ne of these high-sounding things--it was simply
War; the sum total of the battles of centuries. But let me explain
myself: this is a novel view to you, and you are perhaps unable to
conceive how or why war was so fatal to the old world, because you see
how little harmful it is to the new. If you collected in a promiscuous
way a few millions of modern Englishmen and slew them all
simultaneously, what, think you, would be the effect from the point of
view of the State? The effect, I conceive, would be indefinitely small,
wonderfully transitory; there would, of course, be a momentary lacuna
in the boiling surge: yet the womb of humanity is full of sap, and
uberant; Ocean-tide, wooed of that Ilithyia whose breasts are many,
would flow on, and the void would soon be filled. But the effect would
only be thus insignificant, if, as I said, your millions were taken
promiscuously (as in the modern army), not if they were _picked_
men----in _that_ case the loss (or gain) would be excessive, and
permanent for all time. Now, the war-hosts of the ancient
commonwealths--not dependent on the mechanical contrivances of the
modern army--were necessarily composed of the very best men: the
strong-boned, the heart-stout, the sound in wind and limb. Under these
conditions the State shuddered through all her frame, thrilled adown
every filament, at the death of a single one of her sons in the field.
As only the feeble, the aged, bided at home, their number after each
battle became larger _in proportion to the whole_ than before. Thus the
nation, more and more, with ever-increasing rapidity, declined in
bodily, and of course spiritual, quality, until the _end_ was reached,
and Nature swallowed up the weaklings whole; and thus war, which to the
modern state is at worst the blockhead and indecent _affaires
d'honneur_ of persons in office--and which, surely, before you and I
die will cease altogether--was to the ancient a genuine and
remorselessly fatal scourge.

'And now let me apply these facts to the Europe of our own time. We no
longer have world-serious war--but in its place we have a scourge, the
effect of which on the modern state is _precisely the same_ as the
effect of war on the ancient, only,--in the end,--far more destructive,
far more subtle, sure, horrible, disgusting. The name of this
pestilence is Medical Science. Yes, it is most true, shudder
--shudder--as you will! Man's best friend turns to an asp in his
bosom to sting him to