their children bereaved, yea, and slain also in the slaughter of their
children; so many old women destitute, whom sorrow more cruelly slayeth
than the weapon itself; so many honest wives become widows, so many
children fatherless, so many lamentable houses, so many rich men brought
to extreme poverty. And what needeth it here to speak of the destruction
of good manners, since there is no man but knoweth right well that the
universal pestilence of all mischievous living proceedeth at once from
war. Thereof cometh despising of virtue and godly living; thereof cometh,
that the laws are neglected and not regarded; thereof cometh a prompt and
a ready stomach, boldly to do every mischievous deed. Out of this fountain
spring so huge great companies of thieves, robbers, sacrilegers, and
murderers. And what is most grievous of all, this mischievous pestilence
cannot keep herself within her bounds; but after it is begun in some one
corner, it doth not only (as a contagious disease) spread abroad and
infect the countries near adjoining to it, but also it draweth into that
common tumult and troublous business the countries that be very far off,
either for need, or by reason of affinity, or else by occasion of some
league made. Yea and moreover, one war springeth of another: of a
dissembled war there cometh war indeed, and of a very small, a right great
war hath risen. Nor it chanceth oftentimes none otherwise in these things
than it is feigned of the monster, which lay in the lake or pond called
Lerna.
For these causes, I trow, the old poets, the which most sagely perceived
the power and nature of things, and with most meet feignings covertly
shadowed the same, have left in writing, that war was sent out of hell:
nor every one of the Furies was not meet and convenient to bring about
this business, but the most pestilent and mischievous of them all was
chosen out for the nonce, which hath a thousand names, and a thousand
crafts to do hurt. She being armed with a thousand serpents, bloweth
before her her fiendish trumpet. Pan with furious ruffling encumbereth
every place. Bellona shaketh her furious flail. And then the wicked
furiousness himself, when he hath undone all knots and broken all bonds,
rusheth out with bloody mouth horrible to behold.
The grammarians perceived right well these things, of the which some will,
that war have his name by contrary meaning of the word Bellum, that is to
say fair, because it hath nothing good nor fair. Nor bellum, that is for
to say war, is none otherwise called Bellum, that is to say fair, than
the furies are called Eumenides, that is to say meek, because they are
wilful and contrary to all meekness. And some grammarians think rather,
that bellum, war, should be derived out of this word Belva, that is for to
say, a brute beast: forasmuch as it belongeth to brute beasts, and not
unto men, to run together, each to destroy each other. But it seemeth to
me far to pass all wild and all brute beastliness, to fight together with
weapons.
First, for there are many of the brute beasts, each in his kind, that
agree and live in a gentle fashion together, and they go together in herds
and flocks, and each helpeth to defend the other. Nor is it the nature of
all wild beasts to fight, for some are harmless, as does and hares. But
they that are the most fierce of all, as lions, wolves, and tigers, do not
make war among themselves as we do. One dog eateth not another. The lions,
though they be fierce and cruel, yet they fight not among themselves. One
dragon is in peace with another. And there is agreement among poisonous
serpents. But unto man there is no wild or cruel beast more hurtful than
man.
Again, when the brute beasts fight, they fight with their own natural
armour: we men, above nature, to the destruction of men, arm ourselves
with armour, invented by craft of the devil. Nor the wild beasts are not
cruel for every cause; but either when hunger maketh them fierce, or else
when they perceive themselves to be hunted and pursued to the death, or
else when they fear lest their younglings should take any harm or be
stolen from them. But (O good Lord) for what trifling causes what
tragedies of war do we stir up? For most vain titles, for childish wrath,
for a wench, yea, and for causes much more scornful than these, we be
inflamed to fight.
Moreover, when the brute beasts fight, then war is one for one, yea, and
that is very short. And when the battle is sorest fought, yet is there not
past one or two, that goeth away sore wounded. When was it ever heard that
an hundred thousand brute beasts were slain at one time fighting and
tearing one another: which thing men do full oft and in many places? And
besides this, whereas some wild beasts have natural debate with some other
that be of a contrary kind, so again there be some with which they
lovingly agree in a sure amity. But man with man, and each with other,
have among them continual war; nor is there league sure enough among any
men. So that whatsoever it be, that hath gone out of kind, it hath gone
out of kind into a worse fashion, than if Nature herself had engendered
therein a malice at the beginning.
