THE GREAT RESOLVE 
 
 An Essay on the European War 
 and the 
 Possible Settlements Thereof ' 
 
 D. P. RHODES 
 

 %:^vxfv?i 
 
 
THE GREAT RESOLVE 
 
THE GREAT RESOLVE 
 
 AN ESSAY ON THE EUROPEAN WAR 
 
 AND THE 
 
 POSSIBLE SETTLEMENTS THEREOF 
 
 IN TWO PARTS 
 
 PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 
 THE SOLUTION 
 
 r^' By 
 
 D: P. RHODES 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 R. H. HINKLEY COMPANY 
 
 PUBLISHERS 
 

 y/^z^^ 
 
THE GREAT RESOLVE 
 
 Patriotism and Devolution 
 
 Behold, in Europe, a great wave of patriot- 
 ism in mid career. There are, at the same time, 
 other phenomena, some correlative, some incon- 
 gruous, — as, for example, a clash of industries 
 and political ideals, a nation believing itself 
 stifled and struggling for air, a religious revival 
 with priests and warriors, shoulder to shoulder, 
 bearing icons ; there are also sluggards, skulk- 
 ers and unwilling soldiers, a pistol nosing them 
 in the back. But over and around these more 
 or less familiar landmarks of an embattled 
 plain presses a weighty flood whose final source, 
 a long way back, lay in untilled valleys afford- 
 ing livelihood to the erect, if simple, denizens 
 thereof — hence to be defended by them unit- 
 edly against all comers, until such time as 
 growing numbers should compel excursions 
 do^vn into the unknown. 
 
 Opinions differ as to the relative significance 
 1 
 
A THE GREAT RESOLVE 
 
 of this feature of the European war. By some 
 it is merely taken for granted as an invariable 
 concomitant of international disputes which no 
 longer figures conspicuously amongst the final 
 causes of such disputes, whilst others urge that, 
 in the present conflict, love of country and pride 
 of race are factors so predominant as to render 
 all else of little weight. But there is no disa- 
 greement whatever as to the persistent reap- 
 pearance of these factors in national quarrels ; 
 for everybody knows that, if there were no 
 patriots, war would be impossible. Either the 
 leader, or the few who hire him, or the many 
 who are led must be patriots ; otherwise there 
 can be no fighting; adjustment of differences 
 carried even unto the amalgamation of two 
 races must take place before any question of 
 hostility may arise. 
 
 Such being the case, it must always have been 
 our duty to put patriotism to the same tests to 
 which we are accustomed to put religions, phi- 
 losophies and political systems : the test of rea- 
 son, the test of sentiment. Have we performed 
 this duty! Evidently not; it is, moreover, a 
 ticklish and ungrateful business. 
 
 Yet if there was ever a favourable season for 
 the disintegration of prejudice, the present mo- 
 
PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 6 
 
 ment, for this purpose, seems fairly teeming 
 with promise. When one half of mankind is 
 engaged in a struggle any settlement of which 
 in accordance with accepted ideas will certainly 
 imply the most sinister possibilities for both 
 the belligerent and the other half, it becomes 
 not only permissible but even obligatory to un- 
 dertake an examination, as rigorous as possible, 
 of that quality in mankind without which no 
 such struggle could ever be set afoot. Espe- 
 cially is this a time when all rhetoric should be 
 suspect. If the tyranny of catchwords and 
 high-sounding phrases to which we are always 
 more or less subject seems now in a fair way 
 to prove more oppressive than ever, a sincere 
 and deliberate effort should be made to secure 
 some measure of relief. And if, in the process, 
 much that we have been accustomed to regard 
 as sacred turns out to be so only verbally and 
 not solidly founded in sentiment or in reason, 
 a further and prodigious effort should be made 
 — how prodigious, to be successful, we already 
 know too well — to bring the embarrassing and 
 false formulas into general discredit. 
 
 The spirit of the clan; tribal jealousies; 
 civic pride; national pride; racial pride: — 
 
4 THE GEEAT EESOLVE 
 
 these are the cherished prepossessions that 
 should now be subjected to a most candid scru- 
 tiny. They verge so obviously upon one an- 
 other that, for the purposes of this essay, they 
 may be grouped under the head, patriotism, 
 except where otherwise stated. The element, 
 nearly always present in patriotism, which is 
 derived from climatic and topographical condi- 
 tions will not be here considered, since it has no 
 immediate bearing on the present inquiry or its 
 results. 
 
 Amongst the vexatious questions here to be 
 asked are the following : — 
 
 Is pugnacity now, and must it ever remain, 
 an essential part of man's composition; if so, 
 is it not merely inevitable but even desirable 
 that his passion be used for upholding an ideal 
 that is to some extent altruistic rather than be 
 vented in paltry quarrels'? 
 
 Have patriots ever rested content with half- 
 successes 1 If so, may they continue indefinitely 
 to be thus satisfied? 
 
 Has any nation ever had so admirable a 
 record as to be justified ipso facto in making 
 considerable sacrifices to the end of keeping it- 
 self in the forefront of civilisation? 
 
 Do we really emulate our famous dead? 
 
PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 
 
 How is our competence to deal with difficult 
 social and economic questions affected by the 
 preoccupations of nationality? 
 
 And the best way to answer the above and 
 many correlative questions will be to answer the 
 two following : — 
 
 What modifications, if any, of patriotism as 
 a motive force may be expected in the future, 
 near or remote? 
 
 What modifications of patriotism, if any, are 
 clearly desirable in the immediate future, and 
 especially in connection with the settlement of 
 the European war? 
 
 DESTINY OF PATRIOTISM 
 
 We may begin by postulating man's interest 
 in his posterity, — not that this is either a truth 
 of the highest certainty or indispensable for the 
 purposes of this inquiry, but that it seems a 
 reasonably safe starting-point and will serve to 
 abridge some of our preliminary steps. Man, 
 to be sure, is by no means conspicuous amongst 
 animals in his solicitude for generations un- 
 born. Even as a provider for his offspring, he 
 suffers by comparison with many of the lower 
 animals which seem to devote nearly their 
 whole energy and an incredible ingenuity to the 
 
6 THE GKEAT RESOLVE 
 
 protection of their young. Nevertheless the 
 public works that he undertakes, both of a 
 material and of an intellectual character, 
 would be incomprehensible if he had no care 
 beyond the egoism of his grandchildren. Con- 
 sciously or no, he must somehow be concerned 
 for their altruism as well ; i. e., for their con- 
 cern for their grandchildren, and so on, ad 
 infinitum. Also the childless have counted 
 amongst the most thoughtful providers for the 
 distant future; and it would be difficult to 
 maintain that the most depraved specimens of 
 the race were ever quite successful in resisting 
 the claims of posterity. 
 
 Keeping this in mind, we may pass on to the 
 central theme of the discussion and note that 
 patriotism is to no one a mere emotional luxury 
 without practical implications. Looking for- 
 ward or looking backward, it looks always 
 toward achievement, or toward an effort at 
 achievement, no matter how hopeless the effort 
 may appear. We should, then, consider in what 
 ways patriotic endeavour may eventuate in the 
 life of a single patriot or of a community of 
 patriots and of their posterity. First, the effi- 
 cient or fortunate patriot. 
 
PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 7 
 
 THE FORTUNATE PATRIOT 
 
 Every true patriot wishes to see his father 
 land in the van of civilisation. He applauds 
 and seconds all efforts of his countrymen made 
 in the direction of better thought, better art, 
 better government, better living, greater 
 wealth. If jealous neighbours interfere, he 
 fights for his country with all the determina- 
 tion that in him lies. Finally if, through peace- 
 ful or warlike measures or both, his hopes are 
 realised and he sees his fatherland indeed and 
 admittedly pre-eminent amongst nations, may 
 he rest content with this achievement! If he 
 may, his patriotism will be satisfied and will 
 cease to be for him a moving force. But the 
 other nations, by their very existence, will re- 
 main a menace to the supremacy of his own. 
 They, too, must be supposed to contain patriots, 
 — possibly efficient ones. Hence our original 
 patriot, or society of patriots, to achieve final 
 success, must either contrive the conquest of 
 these other nations or, by voluntarily sharing 
 with them the secrets of national progress, pro- 
 ceed to break down the barriers between nation 
 and nation, race and race, community and com- 
 munity, until one kind and one degree of civili- 
 
8 THE GKEAT KESOLVB 
 
 sation shall become the common property of 
 mankind. In either event, patriotism, — the 
 original motive force, — will dwindle and dis- 
 appear. In other words, the highest aims of 
 patriotism are suicidal. 
 
 THE UNHAPPY PATKIOT 
 
 But such a state of affairs, or anything nearly 
 approaching it, has never been realised upon 
 Earth. Men have dreamed it, but it has not 
 come to pass. Evidently, the most aspiring 
 patriots have been cheated of their goal, either 
 by other patriots who were in turn foredoomed 
 to failure, or by some other opposition with 
 which patriotism had nothing to do. What, 
 then, of these unhappy patriots and their pos- 
 terity? Sometimes we have seen their aspira- 
 tions rudely and completely checked and them- 
 selves become traitors not only to their own 
 country but to all mankind. Again we have 
 seen disappointments and set-backs followed by 
 redoubled efforts and real achievement. We 
 have seen men described as successful patriots, 
 these being of two classes : men who have died 
 while in the process of patriotic achievement, 
 and others who have seemed to get everything 
 they desired in life by using patriotism as a 
 
PATKIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION y 
 
 means. In these last, the patriotic impulse is 
 obviously not unmixed, and in both is it left 
 unsatisfied because of the menace from without 
 to which their unfinished fabric has always been 
 exposed. 
 
 THE CRUCIAL QUESTION 
 
 Hence the question arises, Are civic pride, 
 national pride, pride of race, pride of clan, — 
 all those forms of esprit de corps which, for 
 convenience, we have classed under the head, 
 patriotism, — are these destined to a ceaseless 
 ebb and flow, partial suppression, partial re- 
 crudescence, local triumph and local defeat, as 
 long as the race shall endure? Shall they never 
 become obsolete either through an absolute vin- 
 dication of their virtue or through a final 
 demonstration of their futility! 
 
