
 inhabited Europe, known so many people and dealt with so 
 many states, Napoleon never succeeded in forming a precise 
 idea of the social conditions of European countries, in 
 attaining a deeper understanding of the various European 
 nations, of their latent forces, of what was maturing in each. 
 This can be clearly perceived from the triviality and superfici- 
 ality of many of his expressed political opinions, and which for 
 the most part are mere journalist's phrases, paradoxical 
 crackers let off by a man who always desired to astound 
 his fellows, even when enunciating a political judgment ; such 
 as when he said, " Constantinople is the capital of the world," 
 and " Europe in a century will be all republican or all 
 Cossack." Napoleon never really foresaw what would follow 
 after his death : the end of the chronic wars of invasion ; the 
 application of the energies formerly expended on war to 
 home interests, and the development of trade ; in short, the 
 apotheosis of the bourgeoisie. He believed and the most 
 curious proof of this is to be found in the conversation he 
 held with Lord Ebrington in the Island of Elba that nations 
 would continue to wage war with one another through 
 ambition for rule and rivalry for glory. For this reason he 
 aimed so earnestly at creating a new nobility in France, 
 founded on the remains of the old, because " I felt," he says, 
 " that France was in need of an aristocracy." He felt this 
 great need so lacking was he in the historical sense on the 
 eve of an era when the aristocracy, as such, was to lose in all 
 Europe, but more particularly in France, all social importance. 
 This man who had a lynx's eye in war, was blind in social 
 life. 
 
 Napoleon's intellect, in short, was of the flashy order, not of 
 those which cast a steady and continuous light on everything. 
 His intellect was rather intuitive than reflective ; his mind 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 179 
 
 understood in a flash or misunderstood, penetrating the 
 truth all at once or understanding nothing at all. 
 
 Now this is the intellectual temperament which renders 
 difficult the maintenance of that just equilibrium between 
 ideas and external truth, in which reason consists. It is true 
 that the intellectual energy and will of Napoleon was such 
 that, despite this defect, he might have reached a deep com- 
 prehension of life, repressing by an energetic effort of will the 
 caprices of his imagination, disciplining his natural impulsive- 
 ness. He would then have become one of that class of great 
 thinkers and artists to whom Shakespeare and Hegel belong. 
 But for this he would have needed the peace of a quiet life, 
 the long and severe discipline of methodical work. War, on 
 the contrary, by distracting attention with a thousand 
 hurried cares, gradually increased the fundamental defect in 
 his character. War acted on Napoleon's intelligence in much 
 the same way as journalism acts on that of many writers : it 
 exercised many of his qualities up to a certain point his 
 rapidity of ideas, for instance, the precision in his perception 
 of details, his withstanding intense work, his capacity for 
 great efforts ; but it tired him out at the same time, it 
 diminished his capacity for self-concentration, and for labour 
 which demands deliberation. Intuition is the essence of 
 genius ; but in some it remains in its native rawness, while 
 others refine it by education and discipline. Such is the 
 genius of Darwin, Goethe, Stein, and Julius Caesar, to whom 
 we owe great and lasting creations, who, having received the 
 intuitive revelation of genius, did not give their ideas to the 
 world in their first crudity, but refined and tempered them. 
 But for this to be possible one must be capable of long brood- 
 ing over an idea without growing weary, nourishing it like a 
 foetus, with one's own blood a tremendous effort, to which 
 
l8o MILITARISM 
 
 many keenly intuitive intellects succumb. This faculty can 
 only be acquired by sustained effort in view of one single 
 object. Napoleon was a genius by nature, so intuitive as to 
 be absolutely impulsive ; how could war discipline this extra- 
 ordinary being? War, by diverting the mind to a thousand 
 different objects which demand rapid solutions, could only 
 increase this defect, and thus could only leave the most 
 powerful of geniuses in a crude state, rather than facilitate 
 the refinement due to slow reflection. Indeed Napoleon, in 
 the course of his agitated career, always occupied with 
 transitory details, lost this capacity for synthetic creation by 
 / continuous effort, which alone creates the enduring in politics 
 and art. He acquired the habit of rapid conception. Even in 
 his political relations we see the man of the camp, satisfied 
 with resolving every difficulty in a superficial way, content 
 with the hand-to-mouth policy, consequently he became every 
 day more unfit to realize the ultimate consequence of things, 
 and therefore to act coherently. From this arose the 
 \ entanglement of his politics in ever more inextricable knots, 
 in which at last he found himself entangled. 
 
 IV 
 
 This intellectual degeneration, exercised by war, was 
 intensified in Napoleon by the increase of his pride. Pride 
 isolates, removes from reality, concentrates the mind on con- 
 templation, not of the outside world, but of its own greatness. 
 What is experience to a proud man in comparison with his 
 own ideas or plans ? By degrees, as his pride grew almost to 
 a belief in his own infallibility, Napoleon lost all count of 
 reality ; he lost himself and this was his punishment in a 
 gigantic hallucination in a world of imaginary phantoms in 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS l8l 
 
 which great creative ideas merge with the phantasies of a 
 madman and the ingenuousness of a child. 
 
 The first and second facts were aggravated by another malig- 
 nant influence, exerted by a life of war : intellectual fatigue 
 and exhaustion. War is always accompanied by violent 
 emotions anxiety, impatience, triumphant excitement. Now 
 all things which cannot be accomplished with a serene mind, 
 but demand tension of thought and agitation, are those 
 which weary the most. Moreover, war is a species of work 
 which does not allow of methodical application ; during a 
 campaign, those moments in which a general can give him- 
 self up to diversion, are capriciously alternated with moments 
 of intense mental strain. Work is more fatiguing when it 
 does not demand methodical effort. Now, variety of mental 
 efforts augment fatigue. This renders war one of the most 
 exhausting of human occupations, to which even the strongest 
 succumb. Moltke did not exhaust himself, because, in the 
 ^hole course of his career, he only fought in three wars, each 
 of few months' duration, with long rests between the first 
 and second, which he passed in the quiet and methodical 
 occupations of a military bureaucracy, Napoleon insisted 
 on waging almost uninterrupted war for twenty years, opening 
 a fresh campaign as soon as a preceding one was completed ; 
 and he wore himself out in the effort. 
 
 The psychology of Napoleon in his later years is that of a 
 wearied and exhausted man. Not only did he become more 
 and more intuitive, but his intuition grew constantly more 
 analytical, whilst the ensemble of things grew more remote 
 and his mind became more subjective and less controlled 
 by the conscious observation of exterior life. In order to 
 understand external life, observation and criticism are neces- 
 sary ; a fatigue for which Napoleon grew more unfit as years 
 
1 82 MILITARISM 
 
 passed by, and he was prostrated by mental fatigue. His 
 attention was less capable of restraining his formidable ima- 
 gination ; extravagant and chimerical ideas hustled excellent 
 ones in his brain. Nor could he separate them ; his conduct 
 became incoherent, almost like that of an hysterical subject. 
 
 The Russian Campaign is the most terrible proof of the 
 state of mind reached by Napoleon owing to the concurrence 
 of these three causes induced by war : growth of pride, the 
 disintegration of the synthetic faculties, and brain exhaustion. 
 At last nothing remained to him but the capacity for details ; 
 every now and then he organized a manoeuvre, directed a 
 battle, ordered a march with his usual ability ; but the 
 ensemble of the conditions among which he lived escaped 
 him. He was blind to what his generals had seen from the 
 outset : that the Russians aimed at enticing the French army 
 into the interior in order to wear it out by slow stages. 
 Indeed his marshal's opposition to the advance was only a 
 fresh motive to Napoleon to proceed. At times he agreed 
 with his generals that this was the plan of the Russians ; and 
 yet he acted as though his real conviction lay in the contrary 
 direction, as though some force drew him towards the abyss. 
 At Wilna he already began to realize the danger he would 
 encounter through the expedition he had commenced ; but he 
 declined the proffered peace because, after so many pre- 
 paratives, his prestige would be diminished by a war that 
 finished in anything but a great victory. At Vitebsk he 
 resolved to stop and pass the winter ; then he thought that 
 Europe would consider that he hesitated, so he was re- 
 animated by the desire to end the whole affair with a master- 
 stroke. He asked the counsel of his generals, who advised 
 him not to advance. At this he grew angry, abused them, 
 and ordered an advance to Smolensk. During the battle of 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 183 
 
 Borodino his generals observed with terror " le calme sourde, 
 la dougeur molle sans activite" which he displayed. At 
 Smolensk, in a moment in which he foresaw his imminent 
 ruin, he offered the Czar that peace which he refused at 
 Wilna, but the Czar made no answer. Irritated by this 
 insult, he desired boldly to advance, and ordered the march 
 to Moscow. The Russian general, Kutusoff, admits that 
 Russia would have found herself in a difficulty had Napoleon 
 followed his contemplated plan, to winter at Smolensk and 
 await the spring to recommence hostilities ; but Bonaparte was 
 still the general of Italy, used to rapid campaigns with a 
 succession of repeated assaults and great battles ; and he 
 Bought in the vast plains of Northern Europe the booty he 
 had collected wholesale in the valley of the Po. A vain 
 illusion, which urged him on to Moscow in the pursuit of 
 an ever-vanishing enemy! At Moscow, when his generals 
 informed him that the army was diminishing every day, he set 
 himself obstinately to prove that it was not true ; that fact 
 pointed to the contrary. After the Moscow conflagration, in 
 the midst of the first symptoms of his army's dissolution, 
 when ruin was suspended above his head, Napoleon lost his 
 time in inertia and puerile etiquette ; he passed his evenings 
 finishing the regulations for the Comtdie Fran^aise ; he dis- 
 cussed literature with his intimates ; he ordered the great cross 
 to be removed from the tower of Ivan Velihi in the Kremlin 
 and transported to Paris. This man, so sober formerly, 
 wasted his time at table, as though seeking to stupefy himself 
 with drink ; though previously so active, he now passed long 
 hours in bed brooding over some book, as though he had 
 entirely abandoned himself to Fate. Moscow was burned ; 
 his army began to suffer from hunger ; Alexander made no 
 reply to Napoleon's letters. One morning, the 22nd of 
 
1 84 MILITARISM 
 
 October, Napoleon arose, irritated after a sleepless night, and 
 summoned a council of generals. He expounded to them an 
 elaborate war-plan he had matured during the night, viz. to 
 march through Twer to St. Petersburg in mid-winter. And 
 the master of the world had not thought of the single difficulty 
 which immediately occurs to Davout, i.e. that in a day three 
 hundred peasants could render impracticable the road from 
 Twer to St. Petersburg, which ran for a hundred leagues 
 through marshes capable of swallowing up the whole army ! 
 The first snows fell and the retreat became an urgent 
 necessity ; the generals awaited this order. Napoleon did 
 not give it, he could not make up his mind to let the word 
 " retreat" pass his lips in the presence of his generals. He 
 adopted a circumlocution which salved his pride, saying that 
 in twenty days the army should be in winter quarters. 
 When at last he resolved to issue the order, it was found that 
 the horses did not suffice for the transport of the artillery. 
 And yet he persisted in his desire to carry everything with 
 him, even at the cost of postponing the retreat, for fear the 
 Russians should retain anything as a trophy. When the 
 army neared the Beresina, a colonel of the advance-guard 
 arrived with the terrible news that the Russian troops of 
 Moldavia had reached the Beresina and occupied the whole 
 of the passages. Then an extraordinary scene was witnessed. 
 Napoleon, enraged, ground his teeth and waved his stick 
 threatening to strike the messenger, roaring, " It is not true 
 it is not true ! you lie ! " Blinded by fury, he raised his fist 
 to heaven and broke out into terrible oaths. And in this 
 moment, when all appeared lost, in which it did not seem 
 possible that either he or the relics of this army should escape 
 imprisonment, the conqueror wept in the presence of his 
 generals. His conduct, in short, was so strange that all 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 185 
 
 around him vaguely felt that almost superstitious horror and 
 anguish which a man, struck by the dark and immutable 
 sentence of Destiny, inspires. " It is incomprehensible," 
 writes Labaume, " how Napoleon could have been so blind 
 and obstinate as not to abandon Russia when he perceived 
 that the capital, on which he had counted so much, no 
 longer existed, and that winter was approaching. ... It seems 
 as though God had stupefied him as a punishment for his 
 pride." Carnot declares that he no longer recognized, 
 physically or morally, in the aged emperor the general of the 
 Italian Campaign. " He used to be thin, suspicious, and 
 gloomy, now he is fat and jolly, but always sleepy and dis- 
 inclined. He the man of rapid decisions, who took offence 
 at every counsel proffered is now constantly talking instead 
 of acting, and asking every one his opinion." " The Napoleon 
 we used to know no longer exists," added General Van- 
 damme at Waterloo. And General Wolseley concludes a 
 recent study on the downfall of Napoleon with these words : 
 "No, during the campaign of 1813, Napoleon was no longer 
 the man of 1796 and 1805. The extraordinary vicissitudes 
 of his life appear to have persuaded him, not only that he 
 differed from the rest of mankind, but also that victory was 
 his guardian angel, that he was the conjurer of Fortune." 
 To such a state was his intelligence reduced by pride and the 
 exhaustion of war. 
 
 V 
 
 Napoleon has always been celebrated as possessing a deep 
 knowledge of men, as being an able practical psychologist. 
 Even this quality has, I believe, been much exaggerated by 
 his admirers. In order to understand mankind, it is necessary 
 
1 86 MILITARISM 
 
 not to despise it and to consider one's self as vastly superior. 
 Napoleon was too egoistic, too deeply persuaded that he was 
 made of better clay. He possessed a special psychological 
 ability in things concerned with war ; he knew how to inspire 
 respect and fear in his generals, how to encourage his soldiers 
 and give them confidence, how to dishearten enemies ; he 
 was, in short, a past-master in that simple game of elementary 
 passions which constitutes the practical psychology of war. 
 He had a rare power for understanding the special, I might 
 almost say technical, capacities of men ; the portraits of his 
 generals, for instance, which he has given us, are little 
 masterpieces of psychology. 
 
 But a comprehension of the human soul in its entirety, full 
 of those complicated and contradictory passions which build 
 up real character, he did not possess. Napoleon was a one- 
 sided psychologist, who only grasped a few elementary 
 qualities of the human mind. Used, as he was, to imposing 
 himself by force and fraud, to seeing himself always sur- 
 rounded by men governed by fear, greed, or vanity, led by 
 his pride to consider this as the natural condition of mankind, 
 because it best served his passion for power and flattered his 
 sense of superiority, this man naturally formed a pessimistic 
 and contemptuous conception of humanity. He regarded man 
 not only as a being replete with base and brutal passions (and 
 in this he was right), but and here he was mistaken as 
 possessing nothing but low and brutal qualities, stupid into 
 the bargain, and easily deceived by gross impostures. 
 Examine, for instance, all his proclamations to his soldiers, 
 the observations he has left on social and psychological 
 phenomena. It is obvious that the whole scale of human 
 psychology is composed of three notes only for Napoleon : 
 fear, greed, and vanity. Hence arose his brutal manner of 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 187 
 
 treating his fellow-men, which was partially good, but which 
 applied by him as absolutely good, was among the causes 
 which led to his ruin. 
 
 In none of those formidable wars on which he embarked 
 did Napoleon make any account of the nobler passions. 
 Force was to conquer all ; where force did not suffice he 
 employed deceit and corruption ; above all, deceit, rude, 
 simple, and into which these fools of men so thought this 
 man intoxicated with pride must always fall. His system 
 often met with success : that of force succeeded in Italy, 
 where the higher classes, easy going and addicted to a quiet 
 life, accepted his dominion, almost without resistance, after 
 their armies were destroyed; that of fraud in Poland, where 
 he deluded the flower of the Polish youth into following him 
 by the forged proclamations of Kosciuzko. But he did not 
 understand the psychology of the Spanish peasant and the 
 Russian mujic ; he never imagined that the soul of a people, 
 offended in its rude pride and religion, could be roused to a 
 fearful outburst of courage, energy, and desperate hatred to a 
 sentiment of anything but interest, in short ; he believed that, 
 the armies beaten, everything was at an end, and that the vile 
 multitude would submit to his conquering yoke without ado. 
 But the armies beaten, he found himself, on the contrary, 
 enveloped in the flames of a terrible conflagration that burst 
 from underground, from the depth of the peoples' souls, 
 where a more violent passion had extinguished that brutal 
 cowardice which, according to the fortunate warrior, was the 
 elementary sentiment of mankind. 
 
 Nothing could better depict this ingenuousness of Napo- 
 leon's, his incapacity to understand the strong energy of the 
 human soul, than that which he contemplated and did in 
 the Russian campaign. In order to ingratiate himself 
 
1 88 MILITARISM 
 
 cheaply with the Russian people, he falsified a hundred 
 million rouble notes. These he counted on spending liberally, 
 bribing and buying souls and goods, thus gaining men over 
 to his side through the vile passion for money. But this 
 idea, which in any other country would have been regarded 
 as a shameful perfidy, resulted in ridicule in Russia. Between 
 those who concealed themselves, those who burnt down their 
 houses, and those who fled before him leaving nothing but 
 ruin behind, those who persecuted with petty skirmishes his 
 retiring army, he found no hands outstretched to receive 
 his money. Thus Napoleon himself confessed it to Lord 
 Ebrington nothing surprised him more than the Moscow 
 conflagration, that unexpected and tragical denoilment of the 
 1812 campaign. This burning was partly due to the chance 
 disorder of a city abandoned by its inhabitants and occupied 
 by an undisciplined soldiery, but in no small part also to the 
 patriotic and religious mania of a few fanatics, who set fire to 
 their dwellings rather than see them inhabited by the enemy. 
 An abyss of fire suddenly opened at the conqueror's feet ; 
 and his surprise at the event which compelled the French 
 army to retire, and condemned it to destruction, was so great 
 , that he expressed himself literally in these words to Lord 
 Ebrington : " It was an event which I could not have foreseen, 
 for it was without precedent in the world's history." 
 
 Napoleon in his later years was worn-out and ill. Was it 
 a caprice of chance which insinuated the germs of dissolution 
 in the structure of this colossus ? No ; he carried in himself 
 the law of his own ruin, which no human force could avert. 
 War, to which he owed his rise and the glory of his first 
 successes, slowly undermined his intellect by exhausting 
 work, and by developing that pride which exiled him from 
 the world to the solitudes of an arrogant might. This ruin 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 189 
 
 was not the work of chance, or individual malady, but the 
 natural development of a germ of decay innate in the man's L 
 character. 
 
 He was not a man who created by his genius a unique 
 condition of things in history ; he was a man who, through 
 pride and selfishness, abused a most extraordinary good for- 
 tune, and made of it a tool for his own destruction. Napoleon 
 does^ not represent that victorious force of will and human 
 genius which subject and dominate reality within the limits 
 of reason, but the moral weakness of genius which knows not 
 how to resist the folly of pride, and squanders all its energy 
 to satisfy this weakness. He is a monstrosity rather than 
 an example of human greatness, his power consisted prin- 
 cipally in extravagances and violence. 
 
 VI 
 
 But if such was the man, must we conclude that all his 
 political and warlike deeds were mere ambitious caprices, 
 the result of unmeasured and criminal vanity ? 
 
 That personal egoism and pride were among his political 
 motives is certain, as it is certain that the devotion of his 
 generals was in a large measure proportionate to the high 
 salaries he paid them. In the Emperor's view, many of his 
 wars were merely the caprices of an Assyrian king ambitious 
 to refresh the terror with which his name inspired the world, 
 as in his generals' views they were mere plunderings by which 
 they stuffed their pockets at the expense of their victims. 
 
 But in history the results of a man's deeds frequently far 
 surpass what he had contemplated, as a ball, thrown by a 
 strong arm, frequently goes beyond the destined limit Thus 
 the Napoleonic wars, without the cognizance of their author, 
 
MILITARISM 
 
 contributed to a social work of great importance to some of 
 the conquered countries : those which were Catholic ; that is 
 to say ; a work which is the explanation, and in part the 
 justification, of those fearful slaughters. 
 
 Napoleon was a Jacobin ; the most coherent and energetic, 
 and therefore, at the same time, the most useful and dangerous 
 of Jacobins. The Napoleonic wars, so far as they were not 
 merely the bloody manias of a conqueror, but useful historical 
 events, were the decisive victories of Jacobinism ; and, as 
 such, they were necessary and beneficial episodes in the 
 struggle which waged for three centuries between the new 
 spirit of liberty, elaborated by European civilization, and the 
 Oriental spirit of universal spiritual dominion by which the 
 Catholic Church exists. The Catholic Church was not merely 
 a religion, that is, a theological doctrine and system of rites 
 dealing with the worship of divinity, it was, and still is, a 
 state which aims at directing, in accordance with certain ideas, 
 the whole of society : the family, education, law, the State, 
 charity, art and science. The fact that it has never possessed 
 political power, except within a very narrow limit, does not 
 detract, nay, rather adds to the power and originality of this 
 singular theocracy that aims at being a universal spiritual 
 empire higher than all national states. A grandiose ambition 
 perhaps the greatest that history has ever witnessed, and one 
 corresponded to the perfection of the organization and energy, 
 stronger than time. 
 
 This ambition for dominion over the minds of men is 
 /indeed Oriental and mystical, this desire which the Church 
 has always displayed to subordinate to itself all the intellec- 
 tual forces of education, science and art; Oriental and mystical 
 also is the negative conception of life which is considered 
 as a painful expiation rather than as a thing to be enjoyed. 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 19 1 
 
 Mystical and Oriental, further, is its fundamental moral 
 theory, that perfection consists in the capacity to annihilate 
 will and personality. The result has been that for centuries, 
 as the human mind and European civilization evolved by 
 degrees, men felt an ever-increasing need for liberty, and dis- 
 covered that many direct or indirect Church regulations could 
 be greatly improved upon, that many Church institutions, 
 such as monasticism and celibacy, were injurious to society 
 as a whole. Then commenced the struggle against the 
 Church, resolved to defend its institutions and ideas, a 
 struggle to which many nations gave a religious solution by 
 reforms, substituting other churches for the Catholic, sects 
 whose institutions were weaker, whose moral and religious 
 theories were more plastic. Thus in Protestant countries 
 the various and diverse churches, all of whom are weak, were 
 never able to acquire much social and political importance, 
 and remained subordinate to the State, which was thus freed 
 from the rivalry of that other state the Catholic Church. 
 
 But in those countries where the Church managed to quell 
 the movement for disestablishment, it took courage to reform 
 itself, as in the Council of Trent, and with the Jesuit move- 1 
 ment. But these reforms only affected its internal discipline, 
 and not its ambition for spiritual dominion and its rigid con- 
 servative spirit, which indeed, lent it fresh strength. The 
 Jesuits took a large part in this movement. But, during the 
 eighteenth century, Catholic societies began to find irksome 
 this mental coercion which partly assisted and partly opposed 
 the lay authorities. The more enlightened men of the times 
 considered the influence of the clergy and monks as pernicious. 
 Thought and science advanced in Protestant countries and 
 felt the need of intellectual liberty in Catholic lands, a need 
 which the Church refused to recognize. With the spread of 
 
MILITARISM 
 
 knowledge, a part of the community began to regard the 
 gross superstitions born of ignorance with a species of disgust ; 
 but the clergy, more especially its more ignorant members, 
 spread them far and wide among the people. The tenacity 
 with which the priests and monks sought to work their way 
 into families and sow discord, led to grave discontent. All 
 political, fiscal, and judicial reforms, which the superior men 
 of the times attempted to introduce, went counter to the views 
 of the Church. Finally the need was felt for more wealth 
 and the better use of it, and all the remonstrances addressed 
 to the Church terminated with accusing it of accumulating 
 and abusing riches, with employing both the immense pro- 
 perties belonging to it, and wasting what little money they 
 possessed, in maintaining prelates in luxury, monks in idle- 
 ness, and beautifying churches with gold and precious stones. 
 Jacobinism was essentially a political solution of the 
 problem of the relations between modern civilization and 
 / the Catholic Church. The Church, during the last century, 
 obstinately opposed all social and political reforms which a 
 minority of intelligent men demanded as necessary. How 
 to quell this opposition was the question. These minorities 
 could not give the problem a religious solution such as 
 Protestantism, nor oppose smaller, less ambitious, conserva- 
 tive and powerful sects. They held no beliefs, or at best a 
 very vague one in theism ; thus they could not put them- 
 selves at the head of new creeds and attempt to reform the 
 religious ideas of the masses. These, moreover, were satisfied 
 neither with the incredulity nor the vague belief which could 
 only find favour with cultured people. The masses, for want 
 of a better faith, remained Catholic, and a political rather 
 than a religious solution had to be found for the problem. 
 The Church was allowed to continue the profession of its 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 193 
 
 Oriental ideas, and its authoritarian conception of society ; 
 but in order to diminish its influence, the Jacobins organized 
 against it a strong State, that made itself master of the country, 
 and proposed to regulate in accordance with its own views 
 the life of the whole community in frank opposition to the 
 views of the Church. Such was the Jacobin State founded 
 on a democratic executive. It conceded to the country all 
 those liberties which could counteract the power of the Church 
 and first of all the intellectual liberty to discuss dogmas, to 
 profess atheism and agnosticism. It despoiled the Church 
 of its landed property, and enriched itself by taxes, and, 
 through money, it tried to gain that ascendency over the 
 middle class which the Church had attained by money, 
 substituting the bureaucracy for the monastery, offering, by 
 State employments to the sons of middle-class families, the 
 means to raise themselves above the masses, which were 
 formerly offered by the ecclesiastical grades and convents. 
 In everything else the new Jacobin State entered into com- 
 petition, so to speak, with the Church. It organized secular 
 in opposition to religious education, State philanthropy in 
 opposition to Church charity ; it sought to encourage profane 
 art and science ; it established civil marriage and, in some 
 countries, even civil baptism. The Jacobin State, in short, 
 wished to replace all the social functions of the Church in a 
 new secular spirit ; a condition of things special to Catholic 
 countries, and not to be met with in Protestant, where the 
 State does not consider as enemies the various sects under 
 its power. 
 
