Thus the International Peace Movement takes it for that controversies between nations are inevitable, and concerns itself with creating a state of affairs wherein nations will not hastily resort to war for the purpose of settling their disputes or achieving their ends. Its aim, in other words, is to gain time for discussion and the cooling of passion, and then to provide peaceful, legal and therefore honorable ways of adjusting differences. This is frequently done by diplomacy, many immi nent wars having been happily averted by peaceful negotiations conducted by duly author ized representatives of the opposing groups. But diplomacy usually involves compromise, which, in turn, implies a willingness on the part of the disputants to make reciprocal con cessions in the interest of peace. When a com promise cannot be effected and diplomacy is unable to bring about a settlement, the opposing groups have but three alternatives to choose from: (1) they can leave the question(s) at issue unsettled; (2) they can go to war; (3) they can submit the question(s) to an impartial court of arbitration for a decision in accord ance with the principles of justice and reason. The first is always unsatisfactory, sometimes dangerous and not infrequently impossible; the second is coming to be considered more and more a hideous anachronism; and the third is the primary object of the movement under consideration.
The sentiment of the world at large against war is by no means of recent origin, although it has been greatly quickened during the past generation by reason of -the fact that armed conflicts between nations involve no longer rel atively small numbers of fighting men, but whole vast populations, combatants and non combatants alike, with the result that they are more destructive and calamitous than ever be fore. It is true, however, that there have al ways been individual writers, Utopian dreamers. who were opposed to the settlement of contro versies by force, not only because they Were shocked by the suffering thus caused, but also because they saw that war outraged justice and substituted might for right. But while denunciations of war on these and other grounds have come down to us from the earliest days of recorded history, and are of-comparatively frequent occurrence in ancient, mediaeval and early modern literature, suggestions as to effica cious means of avoiding it, that is, as to ac ceptable substitutes for it, ate relatively few and far between. The idea of resorting to arbitration has been envisaged by many high minded and public-spirited men, but only here and there do we find feasible schemes for putting that idea into practiCe. Moreover, even if a few projects not altogether hopeless were proposed, they could not be put into effect until a tame public sentiment was created in their favbr. For as long as the popular masses remained ignorant of or indifferent to the evils of regarding it as glorious or as con cerning a comparatively small number of lead ers and fighting men, .it was impossible that sporadic proposals looking toward the peaceful settlement of controversies and emanating from a few enlightened leaders of thought should lead to any practical results.
It is not strange that mankind has been very slow to realize that any controversy or difficulty which can be settled at all can be settled by law as w• as by force. It has taken countless ages to do away with private brawling. and the world is by no means en tirely rid of it yet. The truth is that war, in a certain sense, is a ed institution,'" that is, nations have always been in the habit of attacking one another whenever they have con sidered such action either necessary or desir able, whenever the war-passion has been aroused. Ancient action-patterns have devel oped in the nerve-substance of the human animal, so that when a stimulus is offered in the form of a real or imagined danger, or an insult, or a provocation of any kind whatso ever, we clench our fists or seize our weapons and get ready to fight, just as another sort of stimulus will move us to eat, or to tremble with fear of ghosts, or to seek the gratification of our sexual instinct. It has been shown that most wars, historically, result from land-crowd ing, need of expansion-room, but according to modern conceptions of right and wrong a na tion which seeks to acquire territory belonging to another nation by force commits a crime analogous to that of the individual who steals his neighbor's corn and justifies the theft on the ground that he was hungry. However that may be, it is not to be denied that fighting is as ingrown habit and not a rational activity, and that the impulse to fight can be counter acted only by a long and slow process of edu cation; at the same time, however, that educa tion must provide a moral equivalent for war, lest enduring peace shall result in converting men from lions into sheep.
However we explain the phenomenon or account for its development, the fact remains that the sentiment against war has of late be come more 'general and more insistent, with the result that at the present time the advocates of peaceful settlement are found in all classes of society and are becoming numerous enough to exert an important influence upon national and international affairs. Not only are en lightened peace-workers of many kinds (states men, philosophers, juris-consults, economists, journalists, historians, poets, scholars) con stantly giving oral and written expressions to their views all over the world, but whole parties and sects have adopted the abolition of war (universal disarmament) as one of the main planks in their platforms. Moreover, constructive minds are everywhere engaged in advocating, measures and developing plans for bringing about the substitution of a peaceful and legal procedure for war as a means of settling differences that threaten to. involve na tions; and the increasing number of interna tional congresses and conferences held for the purpose of effecting a general agreement con cerning all sorts of economic, commercial, ital and social questions bears witness to the success of the efforts that are being put forth to the end of removing the causes known to be responsible for disastrous conflicts resulting in the wholesale destruction of life and property.