Will ye see how beastly, how foul, and how unworthy a thing war is for
man? Did ye never behold a lion let loose unto a bear? What gapings, what
roarings, what grisly gnashing, what tearing of their flesh, is there? He
trembleth that beholdeth them, yea, though he stand sure and safe enough
from them. But how much more grisly a sight is it, how much more
outrageous and cruel, to behold man to fight with man, arrayed with so
much armour, and with so many weapons? I beseech you, who would believe
that they were men, if it were not because war is a thing so much in
custom that no man marvelleth at it? Their eyes glow like fire, their
faces be pale, their marching forth is like men in a fury, their voice
screeching and grunting, their cry and frenzied clamour; all is iron,
their harness and weapons jingling and clattering, and the guns
thundering. It might have been better suffered, if man, for lack of meat
and drink, should have fought with man, to the intent he might devour his
flesh and drink his blood: albeit, it is come also now to that pass, that
some there be that do it more of hatred than either for hunger or for
thirst. But now this same thing is done more cruelly, with weapons
envenomed, and with devilish engines. So that nowhere may be perceived any
token of man. Trow ye that Nature could here know it was the same thing,
that she sometime had wrought with her own hands? And if any man would
inform her, that it were man that she beheld in such array, might she not
well, with great wondering, say these words?
"What new manner of pageant is this that I behold? What devil of hell hath
brought us forth this monster. There be some that call me a stepmother,
because that among so great heaps of things of my making I have brought
forth some venomous things (and yet have I ordained the selfsame venomous
things for man's behoof); and because I have made some beasts very fierce
and perilous: and yet is there no beast so wild nor so perilous, but that
by craft and diligence he may be made tame and gentle. By man's diligent
labour the lions have been made tame, the dragons meek, and the bears
obedient. But what is this, that worse is than any stepmother, which hath
brought us forth this new unreasonable brute beast, the pestilence and
mischief of all this world? One beast alone I brought forth wholly
dedicate to be benevolent, pleasant, friendly, and wholesome to all other.
What hath chanced, that this creature is changed into such a brute beast?
I perceive nothing of the creature man, which I myself made. What evil
spirit hath thus defiled my work? What witch hath bewitched the mind of
man, and transformed it into such brutishness? What sorceress hath thus
turned him out of his kindly shape? I command and would that the wretched
creature should behold himself in a glass. But, alas, what shall the eyes
see, where the mind is away? Yet behold thyself (if thou canst), thou
furious warrior, and see if thou mayst by any means recover thyself again.
From whence hast thou that threatening crest upon thy head? From whence
hast thou that shining helmet? From whence are those iron horns? Whence
cometh it, that thine elbows are so sharp and piked? Where hadst thou
those scales? Where hadst thou those brazen teeth? Of whence are those
hard plates? Whence are those deadly weapons? From whence cometh to thee
this voice more horrible than of a wild beast? What a look and countenance
hast thou more terrible than of a brute beast? Where hast thou gotten this
thunder and lightning, both more fearful and hurtful than is the very
thunder and lightning itself? I formed thee a goodly creature; what came
into thy mind, that thou wouldst thus transform thyself into so cruel and
so beastly fashion, that there is no brute beast so unreasonable in
comparison unto man?"
These words, and many other such like, I suppose, the Dame Nature, the
worker of all things, would say. Then since man is such as is showed
before that he is, and that war is such a thing, like as too oft we have
felt and known, it seemeth to me no small wonder, what ill spirit, what
disease, or what mishap, first put into man's mind, that he would bathe
his mortal weapon in the blood of man. It must needs be, that men mounted
up to so great madness by divers degrees. For there was never man yet (as
Juvenal saith) that was suddenly most graceless of all. And always things
the worst have crept in among men's manners of living, under the shadow
and shape of goodness. For some time those men that were in the beginning
of the world led their lives in woods; they went naked, they had no walled
towns, nor houses to put their heads in: it happened otherwhile that they
were sore grieved and destroyed with wild beasts. Wherefore with them
first of all, men made war, and he was esteemed a mighty strong man, and a
captain, that could best defend mankind from the violence of wild beasts.