 There can be no doubt that in the acts and 
 utterances of the vast majority of mankind is 
 implied an affirmative answer to this question, 
 as — Yes, patriotic emotion will continue 
 throughout the ages to have pretty much the 
 same influence on human thought and conduct 
 as it has had in the past; it is unlikely that 
 men will ever cease to take pride in banding 
 together and working for the common weal, and 
 
10 THE GREAT EESOLVE 
 
 it is equally unlikely that one man or company 
 of men will ever conquer the earth and consoli- 
 date that conquest in such wise as to render 
 patriotism superfluous. 
 
 That anyone returning such an answer should 
 ever himself be capable of a patriotic act would 
 seem strange but for the fact that nearly all 
 patriots are to be found in the earliest and least 
 ambitious stages of achievement. If they are, 
 for example, earnestly advocating improve- 
 ments in the schools of their own town or 
 diplomatically securing an advantage for their 
 country's trade, it is not inevitable that they 
 should look beyond the immediate results of the 
 business in hand ; — taking care of the pennies 
 should mean that the pounds will take care of 
 themselves. To but few has it been vouchsafed 
 to consider of a world-dominion; and in these 
 the patriotic impulse has generally become so 
 embroiled with other motives as to suggest the 
 probability that it was about to disappear well 
 before its final vindication could be expected. 
 We must ask, then, — Is the common-sense view 
 of the future justifiable; is it possible that 
 patriotism will never be eliminated from human 
 concerns either by a perfect realisation of its 
 virtue or by a final demonstration of its futil- 
 
PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 11 
 
 ity, but will go on repeating its half-successes 
 and half-failures to the end of time? 
 
 And the answer must be that this is indeed 
 possible, but only on one condition : to wit, that 
 the theory of devolution be also justified by the 
 event. If the human race has already reached, 
 or is soon to reach, its highest point in the scale 
 of culture and is thenceforward to degenerate 
 in mind or body, to lose gradually the faculties 
 of logic and criticism or the energy to make the 
 decisions thereof effective, to lose even the 
 power to keep records, and to become finally an 
 insane or lethargic rabble, shorn of all striking 
 significance in the scheme of nature, this devo- 
 lutionary process may indeed be accompanied 
 by those same manifestations of clan-spirit 
 which we have witnessed in its career to date 
 and in the careers of many animals. Even upon 
 this supposition, it might be possible to forecast 
 the eventual disappearance of clan-spirit, but 
 we need not here consider a contingency so re- 
 mote and so barren of any but a purely logical 
 importance. The point which is practically 
 important to be established is that, upon any 
 theory of our future other than the devolution- 
 ary, it is inconceivable that patriotism should 
 endure. If, on the whole, we mark time (though 
 
12 THE GEEAT RESOLVE 
 
 this be but a manner of speaking) or if we in- 
 definitely improve our standard of culture in 
 those directions which are often so easily dis- 
 cernible and always so difficult for a unit of our 
 unwieldy bulk to follow, we shall in time become 
 incapable of responding to the call of country, 
 of glorifying the traditions of a race, of defend- 
 ing the rights of a clan, or of asserting the 
 superiority of a caste. 
 
 OUR COMMON HERITAGE 
 
 In order to admit this necessity we have but 
 to recognise that prime condition of our every 
 effort, — that single essential principle of our 
 very existence, — which binds the white man to 
 the black, the ignoramus to the scholar; nay 
 more, which governs every man 's brain and his 
 belly in equal degree, links them both to his 
 dog's, and, for that matter, levels the whole of 
 stalking creation with the dust that is under its 
 feet. Abhorrence of monotony is the universal 
 rule, — the only one we know. 
 
 In an earlier work,* the present writer has 
 endeavoured to show that the available data of 
 Nature point unmistakably to a single element 
 in a single dimension as constituting the uni- 
 
 * The Philosophy of Change; Macmillan, 1909. 
 
PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 13 
 
 verse in which we live and of which we form a 
 part ; and, in the course of this work, the single 
 constituent element is considered at length in 
 its hypothetical, continuous flux from one pat- 
 tern to another. No definite goal is in view; 
 yet, from this flux, atoms and molecules of 
 matter seem inevitably to be evolved, attracting 
 one another in accordance with the law of grav- 
 itation and creating tri-dimensional illusions for 
 the benefit of any suitably organised, sentient 
 beings that may later appear in their midst. 
 The so-called ether waves, as well, are seen to 
 be inevitable, their known velocity affording a 
 key, as yet unused, to the single dimension of 
 the hypothetical universe. Similarly, matter 
 and its peculiar attributes must eventually be 
 resolved into the simple element, although that 
 condition of the resolution which we call Time 
 may not, perhaps, be regarded in the same way 
 as in any consideration of a known evolution. 
 Matter will be resolved into the simple element 
 when all the reciprocal relations of its particles 
 are exhausted, each relation having been real- 
 ised once and no more. In the interval, matter 
 exists as an appearance or illusion to which 
 sentient, material beings like ourselves may re- 
 spond while remaining insensible to the flux of 
 
14 THE GKEAT KESOLVE 
 
 its constituent. And in this interval is pro- 
 duced our own world and perhaps many others 
 that have preceded its birth or will follow after 
 its collapse. 
 
 If this theory be accepted, the abundance and 
 variety of Nature and the mysteries of thought 
 remain still inscrutable; for it is evident that 
 the manifold details of our world may not be 
 derived from, nor explained by, the considera- 
 tion of any universe, apparent or hypothetical. 
 And indeed, in accordance with the self-same 
 theory, it is inconceivable that these riddles 
 should be finally solved and any bit of reality 
 positively perceived until all the illusions of the 
 one-dimensional universe have been exploited. 
 Yet an attentive survey of this hypothetical uni- 
 verse — which universe, be it repeated, not only 
 seems to be pointedly suggested by the results 
 of modern chemical and astronomical research 
 but may be shown to justify its assumption up 
 to the point of the evolution of geometrical con- 
 cepts and of matter with all its peculiar attri- 
 butes — serves to render all human problems 
 less vexatious in character, less prolific of futile 
 and baneful speculation. For, in the universe 
 of one dimension, the known data of Nature are 
 at once perceived to be illusory yet possessed 
 
PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 15 
 
 of a negative significance, whilst the search for 
 truth appears consistently as a destructive 
 process up to the final step. Hence, all else 
 being equal, the more finished your syllogism 
 and the more solid its premises, the sooner will 
 it be discarded. Tradition is hereby shorn of 
 its meretricious display; Indolence, represent- 
 ing evil to be good in order to let well alone, 
 suffers a loss of countenance; and the general 
 duty to prune our civilisation of its withered 
 boughs in favour of the younger shoots becomes 
 more obvious than ever. Any familiar human 
 institution may then be maintained for an in- 
 definite period but may not be invested with 
 sanctity nor regarded as either indestructible 
 or indispensable for the welfare of the race. 
 When the burthen of it comes to be sorely felt, 
 the question of relief may be taken up without 
 serious misgivings or acute regret. 
 
 A comprehensive summary of the philosophy 
 of change may not be included within the limits 
 of this essay. In connection, however, with our 
 discussion of patriotism and its destiny, it is de- 
 sirable to notice the bearing of this principle of 
 continuity on certain of the normal pursuits of 
 man. Let us proceed, then, to a brief consider- 
 ation of our common heritage. 
 
16 THE GKEAT KESOLVE 
 
 A man may make speeches or play tennis or 
 eat a quail every day for a considerable period, 
 since the conditions of each performance differ 
 so widely from those of the preceding ones as 
 to leave him no doubt that his act is much more 
 a new one than the repetition of an old. If the 
 speechmaker is notorious amongst us for ^^ re- 
 peating himself/' as we say, none knows better 
 than he that our estimate of him is but a man- 
 ner of speaking ; if he were really in danger of 
 repeating himself, his terror would be extreme, 
 and no power could draw a word from his lips. 
 With the assiduous tennis-player, it is the pros- 
 pect of a change in bodily condition, or of new 
 strokes executed or witnessed, or of a novel 
 score and contest, or of an improved standing 
 amongst his rivals, that brings him daily into 
 court. The peculiar meat and flavour of a quail 
 may afford the highest possible relish for a 
 week of dining. And in dining or tennis-playing 
 or speechmaking, or in any other of our activi- 
 ties, — whether bodily or intellectual, and no 
 matter how habitual, — we run no real risk of 
 repetition. In this continuous universe in which 
 we live — unless all appearances are not merely 
 deceptive but even nugatory — it is certain that 
 no act of man's, no process of Nature's, may be 
 
PATKIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 17 
 
 repeated. Nevertheless, in our obscurity, we 
 take account of seeming similarities, seeming 
 repetitions. At the outset, they may lie attrac- 
 tively in the path of least resistance; but, as 
 they accumulate, they become wearisome, then 
 disgusting, then fraught with menace. It is as 
 if Chaos itself were stealing upon us like a 
 deadly gas. We must retreat, if we may, shun- 
 ning Stability as that limit on the hither side 
 of which we have our being. If we are merely 
 speechmakers or tennis-players or diners off the 
 fat of the land, escape should be easy; if we are 
 prisoners in a cell or victims of inquisitorial 
 torture, madness or death may be the only 
 refuge. And generally, in every-day life, a time 
 comes to the most bibulous when he may per- 
 haps do other things but may not drink ; to the 
 most studious when he may do nearly anything 
 but read ; to the scribe when his pen seems as 
 a giant oak ; to the poet when all the world is 
 wrapped in fog; to the philosopher when he 
 excels in platitudes. 
 