 Napoleon gave the finishing touch to this grand and, in a 
 certain measure, extravagant social renovation of doubling 
 the functions of the State, a work which the Revolution had 
 commenced, thanks to the Jacobins and the Convention. 
 
194 MILITARISM 
 
 By organizing the administration which still rules France, 
 Napoleon only completed the work of the Convention ; with 
 the difference that the former destined the executive to be 
 the tool of a democratic oligarchy, opposed to both Church 
 and Monarchy, and Napoleon intended it as an instrument 
 of his own military despotism. But in this case, also, ultimate 
 results went far beyond human intentions. The Jacobins 
 and Napoleon disappeared ; the administration remained, the 
 apparatus of a new conception of government matured by the 
 French people in opposition to the Church, "an instrument 
 destined to save France from theocratic despotism. This 
 revolution, brought about in France by Napoleon, was com- 
 menced by his invasion of other Catholic countries : Italy, 
 Spain, Austria, Belgium, the Ticino Canton. In these 
 countries, more particularly in Italy, feudalism and spiritual 
 tyranny were decomposing in the eighteenth century ; the 
 decadence ,of the aristocracy and monarchy rilled society 
 with misery, corruption, and disorder, whilst only a small 
 minority of cultured men realized the necessity for great 
 political and ecclesiastical reforms. But the Church, strong 
 in the blind support of the masses, opposed these energeti- 
 cally. Hence these minorities felt too weak to break the 
 alliance that bound this ancient constitution with feudalism. 
 Then, just when they found themselves discouraged and 
 disgusted at their own impotence, Napoleon and the French 
 invasions came to their aid, and in a few months were 
 wrought the necessary reforms which they had been unable 
 to obtain in opposition to the allegiance between the masses, 
 the Church, and tne bigoted feudal aristocracy. The Gordian 
 knot which they had so long struggled to untie was suddenly 
 cut by the sword of a warrior, by his victories in Catholic 
 countries, Napoleon assured the triumph of Jacobinism 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 195 
 
 over the Church. What matters it, for instance, if, after 
 1815, Italy appeared to fall again into the power of the 
 Church? The Jacobin spirit introduced by the conquests >/ 
 had fermented, and finally broke out in the revolution of 
 1859-60, creating out of the ruins of the ancient state that 
 had docilely served the Pope the new Italian secular and 
 Jacobin Government, destined, like the French, to rule in the 
 name of an ideal opposed to the Church. 
 
 Such was the true useful result of the Napoleonic conquests 
 which it would be as unjust to deny as it would be unreason- 
 able to attribute all the merit to Napoleon and his genius. 
 He was merely the violent and impetuous executor of the 
 Jacobin programme, using it as a pretext for his extravagant 
 ambition. Moreover, it is not to be denied that the number 
 and proportion of his wars was too great in comparison with 
 the partial utility of their results. What a gigantic waste of 
 life and property he caused throughout the whole of Europe, 
 with the effect of aiding the social evolution of a part ! 
 Napoleon helped in the work of human progress, but not by 
 opening up large and easy routes through a new and desert 
 region ; he rather constructed a frail bridge across a deep 
 and terrible abyss full of perils. He wasted all the timber 
 of an immense forest in order to construct this little bridge, 
 and he did not mind sacrificing a large number of workers 
 during its construction. His proud and tremendous halluci- 
 nations contained a small element of truth and reason, and 
 through his misty dreams he caught a vague glimpse of the 
 future. 
 
1 96 MILITARISM 
 
 VII 
 
 These things being true, how are we to account for the lively 
 admiration for the man that has so revived of late years ? 
 
 May I be allowed to say it frankly : the Napoleon-worship 
 is to the higher classes what brigand-worship is to the lower. 
 The upper classes always believe themselves to be superior 
 to the masses, not because they have fewer vices, but because 
 they are able to satisfy them in a more refined manner. Thus 
 the cultured classes in Europe read with avidity the history 
 of Napoleon for the same reasons that the working classes 
 devour brigand tales. One of the greatest intellectual 
 pleasures, felt by men of all conditions, lies in the perusal 
 of books of adventure, describing life free from all the laws 
 which render ours so secure and monotonous. A simple and 
 uneducated man finds this pleasure in reading about the bold 
 bad brigand. A better educated man needs more delicate 
 food for his imagination ; and this order of literature can 
 offer him nothing more exciting, nearer to our times, or 
 more dramatic, than the Napoleonic story. What is it in 
 Napoleon's history that proves so seductive to youths who 
 vegetate in the monotony of contemporary life ? The inex- 
 haustible surprises, the miraculous changes of fortune, and 
 the romantic existence led by the chiefs of the Napoleonic 
 horde those corporals who became generals in a few years, 
 those sons of innkeepers who became dukes, kings, and 
 millionaires ; that romantic life of reviews, marches across 
 Europe, battles, triumphant entrances into conquered cities 
 amidst the excitement of applauding men and women who 
 pelted them with flowers ; this panorama of perils and ex- 
 citements, of gallant adventures and unforeseen fortunes, 
 
NAPOLEON AND HIS WARS 197 
 
 which formed the existence of the chiefs of the Napoleonic 
 adventures, and which we imagine were common to the time, 
 without reflecting that if a few enjoyed a great feast, many 
 were forced to pay the expenses. 
 
 The history of Napoleon affords yet another pleasure to 
 educated people, just as that of a brigand does to an un- 
 educated man. It is the pleasure which springs from admira- 
 tion, the ideal pleasure felt in witnessing the affirmation of a 
 striking individuality. One of the greatest of human pleasures 
 lies in dominion, the imposition of our will over others. In 
 order to enjoy this in real life, a strong will and the material 
 possibility to rule are necessary, just as to enjoy a life of 
 adventure great force of character is required to bdar up 
 against times of adversity. The power of the great is much 
 reduced nowadays, for the conflict of interests tends to ] < 
 establish an equilibrium of power, and few possess sufficient 
 energy to be able to support a life of adventure. Men, there- 
 fore, seek an ideal satisfaction in the perusal of the histories 
 of brigands and heroes. For the ignorant and the educated, 
 the pleasure is identical ; the sense of admiration roused by 
 the contemplation of their hero is like a reflection of the 
 pleasure they would derive from ruling themselves, or from 
 pursuing a prosperous life of adventure and pleasure. 
 
 But he who fully considers the case will not allow himself 
 to be seduced by the illusion cast by time. Napoleon was 
 a mighty warrior, who lived at a singular period of the great 
 struggle between the Catholic spirit of dominion and the spirit 
 of liberty, between the Asiatic spirit represented by the 
 Church, and the European as represented by the Revolution. 
 Fate made use of this second Attila, of this proud and violent 
 man, as a temporary tool in the great social struggle which 
 for three centuries had tormented Europe. War was able 
 
198 MILITARISM 
 
 to be useful at that moment, and Attila appeared, sum- 
 moned by the need of the age. But this Attila, although 
 engaged on a partially beneficial task, always remained at 
 bottom a warrior a destroyer. He fulfilled his task, but 
 with terrible loss and waste, ruining many great and beautiful 
 living things for a comparatively small result, finally ruining 
 himself and his genius. 
 
MILITARISM AND CESARISM 
 IN FRANCE 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 MILITARISM AND OESARISM IN FRANCE 
 
 I 
 
 To the query, " What is France ? " comes the answer, " A 
 Republic." But " republic " is a word signifying many and 
 diverse things. We must, therefore, overlook superficialities 
 and seek under the surface if we desire to understand the 
 military policy of the European state which has waged the 
 greatest wars of the century, and has played, and still 
 plays, such an important part in the political events of 
 the world. 
 
 France is a parliamentary and democratic republic, founded 
 on universal suffrage. But the republican constitution to- 
 day is what the monarchy and empire were in the past, a 
 mere bark whose nature has changed, but which still covers 
 its original trunk and pith ; that is Caesarism. France is still 
 the country of surprises and enigmas : a little-known and 
 misjudged land, admired or contemned at hazard, because 
 the real nature of its Government is generally ignored. The 
 study of French militarism serves to acquaint us with the 
 life and structure of this social system. 
 
 Essentially military ideas are still most popular in France,^ 
 more especially with the cultured classes. Although, owing 
 to an increase in the sentiment of justice, war between civilized ^ 
 nations is coming to be considered by many as only tolerable 
 
202 MILITARISM 
 
 when urged in defence of some principle, the general senti- 
 ment amongst educated Frenchmen is favourable to war, and 
 little tempered by moral considerations. They deem it a 
 great thing, per se, for a nation to conquer ; political and 
 
 military supremacy are regarded as the first factors in the 
 V 
 
 superiority of a civilization. Hence, a conquered nation that 
 
 has not yet taken its revenge must necessarily consider its 
 civilization in decadence. The policy which aims at the 
 annexation of fresh territories, in Europe, Asia, or Africa, 
 is considered excellent in itself, as by increasing the area 
 of an empire, its glory and power is also increased, where- 
 fore the cost in men and money is held of small account. 
 
 That such is the opinion of educated France well appears 
 from what follows ; for the time being I wish merely to 
 remark that this is not due to chance or to any special dis- 
 position on the part of the French, who are not born possessed 
 of devils or a passion for righting. The collective ideas and 
 sentiments occupying the minds of a people during an entire 
 historical epoch are never without some meaning, they are 
 not created out of nothing; their existence is always con- 
 nected with some special social structure, as a musical sound 
 is connected with some instrument. A blind man, on hearing 
 a piano played, might imagine that the sounds vibrated 
 in the air independently of any metallic cords or sounding- 
 boards ; but when some idea or passion possesses the minds 
 of a nation during a whole period, we are blind in spirit if 
 we imagine that it exists of itself without being connected 
 with some social structure, as music is connected with an 
 instrument. The social structure at the base of French 
 ^militarism is the Jacobin lay State created by the Revolution 
 in opposition to the Church. 
 
MILITARISM AND C/ESARISM IN FRANCE 203 
 
 II 
 
 I must repeat here what I said in speaking of Napoleon : 
 the Jacobin State represents a political solution to the problem ^ 
 of the relation between Catholicism and modern society, and 
 was created by a cultured and unbelieving minority to be the t 
 bulwark of a society founded on liberty ; but an indissoluble 
 contradiction presided like an unlucky star at its birth. We 
 might almost name it the original sin of the modern Latin 
 nations, and more especially of France and Italy, to which 
 their greatest misfortunes are attributable. The opposition^ 
 to feudalism, and the spiritual theocracy of the Church,/ 
 originated in the general weariness of tyranny grown morally 
 and materially insupportable. In France, during the last 
 century, public opinion came to consider it as unjust that 
 certain men should pretend to possess power without con- 
 trol and truth without discussion. The theory of popular 
 sovereignty was founded in opposition to absolute Monarchy. 
 It was affirmed that authority, as a human institution, should be 
 wielded by the numerical majority of that society which con- 
 trolled it, and that it should be discussed, criticized, changed 
 without difficulty, and subjected to such control and restric- 
 tions as would prevent it from degenerating into a tyranny. 
 In opposition to the Church was affirmed the divinity of 
 human thought, capable of great deeds when freed from the 
 trammels of superstition. It was said that men and nations 
 were capable of governing themselves, recognizing no other 
 authority than that of reason, and ignoring those who named 
 themselves the ministers of God, and who were in fact His 
 enemies, and desired to keep the world in ignorance for their 
 own interest, But the advocates of liberty were a small class 
 
204 MILITARISM 
 
 composed of the enlightened men of the time, of the dis- 
 contented and declasses, of the middle class, of the turbulent 
 portion of the working population of large towns, who rose 
 to power, not through the force of their ideas, but because 
 the ancient regime was so far advanced in decay, and the 
 Government so little capable of governing, that a small and 
 bold minority was able to make itself master of everything. 
 The greater number remained voluntarily under the control 
 of the Church, and, therefore, showed themselves hostile to 
 the new ideas of liberty, sometimes in a fanatical spirit, some- 
 times merely passively. The result was that the liberal 
 minority in France during the Revolution and the Empire 
 I/were forced, in order to maintain their authority, as hap- 
 pened also later on in Italy, to impose a liberal regime tyran- 
 nically by means of force, and to enter into competition with 
 the Church, imitating it in many of its authoritarian ways. 
 
 We have observed, in our study of Spanish and American 
 society, that true liberty can only exist where the educated 
 classes lead a useful existence. Despotic societies, on the con- 
 trary, are found to be based on the spirit of protection. Now, 
 the Catholic Church, after the Roman Empire, was the greatest 
 State ever founded on protection. It was, indeed, essentially 
 a gigantic system of protection, organized in barbarous times 
 to assure men, through the fear of God, against those perils due 
 to the poverty and ignorance of the age. The great wealth 
 it has always aimed at accumulating, the culture it has sought 
 to attain, were the tools with which it hoped, and perhaps 
 still hopes, to rule the minds of men. Its gigantic hierarchy, 
 whose highest posts are attainable by men in all conditions, 
 was always a means whereby the intelligent members of 
 the poorer classes could become rich and powerful, even in 
 an age when ; owing to the prevalence of poverty, ignorance, 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 20$ 
 
 and disparity of fortune, it was more difficult to rise. The 
 Church exercised in the past an able patronage over all those 
 studies not dangerous to Faith. It received into its ranks, 
 by providing them with a modest but sure livelihood, many 
 of those " intellectuals " who, as long as they were able to 
 attend to their studies without worrying, material cares, 
 willingly renounced the vanity of wealth and power. By 
 the monastic system, moreover, Catholicism organized a 
 splendid scheme of charity which benefited all social classes. 
 To unmarried women and widows it offered a shelter in con- 
 vents ; to the poor fathers of over-numerous families it gave 
 relief by accepting a son among the monks ; to all those who 
 found themselves de trop in social life it offered a refuge. 
 By obliging the rich, in an age when the sentiment of social 
 solidarity was feeble, to give money to the poor through 
 threats of hell, it found a means of assisting the indigent. 
 They made one of their principal arms of this system of 
 charity at the cost, it is true, of encouraging idleness. Every 
 church and convent was a fountain of charity, both to the 
 genuine poor and to professional vagabonds. In short, the 
 Church was a reserve of spiritual and material assistances^ 
 for all human weaknesses and improvidence ; it assured the 
 nobility the hereditary transmission of the father's wealth to 
 his first-born by making monks and priests of the younger 
 sons ; it assisted the intelligent and ambitious members of 
 the lower and middle classes to overcome the drawbacks 
 of humble birth ; it persuaded the rich to sacrifice part of 
 their wealth, which it distributed amongst the poor, thereby 
 alleviating their sufferings and conducing them to remain 
 obedient and docile. 
 
 The Church was indeed what it professed to be, the Santa , 
 , the universal protectrix in the rude and barbarous 
 
206 MILITARISM 
 
 ages which gave birth to our civilization. Owing to the 
 difficulty in augmenting wealth due to the scarcity of capital, 
 education, and civilization, many would have dragged out 
 a fearfully degraded existence without her benevolent 
 influence. This vast protective system had, until the 
 Revolution in France, and in Italy until 1848 (though in 
 a somewhat modified degree), formed practically the back- 
 bone of society, consequently it necessarily exerted an 
 immense influence over ideas, institutions, and customs. It 
 encouraged amongst the masses a tendency towards idleness 
 and ignorance, an impetuosity of affection and simplicity of 
 mind that pertain to savages, a servile reverence and humility 
 towards those whom they considered as benefactors. In the 
 middle classes it developed political passivity, indifference to 
 public affairs, social egoism, devotion to the powers that be, 
 and the need to be protected. In the highest class it 
 encouraged idleness, bigotry, vanity, and the ambition to 
 distinguish itself, not by benefiting society, but by piety, by 
 ostentatious charity and almsgiving. 
 
 Now, these habits and traditions, which in the course of 
 centuries had penetrated into the very marrow of society, 
 could not disappear in a day. No wonder they found a 
 terrible impediment to the establishment of a genuinely free 
 regime. The Jacobin State, whose object was to give liberty 
 to France, grew rapidly entangled in a grave contradiction, 
 for it was compelled to establish a new protective system 
 analogous to that of the Church, in order to raise itself from 
 the condition of a feeble governmental minority engulphed 
 in the midst of a vast hostile community. French society, 
 accustomed for centuries to universal Church protection, 
 would have found itself, when the Church was stripped of 
 wealth and power, as though deprived of some necessity of 
 
MILITARISM AND C.ESARISM IN FRANCE 2OJ 
 
 existence, in a terrible position, whose dangers can be appre- 
 hended if we study that agitated period of French history 
 from the proclamation of the Republic to the establishment 
 of the Napoleonic rule. Napoleon's reign saved France and 
 the work of the Revolution, by definitely organizing, on the 
 lines traced out by the Convention, the new universal secular 
 protection of the Jacobin State in place of that formerly 
 exercised by the Church. 
 
 Thus the French Government took the middle class under 
 its protection, and offered to it, by means of the bureaucracy, 
 the same advantages which Catholicism had offered by 
 churches and monasteries. Such was the origin, and is still 
 the function, of those 400,000 governmental and 127,000 
 county and communal officials, who receive together in 
 salaries 637 million francs (or about 25^ millions sterling) 
 a year, to which, if we add the .8,000,000 which goes in 
 pensions to the veterans of the bureaucratic army, amounts 
 to a sum of nearly ,34,000,000. This civil and military ; 
 bureaucracy, whose origin can be traced back to the reign 
 of Louis XIV., strengthened and amplified by the Conven- 
 tion, by Napoleon, and successive Governments, is renewed 
 from among the bourgeoisie, but is occasionally reinforced 
 by some recruit from the aristocracy or the people. It is 
 ruled by a competitive system of promotion, in which intrigue 
 plays as important a part as merit ; but which in recom- 
 pense is democratic, for no privilege of birth is recognized 
 there. Notwithstanding the fact that the larger part of this 
 bureaucracy is not handsomely paid, middle-class families 
 always aim at seeking for one of their number a post as sub- 
 prefect, army officer, or Government employe. But although 
 this august body is democratically constituted, it is not open 
 to all, since it can only be entered after a novitiate, and in 
 
208 MILITARISM 
 
 accordance with certain rules ; the novitiate of all public 
 schools, gymnasiums, universities, polytechnic and military 
 institutes, whose diplomas accord a right to compete for 
 the highest posts, thus practically reserving these for the 
 well-to-do classes. 
 
 Thus the election of the executive in France, at the outset 
 of the new regime, was an act distinctly favourable to the 
 bourgeoisie, in which manner the State demonstrated itself 
 to be the successor of the Church. But logic is an inexorable 
 law of life. The Jacobin Government was no foe to modern 
 civilization ; indeed, its programme favoured progress in op- 
 position to the conservatism of the clergy and of feudalism. 
 But with the growth of civilization the State multiplied its 
 favours, and made of all modern discoveries, from railways to 
 science and hygiene, a pretext for its protective generosity. 
 Thus the French Government developed into a gigantic 
 system of private interests that collected, by means of a 
 thousand channels, prodigious riches which it redistributed 
 to a thousand emissaries. Thus it can annually assign a sum 
 of about a milliard francs for the benefit of its officials, while 
 nearly another milliard francs is put by every year to pay 
 those who make Government loans. Fabulous sums are spent 
 every year on subventions and bounties in aid of mistaken 
 industries and doubtful speculations, in supporting educa- 
 tional and philanthropic schemes. Immense credit is given 
 to contractors for public works, useful or otherwise ; huge 
 fortunes are spent on the army and navy, and for the exer- 
 cise of large Government monopolies, such as tobacco and 
 matches. Conspicuous sums are spent on the maintenance 
 of expensive colonies, and on paying out a large number of 
 small salaries to satisfy the needs of public mendicity, whose 
 forms are infinite : such as subsidies to race-courses^ theatres, 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 
 
 exhibitions, scientific and literary publications. In other 
 words, the State has to be lavish with all manner of assistance, 
 to spend freely on public works for the army and navy, not 
 because it benefits them, but so as to provide work for a 
 number of workers, and tofaire marcher les affaires. It has, 
 above all, to make debts so as to offer a safe though modest 
 investment to the savings of middle-class families. It has to 
 maintain intellectual men and warriors. It has to be the 
 patron of genius hidden in the depths of misery, giving 
 artistic and scientific education at an absurdly low cost. 
 
 Moreover, this administration indirectly serves private 
 interests. By means of its custom-houses, it stops at the 
 frontier such foreign goods as would render competition diffi- 
 cult to the national manufacturers. Of this privilege the 
 French Government has made considerable use, more par- 
 ticularly during the last ten years, with the special object 
 of protecting certain industries and branches of agriculture 
 from a depression in price. Modern civilization is admir- 
 able, but it has this disadvantage, that wealth is extremely 
 precarious. A permanent and definitive debasement in value 
 was once a slow historical event which followed at the 
 distance of centuries, nowadays the most formidable 
 variations incessantly occur, entailing the destruction of 
 established fortunes and the creation of new ones. But in a 
 society where the spirit of protection is strong, where ^/ 
 individual energies are restrained by many bonds, a certain 
 stability of fortune is desired and demanded of the Govern- 
 ment, as one of the many forms of its protection. Such, at 
 least in part, is the aim of protectionism in France. 
 

 210 MILITARISM 
 
 III 
 
 When this is admitted we can clearly understand how it is 
 that the Jacobin State is the government of a minority. Its 
 function was to assure to France, by means of a vast 
 protective system, an intellectual liberty in opposition to 
 /,/ spiritual tyranny, and a political freedom from the abuses 
 of an absolute monarchy. It therefore freed writers and 
 thinkers from a large portion of those perils that threatened 
 them from a jealous ecclesiastical censorship, it accorded a 
 fair freedom of the press, and scientific education. 
 
 But to do this, the work of the Jacobin State had necessarily 
 to be aristocratic. The uneducated majority, occupied only 
 with money- making, did not care about intellectual liberty, 
 which, moreover, appeared impious and dangerous to those 
 who had been most influenced by the restricted education 
 of the Church. These naturally regarded an authoritative 
 scheme of official belief as a salutary system rather than a 
 regime of liberty and discussion. 
 
 Moreover, the vast protective system exercised by the 
 Jacobin State for the benefit of the middle class was 
 necessarily oligarchical. Such a protection can satisfy a 
 certain number on one condition only : that it takes little in 
 taxation from a large number, and that it confer great favours 
 on a few. Thus it compels the majority to contribute to the 
 well-being of a minority, which latter alone is really interested 
 in the maintenance of the regime. There is always an upper- 
 class minority which receives more than it contributes, and 
 another class which receives less than it contributes, that is 
 the majority of workers and the lower bourgeoisie. Now, it 
 is clear that such a state of things can only exist on one 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 2 1 1 
 
 condition, i.e. that authority be in the power of a minority which 
 avails itself of this vast system of protection, and feels the 
 necessity for intellectual liberty. This singular combination 
 led the Jacobin State into another self-contradiction when it 
 wished to fulfil the second promise made to the French 
 people, that of conferring on it political liberty. According 
 to their formula the majority was to rule, and yet it had to 
 serve a minority which it entrusted with power. In order to 
 escape from this contradiction, the Jacobin State imagined a 
 thousand expedients by whose means it eluded the political 
 formula which gave it birth. Indeed, a great part of the 
 political ability of France has been thus expended during our 
 century. 
 
 Every few years, all adult males are called upon to elect 
 members for the Chamber of Deputies. By means of this 
 legislative assembly the majority might express and enforce 
 its will it might, that is, if practical possibility corresponded 
 to theoretical. But such is not the case, for many reasons, and 
 primarily on account of the party divisions, which are such 
 as to always ensure rule to the minority, under one form or 
 another. The men who take part in French electoral 
 struggles all belong to the category of those who divide 
 public wealth, or at least electoral contests are conducted as 
 though these only were concerned. French party contests 
 are not waged with a view to affirm with precision the desire 
 of the majority, they consist of cliques and coteries who dis- 
 pute the favours of State protection. Between Opportunists 
 and Radicals the only real difference is this : that the 
 Opportunists have a programme for aristocratic protection 
 in favour of the higher bourgeoisie that shall promote 
 the interests of a small class of wealthy financiers, while 
 the Radical programme favours the lower bourgeoisie of 
 
2 I 2 MILITARISM 
 
 shopkeepers, small landowners, and even, to a certain extent, 
 the workers. The former party desires to cut huge slices 
 out of the public cake to satisfy a few ravenous appetites, 
 the latter would divide it into a number of small biscuits to 
 distribute among the crowd. There are rarely found in the 
 Chamber as many as twenty real adversaries who oppose, 
 not the system by which the cake should be divided, but any 
 division at all of a toothsome morsel made of flour stolen 
 from the workers' mill. A few exist among the Socialists, but 
 these are timid and uncertain, entangled in an indissoluble 
 contradiction which they fail to notice, because at one 
 moment they oppose protectionism as unjust and tyrannical, 
 and then incline to test the extreme absurdity of the system 
 by applying it to the working multitudes, thus inventing 
 proletarian Caesarism. 
 
 Thus political contests in France consist in the infernal 
 clamour of a thousand competitors, who crowd around the 
 public banquet, fighting and scrambling to get their share. 
 Those who reach the feast first gorge ravenously, while 
 occasionally flinging a few crumbs to the crowd to keep them 
 quiet. The competitors in parliamentary, senatorial, municipal, 
 or county elections vie with one another in making promises 
 that shall procure them public favour and votes. One man 
 promises his most ardent partisans one of those positions 
 that carry with them neither heavy work or responsibility, of 
 which there are so many in the French bureaucracy. Another 
 pledges Government support to some declining local industry. 
 A third promises to classify the local tobaccos among the 
 most expensive qualities. Yet another promises a school or 
 railway to his electors, while all try to get into favour by 
 rendering such small services as exemptions from fines, 
 decorations, the remission of small penalties, i.e. by distributing 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 213 
 
 among the mass those crumbs which remain over from the 
 feasts of Caesarism. 
 