Yea, and it seemed to them a thing most equable to strangle the
stranglers, and to slay the slayers, namely, when the wild beast, not
provoked by us for any hurt to them done, would wilfully set upon us. And
so by reason that this was counted a thing most worthy of praise (for
hereof it rose that Hercules was made a god), the lusty-stomached young
men began all about to hunt and chase the wild beasts, and as a token of
their valiant victory the skins of such beasts as they slew were set up in
such places as the people might behold them. Besides this they were not
contented to slay the wild beasts, but they used to wear their skins to
keep them from the cold in winter. These were the first slaughters that
men used: these were their spoils and robberies. After this, they went so
farforth, that they were bold to do a thing which Pythagoras thought to be
very wicked; and it might seem to us also a thing monstrous, if custom
were not, which hath so great strength in every place: that by custom it
was reputed in some countries a much charitable deed if a man would, when
his father was very old, first sore beat him, and after thrust him
headlong into a pit, and so bereave him of his life, by whom it chanced
him to have the gift of life. It was counted a holy thing for a man to
feed on the flesh of his own kinsmen and friends. They thought it a goodly
thing, that a virgin should be made common to the people in the temple of
Venus. And many other things, more abominable than these: of which if a
man should now but only speak, every man would abhor to hear him. Surely
there is nothing so ungracious, nor nothing so cruel, but men will hold
therewith, if it be once approved by custom. Then will ye hear, what a
deed they durst at the last do? They were not abashed to eat the carcases
of the wild beasts that were slain, to tear the unsavoury flesh with their
teeth, to drink the blood, to suck out the matter of them, and (as Ovid
saith) to hide the beasts' bowels within their own. And although at that
time it seemed to be an outrageous deed unto them that were of a more mild
and gentle courage: yet was it generally allowed, and all by reason of
custom and commodity. Yet were they not so content. For they went from the
slaying of noisome wild beasts, to kill the harmless beasts, and such as
did no hurt at all. They waxed cruel everywhere upon the poor sheep, a
beast without fraud or guile. They slew the hare, for none other offence,
but because he was a good fat dish of meat to feed upon. Nor they forbare
not to kill the tame ox, which had a long season, with his sore labour,
nourished the unkind household. They spared no kind of beasts, of fowls,
nor of fishes. Yea, and the tyranny of gluttony went so farforth that
there was no beast anywhere that could be sure from the cruelty of man.
Yea, and custom persuaded this also, that it seemed no cruelty at all to
slay any manner of beast, whatsoever it was, so they abstained from
manslaughter. Now peradventure it lieth in our power to keep out vices,
that they enter not upon the manners of men, in like manner as it lieth in
our power to keep out the sea, that it break not in upon us; but when the
sea is once broken in, it passeth our power to restrain it within any
bounds. So either of them both once let in, they will not be ruled, as we
would, but run forth headlong whithersoever their own rage carrieth them.
And so after that men had been exercised with such beginnings to
slaughter, wrath anon enticed man to set upon man, either with staff, or
with stone, or else with his fist. For as yet, I think they used no other
weapons. And now had they learned by the killing of beasts, that man also
might soon and easily be slain with little labour. But this cruelty
remained betwixt singular persons, so that yet there was no great number
of men that fought together, but as it chanced one man against another.
And besides this, there was no small colour of equity, if a man slew his
enemy; yea, and shortly after, it was a great praise to a man to slay a
violent and a mischievous man, and to rid him out of the world, such
devilish and cruel caitiffs, as men say Cacus and Busiris were. For we see
plainly, that for such causes, Hercules was greatly praised. And in
process of time, many assembled to take part together, either as affinity,
or as neighbourhood, or kindred bound them. And what is now robbery was
then war. And they fought then with stones, or with stakes, a little
burned at the ends. A little river, a rock, or such other like thing,
chancing to be between them, made an end of their battle.