 Patriotic endeavour is probably never as en- 
 grossing a pursuit as any of the above may be ; 
 moreover, it is generally interwoven with a host 
 of other pursuits. On the other hand, it is 
 seldom of so passionate or vicious a character 
 
18 THE GEEAT RESOLVE 
 
 as to escape, for long at a time, the searching 
 glance of reason ; and furthermore, as we have 
 seen, it is forever thwarting its own aims and 
 suffering a self-inflicted defeat. This persist- 
 ent failure to improve its standing amongst the 
 rival concerns of life does but invite the ap- 
 proach of that dreaded cloud of similarities and 
 repetitions which are always threatening human 
 unreadiness. Suppose an ardent patriot and 
 otherwise average man to live forever, remem- 
 bering his own experience of a century as easily 
 as we remember ours of a twelvemonth; no 
 amount of interweaving of his patriotic career 
 with other pursuits could avert the arrival of a 
 day whenceforward it would be impossible for 
 him to take the least interest in the welfare of 
 a nation or the rights of a clan. Howsoever 
 needy or perilous his situation in life, he would 
 be incapable of any effort toward claiming the 
 protection of either nation or clan; or if he 
 should indeed manage to utter the appropriate 
 words to this end, they would at once be recog- 
 nised as a hollow sham. Even so will become 
 the race of us. How far an hereditary aptitude 
 for ideas may accelerate the process, is a ques- 
 tion that need not concern us here, for no such 
 factor is required in the final result. History 
 
PATEIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 19 
 
 alone, uncertain though her vision, may make 
 the implements with which all national barriers 
 will be swept from the face of practical affairs. 
 Certain other barriers will disappear at the 
 same time; but, inasmuch as the world's most 
 urgent business of the moment is with the idea 
 of nationality, we shall do well to begin by ad- 
 mitting that the bombast of Trafalgar Day and 
 the Fourth of July exalts that which is doomed. 
 Patriotism, as an emotion, as a career, as a 
 political device, is doomed to desuetude, even as 
 feudalism, slavery and political religions; — 
 doomed, that is, unless the race itself is doomed 
 to devolution. Which perhaps the race is ; but 
 which the race will never admit. If tomorrow 
 a biologist should discover that we had but one 
 chance in a thousand of escaping a long, contin- 
 uous and eventually fatal decline in bodily and 
 mental efficiency, we might all become professed 
 devolutionists in theory; but, in the practical 
 affairs of life, we should doubtless take no ac- 
 count of the new doctrine, or, if we did, our de- 
 cline would be rapid enough to startle and ex- 
 asperate the biologist. 
 
 FOUNDATIONS OF PATRIOTISM 
 
 We have now to consider another aspect of 
 patriotism, — to ask. What is its origin? 
 
20 THE GKEAT RESOLVE 
 
 Let us begin by admitting that the future is 
 the unique concern of us all. When we enter 
 upon a study of history or go forth to view an 
 admirable monument of the past, our incentive 
 is either the intrinsic pleasure hoped for in the 
 experience or the advantage to be gained there- 
 from for ourselves or others; it is never, in 
 tolerably sane persons, the possil)ility of be- 
 coming actually embedded in the past. Only in 
 its bearing on the future is the past of any in- 
 terest. Moreover, the future, in its general out- 
 lines or as between certain alternatives, is al- 
 ways susceptible of forecast, whilst the past, 
 which may be neither lived over again nor de- 
 rived from experiential elements in our actual 
 possession, — since Nature does not proceed 
 backward, — is largely a subject of surmise, 
 and no two persons may hold quite the same 
 views concerning it. History gathers up the 
 threads of human action and hands them to 
 each new generation who, looking backward, 
 find them already worn filmy and inextricable. 
 Though Caesar crossing the Eubicon be justifi- 
 ably regarded as a fact, it is a fact absolutely 
 devoid of meaning except in connection with a 
 vast number of other facts each of which, when 
 similarly considered, must forever remain 
 
PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 21 
 
 matter of conjecture. Logic tiere is of slight 
 competence; opinion and sentiment mnst be 
 given free play. 
 
 In the argument, just completed, on the des- 
 tiny of patriotism, opinion and sentiment have 
 figured not at all; the subject lay within the 
 domain of logic. On the other hand, a discus- 
 sion of the foundations of patriotism may not 
 be conducted in the same rigorous manner; no 
 more is it an indispensable forerunner of the 
 appeal which will be made in the second part 
 of this essay. Nevertheless, since a tolerably 
 plausible exposition of this subject might have 
 some bearing — not on the ulterior destiny of 
 patriotism, but — on the immediately proximate 
 status of patriotism as a motive force, it should 
 be stated, as briefly as possible and in well- 
 worn words, that the origin of patriotism, in so 
 far as climate and natural surroundings are not 
 involved, would seem mainly to be found in the 
 two following conditions of our early existence 
 as a race : — 
 
 (1) The necessity of primitive men to band 
 together for self-protection in the usual occu- 
 pations of the time, and the contingent obliga- 
 tion to construct an ethical ideal which should 
 justify a resort to aggressive combat ; and 
 
22 THE GREAT EESOLVE 
 
 (2) That inherent discontent — mainspring 
 of our existence — which, while driving the most 
 active individuals forward to improve their 
 condition in life, caused their less enterprising 
 and more reflective brethren to magnify the 
 deeds of their ancestors. 
 
 Thus self-interest and religion combined to 
 establish a kind of cult of the tribe to which 
 even its most powerful and ambitious members 
 might seldom prove unfaithful, — a crude sys- 
 tem, no doubt, and one more suited to savages 
 than to a race of intellects busy with all manner 
 of useful devices. Yet this ingenious race is 
 likewise of a tremendous inertia ; and today we 
 see the tribal system still in full swing in the 
 form of huge nations and alliances of nations 
 engaged admittedly in mortal combat. 
 
 As to Condition 1, — it seems impossible to 
 discover that the spirit of the clan has afforded 
 any but a fleeting and precarious security to the 
 individual in his pursuit of happiness. Imper- 
 fect though it be, this safeguard has doubtless 
 been indispensable through ages upon ages; 
 just as certainly may it be discarded at any 
 moment when its true character and implica- 
 tions have become clear to a considerable num- 
 ber of persons possessing influence in our af- 
 
PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 23 
 
 fairs. And it is precisely this revelation that 
 may not unreasonably be hoped for as a conse- 
 quence of the present European war. To no 
 practical purpose whatever have political phi- 
 losophers, contemplating the superficies of 
 events, deigned to argue that nations, though 
 incapable of rising to those heights of virtue 
 which are accessible to individuals, are always 
 saved from descent into those depths of iniquity 
 which are familiar to countless units in every 
 generation. In point of consequences, material 
 or moral, though nations be indeed incapable of 
 rising even to the height of common justice, they 
 are forever demonstrating that, in the slightest 
 lapse from their accustomed plane of morality 
 or even in preserving the most perfect tradi- 
 tional uprightness, they may cause more misery 
 and whet vicious appetites more effectually than 
 any conceivable society of loose-lived indi^dd- 
 uals could ever manage to do. More of this 
 later on. 
 
 Meanwhile, as to Condition 2, — present dis- 
 content suggesting a reverence for ancestors, — 
 there seems no way of escape from a similar 
 con\dction. To read the words and deeds of our 
 famous dead is not merely obligatory but even 
 entertaining and often either thrilling or sur- 
 
24 THE GEEAT EESOLVE 
 
 prisingly suggestive. Yet our cMef concern, in 
 this occupation, is to profit by the errors of the 
 most admirable amongst them; every effort to 
 derive a paragon for our own day ends in fail- 
 ure. Vaguely as we know our forefathers, we 
 could not admit them to our society; no more, 
 upon consideration, could we wish it were pos- 
 sible to introduce ourselves in their midst. Any 
 of us who should suddenly find ourselves 
 amongst the sturdy Puritans of early New Eng- 
 land should be not only hideously uncomfortable 
 but severely disapproving, as well; and, to 
 climb still higher in the family tree, we might 
 prefer to remain uninvited to our rich uncle's 
 board rather than dodge the post-prandial 
 bones. Edward with the garter would probably 
 appear too heavily humourous ; we should dis- 
 like to roll Kalkstein in a carpet even at the 
 Great Elector's behest, knowing that his head 
 was to come off at the end of the journey; nor 
 can we imagine ourselves clutching at political 
 liberty with the gesture of ninety-three. No- 
 body of today would dare write one of Shake- 
 spere's plays if Shakespere had not already 
 written it himself, nor to speak of Nature as 
 Newton did. *' Each man to his time," it has 
 been said; ^^ if we can do as well for our time 
 
PATRIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 25 
 
 as these have done for theirs, we may still carry 
 the banner of civilisation in the vanguard of the 
 nations.'' Yet the most moderate of such pa- 
 triotic dicta would probably lose their force for 
 any who might assist, even as passive specta- 
 tors, at the events of a bygone age. 
 
 On the other hand, our illustrious ancestors 
 — if, by a similar miracle, they might have sur- 
 veyed the world that was later to be ours of 
 today — would doubtless have looked on us with 
 a similar displeasure and disapprobation. Be- 
 ing ignorant of the intervening steps in the 
 process of evolution, they must take the final 
 product as they found it and compare us with 
 themselves. Their censure would, of course, 
 have been various and we may not guess very 
 many of the counts in the total indictment. 
 Nevertheless, it seems a safe conjecture that 
 certain of our forefathers of recent generations 
 in the Western world would have seen in us a 
 race of weedy, neurotic, inventive busybodies 
 dependent, for our very existence, on manifold 
 combinations of clangorous and evil-smelling 
 machinery, and committed to the most fruit- 
 lessly intricate devices in our social and polit- 
 ical life. These would have welcomed the sight 
 of the rare individuals amongst us in whom 
 
26 THE GKEAT EESOLVE 
 
 were preserved the robustness of physique and 
 simplicity of aim so common in their own day. 
 Other of our forefathers, though not contemp- 
 tuous of our physique, would probably have 
 marvelled at the meagreness of our spiritual 
 life ; still others would have been struck by our 
 timidity in reasoning with ourselves or with one 
 another and our naive reliance on unchallenged 
 syllogisms. All, probably, on witnessing the 
 battles now being fought in Europe, would at 
 once have suspected that this could not have 
 been a people's war in its origin inasmuch as a 
 struggle of such proportions, if precipitated by 
 a generation so peaceably materialistic, would 
 have amounted to a gigantic and unthinkable 
 affectation. 
 
 Similarly, we of today — could the life of a 
 distant generation of the future be suddenly 
 discovered to us, as in a theatre — should doubt- 
 less find repellent traits in our posterity. But 
 we may always hope that such traits would be 
 few and, from generation to generation, more 
 satisfactorily explicable; for the measure of 
 progress, on the one hand, or of decadence, on 
 the other, can never be a comparison with the 
 past, since the past may not be altered, resus- 
 citated, or adequately comprehended. The 
 
PATKIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 27 
 
 measure of progress or of decadence in any 
 day, year, century, or millennium, is the ratio 
 between the sum of those things which are ur- 
 gently and obviously demanding to be done at 
 the beginning of such day, year, century, or 
 millennium, and the portion of those same 
 things which are forthwith set in process of 
 being done and continued in that process 
 throughout each remaining portion of the 
 period in question. 
 
