Nor may we forget that it is the modern spirit which has
claimed some alleviation of the horrors of the field, and that the
majority of the nations engaged in the present struggle have observed
the new rules.

These considerations show that the problem is less simple and more
serious than is often supposed, and I set out to discuss each of them
with some fullness. That the war has _no_ relation to the Churches will
hardly be claimed by anybody. Such a claim would mean that they were
indifferent to one of the very gravest phases of human conduct, or
wholly unable to influence it. Nor can we avoid the issue by pleading
that Christianity approves and blesses a just defensive war, and that,
since the share of this country in the war is entirely just and
defensive, we have no moral problem to consider. I have assuredly no
intention of questioning either the justice of Britain's conduct or the
prudence of the Churches in adapting the maxims of the Sermon on the
Mount to the practical needs of life. If and when a nation sees its life
and prosperity threatened by an ambitious or a jealous neighbour, one
cannot but admire its clergy for joining in the advocacy of an efficient
and triumphant defence. But this is merely a superficial and proximate
consideration. Not the actual war only, but the military system of which
it is the occasional outcome, has a very pertinent relation to religion;
the maintenance of this machinery for settling international quarrels in
an age in which applied science makes it so formidable is a very grave
moral issue. It turns our thoughts at once to those branches of the
Christian Church which claim the predominant share in the moulding of
the conduct of Europe.

But these questions of the efficacy of Christian teaching or the
influence of Christian ministers are not the only or the most
interesting questions suggested by the relation of the war to the
prevailing religion. The great tragedy which darkens the earth to-day
raises again in its most acute form the problem of evil and Providence.
More than two thousand years ago, as _Job_ reminds us, some difficulty
was experienced in justifying the ways of God to men. The most
penetrating thinker of the early Church, St. Augustine, wrestled once
more with the problem, as if no word had been written on it; and he
wrestled in vain. A century and a half ago, when the Lisbon earthquake
destroyed forty thousand Portuguese, Voltaire attempted, with equal
unsuc