In the mean season, while fierceness by use increaseth, while wrath is
grown great, and ambition hot and vehement, by ingenious craft they arm
their furious violence. They devise harness, such as it is, to fence them
with. They invent weapons to destroy their enemies with. Thus now by few
and few, now with greater company, and now armed they begin to fight. Nor
to this manifest madness they forget not to give honour. For they call it
Bellum, that is to say, a fair thing; yea, and they repute it a virtuous
deed, if a man, with the jeopardy of his own life, manly resist and defend
from the violence of his enemies, his wife, children, beasts, and
household. And by little and little, malice grew so great, with the high
esteeming of other things, that one city began to send defiance and make
war to another, country against country, and realm against realm. And
though the thing of itself was then most cruel, yet all this while there
remained in them certain tokens, whereby they might be known for men: for
such goods as by violence were taken away were asked and required again by
an herald at arms; the gods were called to witness; yea, and when they
were ranged in battle, they would reason the matter ere they fought. And
in the battle they used but homely weapons, nor they used neither guile
nor deceit, but only strength. It was not lawful for a man to strike his
enemy till the sign of battle was given; nor was it not lawful to fight
after the sounding of the retreat. And for conclusion, they fought more to
show their manliness and for praise, than they coveted to slay. Nor all
this while they armed them not, but against strangers, the which they
called hostes, as they had been hospites, their guests. Of this rose
empires, of the which there was never none yet in any nation, but it was
gotten with the great shedding of man's blood. And since that time there
hath followed continual course of war, while one eftsoons laboureth to put
another out of his empire, and to set himself in. After all this, when the
empires came once into their hands that were most ungracious of all other,
they made war upon whosoever pleased them; nor were they not in greatest
peril and danger of war that had most deserved to be punished, but they
that by fortune had gotten great riches. And now they made not war to get
praise and fame, but to get the vile muck of the world, or else some other
thing far worse than that.
I think not the contrary, but that the great, wise man Pythagoras meant
these things when he by a proper device of philosophy frightened the
unlearned multitude of people from the slaying of silly beasts. For he
perceived, it should at length come to pass, that he which (by no injury
provoked) was accustomed to spill the blood of a harmless beast, would in
his anger, being provoked by injury, not fear to slay a man.
War, what other thing else is it than a common manslaughter of many men
together, and a robbery, the which, the farther it sprawleth abroad, the
more mischievous it is? But many gross gentlemen nowadays laugh merrily at
these things, as though they were the dreams and dotings of schoolmen, the
which, saving the shape, have no point of manhood, yet seem they in their
own conceit to be gods. And yet of those beginnings, we see we be run so
far in madness, that we do naught else all our life-days. We war
continually, city with city, prince with prince, people with people, yea,
and (it that the heathen people confess to be a wicked thing) cousin with
cousin, alliance with alliance, brother with brother, the son with the
father, yea, and that I esteem more cruel than all these things, a
Christian man against another man; and yet furthermore, I will say that I
am very loath to do, which is a thing most cruel of all, one Christian man
with another Christian man. Oh, blindness of man's mind! at those things
no man marvelleth, no man abhorreth them. There be some that rejoice at
them, and praise them above the moon: and the thing which is more than
devilish, they call a holy thing. Old men, crooked for age, make war,
priests make war, monks go forth to war; yea, and with a thing so devilish
we mingle Christ. The battles ranged, they encounter the one the other,
bearing before them the sign of the Cross, which thing alone might at the
leastwise admonish us by what means it should become Christian men to
overcome.
But we run headlong each to destroy other, even from that heavenly
sacrifice of the altar, whereby is represented that perfect and ineffable
knitting together of all Christian men. And of so wicked a thing, we make
Christ both author and witness. Where is the kingdom of the devil, if it
be not in war? Why draw we Christ into war, with whom a brothel-house
agreeth more than war? Saint Paul disdaineth, that there should be any so
great discord among Christian men, that they should need any judge to
discuss the matter between them. What if he should come and behold us now
through all the world, warring for every light and trifling cause,
striving more cruelly than ever did any heathen people, and more cruelly
than any barbarous people? Yea, and ye shall see it done by the authority,
exhortations, and furtherings of those that represent Christ, the prince
of peace and very bishop that all things knitteth together by peace and of
those that salute the people with good luck of peace. Nor is it not
unknown to me what these unlearned people say (a good while since) against
me in this matter, whose winnings arise of the common evils. They say
thus: We make war against our wills: for we be constrained by the
ungracious deeds of other. We make war but for our right. And if there
come any hurt thereof, thank them that be causers of it. But let these men
hold their tongues awhile, and I shall after, in place convenient, avoid
all their cavillations, and pluck off that false visor wherewith we hide
all our malice.