 When scientists and historians are both pre- 
 pared and permitted to teach the growing mind 
 that we cannot be reasonably certain of the sig- 
 nificance of any event in the past — when, con- 
 sequently, the study of the future may be taken 
 up in a methodical manner — it will be unnec- 
 essary either to exalt or to disparage the stri- 
 king figures in history and, incidentally, a great 
 deal of unprofitable recrimination may be dis- 
 pensed with. The methodical study of the 
 future, to be sure, is confined to negative propo- 
 sitions from which only the most general posi- 
 tive inferences may be drawn; but its conclu- 
 sions possess the advantage of certainty which 
 is denied to our concrete considerations of the 
 past. Let us briefly notice the limitations of our 
 study of both past and future, as applied to the 
 case of patriotism. 
 
28 THE GREAT RESOLVE 
 
 If you try to batter to pieces any idol boast- 
 ing the respectable antiquity of Patriotism, you 
 are at once asked, even by the most friendly 
 onlookers, what you propose to set up in its 
 place. You may smile as much as you like at 
 the audacity with which, by implication, you are 
 being credited; it remains a serious matter 
 nevertheless. For our history lessons have ut- 
 terly failed to dispel the illusion that every 
 proper iconoclast should have a program of 
 reconstruction in his pocket, — one, too, that 
 will really work. It is apparently to no purpose 
 that we have seen the precepts and prophecies 
 of all political and religious reformers of both 
 ancient and modern times perverted and falsi- 
 fied from the very date of their utterance. And 
 perhaps, indeed, this lesson will itself be falsi- 
 fied, since the lessons of history are dubious at 
 the best. Some day, perhaps, an iconoclast will 
 actually reconstruct. 
 
 But the case here in question lies partly 
 within the domain of logic. Premising the lim- 
 its of the best human knowledge, we should 
 readily admit that the more specific is any con- 
 struction of the future, the less exact will be the 
 forecast ; that only in its most general aspects 
 may the future be forecast with any approach 
 
PATKIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION" 29 
 
 to absolute certainty. Which should mean that 
 he who pulls down is very unlikely to build up, 
 or that, if he has indeed a hand in the upbuild- 
 ing, this process will be of a different character 
 from any he may have had in mind. Intelligent 
 destruction is as much as may be reasonably 
 expected of any reformer. 
 
 Just how the daily life and yearly reckonings 
 of the race would be affected by a rapid and 
 considerable weakening of the clan-spirit may 
 not be described. Only general statements are 
 possible. The spirit of the clan will eventually 
 give place to a more rational egoism or — what 
 comes to the same thing — to a more scientific 
 and comprehensive altruism. 
 
 Meanwhile, be it observed, idol-smashing is a 
 big word to be applied to any project under- 
 taken against so venerable an institution as 
 patriotism; idols of this kind are seldom to be 
 disposed of by a single impetuous assault. At 
 any moment, to be sure, they may fall of their 
 own weight or faulty construction; or, on the 
 other hand, they may crumble almost impercep- 
 tibly. Whichever may be the case of patriotism, 
 the actual spectacle will perhaps be full of bit- 
 terness and sorrowful beyond words. It may 
 
30 THE GEEAT KESOLVE 
 
 be accompanied by the most odious by-play; 
 greed and all manner of unworthy pretences 
 may figure among the disintegrating elements ; 
 much of the earth's nobility and simplicity of 
 soul may perish in the ruins. For it is every- 
 where understood that ' ^ Long live the King ! ' ' 
 has been shouted with a generous fervour that 
 has removed all rancour from the heart, left no 
 slightest stain in the memory and afforded a 
 blessed comfort to the dying and the bereaved. 
 Besides, can we of today pretend that we should 
 like to see Frenchmen cease to be Frenchmen, 
 or Englishmen being split up into groups by a 
 central-universal committee on ethnology? 
 However deep and real our present grievance, 
 — however urgent and inexorable, — it may not 
 be denied that the love of country has inspired 
 splendid achievements ; verily, he who purposes 
 taking a hack at our good old idol shall not do 
 it with a light heart. 
 
 But is it easy today to win to light-hearted- 
 ness on any terms! Some few at the battle- 
 front — some few, stocking their granaries very 
 far from the same front — may achieve, or suc- 
 cessfully counterfeit, this miracle. To any who 
 are leading a tolerably normal life, learning 
 what they may of the conditions of the great 
 
PATKIOTISM AND DEVOLUTION 31 
 
 conflict, and keeping a decent faith in their 
 power of independent judgment, it should be 
 clear that we are all confronting a crucial prob- 
 lem, the solution of which, according to any 
 tried method, means inevitably an age of dark- 
 ness to follow. The saying that democracy is 
 at stake is a ridiculously inadequate statement 
 of the crisis. For the world might worry along 
 pretty comfortably without democracy, but it 
 cannot manage at all if the preposterous fashion 
 of stabbing in the back is to be sustained. Rad- 
 ical measures are necessary, the like of which 
 have not been seen before. Neighbour, if you Ve 
 no less than the ordinary ambition to provide a 
 decent heritage for your children and your 
 children 's children, it is most emphatically your 
 business, now and henceforward, to look into 
 your heart and cudgel your brains till you dis- 
 cover the means to this end that are rational, — 
 the means that have a chance of success. If, in 
 the process, certain of your ideals become liable 
 to discredit, it is still your business to ask your- 
 self honestly how best you may help to bring 
 good out of that which seems but a choice of 
 evils. If you fail, no shift will serve when re- 
 tribution is here and hammering on your door. 
 
The Solution 
 
 Why should patriotism, for the purposes of 
 this essay, have been singled out from all human 
 concerns to be consigned so logically to perdi- 
 tion? Supposing we manage to elevate our 
 standard of culture or to maintain it, as we say, 
 upon its actual plane, not patriotism alone but 
 any other of our present concerns, as well, may 
 be eliminated from the future by precisely the 
 same process. In accordance with the cardinal 
 principle of our existence — which is likewise 
 the single principle of all Nature, and which has 
 here been defined as the abhorrence of similari- 
 ties and repetitions — that which is must go, 
 from the greed of gold to the fashion in hats. 
 Why, then, patriotism to the fore! 
 
 Because, on the one hand, it is amongst the 
 most transparent of our illusions. At times, re- 
 cently, it has seemed of an extreme tenuity, like 
 the walls of a bubble; and no one can be cer- 
 tain that its prismatic splendour of the moment 
 is not ominous of collapse. The comparison is 
 perhaps extravagant, — unlikely to be justified. 
 
 32 
 
THE SOLUTION 33 
 
 Yet a weakening of insnlar prepossessions 
 under the normal conditions of peace has not 
 only been observed and repeatedly commented 
 on but has long been deducible as a certain con- 
 sequence of the rapidly growing freedom of in- 
 tercourse between people of different race. 
 
 On the other hand, though national pride is 
 by no means the sole cause of war, the indisput- 
 able fact remains that an appalling proportion 
 of the most valuable men in Europe are at pres- 
 ent entirely given over to the business of des- 
 troying one another who, but for this same 
 pride, could never be herded together for any 
 such purpose. In general, — as we have seen, 
 — patriotism, though never the sole cause of 
 any war, is the one factor which invariably ap- 
 pears in the causation of wars and, by the mere 
 fact of its continued occupancy of a prominent 
 place in men's thought, makes further wars in- 
 evitable. There it lies, ready-to-hand for the 
 quarrelsome purposes of any clique, however 
 small, that is suitably placed for turning it to 
 account. In this sense, patriotism means war. 
 
 THE ESSENCE OF WAR 
 
 It seems difficult to exaggerate the force of 
 this indictment. If war be defended as a 
 
34 THE GREAT EESOLVE 
 
 strengtliener and rejuvenator of the race, it 
 must be shown for what uses it has ever proved 
 or is ever likely to prove such a strengthener 
 and rejuvenator. Not for the uses of peace, 
 would doubtless be the verdict of history as 
 read by impartial eyes. If for the uses of war, 
 not merely, then, is war desirable but peace is 
 undesirable and lo ! we are fairly launched on 
 the devolutionary tide. No doubt, the earth is 
 sadly overpopulated ; and, at the present stage 
 of the science of eugenics, it would seem wise to 
 make it easier for people to die rather than 
 more difficult for them to get born. But war it- 
 self is such a cruel and unscientific method of 
 decimation as to require, for its defence, argu- 
 ments far stronger than any that have, as yet, 
 been brought forward. For that matter, there 
 is some reason to believe that the advocates of 
 war as a racial tonic are already fearing an 
 overdose of this most drastic medicine. 
 
 At the same time, and apart from these dubi- 
 ous doctrinaires, there exists a tendency, almost 
 fashionable, to represent war as an inevitable, 
 and not altogether undesirable, feature of our 
 civilisation. There is nothing surprising in this 
 phase of opinion, in so far as it may be derived 
 from a more or less restricted consideration of 
 
THE SOLUTION 35 
 
 Ufe in Europe today. For, indeed, those who 
 are already, and excusably, weary of the formu- 
 las with which war is being decried may find 
 much to attract them to the opposite point of 
 view. For one thing, they may be struck with 
 the fact that a great majority of the combatants 
 are now so inured to the business of strenuous 
 fighting as to take it pretty much as a matter of 
 course. For another, they see a little army of 
 erstwhile idlers now aroused to a sense of re- 
 sponsibility; luxurious women, too, performmg 
 menial services and earning gratitude. To add 
 to these phenomena manifold deeds of valour 
 and material sacrifice is to demonstrate beyond 
 a shadow of doubt that there is a bright side to 
 war. And similarly, there is a bright side to 
 every age of darkness; again and again, when 
 humanity was exceedingly oppressed, remark- 
 able talents have been brought to light which, 
 otherwise, would certainly have remained hid- 
 den. Hence arises the question, Does the in- 
 most, inscrutable soul of this present age of 
 science and democracy believe that no effort 
 should be made to avert great tribulations, 
 since herein lies, at least, a momentary salva- 
 tion? One answer — of a didactic nature — 
 would be that, if tribulations are required, peace 
 
36 THE GREAT RESOLVE 
 
 may provide thereof as generously as war, if 
 not so strikingly. As to the possibility of the 
 tribulations of war mitigating the tribulations 
 of peace, — let us consider the question. 
 
