himself with
the thought that he will arrive somewhere. But the time comes when it
becomes quite clear that the way along which he is going will lead to
nothing but a precipice, which he is already beginning to discern before
him.

In such a position stands the Christian humanity of our time. It is
perfectly evident that, if we continue to live as we are now living,
guided in our private lives, as well as in the life of separate States,
by the sole desire of welfare for ourselves and for our State, and will,
as we do now, think to ensure this welfare by violence, then, inevitably
increasing the means of violence of one against the other and of State
against State, we shall, first, keep subjecting ourselves more and more,
transferring the major portion of our productiveness to armaments; and,
secondly, by killing in mutual wars the best physically developed men, we
must become more and more degenerate and morally depraved.

That this will be the case if we do not alter our life is as certain as
it is mathematically certain that two non-parallel straight lines must
meet. But not only is this theoretically certain in our time; it is
becoming certain not only to thought, but also to the consciousness. The
precipice which we approach is already becoming apparent to us, and the
most simple, non-philosophizing, and uneducated men cannot but see that,
by arming ourselves more and more against each other and slaughtering
each other in war, we, like spiders in a jar, can come to nothing else
but the destruction of each other.

A sincere, serious, rational man can no longer console himself by the
thought that matters can be mended, as was formerly supposed, by a
universal empire such as that of Rome or of Charles the Great, or
Napoleon, or by the mediaeval spiritual power of the Pope, or by Holy
Alliances, by the political balance of the European Concert, and by
peaceful international tribunals, or, as some have thought, by the
increase of military strength and the newly discovered powerful weapons
of destruction.

It is impossible to organize a universal empire or republic, consisting
of European States, as different nationalities will never desire to unite
into one State. To organize international tribunals for the solution of
international disputes? But who will impose obedience to the decision of
the tribunal upon a contending party who has an organized army of
millions of men? To disarm? No one desires it or will begin i