 The majority of the people that is to say, those who pro- 
 vide the banquet are unable even to approach it. But, owing 
 to the fact that they are dispersed, disunited, unconscious of 
 their ills, and often ignorant, they can do little against a 
 well-organized and active minority. As a Frenchman on 
 entering the world finds the State ready constituted, so also 
 he finds ready made the various factions who dispute the 
 enjoyment of its protection. No party exists to represent 
 his confused desire to be less exploited by the State. Of 
 what use, then, is the right to vote at elections if, amongst all 
 the candidates who solicit his favour, he cannot find one to 
 express his thoughts and wishes ? All those who suffer from 
 this method of government should come to a mutual under- 
 standing, unite together to found new parties, and seek for new 
 men to rule them. An understanding and union, however, 
 is difficult between so many people scattered all over France, 
 between whom, moreover, there exists such wide differences of 
 education and social position, differences which the unceasing 
 and cunning conduct of the administration tends to increase. 
 
 Besides the task of maintaining order, the Government has 
 another more important duty to fulfil : that of rendering 
 universal suffrage a harmless toy in the people's hands. This 
 weapon it was, by force of circumstances, compelled to give 
 to the populace, as you give a child a toy pistol to quiet him. 
 It uses all manner of devices to attain this object. For 
 this end there exists a distinctly political body, served by 
 prefects and sub-prefects, and aided by the executive. Pre- 
 fects and sub-prefects are scattered in all French towns, 
 and are most especially charged with the organizing of 
 electoral cabals, to render impossible the growth of any real 
 
214 MILITARISM 
 
 party of reform, and to maintain and, if possible, increase their 
 disunion. By all methods of corruption they successfully 
 bamboozle the working-men and middle-class associations. 
 They keep a keen eye on the local authorities ; they curry 
 favour with rich proprietors, manufacturers, and well-to-do 
 people in general ; they disperse decorations, promise favours, 
 judiciously regulate the pressure of certain fiscal laws. By 
 such means they seek to win over the electors, and to induce 
 the majority to elect, now an Opportunist, now a rallie, now a 
 Radical, in accordance with instructions received from Paris. 
 These Government candidates are, of course, men favourable 
 to the traditional politico-administrative system, and prepared 
 to exploit in favour of those who contribute to their victory. 
 The prefects generally meet with success because the chief 
 article of this electoral Machiavellism is very simple and 
 practically infallible : that of blinding a man to the universal 
 ^ interest, which is, of course, indirectly his own, in view of some 
 direct and immediate benefit. Men generally fall into this trap. 
 Hence manufacturers, merchants, and landowners allow them- 
 selves to be enticed by a decoration, or some frail promise to 
 favour a policy, which, by gradually augmenting taxation 
 throughout the country, must ultimately lead to their ruin. 
 
 To intrigue and corruption, in extreme cases, force is 
 added, the force of a huge army, as useful for internal repres- 
 sion as for foreign wars ; and which has, on more than 
 one occasion, saved the Jacobin State from outbursts of 
 national fury. The Commune forms an instance. This fell a 
 victim, not to the capitalist bourgeoisie, but to administrative 
 ^Csesarism. It was crushed down so ferociously, not because 
 it aimed at abolishing private property, but because it 
 favoured a federalist movement which would by centralization 
 w \/ have destroyed the nucleus of the Jacobin State. 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 215 
 
 IV 
 
 But nowadays the possession of arms and money does not 
 suffice, a Government must also have a moral basis founded 
 on some popular sentiment, The French Jacobin State has, 
 therefore, sought to impress the people with an almost mysti- 
 cal idea of its own power and greatness, and to persuade 
 them that it is the strongest, most infallible, and invincible of 
 all Governments. 
 
 We have already observed that man's greatest source of 
 pleasure consists in the consciousness of his own superiority. 
 Personal pleasures originate in a sense of our own individual 
 worth, collective ones in a belief in the superiority of the 
 society to which we belong. This latter satisfaction is 
 stronger in inferior men. The enjoyment of collective superi- 
 ority is, in short, a species of recompense to the mediocre 
 crowd, and this explains its universal prevalence. The 
 scholars of one school consider themselves superior to those 
 of another ; the soldiers of one army to those of their 
 rivals ; the members of one class or profession to those of 
 another. 
 
 Patriotism, in some cases, arises from a similar sentiment. 
 French patriotism, in fact, consists in the complacent belief 
 that France is, and must be, the greatest, the most invincible 
 European nation, that is destined to rule the rest. This belief, 
 flattering to the universal vanity, may become a real pleasure 
 and generate that sentiment which M. Tarde who laments 
 its diminution since 1870 defines as: " Le sentiment delicieux, 
 intime, presque inconscient a force d'etre continu et profond, 
 qui etait le fond de 1'etat d'ame de tous les Frangais avant \$ 
 1870; la foi absolu en la France, en son hegemonic, en sa v - 
 

 2l6 MILITARISM 
 
 mission superieure et providentielle " (Figaro, October nth, 
 1898). 
 
 Now, this pleasant sentiment of superiority lover other 
 nations resolves itself into devotion and admiration towards 
 the Government that maintains it by its arms and policy. 
 The majorities may be discontented with the Government 
 for its impiety, its oligarchic administration, or its constant 
 self-contradictions, but all parties indiscriminately are grateful 
 to it as the author and custodian of this national moral 
 superiority over other countries. From this point of view 
 we can judge the vastness of the service Napoleon rendered 
 to the Jacobin States, because from that extraordinary epoch 
 (\yof war and victory dates that general passion for military and 
 / political greatness which, in France, is such a precious element 
 of administrative stability. 
 
 Hence we can easily understand that the- Government is 
 interested in diffusing and feeding this passion in every 
 manner, and principally by means of its officials. A well- 
 armed Government, generous, amply provided with money, 
 which shows itself even when commanding half a million 
 -^officials, inspires the masses with respect and admiration. 
 
 The French official class, more especially its better-educated 
 portion, are well enabled to inspire the people with respect 
 / for the State. In small towns and country districts the sub- 
 prefects and magistrates, all those officials who possess a* 
 certain grade of education and come from afar, sent by the 
 Invisible which rules over all, to represent that unmeasured 
 thing capable of doing so much good and so much harm, 
 appear as small sovereigns, more particularly to the bour- 
 geoisie, who, possessing a little, have more to expect and 
 more to fear from the State. Thus, partly from the genuine 
 humility of the weaker towards the stronger, partly from 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 21 7 
 
 servility and interestedness, these classes easily accept as 
 aphorisms of Supreme Wisdom the political ideas circulated 
 by the officials. In the same manner much of a priest's 
 authority is not personal, but the result of the accumulation 
 and growth of centuries. 
 
 The ideal which the French bureaucracy represents, and 
 which it impresses on the minds of the middle class, is that 
 of military patriotism, according to which French prosperity C/ 
 depends on its military power, its diplomatic superiority, 
 therefore every victory or the conquest of any territory is a 
 happy event conducive to the greatness of the fatherland. 
 The French military and civil authorities can profess the most 
 varied religious and philosophical theories. They may call 
 themselves atheists or believers, materialists or spiritualists, 
 but all of them, under whatsoever political regime, under the 
 third republic as under the first and second Napoleonic 
 empire, are bound never publicly to deny this ideal. I do 
 not affirm that they all believe in the justice of these 
 principles as in gospel truth. Some may have grown so 
 inured to them as to regard them with fanatical faith, 
 many accept them passively, for love of peace and quiet, 
 without worrying their brains to analyze. No one, however, 
 dares publicly express his aversion or indulge in too free a 
 criticism. An official who, in writing or in a public speech, 
 1 maintains that the military honour of France is an absurdity, 
 and the military policy fatal to the country, would be evicted. 
 Therefore the more liberal spirits are forced, by fear of 
 poverty, to keep silence. 
 
 Thus the French executive, even to-day, is the custodian of / 
 the bellicose traditions of the country, just as the clergy is 
 the defender of its faith. It is assisted by many auxiliary, 
 literary, religious, political, and economical influences, which 
 
2l8 MILITARISM 
 
 together build up an ingenious system of mutual intimidation 
 that works admirably. 
 
 Public schools are carried on in the same spirit. The 
 Jacobin State organized its educational system in opposition 
 to that of the Church, making of it a tool to cultivate the 
 sentiment of the politico-military greatness of France. These 
 schools are mere gymnasiums where youths are tired out 
 with useless fatigues and stupid mnemonic exercises that 
 only result in procuring the ephemeral glory of " first-class 
 certificates " to a few boys gifted with feeble intellects and 
 good memories. But French schools, by way of recompense, 
 foster military and patriotic enthusiasm. All the chief per- 
 sonages of French military history are paraded before the 
 boys, aggrandized into ideal proportions : Clovis, Charle- 
 magne, Bayard, Louis XIV., Napoleon. The great events of 
 national military history are narrated in glowing and senti- 
 mental language. The belief in national and military great- 
 ness is fostered in every way. Indeed, these beliefs are 
 perhaps the only ones which have any real hold on the minds 
 of modern French youths. 
 
 Religion collaborates with the public schools. From the 
 village pulpit the priest preaches to the peasants concerning 
 the fatherland, the army, the honour of arms, the standards 
 blessed by the Almighty. In the remotest villages of the 
 Alps and Pyrenees, where the schoolmaster possibly would 
 be useless, the priest penetrates, sent thither by the State to 
 represent religion, on condition that he will also put in a good 
 wcrd for the military greatness of France. 
 
 The most perfect side of this subtle and varying work of 
 propaganda is to be found in the system of mutual intimidation, 
 thanks to which the most thoughtful men are prevented from 
 rebelling against the tyranny of absurd military prejudices. 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 2ig 
 
 The patriotism of the cultured classes in France resembles, 
 to a certain degree, those walls in which the bricks support 
 one another without cement ; or, if you prefer, a prison 
 in which every one is in turn the gaoler of his neigh- 
 bour on the left, and the prisoner of the one on the right. 
 Many Frenchmen are intimately persuaded that much of this 
 high-flown patriotic agitation is mere bluster, nor could it be 
 otherwise, as prepossession has been pushed to the extreme 
 of absurdity. A recent event furnishes an example : The 
 Madagascar expedition cost the nation ^"5,000,000, and the 
 lives of 5000 soldiers, raised by conscription and sent there 
 by force. How was it possible that several deputies and 
 I have known many who admitted it in private conversation 
 should not regard as insane such waste of life and money 
 for the conquest of an island whose only use would be to 
 institute new expensive bureaucratic sinecures, and which 
 commercially would be exploited by Englishmen and Ger- 
 mans ? And yet, in this small matter, as in many more im- 
 portant ones, no one dared to declare openly that the talk 
 about the honour of the French standard in Madagascar was 
 absurd, and that the first duty of a Government is to waste 
 neither men nor money. Thus it always happens, in matters 
 where the traditional ideals of French military glory are con- 
 cerned, many persons are more or less conscious of the same 
 opinion, but each would be ready to stone for his boldness 
 any one who dared proclaim the truth hidden at the bottom 
 of every one's mind. Were this audacious spirit a journalist, 
 he would find his readers rapidly diminish ; were he a deputy 
 he could never again speak in public ; a university professor 
 would be ruined, an independent literary man would never 
 enter the Academy. French public opinion is ferocious 
 against the crimes of Ihe-patriotisme, and the Press, which 
 
220 MILITARISM 
 
 understands this, and speculates on the most ardent passions 
 of the human heart, occasionally goes in for wild outbursts of 
 patriotism, which so excite the public that they positively 
 lynch metaphorically speaking all those suspected of little 
 or no patriotism. 
 
 Thus it happens that journalists, officials, scientists, and 
 literary men, volens nolens, all live in terror of the threatened 
 anger of the public, and are compelled to become the accom- 
 plices of this colossal military-territorial delusion which is 
 hurrying France to its ruin. The revolutionist Rochefort 
 is as great a "jingo" as the imperialist Cassagnac ; the 
 socialist municipality of Paris is forced to receive the Czar ; 
 Pasteur has to refuse a title of honour from the Emperor of 
 Germany ; Ferry becomes the object of universal detestation 
 from the day he is suspected of wishing to reconcile France 
 with Germany. The sincere fanatics for revenge are few, 
 because all know in their heart of hearts that war with 
 Germany would have disastrous results for European civiliza- 
 tion. And yet, how many years will pass before any of the 
 parties which come into power will publicly renounce this 
 idea, and set Europe at peace? a universal and fatal error 
 in which all mutually imprison one another, from which all 
 would be only too happy to escape. 
 
 V 
 
 Thus the cultured classes, if not the whole nation, accept 
 in silence these ideals which correspond so ill to the require- 
 ments of the age, and consequently military traditions are 
 transmitted from generation to generation, and fossilized 
 into integral parts of the administration. We have seen that 
 the majority does not and cannot rule in France ; that the 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 121 
 
 various coteries and small minorities, who from time to time 
 come into power, take no trouble to reform the Government. 
 The only aim of a ministry is to satisfy the "clients " which 
 raised it to power. All the rest, the reform of abuses and 
 so forth, except what is brought about by the force of cir^ 
 cumstances, is treated by the various Governments with a 
 very Mussulman indifference. As a general rule, the more 
 unjust the constitution of a Government, the greater its need ^ 
 to emphasize some ideal to play on, some disinterested and 
 altruistic passion of the human heart. In our day, the Govern- 
 ment which, more than any other, depends on an ideal is the -r~ 
 Turkish. Why are its officials and soldiers ready to die 
 heroically wherever the caprice of a foolish Government 
 chooses to send them ? Not for any consideration of personal 
 gain, certainly, for the Government lets them hunger twelve 
 months a year, ill-treats and oppresses them, but out of 
 devotion to their religious beliefs. Is anything found to 
 equal the barbarous but infinite heroism^which the Turkish 
 Government livesjn the Swiss regime ? In comparison with 
 the Turkish Government, that of Switzerland is a prosaic 
 company of tradesmen ; its virtues consist in pedantry, in an 
 orderly and economic spirit, in the subordination of every- 
 thing to saving. Nor should this surprise any person who 
 well considers the question. The unjuster a Government, 
 the more it has to fear from the resistance or aversion of its 
 subjects. If it can manage to inspire its victims with some 
 generous passion, and ingeniously connect itself therewith, 
 then it frequently succeeds in gaining the affection of those 
 it oppresses. Throughout history an ideal has mostly 
 the sentinel of injustice. 
 
 Owing to an analogous phenomenon, the satisfaction of this 
 sentiment of national pride has, in normal times, diminished 
 
222 MILITARISM 
 
 in France, and obscured any feeling of aversion or discontent 
 towards the Government. Political parties have always 
 availed themselves of this public passion for military glory 
 as a cover for their injustices and errors. Napoleon III. 
 managed for eighteen years to popularize his government 
 by continued fortunate military expeditions, for which he 
 found opportunities and pretexts in every quarter of the globe, 
 in China, Germany, and Mexico. Under the present Re- 
 public the various parties try to animate the people by visions 
 of colonial trophies. When General Duchene disembarked 
 at Marseilles, on his return from Madagascar, where he had 
 waged a greater struggle against malarial fever than against 
 any troops, the socialist mayor of the town went to meet him, 
 made a complimentary speech, and thanked him as a bene- 
 factor of his country. General Dodds, who conquered the 
 King of Dahomy, met with an absolutely triumphant recep- 
 tion from the Parisians. But the strongest proof of the 
 strength of French bellicose sentiments is found in the attitude 
 of the socialists who, in their war against militarism, display 
 none of the violence shown by socialists in other lands. I 
 remember attending a meeting of the Association of Rail- 
 road Workers, men who are nearly all socialists, presided 
 over by the socialist deputy, Claude Hugues, that was held 
 to protest against a law, approved of by the Senate, which 
 prohibited railway employes from forming themselves into 
 syndicates. The chief complaint was that one of the principal 
 motives in favour of the law was this : that permitting the 
 railway men to associate would facilitate strikes, and that these 
 would offer a favourable opportunity to some hostile nation 
 to declare war against France. All the orators expressed 
 their indignation at the idea that any one could believe them 
 capable of continuing a strike after the outbreak of war ; 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SAR1SM IN FRANCE 1 
 
 that the railway men, as Hugues put it, would not have 
 failed in the performance of their duty "under the fire of 
 German cannons." In the project for a general strike, pre- 
 pared by an association of railway employes, was included 
 a clause which became the object of considerable jocularity 
 in the conservative press, but which was very characteristic. 
 It proposed that a member of the strike executive should 
 place himself in direct communication with the minister 
 of war, so as to be able to give orders for the immediate 
 termination of the strike as soon as the necessities of 
 national defence demanded it. 
 
 VI 
 
 But European society is changing with the times. Thus, 
 also, French militarism must of necessity alter its character, ^ \ 
 and, above all, modify itself. 
 
 Herein lies all the significance of the colonial policy in- 
 augurated in France since 1870, at enormous expense, chiefly 
 through the influence of Ferry. What a difference from the 
 English colonial policy! that is, the colonization of Sancho^ 
 Panza : a commercial colonization entered upon prudently 
 and by degrees, with the object of getting buffeted about as 
 little as possible. The French policy is that of Don Quixote, v 
 all for military glory, without any thought for vulgar 
 material interests. The French colonial policy signifies this : 
 the executive realizes that the age of great military under- 
 takings is now for ever past in Europe. It therefore tries to 
 perpetuate the glory of its arms in Asia and Africa. The war 
 of 1870, the downfall of Napoleonism, and the altered condition 
 of European politics, rendered wars in Europe impossible to 
 the Jacobin State, which always but more particularly under 
 
224 MILITARISM 
 
 the two Napoleonic Empires had mixed itself up in all 
 European conflicts, and had even sought after more distant 
 ones in Algiers, the Crimea, Mexico, and China. To-day the 
 military spirit, still so prevalent in France, seeks satisfac- 
 tion in colonial expeditions, by whose means officers, generals, 
 and all the military unemployed are able to practise the skill 
 which in Europe finds no scope. How can we otherwise 
 account for the absurdity of this policy ? France, of all 
 countries, has the least necessity to found colonies. Her 
 population steadily decreases ; so that, instead of requiring 
 fresh territories for emigration, it possesses them for im- 
 migration. The character of the people, as moulded by the 
 long-standing traditions of French civilization, is suited 
 rather to the exploitation of ready formed civilization, by 
 means of its commerce and luxurious trades, than to the 
 cultivation of fresh lands. A Frenchman is much better 
 adapted to sell champagne, fashion-books, and perfumes 
 to the rich of a refined society, than to burn down the 
 virgin forests of desert continents or construct railways 
 across marshes inhabited by serpents and crocodiles who 
 devour the engineers. New York and St. Petersburg render 
 far more to French commerce than all its enormous colonial 
 empire which took such long years to create. 
 
 In short, all the French colonies are the last efforts of an 
 antiquated militarism. They are undertakings of administra- 
 tive exploitation, which cost men and millions to the nation, 
 and only enrich or give social power to a few officials, specu- 
 lators and adventurers. French colonies merely serve to 
 augment lucrative bureaucratic posts, to create a movement of 
 fictitious affairs, under the form of financial undertakings (rail- 
 ways, navigation, etc.) subsidized and guaranteed by the State, 
 whose profits are derived, not from the colony but from the 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 22$ 
 
 national treasury. One of the first acts of the French Govern- 
 ment, after the conquest of Madagascar, was the despatch of a 
 numerous body of officials. The sick and wounded from the 
 terrible expedition of 1895 still crowded the hospitals, when, 
 by decree dated December 3Oth, 1895, the Government con- 
 stituted at Tananarive a court of appeal, and appointed 
 counsellors, although it was not yet known what law ruled 
 in the country, whether the French or that of the island. 
 Inspectors of the French schools were appointed before 
 these schools existed. Such is the nature of all the profits 
 made by the French Government out of its colonial policy, 
 a fruit of the military traditions that have survived from 
 the monarchy that existed prior to the Revolution, right 
 through the two Napoleonic Empires, until our own time, 
 
 VII 
 
 Certainly this curious mixture of democracy and militarism, 
 of republican institutions and imperialist ideas, is most 
 original, and is a proof of great national strength, despite of, 
 I might almost say by reason of, its absurdity, because absurd 
 institutions are those which maintain themselves with the 
 greatest energy. 
 
 This system has several grave defects, partly proper to it 
 and partly inherent to all Governments based on protection/^- 
 Amongst these, the most important is the indifference of the 
 majority to public affairs, their sullen hostility towards the 
 State, in which the better part see only a foe and an oppressor. 
 Outside France, the ardour of her political contests appear 
 extraordinarily active, because they are generally very violent ; 
 but their violence prevents us from perceiving the indifference 
 of the majority, their lack of enthusiasm for the men who 
 
 P 
 
226 MILITARISM 
 
 wage them, their disinclination to take any active part. 
 Social egoism is intense in France, not only among the 
 ignorant masses, but also among the richer and educated 
 class, who, in sharp distinction from this class in England, 
 regard politics as a vulgar and dirty business to be left 
 strictly to ambitious men and demagogues, or at the very 
 best as an amusing spectacle by reason of its bizarrerie and 
 extravagance. 
 
 This is the inevitable result of the vast protection exercised 
 by the State over the bourgeoisie, whereby the Government 
 awards this class the temptation, or places it under the 
 necessity of living on public employments. A class cannot 
 both serve and control a Government. The Jacobin State, 
 by protecting with so many favours the middle class, divides 
 and weakens the moral strength which this class would 
 possess were it independent, reducing it to petty family 
 interests, because every family is seduced into availing itself 
 of the largest possible share of State favours. Politics, in 
 short, take the shape of family interests. In this respect 
 Catholic education has been of service to the Jacobin State, 
 because this system was elaborated for centuries as the best 
 means of preparing men to receive Church favours. Thus it 
 has, with certain modifications, also prepared them to receive 
 JL those of the Government. Catholic education aims at the 
 suppression of personality, at the development of docility, 
 timidity, and reserve, encouraging selfishness and a dislike of 
 taking trouble, qualities which are all more suited to a class 
 of officials who regard the State as father and master, than 
 to strong and energetic political men. Moreover, Catholicism 
 gives great power to women in family life. It constitutes the 
 family on authoritarian and selfish principles, and encourages 
 the idea that politics are merely a field for the promotion of 
 
MILITARISM AND ClESARISM IN FRANCE 22*J 
 
 Js 
 private and family interests. This is more particularly the 
 
 policy of women in Latin countries. These exert great 
 influence in the French middle-class family, perhaps of all 
 the most authoritarianly constituted, so that France is more u 
 under petticoat government than any other European land. 
 
 There are a great number of intelligent and cultured men 
 in the bureaucracy who are thus unable to take any part in 
 politics or exercise any influence on public opinion.- Hence 
 the sentiment of social solidarity is feeble in France, public \^ 
 opinion passive and inert. And this is one of the reasons 
 why political struggles are so fierce, for a man who wishes to 
 influence public opinion knows what a heavy weight he has 
 got to move, and realizes that he must use strong measures. 
 France is rather like a bull before whose eyes we must wave 
 a flaming flag in order to excite him. The hatred of Jews, of 
 Italians, of English or some similar class, the panic of spies 
 or fear of revolution : all these matters tend to keep more 
 refined men from mixing themselves up with politics. It is 
 not every one who cares for this trade of exciting the bull 
 with red rags, as also there are many who do not care for the 
 office of agent of favours, of which a French political career 
 consists. No deputy or minister can long retain the good- 
 will of the public if he does not manage to procure many 
 Government favours for his partisans and entourage, a business 
 in which mediocre men frequently make a great success, but 
 in which men of intelligence fail. Thus the political class is 
 of the commonest order, and consists of men with slight 
 culture and of a low moral standard. 
 
 This leads to another evil : the bureaucracy are too powerful 
 and not sufficiently plastic. It is composed of ill-paid 
 officials, who as a recompense receive life appointments. 
 Each possesses a certain degree of protective influence, and 
 
228 MILITARISM 
 
 many of the higher are able to place their own caprices 
 before the public welfare, retain positions to which they are 
 not suited, oppose reforms which for some reason or other 
 they do not approve.- The ministers, who are at the head of the 
 bureaucracy, ought to insist on the executive serving France, 
 not France the executive ; they ought, in short, to temper and 
 control faction spirit, known in France under the name of 
 mandarinism. But the ministers are, for the better part, 
 commonplace men, political intriguers of little importance 
 and limited education at the best they are elegant writers 
 and orators, not intelligent men of action made to rule. 
 What authority can they have over the administration, com- 
 posed of fixed officials, who know all its mechanism, and 
 have been for years the centre of influence and favours ? 
 __.The executive is the real master of France. The ministers 
 have no power over it, and have to content themselves 
 with being responsible before the public for all its errors. 
 Above all, the heads of a popular administration, such as the 
 army, are all-powerful ; no ministers could ever prevent them 
 from- doing as they chose. 
 