 Those who declare war to be one of the nor- 
 mal states of man always proceed to consider the 
 sum of its activities as a preparative for peace. 
 Those who speak of the normal occupations of 
 peace never represent the sum of these occupa- 
 tions as a preparative for war. Doubtless war 
 is indeed a normal state of certain men, even as 
 the inverted position, head downward from a 
 trapeze, is a normal state of certain others, or 
 narcotic intoxication of still others. But the 
 normality of either of these last two states must 
 be more real than that of war because of its 
 selective quality; one may generally take it or 
 leave it, according to one's natural bent, whilst, 
 in the case of war, there is often no choice. 
 
 That war, however, is generally an abnormal 
 state of man has been practically demonstrated 
 in many phases of the present European con- 
 flict: for example, in the reluctance of conva- 
 lescent soldiers to return to the front; also in 
 the hysteria, nervous breakdown, and insanity 
 that so frequently resulted from the earliest 
 clashes in 1914. The survivors of this ordeal 
 
THE SOLUTION 37 
 
 became hardened eventually to a life which 
 contained few interests outside of the enemy 
 and the means of destroying him — and the 
 daily provision of food. In most places the 
 routine and the physical conditions of existence 
 were healthful and the men suffered no more in 
 this respect than any non-combatant who has 
 become accustomed to some other kind of nerv- 
 ous strain that is both abnormal and ephemeral. 
 But there is no evidence from which one may 
 conclude that the initial crisis of nerves — the 
 battle-sickness in all ranks and all races — was 
 the real anachronism of the day rather than 
 war itself; far less, that it proceeded from a 
 growing torpor or effeminacy that might be ex- 
 tirpated only by pitting the races against one 
 another in a fight to the finish. 
 
 And finally, when peace comes, what is to be 
 expected of the disbanded armies and of those 
 who have ministered to them! Have we ob- 
 served, in the past, that successful generals were 
 less likely to be spoiled by adulation than the 
 famous men of peace, or that old soldiers gen- 
 erally were an especially sober-minded type of 
 citizen, or that the sybarite who had sacrificed 
 his ease for the chance of adventure or out of 
 devotix)n to his country's cause derived from the 
 
38 THE GEEAT KESOLVE 
 
 novel experience a greater aptitude for serious 
 pursuits 1 
 
 Whatever history may say, — and have we 
 really heard the demur of history? — there is 
 no logical ground for denying that war must, 
 on the whole, impair the efficiency of a people 
 for the uses of peace. And herein lies a pitiful 
 irony. The average patriot is a useful man in 
 time of peace; the average skulker is not. In 
 war, the average patriot has a good chance of 
 getting killed or severely maimed whilst the 
 average skulker has not only an excellent 
 chance of coming off with a whole skin but a 
 better chance than ever of becoming a person 
 of influence in his community. And what of the 
 surviving patriot? Is he likely to prove a better 
 husband, a better father, a better worker in the 
 routine of peace for the memory of those in- 
 tensest hours of his existence when he must view 
 with unconcern the spectacle of ruined homes 
 and mangled comrades in order to press for- 
 ward to effectual retribution? For my own part, 
 let me confess that a month in the trenches 
 would doubtless suffice to fill me with that queer 
 jumble of fear, hatred, weariness, scientific 
 expertise, Quixotism and careless devotion of 
 which one has lately heard so much, and to 
 
THE SOLUTION 39 
 
 make me regard as utter balderdash any such, 
 discussion of patriotism as I have undertaken 
 in these pages. I might loathe the war; I 
 might long ardently for peace, yet, once it were 
 attained, I should be fortunate indeed if I could 
 resist the obsession of my warlike days and ad- 
 mit that they were lived abnormally, undesir- 
 ably so, and in the very shadow of devolution. 
 
 One thing more, as to the trench-fighting, — 
 a circumstance not altogether relished even by 
 those who are generally most responsive to the 
 theatrical aspect of war: the ferocity, to wit, 
 of man. 
 
 That a primitive ferocity lingers inherent in 
 man and may be brought to the surface by ap- 
 plication of the appropriate stimulus, is being 
 daily demonstrated on the battle-fields of Eu- 
 rope, where the ghastliest hurts are painless if 
 the lust of slaughter has, for the moment, been 
 thoroughly aroused ; also, it is deemed prudent, 
 wherever possible, to allow the wounded partici- 
 pant in yesterday's bayonet-encounter to com- 
 plete his convalescence within the sound of fir- 
 ing, since his morale may be impaired by re- 
 moval to more peaceful surroundings. At the 
 same time, it is incredible — if we are to put 
 any faith in history — that the thirst of blood 
 
40 THE GREAT EESOLVE 
 
 has liad anything to do with the inception of 
 any war of modern times. Those persons, espe- 
 cially, who determined the precise moment when 
 the present war should begin, could have had no 
 selfish desire to gratify this elemental passion 
 because it was highly unlikely that any but a 
 very few of them would ever have the oppor- 
 tunity to do this. Here, at least, was no fling- 
 back to the impulses of our clawing and biting 
 ancestors. And as to the mass of the popula- 
 tions then precipitated into a struggle in which 
 their inborn ferocity — that hitherto unnoticed 
 companion of patriotic aspirations — might be 
 brought into active operation, one may speak 
 still more decisively. Leaving out of account 
 the unsuspected and extreme brutality of en- 
 counters with bayonet, pistol and hand-grenade, 
 one may confidently assert that the reservists 
 of 1914, generally, were neither eager for a fight 
 of any kind nor in the least likely to become so 
 if the existing state of peace had been indefi- 
 nitely prolonged. Whoever now believes the 
 contrary was either not in Europe during the 
 early mobilisations or was probably misin- 
 formed as to the general temper of the peoples 
 thus engaged. 
 
 The truth is that not ferocity alone but a host 
 
THE SOLUTION 41 
 
 of other curious propensities, as well, lie hidden 
 in the inmost soul of man ; and many of these, 
 henceforward, may seldom, or even never, see 
 the light of day. No doubt, for example, the 
 bulk of the race could be converted into drug- 
 fiends, sun-worshippers, or self-scourging fa- 
 natics if there existed, for the purpose, a ma- 
 chinery comparable to the engines of diplomacy 
 and patriotic eloquence for producing war ; but 
 to argue that those forms of courage bearing a 
 close relationship to the lust of slaughter are 
 still entitled to a survival value in the evolution 
 of the race is to forget that the race would 
 probably be in a most perilous position today 
 but for its continued production of individuals 
 in whom the fighting spirit is as far as possible 
 removed from the variety prevailing in the 
 trenches. Amongst those whose ancestors, for 
 many generations, have never been in the thick 
 of battle and who, themselves, reveal the most 
 striking disqualifications for warlike pursuits, 
 are heads of states, pioneers in learning, artists 
 possessing a creative faculty, — without whom, 
 by the way, we could not exist at all, — and 
 reformers of religion. 
 
 Wlien the impossibility of further wars is 
 finallv demonstrated, the inherent pugnacity in 
 
42 THE GKEAT EESOLVE 
 
 man will be manifested in very different kinds 
 of combat from that kind which is now engag- 
 ing everybody's attention, — and doubtless 
 without detriment to the race. Quarrels ex- 
 ceeding the scope of two pairs of fists may be 
 settled in a gladiatorial arena from which the 
 public and all reporters are excluded. There 
 being no onlookers but the police and a dispas- 
 sionate umpire, we may discover the sheer, un- 
 stimulated pugnacity in all tolerably normal 
 combatants to be remarkably little (less, prob- 
 ably, than appears in the average ring-fighter 
 of today) and so be forced to refer the greater 
 part of that which has hitherto passed under 
 this name to the general need of self-assertion 
 — that desire to excel which, at one time, leads 
 to the subtlest of rivalries ; again, brings quick 
 tempers afoul of one another; and again, as at 
 present, is utilised by blindfold ambitions to 
 reduce whole continents to a state of prepos- 
 terous havoc. 
 
 WHO IS KESPONSIBLE? 
 
 Now, apart from the marching and fighting 
 of armies, what kind of spectacle has been pre- 
 sented to the non-partisan onlooker during the 
 past twenty months? 
 
THE SOLUTION 43 
 
 About the middle of July, 1914, only one na- 
 tion of the earth, probably, was making any 
 special preparations for war. Yet all nations 
 were suffering from internal disorders each of 
 which, in accordance with the tribal system of 
 humanity, was different from that which pre- 
 vailed across the nearest border. In the United 
 States of America, for example, a considerable 
 proportion of the population were either look- 
 ing for a job or wondering how they should pay 
 their office-rent or seeking to prevent their in- 
 comes from dwindling to impossible dimensions, 
 — all of which endeavours were, in the main, 
 quite barren of result. England, meanwhile, 
 was rushing to the verge of civil war; France, 
 groaning under the burden of political corrup- 
 tion. Germany presented a fairer outward 
 aspect, but it was known that many children 
 were not happy there. Such was the rather 
 dubious felicity bequeathed to these four peo- 
 ples, with or without their consent, by their 
 heroic ancestors, — wherein is nothing strange, 
 since the said ancestors themselves were seldom 
 without a superfluous thorn in the side. An un- 
 usually prodigious number of people were say- 
 ing, Human nature is like this — How can you 
 help it? — You can't expect us to be perfect. 
 
