But we need not say that this surely is no period of the world for true Christians to justify war, and especially wars of aggrandizement, retaliation, and slavery. When could the Mexican invasion assume a more hideous aspect in the eyes of good men, than at a time when the missionaries of the cross are penetrating to the remotest parts of the earth on their glorious errand of evangelizing the heathen;* and when even Mohammedan powers, the Sultan of Turkey, the Shah of Persia, the Imaum of Muscat, and the Arabian chiefs have either abolished slavery, or very much restricted it; and when there seems to be a universal movement in the world towards a happier age of Freedom, Peace, and Philanthropy. Thus the spirit of the age rebukes and condemns our war. For into that spirit has entered, we believe, some faint portion of "the mind that was in Christ.” Surely this of all periods, since the world began, is not the day to exact "the pound of flesh next the heart" with a cruel greediness, nor to resent injuries with a hasty revenge, nor to fight for glory, territory, or oppression. Let us hope that our countrymen will yet come to their senses, and frown upon a spirit and a career so utterly at variance with the holy religion we profess, and check any symptoms of a renewal of wars of invasion, conquest, and slavery. * A Chinese emperor once said: "Wherever Christians go they whiten the soil with human bones; and I will not have Christianity in my empire." A Turk at Jerusalem once said to Wolff, the missionary, "Why do you come to us?" The missionary replied, "to bring you peace.” "Peace!" replied the Turk, leading him to a window, and pointing to Mount Calvary, "there! upon the very spot where your Lord poured out his blood, the Mohammedan is obliged to interfere to prevent Christians from shedding the blood of each other!"--Calumet of Peace. CHAPTER XXVIII. THE LESSONS OF THE WAR WITH MEXICO. "Our sole aim being to promote the cause of permanent peace by turning this war into effectual warnings against resorts to the sword hereafter."— PROPOSALS FOR A REVIEW OF THE WAR BY THE AMERICAN PEACE SOCIETY. A BRIEF survey of some of the more prominent lessons, taught us by the events of the last two years, is all that can be given now, though the future will no doubt teach us far more upon this subject than the past. The friends of peace had fondly cherished the hope that pure republics, the governments of the many as contradistinguished from monarchies and aristocracies, the governments of the one, or the few, would be pacific. War has been charged upon rulers, though it has been confessed it "Is a game, which, were their subjects wise, But we are disappointed. We see that republics can wage as fierce, brutal, and unjust wars, as feudal and despotic powers.* The mania of conquest may riot in the veins of a democracy as furiously as in those of a kingdom or empire. * Witness republican France, waging a cruel war against republican Rome to restore the Pope! The example of our wickedness will find in future history but too many imitators. Such cases need not in the least shake our faith in republicanism; but they should convince us of the necessity, if we would have a true republicanism, of compounding with it large admixtures of sound education, pure religion, and the spirit of universal brotherhood. In this respect we witness the non-fulfilment of many wise predictions and cherished hopes. The very independence and self-reliance taught by free institutions make the republican the most formidable soldier on earth, when he cuts loose from the scruples of a religious education. The staterivalry and panting for distinction by the members of different sections of the Union have also blown up the war-passion to a hotter flame, and made the battle-field an arena for the most intense competition. The Mexican war has accordingly taught us not to trust to political institutions alone, however free and admirable, for the maintenance of pacific relations among mankind. We must strike a higher key. We must appeal to deeper motives. Men may know their rights in a republic, and still be ignorant of their duties. They may know their duties, and not discharge them. They may have a morbid jealousy of tyranny over themselves, and yet play the tyrant over others. We would bring no railing accusation against our own, our native land. Heaven bless it, every acre and rood! But because we love it, and would ever rejoice in its unsullied honor and Christian fame, we deeply, deploringly remonstrate against the spirit of political propagandism. If we have so far lost sight of the nature of free institutions, and the true mission of the United States, as to propose to offer, Mohammedlike, the alternative of freedom in one hand, and the sword in the other, to the other nations of the earth, the sooner our days are numbered and finished, the happier for the peace of the world. We say thus much, not to give "aid or comfort" to any enemy of liberty and the institutions in which liberty is organized, but to "point the moral” of the late war. It is not that we love our country less, but mankind more. It is not that we would be any the less devoted patriots, but that we would sanctify and dignify that character by being the more devoted philanthropists and disciples of Christ. And, in general, we have been taught by this war how broken a reed we lean upon, when we propose to accomplish the magnificent result of a general, permanent peace by any temporal expedients, any carnal weapons, any industrial, social, political, commercial, or selfish arrangements. Satan cannot cast out Satan, nor can even selfishness itself exorcise the demoniac spirit of war. Men will hardly give up the gratification of their lusts, though they could turn a penny by it. Yea, we see that they will, under the instigation of the strong and animal passions, fling every consideration of interest, honest reputation, consistency, and safety to the winds, and embark in a crusade against which their pockets, their love of life, and every apparent interest cry out. But wars and fightings come from a different part of the human constitution than the calculating faculties. A whole boiling cauldron of ambition, excitement, pleasure, revenge, sympathetic ardor, is in the breast of the volunteer. He cannot be controlled except by principles and sentiments mightier than those that have usurped the dominion over his reason and conscience. But "where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty;" liberty from those unsanctified lusts and passions of the human heart, out of which all the terrible deeds of war come, as streams of burning lava from the volcano. The motives that are to emancipate even the freest and most refined nations from enacting the appalling tragedy of the battle-field, must descend from a higher plane than the leger, the statute-book, and the laws and interests of conventional life. God must thunder and lighten out of heaven. Jesus must spread out his arms in the agony of the cross, as if to draw all men to their spiritual unity and head. Man's relation to man, as a brother, owning equal rights, and bound by equal duties, must be revealed in its full solemnity and tenderness. Then, and not till then, can we hope to see this foul spirit cast out, from the hearts even of good men, much less out of the sensual mind. We welcome with delight every new tie uniting distant lands in the intercourse of commerce, science, and a material civilization. All hail to the press, the steamboat, the railroad, and the telegraph, as connecting men together more and more, not by links of iron only, but by cords of love. But the causes of war are too inveterate to be cured by any thing short of the miraculous touch of the Son of God. He is the Prince of Peace. He, and he only, can say to a warring world, as he once said to the raging deep, "Peace, be still," and the winds and waves obeyed him. Thanks be accorded to all who are laboring for human improvement in every direction, and by every instrument, for they are co-laborers with the advocates of the uninterrupted brotherhood of nations. But chiefly as Christianity pervades the mass of mankind in its life-giving spirit and efficacy, will men awake to the unutterable wickedness of war, and learn its horrid arts no more. Civilization itself is no adequate remedy; but civilization, after the Christian type, and uplifted and empowered with Christian ideas, will outgrow war. It has outgrown many barbarous notions and customs, the ordeal, torture, persecution, superstition, of earlier ages; and it is only a question of time and faithful effort, when this great embodiment of barbarism shall drop off from the expanding limbs of Freedom, on which it has so long hung as a hideous and monstrous excrescence. Another lesson from these hostilities is, that what are called the improvements of warfare are poor pretexts to justify its continuance. Commend us not to war as a thing which is very susceptible of improvement. The devil cannot be disguised, though he be clothed in a suit of broadcloth, and have a musket and canteen, instead of a bow and arrows. He is still the devil. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he will be a murderer to the end. He will make children orphans, and wives widows, and parents childless. He may use different tools, the bomb instead of the batter |