 Thus, contrary as it is to the general belief, the greatest 
 defect of the French social system lies in conservatism. The 
 European public sees the French Ministry change with 
 bewildering frequency ; they hear statistical dilettantes repeat 
 that the average duration of a French administration is 
 eight months and sixteen days, that from the 4th of Sep- 
 tember, 1870, to the end of 1897, thirty-seven ministries 
 followed one another ; and they conclude that all continuity 
 and seriousness is lacking in the French Government. But 
 the mutability of the ministry is, on the contrary, a guarantee 
 of the immobility of the routine whereby France is governed. 
 France is the most conservatively governed land in Europe, 
 
MILITARISM AND C.fcSARlSM IN FRANCE $29 
 
 because the ministries, by remaining in power for such a short 
 period at a stretch, have no chance of altering or modifying 
 the methods and traditions of the bureaucracy. What could 
 the most energetic of ministers do? He" arrives and studies, 
 but no sooner does he begin to understand the nature of the 
 executive which he has to direct than he is dismissed. The 
 reforms of public services are generally only possible when 
 the bureaucracy itself wakes up to their necessity. The 
 initiative is generally given by the permanent officials of t 
 ministry, not by the ministers themselves. 
 
 A third drawback to the Jacobin State is the alarming "j 
 destruction of wealth it entails ; its military policy, which is / 
 its outcome, costs millions to the nation. Moreover, the 
 executive is anything but thrifty ; on the contrary, it is ex- 
 travagant and wasteful. The balance sheet of a Jacobin State 
 normally shows a deficit, whose necessary consequence is 
 the continual increase of taxes and the national debts, the 
 slow or rapid impoverishment of the country. 
 
 In short, and this is where chance is the greatest evil, the 
 Jacobin State constantly wears itself out in self-contradictions 
 which augment the number of its enemies. It is composed of 
 an official class abounding in clever but ill-guided men, and of (/ 
 a body of politicians of mediocre worth. Before all else, 
 these all have to uphold their power as a minority, in 
 opposition to the majority, and then satisfy as best they can 
 the various parties, insuring intellectual and political liberty 
 to the liberal minority. They have to make the Catholic 
 population forget their impiety, by distributing money 
 favours ; they have to keep the people contented, and satisfy 
 the universal military patriotism, which is the soul of the 
 French Government. We can easily understand how these 
 efforts result in contenting no one. 
 
230 MILITARISM 
 
 And so it happens that, under the sway of whatever Govern- 
 ment France may be, the true nature of its political system 
 is always Caesarism that is, a universally protective, prodigal, 
 and warlike state. The republic may attenuate the Caesarism 
 of the second empire, it cannot abolish it. It, too, is prodigal 
 of public money to give to the people, in a more refined and 
 civilized form panem et cirsenses. It also is ambitious for 
 trophies, not from Europe, but Africa. It also is weakened 
 by the military oligarchy, which devour thousands upon 
 thousands in an administration which is almost irresponsible. 
 
 In short, the evil of evils is that the Jacobin State appears 
 too liberal to the Catholics, too authoritarian to the Liberals. 
 The first consider it impious that the crucifix should be 
 removed from the schools, nuns from the hospitals, and 
 that the publication of books which deride human and divine 
 authority should be countenanced. The others consider as 
 tyrannical a state where free principles are professed rather 
 than practised, where the highest ministerial officials enjoy 
 almost uncontrolled authority, and where citizens have 
 scarcely any means of defending themselves against their 
 injustice. This latent discord assumes every day more and 
 more the shape of antagonism between the Government and 
 executive. Men from Jesuit schools, who have received 
 Catholic education, predominate in the executive. In the 
 political world, on the contrary, liberal ideas prevail. In the 
 French parliament, radical liberalism is represented by a 
 larger number of socialists and radicals than anywhere else 
 in Europe. Thus France has already witnessed radical 
 ministries, that have filled conservatives with terror, who 
 likened them to a vanguard of the revolution that was 
 coming into power. But what could they do, when their 
 instrument of rule was a narrow-minded and bigoted 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 231 
 
 executive ? Even had these ministers been bolder reformers 
 than they were, they would have been none the less impotent 
 at the head of so slow and conservative an executive. 
 
 But the greatest contradiction of all can be observed in the 
 
 policy of the State towards the Church. The Jacobin State 
 
 v^ 
 is founded on a system of protection, and, as we have 
 
 observed, no education is so well suited as that of the Church 
 to prepare men for a regime of patronage. The lay education 
 which the Government attempted to organize was very im- 
 perfect in comparison : the result of a few years' labour is 
 weak beside the work of ages. Thus the Jacobin State is 
 tempted to avail itself of the Church as an excellent im- 
 plement for disciplining the masses, but it had never been 
 able to do anything very definite in this direction for fear of 
 rousing the Church's dormant ambition for absolute power. 
 Thus the spiritual policy of the Jacobin State has always 
 wavered during this century, and still wavers. When it feels 
 itself threatened by the insubordinate disposition of the 
 people, it attempts making advances to the Church, sacrificing 
 part of that intellectual liberty which it is its historical 
 function to insure to France. When this policy rouses too 
 much discontent in the intellectual classes, it abandons the 
 Church and returns to more liberal methods, 
 
 VIII 
 
 This continuous state of vacillation and contradiction, so 
 characteristic of the educated classes in France, finds a 
 unique expression in those three popular Parisian journalists : 
 Henry Rochefort, Paul Cassagnac, and Edward Drumout. 
 Here are three men and three papers which would be quite in- 
 comprehensible anywhere but in France, and which represent 
 
232 MILITARISM 
 
 marvellously the state of feeling that accompanies so singular 
 and curious a form of government as the Jacobin. 
 
 Who are they ? The titles of their journals are equally 
 bizarre. The name of Cassagnac's paper is ISA-liter ite, dry 
 and concise as a shield borne by a brawny arm ; that of 
 Rochefort's is L 1 Intransigent^ which is proud and emphatic 
 as a challenge ; Drumout's organ bears the name La Libre 
 Parole, which title is unprecise and transcendental, like to a 
 mystical book. The one wishes to express his contempt of 
 the crowd ; the other his hatred of the tyrannies of the 
 powers that be ; the third his insufferance of any lie respected 
 by universal abjectness. 
 
 In reality all three represent the same thing : a spirit of 
 desperate malignity towards everything. It would seem that 
 each of them aims at a special target : Cassagnac at the 
 republic, Rochefort at the bourgeoisie, Drumout at the 
 Jews. But this looks like an artifice to direct public attention 
 to the tricks of the shooter, who really aims far beyond his 
 little target. Angry discontent at everything, insolent con- 
 tempt for all that was, furious hatred towards all that is, gloomy 
 pessimism for the future, combined with vague prophesies of 
 extraordinary events ; such are the airs which these singers 
 of political woes, these Jeremiahs of French society at the end 
 of the nineteenth century, never tire of singing. Regularly 
 every morning they write that France is on the verge of per- 
 dition, that her arsenals are empty, her frontiers exposed to 
 the enemy, her powerful ones at discord and more ambitious 
 for personal gain than for public glory, her soldiers des- 
 perately resolute to do their duty, but without confidence, 
 France was never so humiliated and badly served as she is 
 to-day. What other ambition have her foreign ministers than 
 to be the servitors of the German Emperor? France is the 
 
MILITARISM AND C&SARISM IN FRANCE 233 
 
 most wretched country on earth; her industries are ruined, 
 agriculture is no better off, her wealth is stagnant : in a few 
 more years' time she will be reduced to sleep on straw. And 
 what about their verdicts on the best-known and most popular 
 politicians? They are all low comedians, rogues and idiots 
 destitute of ideas, of dignity or energy, their only care is to 
 stuff their pockets ; and when the reader, exasperated by this 
 angry criticism, asks, " But what can be the end of so des- 
 perate a country ? " the three confreres answer him with vague 
 but fearful premonitions ; they speak of imminent convulsions, 
 they hint at universal slaughters, at the renewal of blood- 
 shed and disorder, of supreme judgments and supreme 
 justice. 
 
 Such is the tone in which the three most popular Parisian 
 journalists, these three canailles of the pen, these pavement 
 Cassandras, treat social and political questions both great and 
 small. The temperament of the three writers are certainly 
 diverse : Cassagnac is stormy, Drumout mystical, Rochefort 
 ironical. But their daily task is the same : a task of furious 
 universal onslaught, to which we find nothing similar in 
 history excepting the mission of the Hebrew prophets. These 
 three Parisian journalists have conceived the idea, like the 
 Hebrew prophets, of making themselves little colporteurs and 
 retail salesmen of discontent and pessimism among the people, 
 like so many greengrocers and fishmongers in the market ; to 
 find the merchant in his office during a pause in business 
 while he seeks a moment's repose ; to stop the worker on the 
 way to his shop, and the scholar on the road to school ; to seat 
 himself besides the business man eating a hurried lunch at an 
 eating-house ; to go and exchange a few words with the lazy 
 official slowly looking over the work at his office. By means 
 of their papers, which circulate everywhere, they speak to 
 
234 .MILITARISM 
 
 every one, to rich and poor, women and men, the educated 
 and the ignorant ; and in the minds of all they try to in- 
 sinuate the same discontent, or, perhaps more correctly, to 
 express well what these already feel confusedly. 
 
 Insult and defamation are the two weapons necessary to 
 papers such as these. The axiom on which is based the philo- 
 sophy of these three men is, that every one who opposes them 
 are rogues of the lowest grade. Honest but mistaken belief 
 is a thing which, according to them, does not exist. Thus 
 they speak of all their enemies in a lofty tone of contempt, 
 and the form with which they express this corresponds 
 to the sentiment : it is violent and furious, composed of a 
 choice collection of extreme adjectives and substantives. To 
 express the fact that a man is anti-pathetic, one of these 
 writers will say that he is disgusting and revolting; to say 
 that another is not intelligent, he calls him a d d fool. A 
 third is labelled a thief, brigand, violator. This simply 
 signifies that, in the writer's opinion, the probity of this person 
 is not entirely free from doubt. It follows that as the most 
 virulent adjectives are used in mild cases, there is no means 
 of sufficiently increasing the penalty when grave faults are to 
 be treated. As in those societies where the lightest offences 
 are punished with death, no stronger punishment can be 
 found for grave crimes, and the notions of crime and punish- 
 ment grow confused, so these executioners of the pen so 
 massacre their enemies, guilty of small transgressions, that 
 they are unable to graduate the chastisement to meet the 
 case of worse scoundrels. 
 
 Insult and defamation are twin sisters. Not only are 
 these writers prodigal of insults, but they recount horrible and 
 totally false tales about their enemies, which they affirm with 
 the utmost impudence, as though they possessed authentic 
 
MILITARISM AND CsESARISM IN FRANCE 235 
 
 documents in proof. The laws against defamation of 
 character remain paralyzed in face of such audacity, because 
 timid and weak-kneed laws always recede before fearless 
 crime. 
 
 But surely the French conscience must be in a bad way to 
 be able to take any pleasure, even a purely literary one, 
 instead of feeling moral nausea, in reading these invectives and 
 lies, invented every day to satisfy blind party hatred ! The 
 world, as represented by these maniacs, is like those Chinese 
 pictures, devoid of perspective or proportion, where all the 
 figures are squashed out flat, near objects are smaller than 
 distant ones, the lodgers taller than the roofless houses they 
 inhabit, the horses larger than the trees round which they 
 graze. What would become of the senses and reason of a 
 man who for years saw nothing but Chinese figures of this 
 order ? He would lose all count of the reality of things, of 
 their proportion and solidity. Thus it happens also to those 
 who accustom themselves to consider the moral world 
 without perspective or proportion, as represented by these 
 enraged denouncers, to whom the smallest venial offence is 
 equal to the greatest mortal sin. In the end they lose all 
 sense of moral reality and its gradations, and grow to look 
 upon the world as a horde of horrible scoundrels, created to 
 be observed by the only four honest pairs of eyes that exist : 
 the journalists' and his own. But precisely because with 
 this bitter pessimisim they satisfy a social need, the public 
 permits them to say all that they choose, even the most 
 repulsive thing. They allow Rochefort, in the midst of 
 Catholic France, to call the Pope "ce vieux roublard de 
 Pecci ; " they allow him to associate the name of Mary with 
 a filthy word. What matters it to the public ? He loves his 
 journalist none the less because he wounds his feelings so 
 
236 MILITARISM 
 
 roughly ; he likes him because he expresses well the cold 
 bitterness which lies in the human heart suffering from the 
 stings of unrevenged hatreds. These terrible literary frondes 
 represent one aspect of the revolutionary spirit, that deep- 
 rooted unrest which knows no definite direction, that species 
 of nervous tremor which from time to time seizes a multitude 
 weary of long oppression and not comforted by the hope of 
 any near relief, whence are born mystical revolutions such 
 as Christianity, outbursts of war-like ardour such as the 
 Napoleonic conquests, revolutions which swamp cities in 
 blood like the French Revolution, a psychological epidemic 
 like Boulangism, or a violent, and I might almost say Neronic, 
 journalism like the Parisian. A serious disease for a people 
 is that revolutionary spirit which vaguely dreams of change 
 and knows not of what order it should be, a disease which 
 can only be cured by the spirit of continuous progress ; but 
 this spirit is never found under a despotic Government, and 
 the Jacobin State, despite its appearances, is despotic. 
 
 IX 
 
 The conclusions to be drawn from what precedes are 
 these. Notwithstanding its military character, a Govern- 
 ment like the French, whose executive is so conservative, slow, 
 and ill-controlled, degenerates into a permanent condition 
 of military weakness. The power of an army nowadays 
 depends on its organization, which should be constantly 
 improved in accordance with the mutability of our age. 
 French ministers are not sufficiently plastic to fulfil this 
 work. It is by no means rash to suppose that many of the 
 milliards spent on the army since 1870 have been wasted ; 
 this is easily comprehensible to any one who knows what 
 
MILITARISM AND CsESARISM IN FRANCE 237 
 
 these uncontrolled administrations are worth. The French 
 executive was capable of organizing a good army under 
 Napoleon I. because the organization of armies was then a 
 rudimentary affair, and, slow as it was, it was then the most ; 
 rapid and perfect administration in Europe. Now it has been 
 improved on, and armies require to be more delicately made x 
 and with less clumsy tools. 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK 
 IN ITALY 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 
 
 I 
 
 THE second Napoleonic empire was a splendid blazing sun ; 
 the kingdom of Italy, which was formed out of the revolutions 
 and wars of 1859-60, was its moon, small, pretty, and shining 
 with reflected light. 
 
 The ancient oak of absolutism, and the spiritual theocracy of 
 the Catholic Church, blasted by the Napoleonic victories, had 
 reflourished in Italy after 1815. The old regime was restored 
 there much more effectually than in France ; monarchism was 
 re-established ; the Church regained possession of a large 
 portion of her wealth, by means of which, in league with the 
 State, she once more extended her protection over society. 
 With the consent and deferential supervision of the State, she 
 then undertook the education of the middle and upper classes, 
 in whom she hoped to inspire a healthy respect for secular 
 and ecclesiastical authority ; whilst to the working classes no 
 instruction was imparted, as it was deemed too dangerous 
 a charity. 
 
 The Government endeavoured to check, by every means in 
 their power, the development of trade and industry, and to 
 impede the formation of a class of independent, cultured, and 
 wealthy tradesmen, which would most probably have been 
 a hotbed of liberal ideas. In short, the object aimed at was 
 
 Q 
 
24-2 MILITARISM 
 
 to keep the middle classes in subjection by forcing them to 
 rely solely on State or Church employment. Italian society 
 was composed of an aristocracy of large landed proprietors, 
 bigoted, ignorant, and charitable ; of a middle class studying 
 only the Latin and Italian languages, intolerant of the revo- 
 lutionary culture of France and England, living on Government 
 posts and ecclesiastical benefices ; of an ignorant, narrow- 
 minded class of merchants, whose only occupation, beyond 
 their antiquated commerce, was to cheer the king when he 
 walked abroad, and to fulfil scrupulously their religious duties, 
 not forgetting to give liberally to Church chanties ; and of a 
 working class composed of artisans and peasants, for the most 
 part ignorant, boorish, lazy, and pugnacious, who lived partly 
 by their own work, and partly on chanty doled out by State 
 and convents. 
 
 Fortunately, the revolution of 1848 was an earthquake 
 which so shook and battered the walls of this citadel of 
 tyranny and ignorance, that it could not stand much longer. 
 In Piedmont a liberal party was formed, calling itself the 
 Moderate party, headed by a great man, Camilla Cavoir, 
 Availing themselves of the help of diplomacy, this party 
 succeeded in overthrowing the mainstay of reaction in Italy 
 and Austria, and in conquering the peninsula by force of arms, 
 and in substituting an united state for the many ancient 
 ones it found existing. 
 
 The Moderates who, under the leadership of Cavoir, com- 
 menced from Turin, and, on his death, completed the military 
 conquest of Italy, were the Jacobins of Italy. The title of 
 Moderates, which they assumed, must not delude us. They 
 represented a cultured minority, a handful of " intellectuals," 
 who hated the mean and petty regime of political and 
 spiritual tyranny prevailing in Italy. They admired the 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 243 
 
 flourishing civilization which France and England enjoyed, 
 thanks to their more liberal institutions ; and desired to confer 
 on the Italians political and intellectual liberty, and all those 
 benefits of modern civilization, trade, railways, the telegraph, 
 which had been opposed by the former Governments. They 
 were able to confound and strengthen this desire with another 
 great political dream which then fascinated all cultured minds, 
 and which had been roused to life in Italy by the Napoleonic 
 conquests : I allude to the patriotic fever, the desire for a 
 united national Government free from foreign intervention. 
 Patriotic ambition, combined with a love of freedom and 
 admiration for the industrial civilization of the nineteenth 
 century, formed the programme of the men who made modern 
 Italy. 
 
 The Italian Jacobins, however, had to face the same diffi- 
 culty as their French brethren. The grandeur of modern 
 civilization, the necessity for liberal reforms, was only realized 
 by a small minority. Members of the nobility courageously 
 and devotedly took part in the Italian revolution, but we 
 cannot say that the nobility, as a whole, ever sided for the 
 new order of things. For the most part, their education had 
 been too narrow to permit of their being anything but 
 devoted to the ancient regime. The bourgeoisie mostly lived 
 under the protection of State and Church, in Government 
 posts, or in the ranks of the clergy ; so that, even discounting 
 the ignorance and narrow bigotry prevailing in most families, 
 we could not expect them to revolt against a system by which 
 they lived. The working classes, ignorant and boorish, only 
 wished to eat well and amuse themselves, and cared nothing 
 for parliamentary rule and liberty of thought and Press, for 
 they did not read, and their only thought was for horse- 
 racing, the game of Pallors, and the Lotto. 
 
244 MILITARISM 
 
 The good fortune of the small Jacobin minority consisted 
 in the fact that in 1848, owing to circumstances and intrigues 
 which it would take too long to enumerate, it was able to 
 seize the reins of power in Piedmont, and make that province, 
 which had adopted parliamentary institutions, the basis of 
 operations for a military conquest. 
 
 The new Piedmontese Government was strengthened by 
 those intellectual Italians who were forced to emigrate from 
 their country. It procured the assistance of France and of 
 all those declasses, discontented men, rebels, heroes, and 
 maniacs who abound in a country so fertile in great men, 
 criminals, and fanatics as Italy. But the conquest once 
 achieved, the Jacobin State found itself in the same straits as 
 in the French Revolution that is to say, they had to enforce 
 by violent means a regime of liberty on a country that was, 
 as a whole, indifferent or adverse ; to establish the minority 
 rule in the name of popular sovereignty ; to substitute their 
 own protective system for that of the Church. 
 
 In short, a Jacobin State similar to the French, and 
 initiated in a great measure from it, was established in Italy in 
 1859-60. It gave freedom to the intellectual minority weary 
 of Church tyranny ; it organized secular education ; it in- 
 stituted civil marriage ; it suppressed the convents, and in 
 many ways diminished the Church's privileges, and despoiled- 
 it of its wealth. But the middle class had for centuries been 
 accustomed to live under Church and State protection, and 
 thus the Jacobin Government was forced, for the same reasons 
 which led to similar results in France, to become its protector, 
 or it would never have found favour in a society whose 
 interests it injured by reforms, whose conscience it wounded 
 by its impiety. The same reasons, in the same example, 
 further led to the foundation of a vast civil and military 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 245 
 
 bureaucratic class.. It was thus possible to give salaries and 
 livelihoods to a large number of persons, drawn chiefly from the ]/ 
 bourgeoisie. Thus a nucleus of men interested in the main- 
 tenance of the new r/gimewais formed, and as this administra- 
 tion became the centre of universal protection, it rapidly 
 collected round itself a crowd of jobbers and mendicants whose 
 affairs the Italian Government administers to this day in the 
 interests of a small oligarchy. This protection, in some 
 respects, took the shape of an effort to introduce the new 
 Anglo-French type of civilization, to which the previous 
 Governments had always been hostile, and which the country 
 would certainly not have adopted of its own accord, so strong 
 was the spirit of conservatism, timidity, and ignorance be- 
 queathed by the old regime. Everything had to be done at 
 the instigation of the Government. It opened new roads and 
 forced the municipalities to do likewise ; it constructed public 
 works of various descriptions, established schools, telegraphic 
 communication, and railroads; it founded banks, and improved 
 the various public services, over which it expended fabulous 
 sums and contracted heavy debts. All these novelties being 
 imitated from France, the parliament finally grew to resemble 
 the French parliament, and became an instrument in the hands 
 of an oligarchy. This enabled them to turn to their own 
 advantage all the institutions of the nascent state. Thus the 
 Italian parliament appears to be modelled on the English, but 
 it is in reality similar to the French, more especially in two 
 essential characteristics which we should seek for in vain in 
 England : the interference of the Government and executive 
 in elections, and the disintegration and mobility of parlia- 
 mentary parties. 
 
 In other words, the Jacobin State in Italy consists of 
 permanent functionaries, democratically recruited from all 
 
246 MILITARISM 
 
 classes, but more particularly from the middle, and of a 
 parliamentary oligarchy which was very restricted until 1882, 
 because, till then, the rights of suffrage was accorded to very 
 few. In the first years of the new rule the electors of 
 deputies numbered only 300,000, of whom little more .than 
 a third exercised their prerogative ; so that 100,000 persons 
 were the masters of the State. Since 1882 electoral rights 
 were conceded to all those who had received elementary 
 education, but the number of electors was always small, 
 because many neglected to vote. Thus in 1897, the citizens 
 who took the trouble to inscribe their names in the voters' 
 registrar only numbered 2,120,900, and of these in the 
 general election of 1897 only 1,199,175 voted, i.e. about 
 3 per cent, of the population. 
 
 II 
 
 Now, amongst the other institutions which it was attempted 
 to introduce into Italy, along with the rest of Napoleonic 
 Caesarism, there was militarism, with which we have princi- 
 pally to deal. It was planned to give to Italy a great army 
 and a formidable navy, without any thought of the expense. 
 Two factors played a part in this policy : one ideal, the other 
 material. The ideal was the renewal of the political and 
 military greatness of Italy ; the material, the need felt by the 
 Government for the possession of a strong force to quell the 
 resistance to the new regime which, more especially in Southern 
 Italy, was much more serious than it has been represented 
 hitherto in the histories written by the victors, the need to 
 excite the sympathy of the population in the new regime by 
 attractive illusions of glory, and to find a social position for 
 \a large number of persons. 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 247 
 
 The creation of a strong army and navy led the new Govern- 
 ment to spread throughout Italian society those sentiments ; 
 and prejudices which lie at the bottom of French militarism. 
 It was necessary to rouse the educated classes to an enthu- 
 siasm for military glory and territorial expansion, to organize 
 that system of mutual intimidation which works so well in 
 France. It was a delicate moral undertaking which the 
 ruling classes had set themselves, and at which they have 
 worked with energy ever since 1860. 
 
 But this work was rendered difficult by an inherent con- 
 tradiction which greatly reduced its moral efficacy. The 
 traditions of the Italian revolution are full of a fine spirit 
 of justice, a broad humanitarianism, which manifested itself 
 practically in the plebiscites, and in that theory of respect 
 for nationality according to which it is wrong to coerce a 
 people into subjection to foreign rule. This sentiment is 
 one of the most beautiful inheritances that has come down 
 to the Italians from the revolution, and it is all the more 
 valuable for being deep-rooted and universal and belonging 
 to no party in particular. 
 
 Now, a militarism like the French cannot prosper if it does 
 not popularize the contrary principle : that victory is always 
 glorious whatever be the motive for the combat, that one 
 nation must bully and coerce other peoples. The Napoleonic 
 were able to establish the traditions on which French mili- 
 tarism depends, because they represented anything but the 
 brutal spirit of conquest. The wars of Italian independence 
 could not have this effect, because they were waged those 
 against Austria, at least in the name of international justice. 
 The principles of conquest, and those of justice between 
 nations, are diametrically opposed ; but the Italian Govern- 
 ment long wavered between the two. It dared not altogether 
 
248 MILITARISM 
 
 relinquish the principle that gave it birth, but it sought at 
 the same time to insinuate the passion for conquest in the 
 Italian mind. This contradiction was a source of military 
 weakness to Italy, which had the misfortune to be born, not 
 with an original sin, but an original virtue. An indestructible 
 spirit of international justice, widely diffused, more especially 
 amongst the educated classes, which renders impossible the 
 popularity of those bellicose-patriotic sentiments so prevalent 
 in the French bourgeoisie. 
 
 The Abyssinian War is a singular proof of Italian public 
 feeling on this point. It was the work of a few high-placed 
 military functionaries and foreign ministers, in collusion with 
 a parliamentary faction that recognized Crispi as its leader. 
 At Court, and in the ministries among bureaucrats, a "project" 
 for vast colonial conquests found favour, not because it 
 represented any national interests, but with a view to military 
 prestige, and to forward dubious speculations that should 
 give work to unoccupied officials and financiers in search of 
 lucrative investments. Parliament, which was more directly 
 in touch with the people, has always been anti-Africa, but 
 with that docility which characterises its dealings with the 
 Government, wherever private interests are not concerned, it 
 did not interfere. The people, who are always attracted by 
 military theatricality, applauded the first expedition, believing 
 it would prove innocuous and successful. But by degrees 
 the matter assumed a tragic aspect. This, however, was 
 ignored or unknown except by a few whose foresight was 
 vain. Suddenly the moment arrived when the whole nation 
 should have assisted the Government in its war against 
 Abyssinia. But at that moment the country felt that it 
 lacked strength for several reasons, amongst others, because 
 the undertaking roused scruples in the minds of many, the 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 249 
 
 result of those liberal traditions in the name of which United 
 Italy had been created. 
 