44 THE GKEAT KESOLVE 
 
 Yet, when all was ready — erratic statesman- 
 ship and clumsy diplomacy attuned to just the 
 proper pitch — and declarations of war re- 
 sounded hither and thither like automatic thun- 
 der, the response from all populations, neutral 
 and belligerent alike, was a high-strung wail of 
 astonishment and horror: the affair was too 
 big, altogether incredible. In other words, what 
 Europe had long been waiting for — what Eu- 
 rope had the most convincing reasons to expect 
 — proved, on its realisation under conditions of 
 modern science and organisation, too tough a 
 morsel for the modern digestion. There ensued, 
 accordingly, a spirited contest of platitudes 
 concerning the question of responsibility, in 
 which generals and journalists, seasoned min- 
 isters and budding jurists all had a share. Each 
 side accused the other of having failed, or been 
 about to fail, to observe the rules of the game 
 until, presently, it was discovered that there 
 had never been any rules for the game that 
 might not be ignored by either player upon the 
 development of new conditions of play. The 
 mythical character of international law having 
 thus received a practical demonstration, it was 
 decided to resort to blazonry. Two splendid 
 banners were unfurled, one bearing the device, 
 
THE SOLUTION 45 
 
 Humanity, the other, Culture, and the one was 
 championed against the other. A feeble under- 
 current of rhetoric, too, was always kept in 
 motion for the benefit of that portion of the non- 
 combatant populations which required the as- 
 surance of a real grievance. Meanwhile, the 
 United States of America and other favourably 
 situated neutrals, lulled by the mere lapse of 
 time to a false sense of security, have entered 
 upon the perfectly futile business of turning the 
 conflict to practical account. Fondly unsuspect- 
 ing that the proceeds of this operation will inev- 
 itably return to the coffers of those peoples who 
 will stand in more urgent need of them, they 
 have built up a factitious and one-sided prosper- 
 ity which they are powerless to protect, since 
 it availeth little to save the pieces of a crashing 
 law. They may not even protect the lives or 
 property of their citizens on the seas ; they are 
 naturally averse to adding more precious fuel 
 to the flame of war; so here they stick, facing 
 the future with a bovine stare and chewing the 
 hope that they may one day appear resplendent 
 in the role of mediator and earn the gratitude 
 of all mankind. 
 
 Where the real responsibility lies should be 
 clear to anyone who may forget most of that 
 
46 THE GREAT EE SOLVE 
 
 which has been dinned into his ears and give 
 the bare facts a little serious thought. Let me. 
 confess that, with respect to the mythical prin- 
 ciples of international law and to the equally 
 unsatisfactory principles of fair play and hu- 
 mane dealing in Hell, I, too, have an opinion as 
 to who are the greatest sinners in the present 
 conflict. But nothing would induce me to ex- 
 press this opinion in the course of a serious dis- 
 cussion, both the opinion and its basis in fact 
 being of absurdly small importance in relation 
 to the real peril that lowers over the earth. Nor 
 is there any need to say how ungrateful is the 
 task of trying to prove everybody intensely 
 wrong; for, of all moments suitable for this 
 purpose, the present is so singularly and bril- 
 liantly auspicious that it should certainly not be 
 allowed to pass. For, until 1914, only a few 
 persons knew that nations were essentially im- 
 moral, whilst henceforward no one may expect 
 that any kind of morality such as we associate 
 with individuals will ever be found in nations 
 constructed as are the present nations of the 
 earth, except in affairs of small importance. 
 Thus, the theory that Europe has been set upon 
 by a small party of powerful bandits and that, 
 if these bandits are finally suppressed and made 
 
THE SOLUTION 47 
 
 an example of before all mankind, the old re- 
 gime of nations may resume its peaceful sway, 
 each contributing to the excellences of the 
 others, is no longer to be supported by any who 
 can do just a little better than repeat what has 
 reached their ears from an authoritative source. 
 To attempt the imposition of impossible restric- 
 tions on one weaker nation and then to invade 
 another whose neutrality you have guaranteed 
 is by no means the only way of becoming re- 
 sponsible for the war that follows. Snubbing a 
 monarch is another way ; still another is taking 
 possession, by more or less legitimate means 
 mythically, of a greater portion of the unde- 
 fended territory of the earth than is indispen- 
 sable for your immediate needs. Mere growth 
 is sufficient. The nation that expands, even in 
 the most peaceable known manner, invites at- 
 tack and has no cause for resentment in adver- 
 sity. In the case of the present war, the respon- 
 sibility of the United States of America and of 
 certain other neutral nations, when pragmatic- 
 ally considered, is double, for they have not 
 suffered, in any considerable degree, from the 
 collapse of the system at which they have con- 
 nived. The American tradition of avoidance of 
 foreign alliances only adds to the measure of 
 
48 THE GREAT RESOLVE 
 
 American responsibility. Moreover, transpar- 
 ent as this policy has always been, — yet a sub- 
 ject of rhetorical eloquence, even this ! — it is 
 now threatened with summary abandonment 
 since, upon any conceivable settlement of the 
 European conflict in accordance with the usage 
 of nations, America will be fairly reaching out 
 for alliances. Let us consider the implications 
 of this kind of settlement. 
 
 GERMANY VICTORIOUS 
 
 If Germany should win the war and seem in 
 a fair way to conquer the earth, we who are not 
 Germans should dispute with her every inch of 
 the ground. Leaving out of account the highly 
 probable defection of her present allies as soon 
 as they should learn the price of victory, we 
 others might be subjugated again and again; 
 just as often should we rebel. For we could not, 
 on any terms, consent to the German culture 
 being imposed on us by force. Much as we may 
 admire it in certain respects, in other respects 
 we should always tind ourselves disapproving 
 and thoroughly satisfied with the reasons of our 
 disapproval. Often as we may wish we were 
 more like the Germans, it would be impossible 
 for us to become entirely like them at their own 
 
THE SOLUTION 49 
 
 bidding. The points of essential disagreement 
 vary, of course, with the particular non-German 
 people that may be under consideration, but the 
 important ones are so well known as to require 
 no mention here. It is enough to say that any 
 superposition of German culture upon Gallic or 
 Anglo-Saxon culture, or any process of equali- 
 sation amongst the three, would have to be inau- 
 gurated at the instance of the non-Germans as 
 well as of the Germans. One final consequence 
 of your efforts at conquest, Germany, would 
 be disaster to yourself. But what of the process 
 through which this result should be attained! 
 An age of inky darkness, no less, lit with lurid, 
 infernal flashes, — altogether a most devolu- 
 tionary spectacle. 
 
 ENGLAND VICTOEIOUS 
 
 Given a victorious England, posing as the sa- 
 viour of Europe, — a claim which many esti- 
 mable Britons, missing the faces of their friends 
 and conscious of a lean pocket, would be hon- 
 estly incapable of calling in question, — the ul- 
 terior sequence of events would be similar. Her 
 late enemies must pay the costs — have they 
 anyone but themselves to thank for their sad 
 plight? — and, yet more, they must be bound. 
 
50 THE GKEAT EESOLVE 
 
 hand and foot, that the normal vocations of 
 mankind be no longer exposed to piratical ag- 
 gression. The late enemies sign the peace on 
 these terms, there being nothing else for them 
 to do, but without the slightest intention of ful- 
 filling either condition. Because — not that the 
 signature matters in the least — neither condi- 
 tion is capable of being fulfilled. As to the first, 
 the most resourceful of vanquished peoples 
 would be unable, within any reasonable period 
 of time, to produce a tithe of the cost of the 
 present war. As to the second, a nation cannot 
 be bound, hand and foot ; no civilised people of 
 ancient or modern times has ever been rendered 
 impotent for mischief. 
 
 What, then, shall England do for her friends 1 
 To say nothing of the Balkan Peninsula, — 
 where she will suddenly discover she has had a 
 host of supporters, now asking a reward for 
 their services, — the entente is quadruple and 
 England may not stand alone. She is already 
 owed vast sums and knows that debtors are not 
 without their sensitive, fractious moods. In 
 fine, everybody is scorched, and the balm that 
 was in the cupboard has all been used for yes- 
 terday's hurts. But here is where the neutrals 
 should come in. America, for instance, has a 
 
THE SOLUTION 51 
 
 canal, a Monroe Doctrine, some distant islands 
 and a commerce overseas which is just on the 
 point of blossoming into the prettiest of her 
 products. She is, moreover, years behind the 
 times and a perfect blockhead when confronted 
 with the doctrine of changed conditions ; if she 
 persist in blundering along in the footsteps of 
 her fathers, she must be punished for getting in 
 the way of less laggard folk and cramping their 
 style. Behold her, then, — chaste seclusion un- 
 speakably profaned, — waving a frantic hand 
 across either sea for assistance in her predica- 
 ment. 
 
 Piecemeal plundering, or even cumulative 
 menace, is not tolerated ; war is the only answer. 
 And the interests involved in the settlement of 
 the present conflict being nothing short of uni- 
 versal, any settlement thereof which includes 
 the imposition upon the vanquished of either a 
 punitive fetter or a special material burden 
 means inevitably a succession of new align- 
 ments, not merely of reciprocally defiant pow- 
 ers, but of reciprocally aggressive powers — 
 chaos, to wit, answering to chaos until either 
 degeneracy develops an irresistible momentum 
 or the control of affairs devolves upon some 
 such persons, hitherto practically negligible, as 
 
52 THE GEEAT KESOLVE 
 
 one we have already been introduced to in this 
 familiar conceit, — 
 
 " Durch Mitleid wissend, 
 Der reine Thor; 
 Harre Sein 
 Den Ich erkor.'' 
 
 The situation is as full of irony as it is of 
 peril; consider, by the same token, the people 
 composing the nations of the quadruple entente. 
 Englishmen, Frenchmen, Italians, Eussians, 
 are capable, and have given evidence, of a real 
 admiration for one another ; many of them have 
 been educated, have married, formed friend- 
 ships, within one another's borders; yet the 
 notion of Eussia, Italy, France and England, 
 weary and spent though they be on the day of 
 final victory, combining to maintain peace upon 
 Earth, showing a tolerably impartial consider- 
 ation for one another's needs, and unitedly en- 
 suring a square deal for outsiders is, upon any 
 accepted theory of international arrangements, 
 too preposterous to deserve a moment's serious 
 thought. 
 