But first as I have above compared man with war, that is to say, the
creature most demure with a thing most outrageous, to the intent that
cruelty might the better be perceived: so will I compare war and peace
together, the thing most wretched, and most mischievous, with the best and
most wealthy thing that is. And so at last shall appear, how great madness
it is, with so great tumult, with so great labours, with such intolerable
expenses, with so many calamities, affectionately to desire war: whereas
agreement might be bought with a far less price.
First of all, what in all this world is more sweet or better than amity or
love? Truly nothing. And I pray you, what other thing is peace than amity
and love among men, like as war on the other side is naught else but
dissension and debate of many men together? And surely the property of
good things is such, that the broader they be spread, the more profit and
commodity cometh of them. Farther, if the love of one singular person with
another be so sweet and delectable, how great should the felicity be if
realm with realm, and nation with nation, were coupled together, with the
band of amity and love? On the other side, the nature of evil things is
such, that the farther they sprawl abroad, the more worthy they are to be
called evil, as they be indeed. Then if it be a wretched thing, if it be
an ungracious thing, that one man armed should fight with another, how
much more miserable, how much more mischievous is it, that the selfsame
thing should be done with so many thousands together? By love and peace
the small things increase and wax great, by discord and debate the great
things decay and come to naught. Peace is the mother and nurse of all good
things. War suddenly and at once overthroweth, destroyeth, and utterly
fordoeth everything that is pleasant and fair, and bringeth in among men a
monster of all mischievous things.
In the time of peace (none otherwise than as if the lusty springtime
should show and shine in men's businesses) the fields are tilled, the
gardens and orchards freshly flourish, the beasts pasture merrily; gay
manours in the country are edified, the towns are builded, where as need
is reparations are done, the buildings are heightened and augmented,
riches increase, pleasures are nourished, the laws are executed, the
common wealth flourisheth, religion is fervent, right reigneth, gentleness
is used, craftsmen are busily exercised, the poor men's gain is more
plentiful, the wealthiness of the rich men is more gay and goodly, the
studies of most honest learnings flourish, youth is well taught, the aged
folks have quiet and rest, maidens are luckily married, mothers are
praised for bringing forth of children like to their progenitors, the good
men prosper and do well, and the evil men do less offence.
But as soon as the cruel tempest of war cometh on us, good Lord, how great
a flood of mischiefs occupieth, overfloweth, and drowneth all together.
The fair herds of beasts are driven away, the goodly corn is trodden down
and destroyed, the good husbandmen are slain, the villages are burned up,
the most wealthy cities, that have flourished so many winters, with that
one storm are overthrown, destroyed, and brought to naught: so much
readier and prompter men are to do hurt than good. The good citizens are
robbed and spoiled of their goods by cursed thieves and murderers. Every
place is full of fear, of wailing, complaining, and lamenting. The
craftsmen stand idle; the poor men must either die for hunger, or fall to
stealing. The rich men either stand and sorrow for their goods, that be
plucked and snatched from them, or else they stand in great doubt to lose
such goods as they have left them: so that they be on every side
woebegone. The maidens, either they be not married at all, or else if they
be married, their marriages are sorrowful and lamentable. Wives, being
destitute of their husbands, lie at home without any fruit of children,
the laws are laid aside, gentleness is laughed to scorn, right is clean
exiled, religion is set at naught, hallowed and unhallowed things all are
one, youth is corrupted with all manner of vices, the old folk wail and
weep, and wish themselves out of the world, there is no honour given unto
the study of good letters. Finally, there is no tongue can tell the harm
and mischief that we feel in war.