 The fate of the campaign was not even known, owing to 
 the rigour with which the Government enforced silence on its 
 adversaries. Hence a continual hesitation perplexed the 
 minds of the public. This invasion of a foreign country, 
 whether barbarous or not, was repugnant to a large majority ; 
 but the disgust of the peace faction would possibly have been 
 less evident if matters had gone well. It naturally grew 
 stronger after the crushing defeat, and contributed towards 
 compelling the Government to abandon all ideas of re- 
 conquest. 
 
 Another reason why the Italian Jacobin Government did 
 not succeed in popularizing the passion for military glory 
 among the upper classes, was the poverty of military traditions 
 in Italy. 
 
 The military history of France, more especially in our 
 century, is of grand proportions, and furnishes copious 
 material for the formation of a military reputation. The 
 French do not merely feed their military fervour with the 
 great records of national history ; each family has its own 
 recollections : grandfathers and great-grandfathers who fought 
 under Napoleon I., fathers, uncles, and relations who took 
 part in the Italian wars of 1859, in the Mexican campaign, 
 in the defences of 1870, a whole immense archive of family 
 traditions, which are bequeathed from father to son, and 
 which reanimates in young men the military passion of their 
 fathers. In Italy, on the contrary, the history of the 
 risorgunento is relatively poor in heroic deeds, because the 
 revolution was made as circumstances permitted, i.e. much 
 more by diplomatic manoeuvres than by cannonades. The 
 year 1859 was not an epoch of great conquests and wars 
 
250 MILITARISM 
 
 such as those which disturbed the early years of the century. 
 Such would have convulsed European society too profoundly, 
 and the Powers would not permit Italy to turn the world 
 upside down. The only truly great and terrible war would 
 have been that of 1859, if it had had its full evolution ending 
 with the conquest of Vienna. But that was cut short at 
 its best point. In the other wars, those of 1860 and 1861 
 not excepted, the force of arms was always combined with 
 diplomatic manoeuvres and the underground work of corrup- 
 tion. But diplomatic ability, combined with patience and good 
 luck, is capable of founding a State, not of establishing a 
 warlike reputation. This can only arise from great victorious 
 wars generating in the people a passion for military glory, 
 and such wars were no longer possible in the years that saw 
 the establishment of Italian unity. 
 
 Ill 
 
 But all these were secondary causes, which do not entirely 
 explain the military weakness of contemporary Italy. The 
 tragic history of the African campaign has demonstrated the 
 fact that Italy lacks the strength to resist a long and painful 
 aggressive war. Look at France. Twenty-seven years ago, 
 both reason and humanity counselled peace after Sedan. 
 And yet, if the peace had then been concluded, the military 
 pride of the people would have received a severe shock, while 
 the desperate resistance which followed the first decisive 
 repulses, contributed to save the military sentiments of the 
 public from that dejection which follows on defeat. Now, 
 this resistance was possible because a minority of madmen 
 had the courage to enforce it, at the cost of terrible cruelty 
 to the country which was in need of peace, urging on by 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 251 
 
 martial trials and death sentences the forcibly recruited 
 armies. Indeed, the army, during this inhuman cruel effort, 
 was finally seized with a species of collective homicidal mania, 
 that lasted several months, whose most terrible manifestation 
 was the suppression of the Commune. Those were terrible 
 days of bloodshed, during which every person lived in such a 
 state of sanguinary excitement that no more was thought of 
 shooting a man than we should think of dealing him a blow. 
 If the Italian Government had possessed the cruel energy 
 which the French displayed in similar emergencies, it would, 
 after Abba Carima, have forcibly repressed the demonstra- 
 tions in Rome and Milan ; it would have threatened the most 
 turbulent provtnces with siege ; it would have despatched a 
 great army to Africa, and severely applied all the penalties 
 of the penal code to any soldier who did not properly control 
 his reluctance ; it would have had no scruples about ruining 
 the country in order to raise the necessary funds. In short, 
 it would have tried to quell the feelings of the nation by 
 brute force. Instead, the Government hastened to reassure 
 the country by concluding peace, and the nation renounced 
 without a pang all hopes of revenge. Nothing is so detested 
 and unpopular in Italy as the subject of Africa. The thought 
 of another war horrifies the people to such an extent that the 
 little coteries of soldiers and politicians who, in their hearts, 
 sigh after another campaign, dare not manifest their ideas, 
 however feebly, despite the fact that Italy is also one of 
 those countries where the desires of the majority are less 
 considered than those of the ruling oligarchy. 
 
 The real cause of the weakness of Italian militarism 
 must be sought in the weakness of its Jacobin Government. |\| 
 This Jacobin State did riot find in Italy the same favourable 
 conditions as in France. Hence what were tolerable evils in 
 
252 MILITARISM 
 
 France, in Italy became terrible crises which weaken the 
 country and render its future uncertain and perilous. No 
 ordinarily sane politician believes himself to be omnipotent, 
 and yet nearly all act as though this were their opinion. No 
 policy or institution can be created out of nothing. Like 
 chemical compound, or works of art, they must be drawn 
 from certain materials or necessary elements, without which 
 all creative force is futile. The majority of political errors 
 arise from the fact that men do not realize that, without 
 certain human intellectual and moral elements, it is as im- 
 possible to create certain institutions or carry out certain 
 policies, as it is impossible to make a lamp burn without 
 oil. This is the case of latter-day Italy. A small group 
 of politicians dream of military glory without observing that, 
 not only the social elements necessary to build up a vigorous 
 militarism are lacking, but that the Government has scarcely 
 sufficient strength left to drag on its existence. They have 
 always kept their eyes fixed on French example, and imitated 
 these, but without noticing that the conditions of Italy were 
 very different from those of France. 
 
 IV 
 
 The superior wealth of France is one of the many reasons 
 why militarism and the Jacobin Government are more pros- 
 perous there than in Italy. We have seen that the Jacobin 
 State is essentially wasteful ; that it inevitably squanders 
 a large part of its wealth in useless expenditure, in subsidies, 
 bounties, protections, arms, and wars ; that it is compelled 
 continually to increase taxes. We can a priori affirm that 
 a rich country like France is better able to support the 
 extravagance of its Government than a poorer one. France 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 253 
 
 consists of a vast plain protected by two mountain-chains, which 
 are to her like water reservoires, from whose summits the ice 
 constantly melts to irrigate the fertile land. She is warmed 
 by a sun which shines on her from a safe distance, without 
 being fierce enough to scorch her, or so pallid as to freeze. 
 She is covered with ancient and beautiful towns, densely 
 populated by a conservative people deeply imbued with the 
 mystical oriental spirit of Catholicism, hard and ferocious at 
 bottom, but clever, industrious, and energetic. She looks out 
 on the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, is situated in the 
 centre of Europe so as to be almost its heart. By land and 
 sea her frontiers touch those of nearly every other European 
 country Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, England, 
 and Spain. What a magnificent position whence to carry 
 on all manner of commerce and industries, and to exercise 
 a powerful influence over European society ! Further, her 
 traditions of civilization are more deep-rooted and ancient 
 than in any other European country with the exception of 
 Greece and Italy. Consequently, France was able to direct 
 the democratic and Jacobin movement which has played such 
 an important part in the social and political history of the 
 century, during the whole of which she has, politically and 
 intellectually, been at the head of Europe Prussia, England, 
 and Russia not excepted whilst, at the same time, enriching 
 herself. 
 
 Italy, on the other hand, is a much less fertile land. 
 She is covered with rugged mountains which men have only 
 succeeded in inhabiting at the cost of immense labour. The 
 increase of population necessitated the cutting down of all 
 the mountain forests. But the forests once destroyed, the 
 mountain torrents poured down into the valleys, flooding 
 and ruining. In those parts of the country which do not 
 
254 MILITARISM 
 
 suffer from this scourge, such as Southern Italy and Sicily, 
 there is a lack of water, the rivers are few and poor, the sun 
 does not warm and fertilize, but scorches. Drought is the 
 terrible foe of agriculture. Few countries, in short, are as 
 badly off for water as Italy. The only part of the country 
 well adapted to agriculture is the valley of the Po. Nor is the 
 position of Italy in Europe so favourable as that of France. 
 It is more isolated, and was still more so during the first half 
 of the century, before the opening of the Suez Canal, and 
 when relations with the Orient had not the importance they 
 now have. Italy looks out on that species of internal court- 
 yard of civilization, the Mediterranean ; from no side does 
 she survey the immense Atlantic, now traversed by the high- 
 roads of the human race. To sum up in a few words, the 
 value of Italy is now calculated at 55 milliard francs, or 
 a quarter of the sum at which France is estimated. 
 
 For this reason Italy would not have been able to tolerate, 
 with French facility, the same degree of waste such as a 
 Jacobin State entails, had this waste been of equal intensity 
 and proportion. But such was not the case. This Jacobin 
 Government was constituted in a much more dangerous way 
 in Italy, and disastrous for its economic future. In France it 
 was established at the end of last century, before the great 
 discoveries and inventions of modern civilization had been 
 made, when civilization was less costly and more simple. 
 Thus the State was able to introduce and develop modern 
 civilization under its protection, by degrees, as industrial 
 progress advanced. In Italy, on the contrary, the ancient 
 Governments had kept the country in a state of barbarism, so 
 that when the new Government came into power it had to 
 make up for lost time, and to introduce rapidly that civiliza- 
 tion which in France had slowly penetrated in the course of 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 255 
 
 half a century. But these sudden changes, introduced by a 
 new State, in the midst of an indifferent or hostile country, 
 demanded immense capital, which was procured partly by 
 loans, partly by increase of taxation. To give an idea of the 
 enormous sums which the new civilization cost to Italy, it 
 suffices to say that the expenditure of the Italian Governments, 
 anterior to 1860, amounted to little more than 500 million francs, 
 and that after thirty-six years' continual increase it reached, in 
 1896, the sum of 1,830,753,509 francs. From the 525 million 
 francs which public expenditure reached previous to 1860, in 
 1 863 it had reached 900 millions ; in 1 87 1 it had already reached 
 one milliard and 250 millions, which increased to nearly one 
 milliard and 518 millions of francs in 1881, to rise to one 
 milliard and 936 millions in 1 888. Since then, the expenditure 
 vacillates between 1700 and 1800 millions. These increases 
 naturally represent in part the interest of the loans borrowed, 
 which were gigantic, not counting the period from 1860-70, 
 which was an epoch of war necessary to the unification of 
 Italy. The public debt, which in 1871 stood at 9 milliard 
 francs, had increased in 1897 to something more than 13 
 milliards a debt of 4000 million francs contracted during 
 twenty-six years of peace ! If we add to this increasing expen- 
 diture and debt of the State those of the communes, which 
 have also notably augmented, we can gather some idea of the 
 waste of money which, followed in Italy on the foundation of 
 the Jacobin State. 
 
 V 
 
 Such immense expenditure would have been bad for the 
 country even had it been made wisely, with the sole object of 
 rapidly civilizing Italy. But the Jacobin Government was 
 
256 MILITARISM 
 
 little capable of performing this task judiciously and economi- 
 cally. It was composed, as we have seen, of a bureaucracy 
 imitated from the French and of a parliamentary oligarchy ; 
 but the bureaucracy, recruited in haste from diverse elements, 
 was still less suited than the French to fulfil its task with 
 economy and perfection. The parliament was at first led by 
 a small number of educated, honest, and wise men, who had 
 grown up under the influence of Cavour, and who knew how 
 to temper the faults and errors of a revolutionary Government. 
 But this flite disappeared with time, and the cultured classes 
 were unable to find others to replace it. An idea has survived 
 in the Italian middle class a heritage from the former pro- 
 tective Governments that the only decent position that can 
 be held by the son of a not wealthy family is some Govern- 
 i/ ment post, and that the Government is something sublime 
 and superior to ordinary men, which it is madness to oppose 
 or criticize. The Oriental idea of the sanctity of authority, 
 ^inherited by the Church from the Roman Empire, has sur- 
 vived through the middle ages to our own times. The 
 middle class passively accepted the new Government as it had 
 accepted its predecessors. Any policy which favoured the 
 increase of expenditure, employment, and public works was 
 popular. It was popular with the workers, who thought it 
 would be good for work ; with the middle class, for whom 
 new posts were thus created ; with the higher classes, who, in 
 the extensive State loans, saw a good investment for their 
 money. These classes were timid, unaccustomed to business, 
 and disinclined to run any risk, like all well-to-do people who 
 live under a protective system ; they therefore found it con- 
 venient to make State loans. Thus, after 1882, when the right 
 of suffrage was extended, it sufficed for an ambitious man to 
 promise his electors that he would make the Government 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 257 
 
 spend a lot of money to their advantage in order to get 
 returned. Thus the Italian parliament, more particularly 
 after 1878, became filled with ambitious men of mediocre 
 intelligence, and too often rogues, who were powerful because 
 they knew how to procure, not the well-being of the public, 
 but the transitory well-being of their coterie and friends. 
 
 In this manner, public opinion in Italy can exercise no con- 
 trol over expenditure. It is a well-known fact that military 
 expenditure is unproductive, and leads to the destruction of 
 capital, because the money invested in a fortress or a barrack 
 is consumed for ever, and has not the power of reproduction 
 like that invested in a prosperous business. Therefore, it is 
 evident that a poor country should avoid such expenditure, 
 unless it seeks its own ruin. And yet, by playing on the 
 ignorance and pusillanimity of the parliamentary oligarchy, 
 the heads of the Italian army easily managed to persuade the 
 Government to augment, beyond the bounds of all reason, 
 the military expenses of the State, and to spend, in twenty-six 
 years (from 1871-97), 8 milliard and 223 million francs on 
 the army and navy, an enormous waste of capital to a 
 country whose total wealth is reckoned at 55 milliards ! 
 
 Now, this was not all. Money was spent equally lavishly 
 and foolishly on public works, railroads more especially, by 
 whose construction many contractors enriched themselves, 
 through resorting to all manner of fraudulent tricks. It 
 suffices to cite, as an example, that certain railways which 
 the contractors had agreed to build for 202 million francs, in 
 consequence of various intrigues in the end cost 352 millions 
 to the State. 
 
 The nation, however, paid little attention to this waste, 
 living happily in the midst of the abundance which so much 
 money spent by the State diffused, without reflecting that 
 
 R 
 
258 MILITARISM 
 
 such prosperity must naturally be of a transitory character, 
 and that the Government could not long continue such 
 liberality. The better part of the public wealth was spent 
 by the State on these undertakings, and very little remained 
 for the development of national commerce and industry. 
 The result was that while schools, roads, and railways 
 increased, production flagged ; and this led to heavier 
 taxation. Besides State loans, a large proportion of Italian 
 capital, after 1860, was spent in the cultivation of the 
 monastic lands, which the monks had kept most negligently, 
 in the purchase and untimbering of mountain forests, and 
 the cultivation of unwooded land. Agricultural investments 
 were regarded as safer than hazardous industrial under- 
 takings, in a land where the conservative spirit is strong, 
 and in which, since three centuries, agriculture was found 
 the basis of all riches. But, unfortunately, these agricultural 
 investments proved on trial to be even more dangerous, 
 because fifteen years later agricultural products began to 
 diminish in value, and more especially cereals, owing to the 
 cultivation of new continents and countries. 
 
 VI 
 
 Increase in population must be added to the former 
 evils. In 1881 the Italian population numbered less than 
 29 millions; in 1891 it had increased to 31 and a half millions. 
 In France the decrease of population is much deplored, and 
 its cause is earnestly inquired into. Few seem to perceive 
 that the cause lies in the universal State protection applied 
 by the French State to society. Where the middle class, 
 instead of depending for its livelihood on some useful pro- 
 ductive pursuit, lives principally on the favours of a public 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 259 
 
 body, stability of population is an advantage, because there 
 the population does not augment, so neither do those who 
 demand its favours and protection, and consequently the 
 lucky minority who benefit by it are better off. The Church 
 fully realizes this, and it therefore made celibacy a necessary 
 condition to its priests and monks. Prudent Malthusian 
 practises take the place of celibacy with those favoured by 
 the State. Moreover, as the Jacobin Government is by its 
 nature a dissipater and destroyer of wealth, sterility by all 
 classes is advantageous to the society it governs, for the 
 country is forced to make up by private economy for the 
 extravagance of the administration. In France and Italy 
 domestic economy is much greater than in England ; more 
 especially in France, where, amongst other economies, 
 economy [in children is strictly observed. France borrows 
 many of the workers, necessary to the growing development 
 of civilization, from neighbouring countries, Italy more 
 especially ; and thus other lands have to bear the expenses 
 of rearing these labourers, whom France receives ready to 
 render service. Consequently, there exist in France only 
 a very small number of unemployed. 
 
 In any case, the most important point is that the middle 
 class does not augment in France, therefore the State is not 
 constantly forced to satisfy increasing demands for employ- 
 ment and favours. In Italy, with the constitutions of the 
 kingdom, on the contrary, there sprung into being an ex- 
 tensive bureaucracy ; but this class was no more economical 
 in its prolific energies than with the public funds. Almost 
 every one of these middle-class families generated numerous 
 sons, whom their fathers set to study, so that they might fill 
 official posts, whilst many families of the lower bourgeoisie 
 aimed at similar positions for their children. This fecundity 
 
260 MILITARISM' 
 
 resulted in the consumption of the great part of the savings 
 of middle-class families, which are spent in educational ex- 
 penses, and by diminishing their reserves it ended in 
 impoverishing them, and in the same ratio the chances of 
 rinding employment for their sons diminished. For twenty- 
 five years the Italian Government has been continually multi- 
 plying official posts ; it has created regiments, schools, 
 divisions, manufactured railways ; the communes have found 
 new jobs for their officials, and augmented the number of 
 public services; but with the increase of bureaucratic ex- 
 penses on the one hand, and the waste of public funds on 
 the other, the finances of both State and municipalities 
 came to an end, and they were forced to receive no more 
 functionaries. 
 
 When the fountains of Government abundance began to 
 dry up, when, through lack of funds and the impossibility of 
 negotiating fresh loans, the State was forced to check the 
 extension of the bureaucracy, and to put a stop to public 
 works, then, and then only, did the Italians realize what it 
 meant to have allowed themselves so carelessly to be made 
 one of the most heavily taxed nations in the world. The 
 average of State expenses (apart from those that are purely 
 communal) stood at 1821 million francs from 1890 to 1895, 
 whilst the French was 3665 millions, the English 2266 
 millions, the Belgian 320 millions. Now, as the value of 
 Italy is calculated at 55 milliard francs, while that of France 
 is reckoned at 225, that of England 270, and that of Belgium 
 at 34 milliards, the Italians find themselves in the condition 
 that the French would if they had to pay 7449 milliards 
 in taxes, the English if they paid 8939 milliards, and 
 Belgium if its taxation amounted to 8124 milliards. It is 
 easy to conceive what a terrible drag on industry such 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 2bl 
 
 gigantic taxation must be. The nation's capacity for con- 
 sumption is necessarily much reduced by these fearful taxes, 
 which every year withdraw an immense amount of wealth 
 from useful employment to pay huge military expenses. 
 And consumption naturally limits production, since what 
 object is there in producing what cannot be consumed ? 
 When the number of the bureaucracy was complete, and 
 the diminution of public works had thrown innumerable 
 workers and middle-class youths out of employment, it 
 proved difficult to them to obtain occupation in private 
 industries, because the enormous taxation had checked 
 their development. 
 
 To this must be added a final scourge : protectionism. 
 Availing themselves of the ignorance of the Italian public, 
 who understand economic problems still less than the French, 
 a small number of interested men in 1887 deluded the Parlia- 
 ment, by means of all manner of intrigues, to vote for a new 
 customs tariff, which replaced the free-trade system then 
 prevalent in Italy by an exaggerated regime of protectionism. 
 The old fable of protecting national industries was employed 
 to persuade opponents that this project was a means of 
 enriching the country. But its real effects were the inevitable 
 ones of protection, the impoverishment of the masses, which 
 grew worse in Italy than elsewhere, for this class had been 
 so very poor to start with. Protection, moreover, by 
 impeding or rendering impracticable the exportation of 
 agricultural produce, reduced the value of exportable goods 
 (wine, oil, fruit, cereals), and thus it artificially rendered the 
 investment of large capital in land still less profitable. 
 Protection, in short, though it may have benefited a few 
 industries, increased the demand, and raised the price of 
 most manufactures, just as the earnings of the middle class 
 
262 MILITARISM 
 
 diminished ; so that though it made millionaires of a few 
 fortunate men, and conceded a few brief years of Well-being 
 to the working population of certain industrial districts, it 
 rendered the conditions of the middle class and the multitude 
 still more miserable. 
 
 VII 
 
 The increase in taxation to which the increase in the wealth 
 of the country did not correspond, careless destruction of 
 capital, protection, augmentation of population, impoverish- 
 ment of agriculture, brought about the crisis which was fatal 
 in a country where one of the three factors of production, 
 men, continually increase ; the second, land, remains station- 
 ary ; and the third, money > diminishes, being either destroyed 
 or. squandered. Work, in consequence, is miserably paid. 
 Country labourers work, more especially in the rice districts, 
 for wages under a franc a day. Small proprietors, it is cal- 
 culated, rarely earn so much as 40 a year. In the little 
 towns, where hands are plentiful, there are numbers of men 
 and women who willingly work at the weaving industry four- 
 teen hours a day, for from i to 2 francs per diem. In large 
 towns and in trades which demand a higher grade of instruc- 
 tion, a wage of 3.50 francs a day is considered quite princely. 
 Very few workers earn as much as 5 francs a day, and the 
 luckiest are those who succeed in obtaining employment in 
 the Government arsenals and in the great railway offices, 
 where higher salaries are given, and where men cannot be 
 dismissed when work is lacking. 
 
 Yet worse is the condition of the middle class. The liberal 
 professions are ill-paid on account of the keen competition ; 
 intellectual ones are not paid at all. Crowds of doctors and 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 263 
 
 barristers squabble over patients and clients ; lawyers employ 
 all manner of tricks and ruses to multiply disputes, being more 
 fortunate in this respect than doctors, who cannot make men 
 ill by artificial means, in order to be able to cure them after- 
 wards. Thus, with the exception of a few lucky men who 
 succeed in monopolizing the rare rich clients, the majority 
 who attend the class of bourgeoisie and workers, that are 
 growing poorer year by year, have to content themselves with 
 even poorer remuneration. In large towns excellent young 
 doctors are to be found who accept 50 centimes for a visit, 
 and the most capable, those who consider themselves highly 
 privileged, never ask more than 2.50 or 3 francs. The 
 richest newspapers rarely pay more than 25 or 30 francs for 
 an article, and then it must be by some well-known man, 
 otherwise it is paid 20, 15, 10, or even 5 francs. For 100 
 francs any publisher can find a person to translate a huge 
 octavo volume on political economy or medicine from some 
 foreign language. Young ladies can receive instruction in 
 the pianoforte for 50 centimes a lesson. The best paid 
 schoolmasters receive 2000 francs, but the number of these 
 are few; they very rarely are paid more than 750 or 800 
 francs. In a city like Turin there is a certain set of young 
 teachers who give lessons every day for 100 francs a year ! 
 University professors rarely earn more than 2000 francs. 
 They are divided into various classes, of which the best paid 
 receive 5000 francs a year, but the others receive salaries 
 varying between a minimum of 1200 to a maximum of 3500 
 francs. A lieutenant in the Italian army receives 5 francs 
 a day, a captain less than 10. The higher officials are also 
 relatively poorly paid. The highest salary a judge can receive 
 is 3500 francs. The president of the Court of Cassation, who 
 is the highest magistrate in the land, receives 15,000 francs, 
 
264 MILITARISM 
 
 a State councillor 9000 francs. The general director of a 
 ministry, who is the highest permanent functionary after the 
 president and vice-president, receives 12,000 francs. 
 
 VIII 
 
 The ultimate result of this state of things is that in Italy 
 the Jacobin Government has reached such a degree of weak- 
 ness that it scarcely manages to drag on. In France the 
 State is weakened by many vices and contradictions, but the 
 middle class, the better educated portion more especially, has 
 a reserve of moral energy. One portion of the French 
 population is really enthusiastic for the ideal of the military 
 and political supremacy of their nation, another for the great 
 liberal and democratic principles of the Revolution. Let an 
 unfortunate war, like that of 1870, come to pass, or a dark 
 and tragic history of injustice and horror commence with 
 the condemnation of an innocent man, and a large number 
 of energetic and generous persons are found to stir up the 
 public conscience. The military formula of the national 
 - honour and the national flag, the formula of the Revolution, 
 Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity, are still, to a certain 
 extent, living things to educated France, and the Government 
 derives thence considerable strength. Trouble begins, how- 
 ever, when the military and revolutionary formulas are at 
 variance. Here also the Jacobin State can depend, with a 
 fair degree of certainty, on its bureaucracy, which served 
 the Empire as faithfully as it served the Monarchy and the 
 Republic, but which believes firmly in the religion of the 
 army and the French Revolution. 
 