 A DRAWN BATTLE 
 
 But it may be that neither side will win a 
 decisive victory. After a vast amount of bar- 
 
THE SOLUTION 53 
 
 gaining and contention, the exhausted comba- 
 tants may agree on something approaching the 
 status quo ante as the most feasible liquidation 
 of their quarrel. This arrangement, as expo- 
 nents of both sides have so often admitted, 
 would amount practically to a truce; and the 
 work of preparation for future defence would 
 be carried on with all possible vigour from the 
 very day of the signing of peace. Certain of 
 the neutral nations would be compelled to 
 double the efforts of the late belligerents be- 
 cause of the rearward position in which they 
 would have entered the race. That which has 
 already befallen Belgium, Greece, neutral ships, 
 unarmed merchantmen, unfortified towns, would 
 have sufficiently demonstrated the futility of 
 further treaties and international conventions ; 
 or, if proposals to these ends should actually 
 be made, they must be for quite another pur- 
 pose than the protection, by common agreement, 
 of the supposed rights of any nation small or 
 great, neutral or belligerent. Certain nations, 
 to be sure, might always refuse to be as unscru- 
 pulous as certain of their neighbours. In a 
 democracy, for instance, qualmish citizens must 
 be listened to. But all nations engaged in the 
 present war have shown a readiness, when the 
 
54 THE GREAT EESOLVE 
 
 situation was sufficiently critical, — that is, 
 when the observance of ante-bellum agreements 
 was especially obligatory and fraught with the 
 weightiest significance, — to ignore both the 
 letter and the spirit of these agreements. 
 
 Disarmament, absolute or partial, would 
 doubtless be recognised as a de\dce far too 
 easily circumvented from its very inception on- 
 ward. An international police to enforce dis- 
 armament would be equally out of the question, 
 since all captains possessing the requisite pres- 
 tige and ability for commanding it would be 
 suspected of partiality. In sum, an armed 
 truce would seem, in the present case, the only 
 possible outcome of a drawn battle. This might 
 soon be broken or it might endure for an indef- 
 inite period ; little knowledge and less imagina- 
 tion should be sufficiently convincing that the 
 race is neither sound enough to emerge in de- 
 cent condition from another war of almost uni- 
 versal dimensions nor industrious enough to 
 maintain an effective martial safeguard against 
 it. 
 
 THE SOLUTION 
 
 Is it conceivable that the war will be settled 
 in accordance with some standard different 
 
THE SOLUTION 55 
 
 from the usage of nations? In other words, is 
 a real solution possible, — one carrying a prom- 
 ise for the future? 
 
 One such solution is indeed possible, — and 
 only one. It is very obvious ; it has never be- 
 fore been attempted; it involves a voluntary 
 and pretty general act of renunciation. 
 
 A tall order, this 1 Not likely, at any rate, to 
 be filled, in proportionate part, by those of our 
 acquaintance who are ever ready to prate of 
 human foresight as limited by the tip of the 
 human nose, and of human nature generally as 
 a thing mostly weak and only a little bit strong, 
 — thereby certifying that pessimism, from time 
 to time and place to place, transcends all ra- 
 tional bounds. But these persons may prove 
 as impotent to thwart a just and sensible proj- 
 ect as they are incapable of applying their devo- 
 lutionary doctrines to the practical affairs of 
 life. 
 
 As for the rest of us, what is the incentive 
 to combine for the purposes of such a novel 
 enterprise! 
 
 On the one hand we see disaster, — an age of 
 darkness imminent. 
 
 On the other hand — if the enterprise may 
 but be given the needed impetus — lie an effec- 
 
56 THE GEEAT RESOLVE 
 
 tive safeguard against any such contingency 
 and an absolute guarantee that the war of 1914 
 may never be imitated. 
 
 Europe, being hopelessly at war, must come 
 forgivingly to peace. 
 
 Is Europe perhaps of a formidable bigness 
 for taking such an unwonted decision, — and 
 further swollen with resentment? 
 
 All Europeans may be easily reached within 
 a week if there is anything of importance to be 
 said to them. And amongst an overwhelming 
 majority of them the resentment is certainly but 
 skin-deep or exists not at all. When the mas- 
 ters of war and industry decide to forgive, the 
 men, for once, will be eager to follow. There is 
 but one thing needed, — a great resolve. If the 
 outlook is stormy, therefore is it stimulating; 
 if, for a millennium, we have been shamefaced 
 of the virtue that was in us, the fruit, then, 
 should be ripe ; if an ordeal is before us, to en- 
 dure it is to acquire wisdom, — to have endured 
 it with a tolerable fortitude will be to have be- 
 queathed a measure of happiness and decent 
 living. But if a great problem is before us, it is, 
 at the same time, a problem of the simplest. 
 There is one solution of it, and that one should 
 be understood immediately by every man or 
 
THE SOLUTION" 57 
 
 woman of the earth who has ever condoned a 
 trespass. 
 
 Here is the entire, brief program. The vic- 
 tor must perform a voluntary act of abnegation 
 — a refusal to accept the spoils of war or 
 humble the beaten foe — so clear and unequiv- 
 ocal as to silence all skeptics living and yet un- 
 born. This means not merely the avoidance of 
 such a tactical blunder as was the seizure of 
 Alsace and Lorraine. It means an overt avowal 
 of complicity in the late malfeasance, hence the 
 erection of a solid precedent of justice that may 
 be viewed and comprehended from every level 
 of society. 
 
 The same necessity applies to the case of a 
 drawn battle : there must be no bargaining. 
 
 The same necessity applies again to the neu- 
 tral nations; and, in the case of those which 
 have not suffered, the sacrifice must be doubled. 
 Of money, the rich must give, if necessary, even 
 unto one half of all they possessed; the poor 
 might give pennies which would probably be 
 returned to them. Not cash, alone, but active 
 help, as well, must be forthcoming until more 
 should be refused, a state as nearly as possible 
 approaching equilibrium having been estab- 
 lished. 
 
58 THE GKEAT KESOLVE 
 
 It is obvious that, in every case, the consent 
 of the people must be obtained; every dona- 
 tion, even, might be voluntary; for a people 
 may not be taxed in the traditional manner and 
 on a large scale for novel purposes. 
 
 Once the act of renunciation were performed, 
 — and only then, — disarmament would follow, 
 for it would thenceforth be impossible to enlist 
 a population in the prosecution of any quarrel 
 not with savages. Of the ulterior benefit here 
 indicated, no more need be said in this connec- 
 tion. Let us, however, notice some of the up- 
 setting consequences of the supposed altruism 
 of nations. 
 
 EMBAEKASSMENTS 
 
 The disbandment of armies would leave their 
 officers, many of them otherwise untrained, 
 without a vocation; manufacturers of muni- 
 tions of war would find their stocks and facto- 
 ries practically valueless. Universal free trade 
 would be inevitable to the benefit of certain in- 
 dustries and to the acute, temporary disadvan- 
 tage of others. Mills of many different kinds 
 in certain regions would be forced to close, 
 causing great numbers of workmen, skilled and 
 unskilled, to become, for a space, a burden on 
 
THE SOLUTION 59 
 
 their communities. This contingency wonld 
 probably develop a spirit of free trade in human 
 material, as well, leading to a more or less 
 thorough redistribution of the industrial popu- 
 lation throughout the earth and causing initial 
 losses in connection with equipment and organ- 
 isation. Many retired persons of both sexes 
 would be startled at the sudden disappearance 
 of their incomes; others would see theirs sur- 
 prisingly augmented. In sum, the world of 
 business and finance would be pretty rudely 
 thrown out of kelter and would have to search 
 diligently for several new starting-points; 
 meanwhile charity would, for a while, become 
 more of a career than it is even today, and the 
 receiver of alms would cast his old garments of 
 bitterness and pride and appear in fashionable 
 raiment. 
 
 In this picture of distress and embarrass- 
 ment during the readjustment of affairs, or in 
 any more lurid variant thereof that may sug- 
 gest itself, is there anything really resembling 
 chaos, — confusion poignant and without rem- 
 edy? Are we not here contemplating, on a 
 somewhat enlarged scale, a scene that is already 
 familiar to the greater portion of mankind and 
 has never included a tithe of the misery actually 
 
60 THE GREAT RESOLVE 
 
 saddled upon the earth this day? Is any cyn- 
 ical financier or manufacturer likewise so ava- 
 ricious and shortsighted as — rather ^than con- 
 secrate a portion of his wealth to an altruistic 
 and practically remunerative enterprise — to 
 conspire against himself to the extent of in- 
 viting strangers to relieve him of his all ! And 
 finally, is anyone blind to the significance of 
 nations actually practising, not magnanimity 
 — let us, at any cost, steer clear of rhetoric — 
 but justice, and to the powerful incentive 
 thereby supplied to individuals and associations 
 of individuals to lend strenuous arms and right 
 the rolling ship! '' But where do I come in? " 
 is a cry that might be heard pretty frequently 
 for the space of a few weeks, at the most. 
 
 All thoughtful people are doubtless aware 
 that the least hitch in the working of a novel 
 program is regarded by many as a final demon- 
 stration of the unsoundness of the program and 
 is generally greeted with as many shouts of pro- 
 test and execration as are brought forth by 
 positive calamities resulting from an adhesion 
 to traditional usage. It is only when the calam- 
 ity is excessively dire and when even direr are 
 being actively plotted for the future, that rea- 
 sonable tolerance may be expected for the im- 
 
THE SOLUTION 61 
 
 perfections of any scheme involving a consid- 
 erable dislocation of the grooves of human ac- 
 tivity. This is the case of today. 
 
 Once the process of re-adjustment were com- 
 plete and our one notable gain incorporated in 
 common speech and memory, we should, in other 
 respects, get on at least as well as before and 
 probably a great deal better. Certain problems, 
 however, might remain as tough as ever. Let 
 one of these be mentioned forthwith, partly by 
 way of confession to an earlier inaccuracy in 
 these pages which might not easily be explained 
 at the moment. To say that a solid precedent 
 of justice may be reared which will be viewed 
 and comprehended from every level of society 
 is to say what is not true. For there exist 
 amongst us certain pitiable monsters who are 
 constitutionally incapable of accounting for any 
 just or generous act and have therefore no 
 choice but to deny that any such act is possible. 
 Others, through early training or later associa- 
 tions, become so like unto these that any prac- 
 tical distinction between the two may hardly 
 be established. Not criminals, especially, in the 
 eye of the law, are here indicated ; probably the 
 vast majority of thieves and murderers are by 
 no means of this degree of moral depravity 
 
62 THE GEEAT EESOLVE 
 
 which, for that matter, is met with in every sit- 
 uation of life, — now clad in expensive furs and 
 ministered to by a retinue of servants, and again 
 miserably congested in the slums of a great city. 
 The simplicity of nations could have but little 
 meaning for these unfortunates; and, until 
 somebody should discover a better method, we 
 must cope with them in some such manner as 
 in the past. Fortunately, they are not a numer- 
 ous class and have seldom acquired a consider- 
 able influence in our affairs. 
 
