Through Matthew Arnold we have been made familiar with one of the
figures clearly limned by Clarendon. It is that of Falkland, whose
humane spirit and love of peace made the casting of his lot in the time
of the civil war in England seem peculiarly tragic. Often in the course
of that bitter and bloody conflict he was heard to “ingeminate” the
word “peace.”
A similar feeling of grief and frustration in the presence of war is
one of the distinguishing marks of our own day. The best and wisest in
the world hold peace congresses and conferences on arbitration (as they
are to do soon in St. Louis), and seem to gain painful inches only to
have all their efforts made apparently vain by some inrush of the war
spirit. The Hague Tribunal is founded and The Hague agreement solemnly
entered into, but that does not prevent one of the covenanting nations
from seizing another’s land by the sword. Projects for universal
arbitration are mooted, amid the applause of Christendom, and plans
for the judicial settlement of international disputes are ripening, at
the very time when tens of thousands of men are about to be killed in
battle.
So it is that peace seems to be to the civilized world only an
unattainable longing. We think of war to-day, in the Scripture phrase,
with groanings that cannot be uttered. Never so hated, it sometimes
appears as if it were never so fated.
It is well for peace-lovers now and then to put the case thus
strongly, in order that they may face the difficulty at its darkest.
The fact that the evil they struggle against is persistent is but one
argument more for their own persistence. Pacifists must be as ready
and resourceful as the militarists. If ever it is right to learn
from an enemy, it surely is in this instance. Something has been
gained in this way. The late William James, for example, contended
that we must admit that there are some good, human weapons in the
hands of the war party, and that the peace men must study, not only
how to appreciate them, but how to use them. Professor James would
have sought in peaceful pursuits the equivalents of the appeal which
war makes to certain manly qualities. Heroism in private life, in
scientific pursuits, in exploration, in reform--this is what he urged.
The patriotic impulse transmuted into great engineering works, vast
plans for sanitation, campaigns against disease and misery--that is
what peace can offer to ardent youth. All this is sound, and good as
far as it goes; but the question arises to-day whether there is not
need of something more positive and aggressive, whether the spirit of
militarism cannot be turned against itself; whether, in a word, there
should not be war against war.
The conduct of a military campaign calls for an enormous amount of
preparation and organization. Let the advocates of peace take this
to heart. They cannot win simply by wishing to win. It is for them,
too, to be far-sighted, to lay careful plans, to enlist every modern
method of working in unison to a definite end. War mobilizes men. Peace
must muster ideas, sentiments, influences. In the _Kriegspiel_ the
strategist seeks to mass his troops upon the enemy’s weakest point. The
tactics of peace should be similar. Argument and persuasion and appeal
should be made to converge upon the exposed flank of the militarists.
This may be found, at one moment, in the pressure of taxation, which
needlessly swollen armaments would make unbearable. At another time,
it may appear that the thing to hammer upon is the pressing need of
social reforms, even attention to which will be endangered if all the
available money and time are squandered upon preparing for a war that
may never come. Let peace, too, acquire a General Staff, whose duty
it shall be to survey the whole field, to work out fruitful campaigns,
to tell us where to strike and how, to lay down the principles of the
grand strategy to be followed.
Nor need individual effort be ruled out. Despite the large and
coördinated movements of soldiers in a modern battle, there yet remains
room for personal initiative and daring. The shining moment comes when
some one in the ranks or in command is called upon to risk all with
the possibility of gaining all. And there are still “forlorn hopes” to
be led. Why should not these methods and appeals of war be imitated
by those who are fighting for peace? They can point to many services
calling for volunteers. There is ridicule to be faced, unpopular
opinion to be stood up for calmly in the teeth of opposition and even
scorn, testimony to be borne, questions to be asked, protests to be
made. There is, in short, every opportunity to import from war the
heroic element and give it scope and effect in the propaganda of peace.
The very wrath of man can be made to praise the growth of civilization.
War against war can be made very concrete and practical. Committees
can be formed to watch the military authorities and Congress, and to
elicit an expression of opinion when it will be most useful. It is a
matter of frequent lamenting on the part of peace men in the House
of Representatives that their hands are so feebly held up by the
opponents of war. The other side is alert and active. When big-navy
or big-army bills are pending, the mail of congressmen is loaded with
requests--usually, of course, interested requests--to vote for them.
The lovers of peace, on the other hand, appear to be smitten with
writer’s cramp. They act as if they were indifferent. This state of
things should not be permitted to go on. There should be minute-men of
the cause all over the land ready to spring into action. That a sound
opinion of the country exists, only needing concerted effort to call
it forth, has been shown again and again. It was proved at the time
when President Taft’s treaties of universal arbitration were pending
in the Senate. In those days the desire of the best people of the
United States came to Washington like the sound of the voice of many
waters. Schools and colleges, chambers of commerce and churches, sent
in petition piled on petition, and remonstrance heaped on protest. One
of the senators who opposed ratification admitted to the President that
he had never had so formidable a pressure from his own State as on this
question.
That lesson should not be lost. By organization, by watchfulness, by
determination, the peace spirit of the land can be given much more
effective expression than it has yet had. The situation is not at all
one that justifies discouragement; it simply calls for fresh and more
intelligent action, with heightened resolution. If only the genius of a
Von Moltke could be devoted to organizing and directing the forces that
make against war, we might reasonably hope for a realization of the
poet’s vision of peace lying like level shafts of light across the land.