 But this state of the French mind is not due to any quality 
 innate in the people, but in a great measure to the social 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK AV ITALY 265 
 
 conditions of France, more especially to the superior remu- 
 neration' of labour, more particularly in the middle class. We 
 have already stated that an essential social condition on 
 which the morality of a community depends is the remunera- 
 tion of labour. Where man's labour is badly paid, where the 
 educated classes the backbone of modern society are com- 
 pelled to work hard for a wretched pittance, ideal energy 
 slackens ; men abandon themselves to pessimistic indifference, 
 and seek consolation in exaggerated mysticism. And thus it 
 happens that the educated class in Italy, disgusted at the 
 wretched remuneration they receive for their work, weary of 
 the hard labour they are forced to endure in order to exist, 
 irritated at their own squalid existence, give themselves up to 
 a universal laissez faire, lack the energy to trouble themselves 
 about anything outside of the sufferings and bitterness of their 
 daily life, and grow indifferent to national interests. The 
 honour of the flag ! The absurdities which have taken "place 
 in France on account of this phrase would never have been 
 possible in Italy. After the battle of Adna the military 
 party was compelled to abandon any idea of revenge, for 
 otherwise it ran the risk of creating a revolution. Even to- 
 day the fate of the monarchy depends to a certain extent on 
 the future aspect of the African policy. The country wishes 
 for peace, and cares little about great international questions. 
 It does not trouble itself in the least about the problem of the 
 East, or the equilibrium of the Mediterranean. It has no 
 ambition to share in the division of China. In no country, 
 perhaps, is there so little interest displayed in international 
 problems. 
 
 In short, the educated classes have sunk deeper than ever 
 into that condition of political inertia which was always natural 
 to the Italian bourgeoisie, and which is the sad inheritance 
 
266 MILITARISM 
 
 from past Governments. So long as the Government pos- 
 sessed money to spend, this class took some slight interest in 
 the State. Now that they have nothing to hope from it, they 
 abandon it to its own devices. We have already seen that 
 only a small proportion (three per cent, of the population) take 
 part in the elections, and we must add that these consist 
 chiefly of men in humble positions, and that abstention from 
 voting is much more general in large rich cities, such as Milan, 
 than in country districts. The fact is, that the elections are 
 carried on almost entirely by small coteries of ambitious men, 
 who naturally recruit their partisans principally from among 
 the ignorant workers, whom they bribe to go to the ballot, 
 while educated men abstain from voting out of indifference or 
 disgust. This abstention is rendered still more general by 
 the Catholics, who have always preached indifference to State 
 politics in the hope of rendering matters intolerably difficult. 
 The Catholic party is very strong, and is led by the High 
 Church prelates, who are clever and ambitious, men who hope 
 to witness the return of the good old days when society could 
 not get on without them. Have they any precise political 
 ideas or programme ? None, beyond that of exploiting the 
 Jacobin Government in so far as it can be of use to them, and 
 of creating difficulties for it by preaching abstention from 
 the ballot. Thus the followers of the Catholic party are not 
 above accepting Government posts and investing their savings 
 in Government funds. Indeed, the richest section of the party, 
 which consists of nobles and great land-owners, has succeeded 
 in obtaining from the hated Government protection for corn 
 just when its price was going down in the American markets. 
 But the Catholics have never agreed to recognize the Govern- 
 ment they exploit. 
 
 Difficulties are thus ever on the increase, because the 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 267 
 
 indifference of the middle class is still the least danger which 
 threatens the Jacobin State in Italy. A large proportion of 
 the middle class, and even of the bureaucracy, is, in fact, grow- i 
 ing hostile to the Government. The Government can depend 
 on the bureaucracy in France ; in Italy it cannot. Here many 
 officials, dissatisfied with their careers, which are blighted by 
 the poverty of the State, burdened with families and in debt, 
 frequently disgusted by the injustice to which they are 
 subjected, and the intrigues necessary for promotion, hate the 
 Government they serve. In the ranks of the bureaucracy there 
 are many who profess republican-socialist ideas. In political 
 elections in large towns it has been observed that socialist 
 candidates run a better chance of getting elected in the districts 
 inhabited by Government officials and the educated classes 
 generally. Let us add to this, disaffection of another order, 
 but equally grave, against the parliamentary oligarchy. That 
 portion of the middle class which has received a university 
 education and represents the cultured Italy of to-day, by 
 reason of its poverty and the hard work to which it is con- 
 demned in order to live if it follows a liberal profession, if 
 it enters the bureaucracy is excluded from taking any part 
 in politics. Thus parliament grows ever fuller of rich noodles 
 who look upon politics as a species of sport, and of ambitious 
 intriguers, who see in it only a means of satisfying their vanity 
 and private interests. What greater dilemma could one 
 conceive for a country than for its enlightened men to be 
 condemned to inertia whilst perceiving the evil and its cause 
 and remedy ; and for education, which should be a fountain 
 of courage and faith for State reforms, to be only another 
 ground for discouragement, and to afford merely the vain 
 knowledge of an apparently incurable evil ? 
 
 In the midst of this universal indifference with regard to 
 
268 MILITARISM 
 
 politics, one party only prospers, and that is the socialist. 
 The only seriously organized party which knows how to keep 
 ambitious men and intriguers at bay is the socialist, which 
 is led by intelligent and educated men. It organizes the 
 workers and collects the votes of the discontented members 
 of the middle class, meeting everywhere with a success which, 
 not without cause, alarms the Government. The elector 
 frequently has to choose between two candidates : the one a 
 socialist, the other an ignorant and dishonest rogue. How 
 is he to act ? Many belonging to the upper classes abstain ; 
 others, in disgust and despair, vote for the socialist. We can 
 easily understand how all this favours the socialist and per- 
 plexes the Government. But the socialist party, in its turn, 
 although it is strong, owing to the weakness of its rivals, is 
 undermined by an indissoluble contradiction. Is it, or is it 
 not, a revolutionary party ? Equally good arguments could 
 be found to prove either of the two hypothesis, because the 
 true nature of the party is very ambiguous. It knows that 
 the sympathy it inspires in the cultured classes is due to the 
 fact that it is considered solely as a party of reform, which 
 desires to ameliorate the existing Government, not as a 
 party which desires at an early date to upset property and 
 society. It therefore makes 'a great point of insisting on 
 its evolutionary character. But another branch of the 
 party conceives socialism in a far more revolutionary light, 
 which affrights the Government, just as the evolutionary 
 faction assuage the intellectual minority who intrigue against 
 the Government. 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK IN ITALY 269 
 
 IX 
 
 Is it difficult now to understand the reason of the bank- 
 ruptcy of Italian militarism ? The Jacobin State, which is 
 like the scaffolding of militarism, is too weak in Italy. This 
 Government rests on three pillars : military prestige which 
 arises from fortunate wars ; money ; and the material strength 
 of the army. In France, the State still possesses much money, 
 although less, perhaps, than at one period ; a military prestige 
 which, though somewhat antiquated, is still considerable ; and 
 a strong army. Italy no longer possesses either military \ . 
 prestige or money ; the army alone remains. 
 
 Surrounded by the indifference of that portion of society 
 which it chiefly benefits, pursued by the discontent of another 
 class which it oppresses, not master of its own bureaucracy, ^ 
 poor in funds, opposed by some as impious and an enemy of 
 the Pope, by others as being corrupt, wasteful, having 
 exhausted all the resources of taxation, with a population so 
 miserably impecunious that a rise in the price of bread, such 
 as that which took place in 1898, reduced large numbers to 
 the verge of starvation and drove them to rebellion the 
 Jacobin Government is too much in need of the army to <^-(J 
 maintain internal order to undertake great foreign wars. In 
 the social crisis which convulses Italy, militarism is altering 
 in character and object. It has become a State weapon for 
 internal defence. The Jacobin Government, by its constitu- 
 tion and origin, is obliged to concede to the country a certain 
 degree of intellectual liberty ; it cannot rule despotically like 
 the Russian. In order to suppress and efface the tradition of 
 liberty which it itself introduced into the Italian State, it 
 would need to be very strong. On the other hand, if it were 
 
270 MILITARISM 
 
 thus strong it would have no more need than the French to 
 suppress the liberties of press, speech, and meeting. At the 
 same time it has to contrive so that this regime of freedom 
 should not prove too favourable to its enemies. In this 
 state of things we perceive the contradictory character of the 
 Italian Government. It has established a regime of liberty 
 j/based on periodical epochs of military dictatorship. The 
 Italian army has become the tool of these intermittent 
 dictatorships, which grow more and more necessary to protect 
 the State against those periodical crises to which it is falling 
 a victim. The first great experiment of this order was made 
 in the spring of 1898, when, owing to the famine riots, half 
 of Italy was declared in a state of siege, the constitution 
 suspended, military law declared, and the officers charged to 
 decimate the ranks of the opposition (the socialists and 
 clerical more especially) by a series of arbitrary trials whose 
 absurdity and extravagance it would be difficult to imagine. 
 Criminals, vagabonds, honest workmen, loyal and courageous 
 writers, priests, monks, even merchants, political men, and 
 deputies more than 5000 men in all were, in the course of 
 two months, brought before the military tribunals, tried, and 
 condemned in hot haste, without any preliminary examination, 
 frequently condemned for offences not written in the penal 
 code to punishments not assigned there. Then by slow 
 degrees things resumed their natural course, and the regime 
 of semi-liberty which Italy enjoys by degrees returned. The 
 unjust sentences of the courts-martial are gradually cancelled 
 by royal pardons and amnesties, for which the excuses are 
 found in regal birthdays, and, once all the men are liberated, 
 national life will return to its pristine calm until the next 
 convulsion. 
 
 Until several important reforms will have been made, the 
 
THE MILITARY OUTLOOK SA f ITALY 271 
 
 Italian Government will be compelled periodically to rouse 
 itself from its habitual apathy to these attacks of dictatorial 
 cruelty, during which it will endeavour to frighten its enemies, 
 red and black, socialist and clerical, threatening them with 
 the sword which twenty-five years ago it forged, according to its 
 own saying, in order to spill foreign blood. For this reason we 
 need not fear that the peace of Europe will be disturbed by 
 Italy. Nevertheless, any initiative for partial disarmament, 
 whether it come from the Pope, the Czar, or any other 
 powerful personage, will always meet with a cold or hostile 
 reception, whether open or covert, from the Italian Govern- 
 ment. Although it has no longer any desire to wage war, - 
 neither does it wish to discontent the military class, of whom 
 it stands in need periodically to strike and weaken its 
 enemies in order to prolong its own infirm existence, and 
 to postpone, as long as it may, the reforms necessary to its 
 cure. 
 
MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND 
 GERMANY 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND GERMANY 
 
 I 
 
 FRANCE is a bellicose country, Germany a military : herein 
 lies the essential difference between the two hostile and rival 
 nations. 
 
 If we disregard the number of soldiers each nation keeps 
 under arms, and consider only the popularity of the ideas and 
 sentiments of military glory that prevail among the educated 
 classes of the respective countries, the Germans are immedi- 
 ately found to be less warlike than the French. The barrack 
 of Germany, the country in which military traditions are 
 oldest and strongest, is Prussia ; but though the whole of 
 Prussian society looks as though it had been moulded in a 
 barrack, the bellicose spirit in the upper and middle classes is, 
 and was always, feeble. From Frederick the Great to Bismarck, 
 Prussia only fought in the wars against Napoleon. Not much 
 for a truly bellicose nation which desired to reap military 
 trophies. From 1815 to 1863 Prussia stood aside, contenting 
 herself with a humble position that was somewhat humiliating 
 at times, as, for instance, under William and Frederick IV., 
 when it tolerated the public interference of Tzar Nicholas I. 
 with its home politics. How, then, would it be possible to 
 affirm that a people, which allowed its Government so to 
 
 S 2 
 
276 MILITARISM 
 
 debase national dignity, possessed any great passion for 
 military glory ? 
 
 Bismarck's new policy became necessary and herein lies 
 one of his principal merits in order to reanimate by some 
 dignified sentiment the debased soul, first of the Prussians, and 
 afterwards of the Germans. But Bismarck was a cause of alarm 
 to all to the Prussian nobility, and in a yet greater degree 
 to the people, so frightened were these timid folk at his bold 
 and aggressive rule. Thus he was forced to lead them all by 
 force court and parliament, nobility and people to the war 
 of 1866, the only war absolutely necessary to the social 
 progress of Germany, the great political creation of Bismarck. 
 But this, too, was not a war of conquest, Its real object was 
 to strengthen the union of the various German States, and 
 to exclude Austria from the German Confederation that 
 country without original character, without nationality, with- 
 out any political reputation beyond intrigues, makeshifts, and 
 diplomatic tricks. Had the German States always been com- 
 pelled to tolerate the interference of this mean and petty 
 government, they would never have been able to manage their 
 affairs with that liberty which is indispensable to any real 
 progress. And yet the German people were actively hostile to 
 this war, which was so necessary in order to cut the Gordian 
 knot of diplomatic and political problems, so feeble were their 
 warlike tendencies. 
 
 A still more remarkable indication of public feeling consists 
 in the fact that the Germans never allowed themselves to be 
 inebriated by their victories in 1870. The unexpected great- 
 ness of the triumph did not suffice to extinguish the old" love 
 of peace and tranquillity. At first it seemed to rouse a passion 
 for war in the people ; but this rapidly dispersed in smoke, 
 despite Bismarck's efforts to fan this commencement of fire. 
 
MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND GERMANY 2J? 
 
 No unprejudiced person travelling in Germany can fail to be 
 surprised at the feeble enthusiasm which survives for the two 
 victories of 1870. Even the French are astounded. Indeed, 
 one of their most famous writers told me, that what struck 
 him more than anything else in Berlin was, that he saw there 
 a much smaller number of pictures, engravings, and illus- 
 trations of the war than were to be found in the Parisian 
 shops. The twenty-fifth anniversary of the war passed amidst 
 general indifference : the people scarcely raised their heads a 
 moment from their work to watch the processions of soldiers 
 passing in the streets. What did these processions recall to 
 their minds other than an historical recollection ? In fact, the 
 armour with which Bismarck invested her weighs heavily on 
 the shoulders of Germany, who cannot rid herself of it as 
 she would desire, because modern militarism is an armour so j .'kjr 
 curiously constructed that a people can easily don it, but 
 once on, it is with difficulty cast off. 
 
 In no country is the treatment of soldiers by their officers 
 so continually controlled by the press as in Germany. The 
 denunciations of brutalities committed in barracks are fre- 
 quent and virulent. The sovereigns of various German States 
 have been compelled, owing to these press protests, to 
 charge the heads of the army to keep their officers under 
 proper control. In no other great European country has 
 funds for military purposes been so difficult to obtain. 
 While in France, ever since 1870, the Government has obtained 
 milliards of francs from the parliament for the asking, merely 
 stating that it was necessary for the national defence, 
 Germany has always provided money for military purposes 
 with a reluctance which grows with the increase of her 
 wealth. Bismarck succeeded several times after 1870 in 
 persuading the country that more money was needed for 
 
278 MILITARISM 
 
 military uses, but at the cost of endless disputes with the 
 Reichstag, and by alarming the public with terrible tales of 
 the approaching wars of reconquest. In no other country 
 is such an energetic crusade made by the press, which 
 represents the upper classes, against duels. So strong was 
 this crusade that the Emperor William was compelled to 
 publish an edict regulating and controlling the practice among 
 officers. Propaganda against duelling is a sign of aversion 
 to militarism ; so distinctive a sign, indeed, that the present 
 aspect of public opinion in Germany very much resembles 
 that in England during the first half of this century. 
 
 But however true it may be that public feeling is not 
 bellicose in Germany, and that anti-military tendencies are 
 strong, it is none the less a fact that the constitution of 
 Germany has a more military character than that of almost 
 any other European society. Soldiers occupy the most 
 important positions in the official world. The military class 
 is a class apart. Officers lead a separate existence ; they have 
 their own habits, laws, jurisdiction, and almost a weltanschaung 
 all their own ; they take more part in civil government than 
 in other countries. Thus, while in France you can find a 
 bourgeois minister of war, in Germany, on the contrary, civil 
 ministries are to be found directed by generals, notwithstand- 
 ing the fact that officers on active service have not the right 
 of suffrage. Bismarck was originally a doctor of law, who had 
 only fulfilled the ordinary period of military service, and yet, 
 when it was wished to consecrate his high position in the 
 State, he had to be made a general ; and in a general's uniform 
 he was wont to make his appearance in the Reichstag. The 
 second chancellor was also a general. All the citizens belong- 
 ing to the landivehr, or reserve list, have to appear in uniform 
 at official ceremonies. At the inauguration of the new 
 
MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND GERMANY 279 
 
 Reichstag palace the president actually appeared in the 
 uniform of a landivehr major. The German emperor always 
 appears surrounded by swarms of generals at official 
 ceremonies, and sometimes he has even criticized the conduct 
 of the Reichstag at a military assembly. 
 
 II 
 
 In England, on the other hand, militarism is reduced to a 
 minimum. 
 
 Let it be understood, however, that militarism being 
 reduced to a minimum does not signify the lack of an army 
 or inconsiderable military expenses. The English land 
 forces are not very numerous (they number little more than 
 200,000 men), but to make up, they are the most expen- 
 sive in Europe, costing the nation an annual sum of 
 from 18,000,000 to 20,000,000. The navy costs from 
 14,000,000 to 16,000,000. The total military expenditure 
 thus stands annually at from 32,000,000 to 36,000,000. 
 
 Neither is there a lack of admiration for military display, 
 which is proper to all countries possessing a strong military 
 reputation. From certain points of view this feeling is 
 stronger in England than in France, because the army has 
 preserved, in a sense, a more aristocratic constitution. The 
 grade of officers has remained much what it was in France 
 before the Revolution, i.e. a privilege of the rich. Before 
 1870 commissions were bought and sold. 
 
 Under Gladstone's first ministry the purchase system was 
 abolished, but this has not greatly altered matters. Regimental 
 life is still so extravagant and showy, that an officer's mere 
 pay does not suffice to maintain his position. The mess, 
 which ought to be an economical system, has become a most 
 
20 MILITARISM- 
 
 luxurious affair, in which officers vie with each other in 
 extravagance. 
 
 To be an officer, more especially in certain regiments, is a 
 diploma of elegance, a distinction which attracts the sons of 
 rich and noble families. Among the people there is the 
 same silly ambition to wear a showy uniform as in conti- 
 nental countries. Hence the uniforms of the English army are 
 the absurdest and most eccentric in the world. Lord Wolseley 
 has said that the British soldier needs to wear a grotesque 
 uniform in order to rouse admiration in the breasts of 
 members of both sexes. On the enlistment posters displayed 
 at every street corner in London, the fact that the cooking is 
 good and the uniform attractive is never left unmentioned. 
 
 If the middle classes do not entertain the same vulgar 
 admiration for the uniform as does the populace, even if they 
 do not regard the career of an officer as a particularly 
 desirable one, they are not the less Jingo on this account. The 
 victories of the British army, even over some little African 
 monarch, lend prestige to the Government in power, for the 
 public mind is distinctly bourgeois. In no country have so 
 many monuments been raised to generals, or so many 
 histories of wars been written, as in England ; few other 
 countries are so proud of their military history or their naval 
 power. Bellicose outbreaks of public feeling are not rare. 
 There was one in 1878 during the Russo-Turkish war, and 
 another one is now in full swing. 
 
 Ill 
 
 And yet, of all European countries, England is the one 
 where militarism is reduced to a minimum, because the 
 military class does not possess a code of morality of its own, 
 
MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND GERMANY 281 
 
 nor any special laws or manner of life. An officer is merely 
 a Government official, like an employe of the Minister of 
 Finance, or public-school inspector. He is in no manner dis- 
 tinguishable from them ; he observes the same laws and 
 customs. Only his office is different, because, instead of 
 looking after accounts or inspecting schools, he is expected to 
 lead soldiers under fire with firmness and courage. 
 
 In the officers, who represent of course the better educated 
 portion of the army, this civilian tendency is marked. While 
 in continental Europe it is considered a special duty for a 
 soldier never to refuse a duel, in England it is regarded as 
 disgraceful for him to fight a duel as for any other well- 
 conducted person. The old barrack code no longer holds 
 good, with its strict rules concerning the personal relations of 
 one officer to another. These are taking the form of the 
 ordinary relations between gentlemen, who do not command 
 one another, but politely request the performance of certain 
 services. The mess does not live enclosed in a barrack ; it 
 opens its doors and windows to the world ; it gives balls and 
 entertainments, organizes parties and pleasure trips. Officers 
 of all ranks preside in turn. Within its precincts there are no 
 longer superiors and inferiors, but only men of the world, 
 comrades disciplined by the common sentiment of professional 
 duty. The English officer scarcely possesses a special 
 uniform ; he has dropped his livery. While Italian, French, 
 and German officers have a special uniform which they have 
 to wear always when moving in the midst of their fellow- 
 citizens, the English officer only wears his on duty. Each 
 day when his barrack duty is over, he returns home, puts on 
 civilian dress, and in civilian dress goes into society. 
 Uniform is for him not a class uniform, but a profession 
 one, like a judge's gown and a clergyman's surplice a 
 
282 MILITARISM 
 
 costume which is donned from time to time to fulfil a duty, 
 not to represent a caste. This fact alone proves that the 
 army in England is a profession not a caste. 
 
 The same thing on a lesser scale is to be observed among 
 the soldiers a more boorish and ignorant class. The 
 English soldier is not recruited by conscription, but is a 
 volunteer who enlists for a given period, lasting rarely less 
 than ten years, and who receive a minimum pay of a shilling 
 a day. He adopts soldiering as a trade to earn a livelihood. 
 And yet this military and caste spirit is not so strong in the 
 English as in other European temporary soldiers. Their 
 feelings, their relations to superiors, are much like those of 
 ordinary workers. English barracks have lost much of that 
 odious character, a cut between a monastery and a prison. 
 They more and more resemble the traditional cottage, under 
 whose roof English families live and work in all parts of the 
 glebe. It consists of small pavilions, surrounded by little 
 gardens, and cheered by the green of vegetation, and by 
 all manner of games, such as cricket, football, and lawn-tennis. 
 
 The canteens are not the brutal taverns they are in con- 
 tinental countries, but species of clubs whose profits are 
 divided among the soldiers ; and where these are not only 
 furnished with food and drink, but with books, papers, games, 
 and even small theatrical entertainments. The soldier, too, 
 wishes to take his share of the comfort of bourgeois life 
 of those luxuries which industrial progress places within 
 reach of the workers. The life he aims at is not that of 
 European armies, but of the British workman. As his 
 conditions improve, so do his pretensions the better he wishes 
 to eat, to dress, to be lodged. When he is discontented he 
 combines with his comrades, and they go on strike like other 
 workers; and discipline does not threaten such strikes with 
 
MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND GERMANY 283 
 
 the terrible punishments that would be meted out in con- 
 tinental countries. Thus, also, the relations between soldiers 
 and officers are not the harsh ones of slave to master which 
 they are in other armies. They are the relations between 
 men and men ; where superiority of education is recognized by 
 reasonable subordinates ; where it is enforced on riotous ones 
 by means of chastisement both barbarous and familiar the 
 cat-o'-nine-tails. 
 
 English militarism is bourgeois, and observes the bourgeois 
 moral code ; it is a profession like any other. Nor does this 
 special characteristic appear to have rendered it inferior to 
 other armies, in any case as far as the valour of the soldiers is 
 concerned, for during this whole century in Asia, in Africa, 
 and in Europe, at the siege of Sebastopol as in the cam- 
 paign against King Cetewayo these regiments, made up of 
 all the ne'er-do-wells, all the scrapegraces and vagabonds of 
 the United Kingdom, have displayed unflinching calm and 
 courage. Although the English army has often been badly 
 led by incapable generals, it has always displayed great courage 
 in its common ranks, who rarely give way to vulgar terror, the 
 result of their excellent professional education, which teaches 
 them a necessity of their trade, never to be afraid, just as a 
 postman learns to walk quickly. This education meets with 
 the better success because as the soldiers all enlist voluntarily 
 they mostly consist of men who feel some natural aptitude 
 for the life. An army recruited from volunteers has a greater 
 chance of consisting of men to whom courage is easy ; so 
 that the English army, if it is largely composed of soldiers 
 whose requirements, even in time of war, strike their 
 European brothers-in-arms as absurdly luxurious, is neverthe- 
 less composed of soldiers who are not inclined to run away, 
 a fact which is not without importance. 
 
284 MILITARISM 
 
 IV 
 
 Thus soldiers form a caste in Germany, whose power is 
 more composed and controlled by public opinion than 
 in France. In England they no longer form a caste, but 
 a special branch of the bureaucracy that is entirely in the 
 service of the civil authorities : a class that does not give 
 orders but receives them, which follows the policy of the 
 civil Government but does not direct it. 
 