 But to the solution of the majority of social 
 and economical problems we should be able to 
 devote more time, a better class of brains and 
 a freer spirit of inquiry than while labouring 
 constrainedly under the prejudice of an inflated 
 national life. 
 
 THE FIKST STEP 
 
 After all, in this business, as in so many 
 others, the first step is the crucial one; it de- 
 mands nerve, resolution and a cool head. Those 
 who advocate it should be possessed of author- 
 ity and prestige; which means, they will be 
 subject to all the embarrassments of an estab- 
 lished record. First to confront them will be 
 the financier and the capitalist, seeing the whole 
 
THE SOLUTION 63 
 
 big world in their smaller concerns and bred to 
 a blind faith in the effective guardianship of the 
 law. These will be supported by the statistician 
 bringing a bagful of premises for the false 
 inferences of a materialistic age. Derisive 
 cynics from all walks of life will be much in 
 evidence with a jingle of hackneyed aphorisms ; 
 earnest citizens will naively beseech us to per- 
 form the superhuman feat of seeing things as 
 they really are. And the most measured of all 
 protestant voices will be that of the conserva- 
 tive statesman. This conscientious person has 
 always been seated in uneasy majesty on the 
 bank of the river of life. Exposed incessantly 
 to the dust-whirls of diplomacy and the chilling 
 blasts of parliamentary eloquence, he has never 
 dared try if the water be warm and clean; 
 hence, in the present instance, he is certain to 
 pronounce in well-considered, frosty periods to 
 the effect that not only is any solidarity of na- 
 tions deriving so remotely from self-interest 
 impossible of realisation but any efforts to this 
 end would open up vistas of endless mischief, 
 etc., etc. To face him with the alternative were 
 to precipitate a discussion of the lessons of his- 
 tory. On his chosen ground, which he sorrow- 
 fully declines to abandon, he is perfectly unan- 
 
64 THE GREAT EESOLVE 
 
 swerable, and the only sensible thing to do is to 
 leave him alone. He will be negligible anyhow, 
 if true insight shall have begotten a will to win. 
 If such prove indeed to be the case, there 
 need be no further waiting. It should be easy 
 to bring the sleekest of stay-at-homes to a reali- 
 sation, not merely verbal, of the significance of 
 thirty million of the best men of the race hav- 
 ing each a hand at one or other of the thirty 
 million throats. As for these armies them- 
 selves, no doubt can exist but they would aban- 
 don the struggle at a moment's notice, even if 
 given no better than the traditional assurances 
 as to the future. Yet, within their ranks, 
 weekly, tens of thousands succumb. And how 
 many cowards are there ! Precious few, we are 
 told, at any battle-front. Valour seems indeed 
 a terrible thing, highly infectious in one cause 
 or another. But has anyone the pluck to stand 
 forth and stay its overbrimming rage? A few 
 determined men, capable of a great resolve, are 
 the one and imperative need of the time, and 
 for all time. 
 
 IMPERFECTLY RENOVATED 
 
 Not many, be it hoped, among those dismal 
 experts in the dissection of human nature are 
 
THE SOLUTION 65 
 
 nursing the delusion that, if we were successful 
 in making war impossible, we should be almost 
 too good to be real. On the contrary, to escape 
 from martial preoccupations through conscious 
 efforts of our own would be to bring into 
 stronger relief certain far tougher problems of 
 our social and industrial life; any cherubic 
 countenance appearing incontinent in our midst 
 would rapidly be creased with care. It is not 
 within the scope of this essay to discuss the 
 social or industrial conditions prevailing in sep- 
 arate communities nor even to mention the 
 problems connected therewith, except in so far 
 as an analogy may be perceived between them 
 and the problem of international usage. When 
 a nation exacts indemnity, levies tribute, im- 
 poses restrictions, or attempts subjugation be- 
 yond its own borders, it does indeed suggest a 
 parallel between its own procedure and that of 
 the communities which go to make it up. It 
 thereby exhibits the same restless propensity 
 to jump at such conclusions as are readily ex- 
 pressible in language — hence, the same pro- 
 found ineptitude for safeguarding its own best 
 interests — that is manifested within its bor- 
 ders in the results of all manner of collective 
 enterprise, such as laws, political and charita- 
 
66 THE GREAT EESOLVE 
 
 ble ideals, and public opinion variously crystal- 
 lised. Here are two syllogisms typical of the 
 kind that were snapped up by our impulsive 
 forebears to the exceeding detriment of their 
 posterity's digestion. 
 
 Punish the thief, and others will think twice 
 before stealing. 
 
 Protect not only the drunkard's family and 
 their neighbours but even the drunkard from 
 himself, thereby scoring a victory for reform 
 that shall prove an inspiration for all sinners. 
 
 In the one case, the inflammable imaginations 
 of the young, of the feeble-minded and of 
 cramped adventurers are left out of account; 
 in the other, the possible influence upon the race 
 of sustaining the drunkard through generation 
 upon generation suffers a similar fate. 
 
 But for the fact that present satisfaction, all 
 else being equal, is generally suspected of con- 
 taining a snare, we of the Western world should 
 probably recognise the things that may really 
 make for happiness in a community as being — 
 next to the life of the family, which, under all 
 circumstances, occupies the first place — the 
 right to work, play, speak and earn an honest 
 wage without prejudice or vexatious restric- 
 tions; the social glass; a penny in the old 
 
THE SOLUTION 67 
 
 man's hat; the dollar lent ungrudgingly; a 
 helping hand to the wife in a throng; a kind 
 word to the erring daughter; tolerance unre- 
 served for the bastard ; civil and dispassionate 
 consideration for the thief. Even as we know 
 in our hearts that we have, none of us, the 
 shadow of a right to sit in judgment on the 
 adulteress or the thief, so have our pitiful little 
 prophylactic devices of ostracism and imprison- 
 ment been frustrated throughout the ages. Has 
 it ever indeed been proved that they sometimes 
 really deter? Unhappily, there were no statis- 
 ticians at the time when organised intimidation 
 was first thought of. Some forgotten genius of 
 antiquity said, ^' Of course they will deter; 
 why, man, it's obvious ! " — and everybody was 
 thenceforth too busy with general felicitations 
 over the extreme ingenuity of the contrivance 
 to observe if there were any sensible change in 
 the sum of evil-doing. 
 
 In our own day, the deterrent force of threat- 
 ened punishment is doubtless felt strongly by 
 those whose only- crimes are not mentioned in 
 the penal statutes; but the tremendous incen- 
 tive to recognised crime provided by this same 
 device — especially the fatal attraction of the 
 death-penalty and of a possible escape there- 
 
68 THE GREAT EESOLVE 
 
 from — lias probably never received full justice 
 at the bands of psychologists and practical 
 criminologists. As a makeshift — a choice be- 
 tween two supposed evils — it is undoubtedly 
 a failure ; but, as a cardinal principle of civili- 
 sation, to be upheld brazenly, even rhetorically, 
 it is the kind of monstrosity which, so long as 
 it may endure, will prevent honest and thought- 
 ful men from contributing anything to social re- 
 form. Here is no need to depict the jubilation 
 of downtrodden malefactors, if the police should 
 become suddenly a mere restraining influence, 
 — nor the momentary increase of crimes and 
 misdemeanours by hundreds per cent, followed 
 by a swifter decline of the same to unheard-of 
 low levels when it should transpire that the 
 prey were as children and the law no longer an 
 enemy, — because the right to punish will not 
 be renounced by a single stroke of the pen. 
 
 But it cannot endure forever. The time will 
 come, barring devolution, when from every 
 pulpit will be preached the doctrine. Do unto 
 your neighbour — not merely as you would 
 have him do unto yourself, but — as you would 
 soberly like to do unto him. When that time 
 comes, practically no incentive to what we now 
 call crime will remain; murder and rape will 
 
THE SOLUTION 69 
 
 be but the dreams of madmen lacking an oppor- 
 tunity; it will be possible to ridicule the thief 
 and the adulteress instead of making them the 
 cynosure of morbid eyes; the drunkard will 
 have the choice between, on the one hand, elim- 
 inating himself from the race by the obvious, 
 painless and scientific method of alcoholism 
 persevered in and, on the other, re-instating 
 himself in efficiency by the exhilarating effort 
 of his own will and intelligence ; any lineage for 
 whom other forms of present satisfaction con- 
 tain indeed a dangerous snare will, similarly, 
 either lose influence in our affairs up to the 
 point where they may no longer perpetuate 
 their kind, or else will clear the snare forever 
 from their path; the greater part of human 
 drudgery will be over by midday ; etc., etc. — 
 and we shall then be all the better prepared to 
 attack the really difficult problems of existence. 
 Meanwhile the nations are, in the above re- 
 spects, still behaving toward one another very 
 much as their citizens are encouraged recipro- 
 cally to do ; but the consequences of united mis- 
 behaviour are at present so staggeringly obvi- 
 ous as to draw speech even from those who are 
 habitually silent. How, indeed, is it possible to 
 hold one's tongue? WeVe a good country for 
 
70 THE GKEAT RESOLVE 
 
 our habitation which is by way of being con- 
 verted into a wilderness. Water is plentiful, 
 no less than the river of life, itself. Its mur- 
 mur is grateful to the ear ; the play of its waves 
 is an inexhaustible delight to the eye; it 
 abounds in pleasant little creatures enjoying a 
 heyday. But we may not use it on our lands 
 because the authorities have declared it impure 
 and posted watchmen along the banks. Here 
 and there, a renegade plunges boldly in, drinks 
 and is refreshed; but his annoyance, on being 
 fished bodily out, stamps the experience as an 
 unwholesome one. Now and then, the problem 
 of sanitation is officially considered, but nobody 
 has ever been able to discover the contaminating 
 source. Meanwhile, what of the precious 
 stream, itself ; if the appointed guardians of the 
 valley, grown fearful of darkness and shadows, 
 decide to level the primeval forest, how shall it 
 be replenished? From the ocean of the uni- 
 verse, perhaps ; but only the coast-line is known. 
 Or from the wells of human curiosity. 
 
CD d^^ i'j .