evertheless one too true thus far
in human history, that liberty, man's greatest earthly boon, can be
reached only through a pathway of blood. The Army made good our
declaration of independence; and upon the Army and Navy Lincoln relied
for the efficacy of his plan of emancipation. Abstract right is fair to
look upon, and has furnished the theme for charming essays by such
beautiful writers as Ruskin and Emerson; but right, backed up by
battalions, is the right that prevails. When the men of blood and iron
come, there is no longer time for the song or the essay. It is, "Get in
line or be shot." The days of rhetoricals are over. The eloquence of the
soldier silences all. Even the laws are dumb when the sword is
unsheathed.

Is this horrible doctrine? It is only God overthrowing Pharaoh by means
more humane than His fearful plagues, and less destructive than the
billows of that relentless sea over which redeemed Israel so exultingly
sang. No, brethren; the sword of the Lord and of Gideon has not ceased
to be a useful instrument. It is the proper thing for evil doers.

The army is the national sword, and the "powers that be" bear it "not in
vain." It is a fearful engine of destruction, pure and simple. Von
Moltke says: "The immediate aim of the soldier's life is destruction,
and nothing but destruction; and whatever constructions wars result in
are remote and non-military."

An Austrian officer says: "Live and let live is no device for an army.
Contempt for one's own comrades, for the troops of the enemy, and, above
all, fierce contempt for one's own person, are what war demands of every
one. Far better is it for an army to be too savage, too cruel, too
barbarous, than to possess too much sentimentality and human
reasonableness. If the soldier is to be good for anything as a soldier,
he must be exactly the opposite of a reasoning and thinking man. The
measure of goodness in him is his possible use in war. War, and even
peace, require of the soldier absolutely peculiar standards of
morality. The recruit brings with him common moral notions of which he
must seek immediately to get rid. For him, victory--success--must be
everything. The most barbaric tendencies in man come to life again in
war, and for war's uses they are incommensurably good."

Perhaps the greatest of American psychologists, Professor William James,
adds to these remarks: "Consequently the soldier can not train himself
to be too feelingless to all those