 To what can we attribute this condition of things, so 
 different from what we have observed in France and Italy ? 
 To one sole cause : in England, to the existence of an inde- 
 pendent, well-to-do, and educated middle class, which directs 
 the Government and executive by means of parliament and 
 numerous organs of public opinion, and formulates and 
 modifies the existing moral code ; in Germany, to the daily 
 growth of this class, whose every progress is a progress in 
 bourgeois morality, and a fresh step towards the decadence 
 of militarism. In both countries this class is composed of 
 those who live comfortably by industries, commerce, and 
 intellectual professions independently of governmental aid : 
 such as the directors of factories and businesses, rich mer- 
 chants, manufacturers, and business men, professors, journal- 
 ists, etc. Protestantism has practically abolished Church 
 protection in Germany and England since the sixteenth 
 1 century. It has destroyed monasticism, an oriental institu- 
 tion which has very largely contributed to enervate the 
 bourgeoisie in Latin countries. Since this date this class has 
 had to depend principally on its own resources in England 
 and Germany. These countries now receive their reward 
 for any sufferings this may have caused in past times, 
 
MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND GERMANY 285 
 
 because we find in them to-day those conditions which, 
 according to the keen observation of Gaetano Mosca, are 
 most necessary to the exercise of a free government. He 
 writes : " No condition is better suited to the relative perfection 
 of the political organization of a society, than the existence 
 of a numerous class economically independent of those who ^ 
 are in power a class sufficiently well-to-do to be able to devote 
 part of its leisure to improving its mind and to take an 
 interest in public concerns, an almost aristocratic sentiment 
 I might call it, which alone leads men to serve their country 
 for the mere satisfaction of their amour-propre. In all 
 countries in the vanguard of freedom, such a class is to be 
 found." l This class, owing to its being distinctly bourgeois, 
 although it may be willing to make use of a military class 
 in case of need, naturally conceives life very differently to 
 professional soldiers, and therefore, as its power augments, 
 it invariably comes into conflict with the military caste, and 
 seeks to weaken it as in Germany. When in the end the 
 bourgeoisie become masters of the State, they transform the 
 military class into a profession dependent on the Government / 
 as in England. The decline of militarism is everywhere con- 
 nected with the rise of this bourgeois class, which introduces 
 V a mercantile spirit of calculation into every branch of 
 life, and which, though it may be accessible to bellicose & 
 enthusiasm, is too intensely utilitarian ever, in the most 
 heated moments, to lose sight of its monetary interests. 
 Hence, in those countries where this class is in power, war 
 loses any romantic character of poetical glory, and becomes 
 merely a matter of s. d. But from the moment that 
 a people looks upon war as a mere matter of business, it ;^ 
 rapidly becomes pacific, so far as other European nations are 
 
 1 G. Mosca, " Element! di Scienza Politica," p. 153 (1896). 
 
 & 
 
286 MILITARISM 
 
 concerned, because the risk of such an undertaking would be 
 too great in proportion to its advantages. The policy of the 
 country consequently becomes prudent and cautious. These 
 nations, then, even if they preserve or augment their armies, 
 regard them merely as a defensive weapon as does Germany, 
 or make use of them for distant wars in barbarous countries 
 as does England. After the fall of Napoleon, England has 
 only taken part in one European war, the Crimean ; since 
 when it has grown more and more cautious, and more disposed 
 to resort to diplomacy than to arms. 
 
 V 
 
 In a certain portion of the German people these conditions 
 take the shape of an anti-military feeling, which is much 
 stronger than in England, because both the Prussian and the 
 
 ( Imperial Government have an aristocratic constitution. The 
 German State is neither lay nor democratic ; it is ruled by 
 
 Ttwo equal forces, legislative power and a civil and military 
 bureaucracy. The ministers are chosen by the king- 
 emperor from any class he pleases ; and they remain in 
 office until it suits the sovereign to dismiss them. A parlia- 
 mentary vote does not suffice to depose them. As the 
 ministers are at the head of the bureaucracy, this depends 
 on them, and therefore on the sovereign. Consequently the 
 monarchy act and work in accordance with laws made by 
 the assemblies elected by the people, but is not under their 
 control. In other words, whereas in France the bureaucracy 
 is theoretically controlled by the ministers elected by parlia- 
 ment, and emanates from the people's will, in Germany it 
 professes to emanate from God by the will of the sovereign, 
 the king of Prussia and German emperor, who is at the head 
 
V 
 
 MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND GERMANY 287 
 
 of the Lutheran Church. Thus unconverted Jews are excluded 
 from many posts in this bureaucracy, which professes to be 
 strictly Christian. The army is naturally its most important 
 department. 
 
 Now, in a society thus organized, if anti-militarism were 
 not very strong in the educated bourgeois class, the power of 
 the army and bureaucracy would rapidly degenerate into a 
 tyranny. France may adore her soldier, and be happy to be 
 ill-treated by him, like certain hysterical women who are fond 
 of brutal lovers who beat them. The French army depends 
 theoretically on the minister of war, who is dependent on 
 parliament, and if this power is smaller in practice than 
 it is in theory, the fault lies, not with the constitution, 
 but with the men. England is similarly situated. But in 
 Germany, on the other hand, whatever abuses the army 
 might commit, the Reichstag would be impotent to reform 
 it, and it would remain with the army to decide to alter 
 itself. Civil society would have no power to enforce the rigl 
 of reason and morality against the usurpation of the military J 
 class. 
 
 Therefore a latent spirit of hostility, in the educated class^ 
 towards militarism and war, is necessary in Germany, to 
 control the strong desire of the army to supersede civil 
 power. If a war, or foolish prejudices like those of the 
 French people, were to augment the moral power of the 
 army, the constitutional regime would easily degenerate into ft 
 a military tyranny. Peace, therefore, is an essential condition 
 to liberty in Germany. If Germany wished to oppress other 
 nations by force of arms, it would itself be punished by 
 falling a victim to a military despotism. And as the desire 
 for freedom is strong in Germany, thanks to the strength 
 and number of the independent bourgeoisie, military 
 
288 MILITARISM 
 
 fanaticism is not so rampant there as in France. Therefore, 
 paradoxical as the assertion may appear, Germany is not 
 a bellicose nation, because the constitution of its Government 
 is very military. 
 
 VI 
 
 But it will be objected, this large, well-to-do, and educated 
 middle class exists also in France : why does it not therefore 
 slowly undermine militarism as in England ? Because in 
 France it is slave, not master, of the Jacobin State, and it is 
 to the interest of the Government to propagate warlike sen- 
 timents. The independent bourgeoisie is less strong in France 
 than in England and Germany, because Caesarism ties it in 
 a great part to the Government, to its traditions and prin- 
 ciples ; and those few who are not thus tied can do little. 
 Thus inertia favours these traditions, and prolongs, to the 
 detriment of France and Europe, that militarism which is 
 a mere anachronism to-day, the shadow of something which 
 once had life and being. The traditions survive, but grow 
 feebler from day to day, whether it be that public opinion is 
 modifying in France, or that the spiritual and social con- 
 ditions of the rest of Europe indirectly influence his. 
 
 But in France, at least, the middle class, though the slave 
 of the Government which it obeys instead of guiding lives 
 under materially and morally good conditions ; and while a 
 few may grow unjustly rich, the majority are not reduced to 
 such a wretched and squalid condition as to render odious 
 to them the Government under which they live. Thus the 
 bourgeoisie preserves sufficient enthusiasm for those military 
 ideals which still play such an important part in French 
 politics ; and though it be frondeuse and discontented, it is 
 
MILITARISM IN ENGLAND AND GERMANY 289 
 
 neither sceptical nor so embittered by its conditions as to 
 grow revolutionary and anti-patriotic. 
 
 Italy, on the other hand, lacks the independent bourgeoisie 
 which prospers in England and Germany ; the middle class 
 is tied down to the Government as in France. Thus it lacks 
 all influence to modify the political traditions that govern the 
 country. Although these traditions are recent, shallow, and 
 unpopular, nevertheless they drag on through lack of any 
 contrary influence to destroy them. Supported as they are 
 by the Court and a few groups of interested men, who avail 
 themselves of universal sloth and stupidity, they drag on 
 more through general inertia than any essential virtue of 
 their own. But the middle class is declining in Italy, slowly ^ 
 ruined by the increase of population, and by the reckless 
 waste committed during the last thirty years by the rising 
 and thoughtless Italian Csesarism, by the Government's policy. 
 The middle class being reduced to such a miserable condition, 
 corrupted by having to beg their bread of those in power, 
 degraded and exhausted by the hard work they are forced 
 to endure and the poor remuneration they receive, by the 
 emptiness of an existence rich only in mendacious appear- 
 ances, this class degenerates into a state of bitter scepticism. 
 It grows to hate the Government, or, worse still, grows in- 
 different towards it. A middle class in such a dangerous 
 moral state, passing through so terrible a period of passion 
 and unrest, cannot be the creator of a militarism that has. 
 any chance of success, nor indeed, anything else of a serious 
 kind, so that Italian militarism is nothing but an expensive y 
 lie, which can bring only shame and injury to the country. 
 
 Such, in broad outline, the picture of European militarism, 
 from the English, a mere profession, to the Italian, a mere 
 appearance. 
 
 T 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 
 
CHAPTER X 
 TAX CHRISTIANA 
 
 WE have studied the military constitution of some of the 
 principal European States, and seen how it corresponds to 
 certain requirements and characteristics of the societies them- 
 selves. But though these armies have an internal social 
 function, they have also an external one they are organized to 
 serve against each other. The whole military organization of 
 Europe necessarily presupposes one or more reasons of rivalry 
 between the Governments, on account of which they are every 
 now and then led mutually to attack or defend themselves. 
 
 Economic rivalry is considered by many as the chief cause 
 of conflict, that mania for wealth which torments all European 
 nations, on whose account all seek to conquer new colonies 
 and open fresh markets. It is commonly believed that this 
 rivalry must ultimately lead to a terrible conflict, whose 
 dimensions and consequences it is difficult to conceive. Are 
 these /ears legitimate and reasonable, or are they merely a 
 survival of ancient ideas no longer corresponding to the 
 necessities of the age ? 
 
 Doubtless, one of the most general features of history is, 
 as we have observed, the desire of a small number of men to 
 accumulate wealth. We have seen that wars in ancient times 
 were nearly all directly or indirectly caused by the efforts of 
 
294 MILITARISM 
 
 these minorities, who ruled society, to enrich themselves, in 
 an age when capital had small reproductive power. Is it to 
 be supposed that human greed will lead to the same results 
 amongst the nations of to-day ? Or is it not more probable, 
 on the contrary, that by slow and uncertain stages a novas 
 ordo of human things is beginning for the civilized world ? It 
 is as difficult to a man to realize the full importance of events 
 in whose midst he lives, as for a traveller to realize the 
 motion of his conveyance. Things often appear mere trifles 
 to contemporaries which, by their descendants, will be judged 
 as events of prime importance ; for great historical events are 
 like the facades of monumental cathedrals, that can only be 
 understood in their entirety when seen from a distance. Most 
 people think that we are living in an age like any other, which 
 will merge into the course of time, just as the hours which 
 have preceded it, and those which will follow. As a matter 
 of fact we are living perhaps in an age that is witnessing 
 the greatest social and moral revolution history has ever 
 chronicled. Those who regard the introduction of machinery 
 as the chief characteristic of our century, show that they have 
 only looked at things from a superficial point of view, and 
 understood nothing but the external features of the great 
 moral revolution, which is the real work, whether enduring or 
 temporary, of our time, thanks to which the ruling classes 
 have at last realized that it is their duty to take their share in 
 the work of civilization. 
 
 In the past, nearly the whole responsibility of the work 
 whereon the life of society depended, was left to the ignorant 
 peasant and humble artisan, compelled by force to provide 
 the leisure of their ignorant and stupid masters with pleasures. 
 Nowadays, on the contrary, the ruling class collaborates 
 - with the masses in working, and although it is frequently 
 

 PAX CHRISTIANA 295 
 
 overpaid, and often squanders the people's strength in creating 
 unreal wealth, nevertheless it notably enchances the universal 
 activity. England, Germany, America, and, in a minor degree, 
 France and Italy all civilized nations, in short are no longer 
 governed by oligarchies of idle sybarites, but by social groups ; 
 who direct, more or less efficiently, the work of society. 
 
 Owing to this change, it was possible that between societies 
 which for thirty centuries had not ceased for an instant to 
 persecute one another with wars, a sudden desire for peace 
 should grow up : a desire which many have derided because 
 they were unable to understand it owing to its novelty 
 and the rapidity of its growth. But it arose principally 
 from the fact that since the ruling class ceased to acquire/ 
 wealth by brigandage, seizing it forcibly from other nations 
 or classes, war lost its essential function, and commenced f 
 to grow repugnant. t |W ;l 
 
 II 
 
 We must not imagine, however, that greed has lost its holdL/ 
 on the human heart. The legend of the Argonauts, who set 
 off for the conquest of the golden fleece, not that of Prometheus, 
 who ventured, for the good of mankind, to rob fire from a 
 capricious and malignant god, still symbolizes the doings of 
 modern men. The passion for accumulating treasure is still the 
 strongest of the motives that sway the minorities who govern 
 European society ; and though it no longer resorts to such 
 violent means in order to satisfy itself, it is still as strong in 
 the heart of a highly Christian English banker as in a Roman 
 proconsul or an ancient Pagan chief. But these minorities 
 are no longer composed of warriors and statesmen, but of 
 financiers, merchants, and industrials. As we have already 
 
296 MILITARISM 
 
 seen, the supreme characteristic of modern civilization is the 
 I/ indefinite variety of productive investments for capital, due to 
 the extent of our scientific knowledge and the universality of 
 laborious habits. In opposition to ancient civilizations, which 
 were, above all, artistic, unlaborious, frugal, and poor, modern 
 civilization is learned, laborious, rich, and has many require- 
 ments ; universal industry and a continual increase in demand 
 are its salient characteristics. Hence nowadays the ruling 
 classes, instead of devoting their time to war and the State, 
 occupy themselves in putting accumulated capital to good 
 use, directing work, perfecting and multiplying instruments 
 and machinery, not from any noble sentiments of social 
 duty, but for the same reasons that the aristocracies of the 
 past went to war so frequently for the accumulation of 
 great and superfluous wealth. This was the chief cause 
 of the creation of modern commerce and industry. 
 
 On this account there is a certain spirit of conquest innate 
 in modern trade by reason of which it resembles a species 
 of tempered war. Many economists affirm that industry 
 exists in order to prepare the necessities of life, and that the 
 object of commerce is to organize the exchange of these 
 goods between men, families, classes, and nations, so that by 
 dividing their work they can satisfy all their requirements. An 
 impartial observer can discover in modern business another 
 reason beyond either of these : an elaborate machinery 
 which in part serves the purpose indicated by the economist, 
 in part serves to enable certain classes and nations to rule 
 over other classes and other nations in short, taking the 
 place and function filled by armies in the past, 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 297 
 
 III 
 
 Modern civilization is founded entirely on the development 
 of work and consumption, for the increase of supply always - 
 entails a relative increase in demand. Certain economists 
 make a great error in believing that the only object of 
 industry is to satisfy the needs of man. It serves, above all, 
 to create and diffuse these needs, so as to be able subse- 
 quently to satisfy them. In order that it may enrich and 
 support so many people, it is a necessary condition that it 
 should not remain the humble slave of human requirements. 
 An infinite number of objects are every year invented, and 
 made in thousands upon thousands of factories, by rich 
 capitalists in the hopes of gain, by means of powerful and 
 expensive machines, and an immense number of workers 
 whose desires for an easy life every day increase, under the 
 direction of brain-workers, who also demand ample recom- 
 pense. These goods are then sold by merchants more 
 anxious to make profits out of them than even the very 
 manufacturers, who travel to the most distant countries in 
 search of the strangest and most various products of the 
 globe. Now, how could so many desires and greeds be satis- 
 fied, if the price of goods sunk too low? In order to prevent 
 this it is necessary that production should never surpass a 
 certain measure of abundance, or that consumption should 
 so augment as to constantly exceed it. For various reasons, 
 which it would take us too long to develop, every effort to 
 bridle production has failed of late: hence the necessity to 
 increase demand. 
 
 To succeed in this bold and difficult undertaking, it has 
 been necessary to modern commerce and industry to attempt 
 
298 MILITARISM 
 
 a new and very hazardous conquest in the world that of 
 inducing other people to adopt a more expensive and com- 
 plicated mode of life. It is not necessary to enlarge on this 
 subject in order to demonstrate the fact that during this 
 century innumerable things have been invented to satisfy 
 fresh requirements, and introduced into distant countries. 
 The fact is well known, as it is also well known that the ever- 
 increasing cost of living, which is, curiously enough, combined 
 with the lowering of the price of single objects, is caused by 
 the prolificacy of industry and trade. Now, these new needs 
 were felt because in a certain sense they had been latent in 
 the minds of men ; but it is also certain that they would have 
 continued in this latent state had it not been for a few greedy 
 and ingenious men, who found the means of developing these 
 inclinations. Thus modern commerce, by means of numerous 
 agents, has succeeded in spreading the temptation of these 
 new methods of life throughout the whole of our planet. 
 Everywhere it has despatched apostles, not to preach a new 
 gospel, but to persuade men of all colours, tongues, and 
 customs to consume their ever-increasing fresh productions. 
 No difficulty has ever succeeded in baffling these slow and 
 patient conquerors neither the inertia of men in matters 
 which entail the alteration of old customs, the diffidence, 
 ancient traditions, and diversity of customs of the races 
 unused to our civilization, the invincible prejudices of primi- 
 tive religions and Governments, nor the barbarism of wild 
 unknown regions, abounding in traps and perils, wild beasts, 
 and still wilder men. By plodding persistence, by all manner 
 of deceit to delude the ignorant, by corrupting the great ones 
 of the earth, and, in some desperate cases, by forcing their way 
 by arms, filling the desert roads, abysses, and little cemeteries 
 of far-away lands with corpses, these obstinate invaders 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 299 
 
 from the great industrial centres have succeeded in vanquish- 
 ing the world, as though they had all united together for one 
 supreme object, and worked unanimously as one body from 
 the centre of Africa to India, from Siberia to California, from 
 Sicily to Australia. 
 
 IV 
 
 In this manner, what we may call the mechanical-industrial 
 civilization of the nineteenth century has diffused itself 
 throughout Europe, from Italy to Russia, and also throughout 
 America. Partially, also, it has penetrated other continents. 
 But it would be too simple to imagine that this spread of 
 civilization was merely like an exchange of produce between 
 various nations for their mutual benefit. Its result has been 
 the division of the civilized nations of Europe into two classes 
 the creditor nations, who are those which contributed towards 
 this new order of civilization ; and the debtors, which are 
 those who have merely profited by it. Let us recall to mind 
 the simple primitive scene narrated in the " Odyssey." 
 
 The Phoenician merchants landed on the Greek shores, 
 took from their ships the merchandise of their country, and 
 exhibited it ; then from the neighbouring villages came 
 troops of women and girls to gaze at them, and through 
 these samples of a more refined industry, the desire for more 
 luxurious things took birth in the minds of the barbarians. 
 Our latter-day great manufacturers and merchants have 
 repeated the undertaking of the Phoenician merchant a 
 thousand times during the course of this century. They 
 have penetrated everywhere, amidst civilized, barbarous, and 
 savage nations ; they have exhibited on the seashore, in the 
 village squares and city streets, samples of an infinite 
 
300 MILITARISM 
 
 number of things manufactured in their country by millions of 
 human hands, and by machines working rapidly as lightning. 
 A few savage races have expelled and slaughtered them ; 
 but generally, even in the remotest mountain villages, the 
 merchant has met with a ready welcome from the simple 
 folk. Men and women have surrounded him, curious to 
 inspect the new goods introduced by the stranger ; and one 
 having given the example, another and another followed suit, 
 until all bought a specimen, thinking that they thus satisfied 
 an innocent desire. But the merchant's treasure-bag was 
 inexhaustible. Every day he produced thence some new 
 object, and the temptation to indulge in them grew ever 
 stronger ; so that the better part having spent all their ready 
 cash, dug up the little hoards hidden away by the old people ; 
 all their savings gone, they gradually got into debt with the 
 village usurer and the merchant himself. And the merchant, 
 in the mean time, grew richer and richer. 
 
 This little fable sums up very characteristically one of the 
 least known episodes of modern history. It accounts, in a 
 certain manner, for the mysterious growth of fortunes which 
 our century has witnessed. Leaving the smaller nations out 
 of account, among which there are many creditor nations, 
 such as Belgium and Switzerland, which, although in a 
 flourishing condition, pay little attention to politics, among 
 the great nations of Europe, France, Germany, and England 
 count as creditors, Italy, Spain, Russia, and Austria as 
 debtors. 
 
 V 
 
 Now, the superior or inferior condition of modern nations 
 all depends on this matter of debtor and creditor. The creditor 
 nations are to-day in the same condition that countries 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 301 
 
 ruling by force of arms found themselves in ancient civilization ; 
 the debtors represent the conquered tributary populations. 
 
 The creditor nations are the centre of world-wide capital- 
 ism, i.e. capital is so abundant as to be superabundant for 
 internal requirements, and consequently can be used for 
 productive investments in other lands, for Government loans, 
 industrial, banking, and commercial speculations. By means 
 of this capital these nations have become a world empire. 
 We cannot gauge the real extent of the English and French 
 empires by those territories marked yellow and red on 
 geographical charts, but by the gigantic investments English 
 bankers have made all the world over, in United States 
 industries, as in those of Moscow, in the diamond mines 
 of the Cape, as in the hydraulic works in the Italian Alps ; 
 in the loans made by France, the great usurer of this century, 
 to all the Governments of the globe, in the international 
 commerce of money of which she is the centre. The power 
 and empire of Germany are not extended by the coreografic 
 journeys made by the emperor to Palestine, got up in the 
 costume of a Crusader, but by those patient business men 
 who, in Russia and Italy, in the two Americas, and the 
 extreme Orient, manage to find new productive invest- 
 ments for capital. This is an empire without geographical 
 dimensions, invisible and intangible, above all political 
 divisions of nations, but one which assures well-being to 
 the creditor countries. 
 
 Wherein did the greatest privilege of the ruling nations 
 of antiquity consist? It was the tribute they enforced by 
 arms from the conquered nations. To-day the ruling nations 
 still extort tribute which takes this form, that they are able 
 to import a larger quantity of goods than they export. Any 
 one who examines the English, French, and German statistics 
 
302 MILITARISM 
 
 of exportation and importation, immediately perceives that 
 these nations import much more than they export. In some 
 years, for instance, England has imported as much as a 
 milliard of francs more than she exported, and France 
 800 millions. This signifies that these nations obtain an 
 enormous amount of goods from other countries without 
 giving anything in exchange ; that from those countries 
 which are in their debt they take every year a quantity 
 of useful and beautiful things as payment of interest without 
 contributing anything in exchange ; they carry away what 
 they choose, whilst the wretched debtor nations pay back as 
 interest on the sums they borrowed all their most valuable 
 possessions. English and German millionaires drink the 
 best Italian and Spanish wines ; they purchase the historical 
 palaces of Venice, the villas and lakes of the Alban hills ; 
 they keep a keen eye on the masterpieces of ancient Italian 
 art, which, but for governmental prohibition, they would 
 carry away from Italy in larger numbers and more effectively 
 than did Napoleon. British workmen batten on the best 
 oranges of Spain and Sicily. The first effect of the abolition 
 of feudalism in Russia was that the peasants had to leave off 
 eating wheaten bread and to content themselves with bread 
 made of rye, because all their corn was exported to nourish 
 German and English workmen. As in the ancient world all 
 countries sent their goods to Rome, the universal ruler, in 
 homage to the final victress of so long a contest of intermin- 
 able wars, so to-day half the world sends the best produce 
 of its agriculture, its art and industry, to London. 
 
 This vast lucrativeness of capital employed productively 
 in foreign countries, is a cause of well-being to the creditor 
 nations, who are well off from the workmen to the upper class, 
 the middle class, the backbone of modern civilization, being 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 303 
 
 the most prosperous of all. Capital abounds ; the desire to 
 invest it profitably is universal ; hence work is also plentiful, 
 the standard of life tends to improve in all classes, individual 
 energies have ample scope, and the whole of society becomes 
 a vast field of scientific, industrial, social, political, artistic, 
 and literary experiments. Those who are desirous of en- 
 riching themselves can do so without being noxious to 
 society whilst promoting its interests, while intellectual men 
 have much fuller scope for doing their best. Prosperity being 
 so widespread, the workers are satisfied, and the Government 
 has an easy task. 
 
 In the debtor nations, on the contrary, the conditions of ~ 
 the middle class and workers are hard ; capital being scarce 
 there is little work, salaries and profits are small ; little is 
 consumed, the vast exportation renders life dearer to the 
 middle and working classes indeed, to the whole of society 
 life grows more and more difficult. All aspire to a broader, 
 more dignified, and intellectual life, but they are daily reduced 
 to a meaner and more squalid existence. The very rich are 
 comparatively poor and ungenerous. There is little scope 
 for energy, originality has small chance of displaying itself ; - 
 wherefore those countries which used to be the seat of an 
 ancient and vast civilization, and which to-day abound in 
 intelligent and clever men, find themselves in a most un- 
 fortunate condition to compete in the field of intellect with the 
 newer creditor nations, to whom belongs in a great measure 
 the honour of directing the intellectual movement of our 
 times. Nations which are economically in a tributary position 
 are imitative intellectually. 
 
 What country has contributed so much to the history of 
 civilization as Italy ? And yet for the last forty years she 
 appears to have lost all originality. With the exception of 
 
304 MILITARISM 
 
 a few men who have managed to preserve their individuality 
 at all costs, and who have generally been persecuted by the 
 envy of their country, nearly the whole intellectual movement 
 of Italy is borrowed from abroad ; her literature is in a great 
 measure imitated from the French, her experimental science 
 from Germany, her social and political ideas from France and 
 England. The latter country has also exercised considerable 
 influence on those general theories which have contributed 
 towards the development of Italian thought : Spencerism and 
 Darwinism. Such a pass has been reached that in the 
 country of Raphael and Michael Angelo artists take the 
 paintings of English Pre-Raphaelists as their model. Debtor 
 countries, in short, are in such bad internal conditions that they 
 find it relatively difficult to develop their intellectual energies. 
 But the greatest evil is that in the debtor countries also 
 greedy plutocracies are formed anxious to draw profit out of 
 the direction of some social work. However, in these countries 
 the scarceness of capital renders the few people who possess 
 it very cautious ; they are unwilling to risk more than a small 
 sum at a time, and that only with the certainty of good 
 profits. Thus industry finds it difficult to compete with richer 
 nations, and it seeks to augment its profits by protectionism. 
 Whilst the world-wide industries of creditor nations prosper, 
 little provincial traders struggle on in the conquered nations, 
 protected and assisted in all manner of ways by the Govern- 
 ment. A small minority manages to live and prosper, and 
 does its best to imitate the life led in powerful countries, 
 thanks to the eternal historical law by which the conquered 
 always seek to imitate the conquerors. 
 
 Thus a ruling class is growing up in these countries which 
 
 . attempts to augment the social value of their work by the help 
 
 V of Csesarism in its many various forms, including protectionism. 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 305 
 
 In other words, while all creditor nations with the 
 exception of France, which is an eccentric exception to 
 everything display a decided tendency towards free trade, 
 in debtor countries the great industrials and landowners 
 seek to augment their profits, by artificially raising the prices 
 of goods by customs-house tariffs, thus paying a higher price 
 than could rightly be demanded by the producers, whilst 
 obtaining State favours in the shape of subsidies and other 
 artifices common to the not very scruplous finance of European 
 nations. Thus we find the Spanish industrials up to last 
 year drawing large profits from being able to export to 
 the colonies under a lower tariff than other countries. The 
 idleness of the Sicilian landowners is insured by the Govern- 
 ment by means of taxes which raised the price of bread. 
 Then again we see that the great Russian merchants by 
 introducing a vast system of customs tariffs, became the 
 masters of Russian consumers. In the same way the Italian 
 cotton and wool manufacturers, by the customs revolution of 
 ten years ago, procured themselves a few years of great 
 prosperity. 
 
 By such means in those weaker countries which were 
 not sufficiently favoured by fortune to become centres of 
 capitalism, the greedy and ambitious succeeded in ac- 
 cumulating large fortunes by impoverishing their fellow- 
 countrymen, by exploiting their brothers who speak the 
 same tongue, and this not by violent, but by insidious means, 
 in the name of industrial patriotism a catchword capable of 
 seducing many minds, and which represents the economic 
 sophisms of protectionism as salutary truths. Protectionism 
 aggravates the already hard condition of tributary nations, 
 and becomes at the same time a partial means of enriching 
 the creditors, who always invest large capital in the protected 
 
 u 
 
306 MILITARISM 
 
 industries. Thus Russian protectionism has enriched English 
 capitalists, Italian protectionism has enriched Germans ; the 
 first founded many industries in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and 
 Lodz, the latter have done the same in Lombardy. 
 
 VI 
 
 But these world-wide empires of capitalism are based not 
 on territorial extension, but on the abundance of capital and 
 x/ the capacity of men to use it productively. Therefore, as has 
 already been demonstrated, societies founded on free principles 
 run a better chance of success than those where the middle 
 class depend on governmental protection. The only excep- 
 tion to this rule is France. All the remainder, Austria and 
 Spain, Russia and Italy, are debtor subject nations. This 
 explains at the same time the relative decadence of Catholic 
 countries as compared to Protestant ones ; as Catholicism is 
 still the most potent protective system. 
 
 Moreover, as this empire does not depend on territoral 
 extension, military power is not essential to its stability. 
 Little countries, like Belgium and Switzerland, may be 
 creditors and rulers ; huge empires, like Russia, debtors and 
 tributaries. Militarism may in some cases be an auxiliary of 
 the capitalist empire, but only on one condition, i.e. that it 
 does not entail such an immense expenditure on arms and 
 wars as to impede or arrest the accumulation of capital. 
 Italy is a terrible example of how a nation can be reduced 
 by debt to a tributary and inferior condition, from having 
 squandered too much of its wealth on arms. Moreover, a 
 creditor Government finds itself to-day carteris puribus, and 
 capable of becoming stronger than other States, also from a 
 military point of view, because armament expenses are 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 307 
 
 continuous and recurrent. Who is not aware that, nowadays, 
 arms and all the apparatus of war have to be renewed nearly 
 every ten years, thanks to the mad fury for military inven- 
 tions which afflicts Europe ? This continuous change renders 
 militarism too expensive a matter for debtor nations, who 
 find themselves constantly embarrassed at each fresh renova- 
 tion of the army and navy to find the necessary funds. 
 
 VII 
 
 A world-wide commercialism in "a creditor country or a 
 large system of commercial and industrial Coesarism pro- 
 ducing large profits for a fortunate plutocracy in a debtor 
 country, are then the greatest, pleasantest, and least immoral 
 means for satisfying the greed of the governing minority, 
 which in the past sought to satisfy itself by means of war. 
 This is so true that in those countries which possess a 
 world-wide commerce, or where a vast national financial 
 Caesarism exists, the State grows ever less bellicose, by mere 
 force of circumstances, even if it be unaware of the fact, 
 and go on increasing its military armaments. 
 
 I will give two examples England and Russia. England 
 is the seat of the vastest and most powerful world-wide 
 capitalism existing, and may, in some respects, be considered 
 the first military power in the world ; for it possesses the 
 largest fleet, and the European army most exercised by con- 
 tinual wars. But, notwithstanding, her policy grows ever 
 more prudent and conciliating. Her diplomatists never make 
 demands which are likely to require enforcing by wars ; in 
 the East and in the Far East they have always preferred to 
 manage matters in a friendly spirit, and to give in rather than 
 to display her naval superiority in one or more wars. 
 
308 MILITARISM 
 
 English diplomatists always prefer slow solutions and transi- 
 tions ; if in the Fashoda question they acted with unaccus- 
 tomed energy, it cannot be said that in other questions which 
 have arisen with France, Germany, and Russia, they have 
 not displayed great consideration. The Fashoda question 
 had become one affecting the national pride more than 
 interest, and served to interrupt by energetic action a system 
 of conciliation, which seemed in its turn likely to become 
 perilous. Moreover, an English ministry has recently 
 declared that British imperialism strives above all things to 
 avoid conflict and expense. By so doing the United Kingdom 
 provides both for its own well-being and that of European 
 civilization, for wars occasioned by thirst of power would 
 arrest its magnificent development. History will be grateful 
 to England for not having abused her naval power, for having 
 recognized the right of other nations to their place under the 
 sun, for realizing that the prosperity of others does not entail 
 her loss, and that war, whatever its result, would damage her 
 power. The English Empire stretches beyond its territorial 
 confines ; it extends wherever English capital is invested, and 
 becomes one of the motives of civilization. Thus a war resulting 
 in the annexation of new and vast territories, but also imply- 
 ing a huge destruction of capital, would diminish the grandeur 
 and power of the Empire, for every million of capital con- 
 sumed represents a square million of ideal empire lost. Thus 
 England is, and daily becomes, more pacific, because no class 
 of society is interested in war, no one wishes to avail himself 
 of it to satisfy his creed, which can be better appeased by 
 other means. War with civilized countries is repugnant to 
 her, she accumulates huge armaments merely for self-defence, 
 which remain idle, and were only used in petty colonial wars, 
 whose one object is to open and maintain roads across savage 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 309 
 
 continents for the use of her merchants, at a comparatively 
 trifling cost. 
 
 Russia is another example. No European Government 
 presents so military an aspect. Russian society appears to 
 an outsider to be ruled by a military despotism. Yet the 
 very heads of this system, the Czars themselves, rank to-day 
 amongst the upholders of peace ; a Russian policy during the 
 last twenty years has become ever more pacific in its rela- 
 tions with other European nations. If the external form of 
 Russian society, the military absolutism, remains unchanged, 
 the internal is rapidly modifying. The old Russian aristocracy, 
 composed of land and serf owners, which diminuted by force 
 of arms till the abolition of serfdom, is decaying, ruined by 
 usury and idleness, and the social reforms which for the last 
 thirty years, ever since the second half of the reign of 
 Alexander II., have hastened the introduction into Russia 
 of the mechanical industrial civilization of the West ; and 
 the place which it is leaving vacant, as it disappears into 
 the shades of the past, is filled by a very powerful financial 
 oligarchy composed of merchant princes and manufacturers, 
 to whom the Government abandons, with the most shameless 
 protectivism and Caesarism, the whole of the immense empire. 
 For the past twenty years Russia has been seized with the in- 
 dustrial fever, with the unlimited ambition to accumulate huge 
 fortunes by means of industries, protected by tariffs, subventions, 
 and encouraging rewards prodigated with princely generosity. 
 
 Thus the military pride of ancient Russia is disappearing, 
 that pride which dreamed of new conquests, and hoped to 
 expand the Sclavonic empire, contemplating the conquest of 
 Constantinople and India, and the establishment of apolitical 
 and military dictatorship over Europe ; and it is replaced by 
 the desire to develop all over Russia an immense system of 
 
310 MILITARISM 
 
 traffic and industry. Hence the gigantic projects for public 
 works, first among which ranks the trans-Siberian railway, 
 which will open up to adventurous Russian capitalists an 
 empire vaster and richer than that which Alexander the 
 Great conquered for himself with his sword Macedonian 
 legend ; hence the laws to protect industry and commerce 
 which engross more and more the cares of the State to the 
 detriment of war. But as this new spirit grows the ancient 
 spirit declines ; so that the Russia of to-day, instead 
 of being governed by generals, is at the mercy of a band of 
 ambitious financiers, who dream of an age of gold for Russia. 
 The wealth they dream of would fall to the share of a few 
 capitalists, however, not to the people ; for the terrific expense 
 entailed by this gigantic Csesarism is, and will be, paid above 
 all by the peasants, the citizens, and the middle classes, who 
 contribute the greater part of the money necessary for the 
 construction of railways, for paying the liberal rewards 
 assigned to the encouragment of absurd and mistaken 
 industries, and for supplying the deficit entailed by a bank- 
 ing system which enriches a few unscrupulous speculators 
 whilst despoiling the masses. 
 
 The first concrete proposal for disarmament has emanated 
 from Russia, and this fact, though it has taken the world by 
 surprise, appears, on deeper study, less astonishing than one 
 would think for. Russia is a debtor State, poor in capital, 
 which has accomplished the progresses of the past thirty 
 years by borrowing money from France, Germany, and 
 England. The growth of wealth is slow there, accumulated 
 capital scarce, whilst the need thereof is great, for civilizing 
 huge countries, opening up new roads, building railways, and 
 meeting the annual deficit incurred by a wasteful adminis- 
 tration. Hence Russia is one of the countries which finds 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 311 
 
 most difficulty in meeting the ever-growing burden of 
 military expenditure, a difficulty proportionate to the im- 
 mensity of the empire, and to the gigantic capital necessary 
 for civilizing it ; and thus it is interested in maintaining peace 
 even more than is its rival creditor. 
 
 VIII 
 
 All that we have said about creditor and debtor countries 
 applies to Europe, but not to America. Another proof of 
 the privileges enjoyed by the new continents is that there 
 a society may be economically a debtor and yet enjoy those 
 material and moral conditions which in Europe belong to 
 creditor countries. Such is the case with the United States, 
 which is a debtor country, inasmuch as English capital is 
 largely employed there, and whose exports exceed its 
 imports. But, owing to the reasons which we studied in 
 our first chapter, fruitful investments for capital are very 
 numerous ; and hence the governing classes are intensely 
 pacific. The recent Cuban war must not lead us to think 
 that America is entering on a new epoch of military con- 
 quest, unless, indeed, its governors go mad. If such were 
 the case, the prosperity and strength of American society 
 would rapidly decline ; because all the capital which would 
 be expended in conquering territory in Asia and Africa 
 would be withdrawn from useful employment in the mother- 
 country, from which we must expect the ever-growing great- 
 ness of American civilization. This decay would be all the 
 more rapid, as recent events have proved that if Americans 
 know how to conduct wars successfully, they are unable to 
 manage it cheaply. 
 
MILITARISM 
 
 IX 
 
 But, it may be objected, although already these social 
 conditions have flourished nearly all over Europe, our century 
 can chronical an infinite number of wars from its commence- 
 ment until 1870. Firstly, the Napoleonic wars ; then, after a 
 long interval of peace, the various wars from 1848-49: the 
 Crimean war ; the war between Austria, France, and Ger- 
 many of 1866 ; the war between Germany and France of 1870. 
 A long list indeed, even if we omit the minor wars, for a 
 century which is considered destined to witness the disappear- 
 ance of war from the history of Europe ! But the greater 
 
 part of these wars had a political, not economic motive, and 
 i/ 
 
 were necessary in order to modify a condition of things which 
 
 rendered life impossible to many European nations. This 
 work having been completed by the war of 1870, the era of 
 peace commenced afresh. It has endured now for twenty- 
 nine years, and to all appearances it means to endure a long 
 time yet. 
 
 There were two principal causes for war during our cen- 
 tury : the policy of Austria prior to 1866, and the turbulent 
 ^Napoleonic spirit. That curious spirit of intrigue, interference, 
 and conservative fanaticism which characterized the Austrian 
 policy from 1815 to 1866, rendered that country a potent 
 cause for disturbance to Europe a base and intriguing 
 diplomacy which was energetic and sterile at the same 
 time ; a brave but stupid military class ; an honest, diligent, 
 but retrogressive and bigoted executive ; a small oligarchy 
 which the French Revolution had maddened with terror. 
 Such were the elements which together went to build up 
 this curious military empire, which since 1815 attempted to 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 313 
 
 solve by force the problem, not of perpetual motion, but of 
 the eternal immobility of European society. The prejudices 
 and stupid obstinacy of this Government retarded the progress 
 and development of three countries : Italy, where Austria 
 tried to compel even those provinces which were not under 
 its domain to submit to the barbarous rule which tormented 
 her ; Prussia and the German States, in whose confederation 
 Austria represented the spirit of negation and disorder ; and 
 Hungary, which was subjected to the tyrannical rule of the 
 Austrian army and executive. 
 
 On the other hand, no sooner had Napoleonism reopened 
 the tomb of St. Helena and Napoleon III. mounted the 
 throne of France, than the turbulent elements of French 
 politics, which had appeared dormant since 1815, began to 
 reassert themselves. The French Government immediately 
 armed and took to the road in search of adventure, a little 
 like a mediaeval knight, and not altogether unlike a brigand. 
 Now we find it defending the weak, here again associating 
 itself with the masterful. Whether side by side with Turkey 
 or fighting against Austria ; whether in defence of the Pope 
 or in opposition to the growing power of Prussia ; whether 
 against China or in aid of the poor Italian provinces suffer- 
 ing under the tyranny of barbarous Governments ; wherever, 
 in short, an occasion presented itself for fighting and glory, 
 Napoleonic France stained the earth with blood. What was 
 its object ? To what motive can we attribute her actions ? 
 Little matters it whether, in a few of these various adventures, 
 the Napoleonic Government served a useful social or political 
 purpose ; for instance, as in the Italian war. It was not with 
 this object that it so often resorted to arms, but in order to 
 obtain the approbation of France by satisfying a vain passion 
 for military glory. It could thus also constitute a vigorous 
 
3 H MILITARISM 
 
 and well-disciplined class of professional soldiers, who would 
 be a solid weapon to the Government to keep its ^subjects in 
 order. Was it necessary periodically to disturb the peace 
 of Europe in order to attain this end ? Little mattered it 
 so long as the traditions of Napoleonic glory were well re- 
 established with the new empire, 
 
 Even bad things contain an element of good. Napoleonism 
 and the Austrian empire, both intrinsic evils, served the use- 
 ful purpose in respect to one another of each weakening the 
 other by wars, until Prussia and the German States gave 
 them both the coup de grace. Since 1866, Austria has wisely 
 resigned herself to passivity. Of the unmeasured ambition that 
 used to characterize her, she only preserves a short programme 
 of negations, whose principal object is to prevent Russia 
 becoming too powerful in the Balkan peninsula and the 
 Orient, and from preventing Hungary, which is independent 
 in reality, from becoming so also in name. The French 
 Republic, on its part, has not entirely broken with the military 
 traditions of the nation. This would have been impossible, 
 but its policy of European warlike adventures has, in the 
 course of time, been modified and softened into one of colonial 
 expeditions to Asia and Africa. We might almost say that 
 it is gradually lulling it to sleep in the public conscience. 
 France, the warrior all in arms, like the legendary Valkirie, 
 is gradually sinking into an enchanted sleep on the mountain 
 of things that have been, beside the stake of Time, which 
 reduces everything to a heap of ashes ; and here she must 
 sleep until some hero shall arrive to rouse her from her 
 slumbers. And she will sleep for a long time yet, you may 
 be sure. The race of such heroes is extinguished in Europe ; 
 if it is rash to say for ever, for a very long time to come at 
 least. With Austria converted to a more reasonable policy, 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 315 
 
 and Napoleonism dead, Europe was able to establish an 
 equilibrium which, if not perfect, is at least tolerable one 
 which has resisted many perils and disturbance during the 
 past twenty-seven years, and which will grow better in the 
 course of time. Germany merits no small credit in having 
 contributed towards this new phase of European politics, a 
 merit which she has done her best to efface by the annexa- 
 tions of 1871 a useless annexation which concluded madly 
 a useful work. The war of 1870 was the rudest blow given 
 during the century to European militarism, because it 
 destroyed for ever the Napoleonic spirit ; but that fatal land- 
 grabbing which concluded it must have appeared as a triumph 
 of militarism, giving back to this spirit a little of that sign of 
 which Germany was rapidly stripping it by means of those 
 fierce blows known as Gravelotte and Sedan. Many imagine 
 that the war of 1870 gave a fresh lease of life to militarism 
 in Europe. In reality it killed it by destroying Napoleonism. 
 But the annexations which were its contradictory conclusion, 
 the increase of armament which were a transitory consequence, 
 led many minds totally astray with regard to this historical 
 event. History, however, will judge differently, because, 
 though Europe may never have been so heavily armed as it 
 has been since 1870, desire and opportunity to make use of 
 these weapons have never been so reduced. Now, arms are 
 the body of militarism, while the desire to resort to them is 
 its soul. Lastly, the Spanish-American War arose, also, from 
 a purely political cause. The United States demanded of 
 Spain to alter its policy in the government of Cuba. A 
 political incompatibility existed between the United States 
 and Spain analogous to that which existed between Germany 
 and Austria, and Austria and Italy, and therefore war became 
 inevitable in the end. But this political incompatibility is 
 
316 MILITARISM 
 
 everywhere diminishing in the civilized world, while colonial 
 and commercial jealousies are everywhere on the increase- 
 troubles which, as we have demonstrated, can in no way be 
 solved by war. 
 
 Thus the duty of every well-meaning man to-day is to 
 diffuse knowledge of the fact that war no longer serves the 
 purpose it once served in the struggle for civilization. The 
 aspect of society in whose midst we live is continually 
 changing ; but we persist in seeing it as it was, not as it is, 
 owing to that inertia and misoneism which are fundamental 
 laws of the human mind. Were I to ask a man : " In what 
 century do you suppose that you are living?" he would pro- 
 bably think that I wished to deride him. And yet, although 
 we all live bodily at the end of the nineteenth century, a great 
 number of us are still living mentally in past ages : we see 
 the world as it used to be, not as it actually is. As, every 
 night, millions of eyes lift themselves to heaven to con- 
 template the radiancy of those stars which, though they have 
 been dead for years, still shine so brilliantly, thus for years 
 and centuries men see around themselves things which once 
 were, but which are no more. Facts follow one another at a 
 rapid pace, more especially in our times, while human thought 
 limps after them with halting steps. In this problem of war, 
 as in every other problem, that incredulity which is due to 
 the debasement of ideas to facts must also be overcome, the 
 conscience of man must be awakened to the greatness of the 
 historical moment in which we live, to the rapid progress going 
 on around us, to the process of transformation of which we 
 are in part the subject, and in part whether consciously or 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA Z 1 7 
 
 not the tool. Now, none of the diplomatic conflicts which 
 actually divide the nations of Europe are of a kind which ' 
 could not be settled without resort to arms. Indeed, modern 
 civilization is so organized that the most powerful countries 
 are those which most benefit by peace ; because not war, but"? 
 the accumulation and right use of capital, is what gives a M 
 
 \J 
 
 nation supremacy nowadays. Yet many people still believe 
 that problems of social and political supremacy can only be 
 settled by the sword a common error which is one of the 
 obstacles to a rapid and reasonable solution to many inter- 
 national problems. 
 
 It is our duty to free the eyes of the multitude from this 
 veil of error which blinds them, by proclaiming the truth that 
 war in Europe is to-day nothing but the ghost of dead in- 
 justices, which, like the bogies of fiction, return from time to 
 time, but only to alarm. During those thirty centuries from 
 which dates our historical knowledge, war has been more a 
 social system than a cruel pastime of kings the first most 
 violent and brutal means adopted by ruling minorities to 
 acquire wealth. At last, after so many centuries of iniquity, 
 the absurdity of the social system of war has been demon- 
 strated by the decay of all the triumphs which war, in its 
 mysterious caprices, conferred on men and people. A new 
 form of civilization has arisen in which men can appease 
 their greedy instincts by the productive investment of capital 
 a wise, laborious, extravagant, and magnificent civilization, 
 which produces and consumes a prodigious quantity of 
 material. Thus, for eighty years, since the fall of Napoleon 
 the man who had tried to reanimate the spirit of warfare in 
 modern society the civilized nations of Europe have renounced 
 the exercise, to each other's hurt, of that systematic brigandage 
 named warfare, and from that moment war was a dead thing. 
 
 
3 1 8 MILITARISM 
 
 A few campaigns have been fought since then which arose 
 from political problems which prejudices inherited from past 
 ages rendered it impossible to settle by other means ; but 
 war, in its true and proper sense, was dead. So long as our 
 present civilization shall continue, so long as men and their 
 needs shall augment, so long as in new lands and old countries 
 the productive investment of capital can be multiplied, war 
 between civilized nations for economic motives will be im- 
 possible ; and those more pacific countries which have become 
 the centres of world-wide capitalism will be the most power- 
 ful. Only some access of insanity, contagiously communicated 
 from one European Government to another, could rekindle 
 war over questions of colonial dominion ; and hence arises the 
 necessity of intellectual propaganda with the object of bring- 
 ing about a clearer and more profound understanding of the 
 truth among the governing classes. 
 
 Thus propaganda against war is intimately connected with 
 any movement for social progress and any agitation which 
 has this object in view. War in the past was the daughter of 
 ignorance and vice and the mother of injustice. Were it to 
 assume its former sway in modern society, it would generate 
 sloth, ignorance, and injustice in an aggravated form. War 
 is, in itself, a pure injustice, and this alone ought to suffice to 
 induce men to do all in their power to abolish it ; for injustice 
 is the origin of all evil, of the physical evils of disease, 
 pestilence, and premature death, of the moral ones of mad- 
 ness, crime, and all the suffering which is the invisible but 
 inseparable companion of mankind on earth. How many 
 men have not asked themselves, in face of so much atrocious 
 suffering which appears inexplicable because unmerited : 
 11 What is the cause of so much pain in life ? " A terrible and 
 august reason there is, be sure of it. The baby who dies in 
 
PAX CHRISTIANA 319 
 
 its cradle, the youth who is killed by consumption, the man 
 who goes mad in the flower of his years, the son who inherits 
 his father's disease, the degenerate who becomes a criminal, 
 the neurotic who passes his existence tormented and torment- 
 ing, the unfortunate who succumbs to a broken heart on 
 account of one of those thousand injuries which men blindly 
 exchange in the thick of the struggle for wealth and honour, 
 all of these are the expiatory victims of the innumerable 
 injustices which every society tolerates in its midst, and for 
 which we are responsible, one and all, by reason of an iron 
 law of solidarity which admits of no immunity nor privilege. 
 The sin may not always have been committed by the man 
 who expiates it. But what matters this ? The process by 
 which justice is dealt does not directly affect individuals, but 
 the whole of society. Only in a society totally free from 
 injustice would man be absolutely liberated from evil. That 
 society would no longer be afflicted with invalids, criminals, 
 lunatics, paupers, vicious or unhappy men. The seed once 
 destroyed, the bitter fruit could no longer ripen. 
 
 For this reason society unconsciously always tends towards 
 a greater degree of justice, because injustice leads to suffer- " 
 ing, and man ever tries to avoid pain. The history of man- 
 kind is merely the history of these efforts : slow efforts, of 
 which a single one frequently fills a whole epoch in history ; 
 incoherent efforts, which, in one age or one people, often differ 
 from those of a former age and another nation ; intermittent 
 efforts, where long pauses often alternate with periods of 
 feverish energy ; vain efforts, not unfrequently, because, seduced 
 by an apparent or transitory happiness, man has found pain 
 instead. But the great work is equally well accomplished 
 because it is necessary ; because man, considering in the light 
 of experience one after another all the many mendacious and 
 
320 MILITARISM 
 
 apparent forms of happiness, naturally approaches to a better 
 comprehension of the nature of true happiness ; and in face of 
 this inevitable final success, all the most shameless triumphs 
 of injustice are but mere episodes of which the very recollection 
 will be lost when the term of expiation shall be fulfilled. Cer- 
 tainly these expiations of injustice, that stupefy the human 
 comprehension by reason of their greatness, are often very slow 
 in comparison to the brevity of a single life. But, after all, what 
 is man in the universal mystery of existence ? Let us, then, 
 take hope when we consider the past, and rejoice in the 
 thought of the great events and doings in whose midst it is 
 our lot to live. At the present moment the Christian world 
 has before it, if its wisdom is not less than its fortune, a long 
 respite of peace. How many great and good things might it 
 not accomplish ! Oligarchies, whose only object was to 
 enrich themselves, filled past ages with their violent iniquities, 
 from that which reigned in ancient Rome to that which 
 sprang up last century around Napoleon. To-day nothing 
 remains of them but dust, and from their ashes they shall 
 arise no more. If men are wise, the age of Pax Christiana 
 can now be inaugurated, of longer duration and more glorious 
 than the Pax Augusta ; and this should herald a fresh chapter 
 in the history of the white man's civilization an unheroic 
 chapter if you will, but, let us earnestly hope, a less lugu- 
 brious and less bloody chapter, and one less replete with 
 atrocities than those which have preceded it. 
 
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