David Low Dodge

WAR INCONSISTENT
WITH THE
RELIGION OF JESUS CHRIST

BY
DAVID LOW DODGE

With an Introduction
BY
EDWIN D. MEAD

PUBLISHED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL UNION
GINN & COMPANY, BOSTON
1905

Copyright, 1905, by
THE INTERNATIONAL UNION

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
55.8

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

To David Low Dodge of New York belongs the high honor of having written the first pamphlets published in America directed expressly against the war system of nations, and of having founded the first peace society ever organized in America or in the world. His first pamphlet, The Mediator’s Kingdom not of this World, was published in 1809. His second and more important pamphlet, War Inconsistent with the Religion of Jesus Christ, was prepared for the press in 1812. This was two years before the publication of Noah Worcester’s Solemn Review of the Custom of War, which was issued in Boston on Christmas Day, 1814. Early in 1812 Mr. Dodge and his friends in New York deliberated on the expediency of forming a peace society; but on account of the excitement attending the war with Great Britain this was postponed until 1815. In August of that year the New York Peace Society, the first in the world, was organized, with Mr. Dodge as its president. This was four months before the organization of the Massachusetts Peace Society (December 26, 1815) under the leadership of Noah Worcester, and nearly a year before the English Peace Society, the first in Europe, was formed (June 14, 1816) in London.

The preëminent historical interest attaching to Mr. Dodge’s pioneering work in the peace cause in this country would alone justify and indeed seem to command the republication of his pamphlets at this time, when the great ideas for which he so courageously and prophetically stood are at last winning the general recognition of humane and thoughtful men. But it is not merely historical interest which warrants a revival of attention to these almost forgotten papers. Their intrinsic power and worth are such as make their reading, especially that of the second essay, War Inconsistent with the Religion of Jesus Christ, which stands first in the present volume, edifying and inspiring to-day. Marked by few literary graces and cast in a theological mold which the critical thought of the present has in large measure outgrown, there is a force of thought, a moral earnestness, a persevering logic, a common sense, a hatred of inhumanity, a passion for justice, a penetration and a virtue in them, which commends them to the abiding and reverent regard of all who work for the peace and order of the world. Among such workers to-day are men of various political philosophies, and perhaps only a small minority are nonresistants of the extreme type of David L. Dodge; but to that minority, we cannot fail to remark, belongs the greatest and most influential of all the peace prophets of this time, Leo Tolstoi. None can read these old essays without being impressed by the fact that their arguments are essentially the same as those of the great Russian. There is little indeed of the Tolstoian thunder and lightning, the pathos, wrath, and rhetoric, the poetry and prophecy, in these old-fashioned pages; but the doctrine is the same as that of Bethink Yourselves! and Patriotism versus Christianity. In his central thought and purpose, in his religious trust and reliance upon the Christian principle, the New York merchant was a Tolstoi a hundred years before his time.

David Low Dodge was born June 14, 1774, in that part of Pomfret, Connecticut, now called Brooklyn. This was the home of Israel Putnam; and David Dodge’s father, a farmer and carpenter, was Putnam’s neighbor and friend,—may well have been near him when in April, 1775, upon hearing of the battle of Lexington, he left his plow in the furrow and started to join the forces gathering at Cambridge. David Dodge’s father, grandfather, and great-grandfather each bore the name of David Dodge. The great-grandfather was a Congregational minister, who was understood to have come from Wales,—a learned and wealthy man, who was for a while settled in the vicinity of Cape Ann in Massachusetts. The grandfather, who also received a liberal education, probably in England, came into the possession of his father’s estate, for that day a large one, and we are not informed whether he followed any profession or regular business. He was a man fully six feet tall, of great muscular power, and a lover of good horses, on which he spent much time and money. He married Ann Low, from a wealthy Massachusetts family, and settled in Beverly, where their sons David and Samuel were born, and where the family fortunes became much embarrassed. About 1757 the family removed to Pomfret, Connecticut, and the boys, whose education at the hands of their mother had been but slight, were apprenticed, David to a carpenter and Samuel to a shoemaker. Their father, obtaining at this time a commission in the army invading Canada, met his death in a bateau which attempted to descend the falls of the Oswego and was dashed to pieces on the rocks with the loss of every soul on board.

David Low Dodge’s mother, when a girl, was Mary Stuart, and when she married his father, in 1768, was a widow bearing the name of Earl. The young husband hired a small farm, the wife by her industry and economy had furniture sufficient to begin housekeeping, and the little home was founded in which David Low Dodge’s only sister Mary was born in 1770. Three years later the father hired a more expensive place in the same town, where the boy was born in 1774. “During that year,” he writes in his autobiography, “my father became serious, and commenced family prayer. He was educated in the old semi-Arminian views of his mother and the halfway covenant. My mother was a rigid Calvinist of the Whitefield school. Neither of them ever made a public profession of religion, but they were careful to observe external ordinances, catechize their children, and give religious instruction. They were honest, industrious, temperate, kind-hearted people, universally respected and esteemed by all who were acquainted with them.”

Such was the atmosphere in which the boy grew up. “The American Revolution at this period was convulsing the whole country, drafting and enlisting soldiers. Wagons were needed for the army, and by the advice of the Putnams, the old general and his son Israel, who was about two years younger than my father, he was induced to engage in the manufacture of continental wagons. He hired a convenient place for carpenters and blacksmiths, took several journeymen into the family, and embarked all his earnings in the business.” The boy’s half-brothers, William and Jesse Earl, entered the army at the tender ages of fourteen and sixteen, endured battles, sickness, and every privation, and both died towards the close of the war, the event almost wrecking the nervous system of the mother, a woman of acute sensibility. Thus early were the horrors of war brought personally home to the boy. He remembered hearing the distant cannonading when New London was burned by the British, and the exclamation of the man beside him, “Blood is flowing to-day.” “News came the next morning that the forts were stormed, the garrisons put to the sword, New London burnt, and the British were marching upon Norwich, and would proceed up into the country. My mother wrung her hands, and asked my father if we had not better pack up some things to secrete them.”

The boy’s education was slight and fragmentary. The summer he was six years old he attended the school of a venerable Irish maiden lady about sixty years of age, learning Watts’ Divine Songs, texts of Scripture, and the Shorter Catechism. From the age of seven to fourteen—the family now living on a farm in the neighboring town of Hampton—he attended the district school for two terms each winter, having no access to any other books than the primer, spelling book, arithmetic, and Bible. “I used often, when not at work in the shop evenings, to retire to the old kitchen fireplace, put my lamp into the oven, and, sitting with my back against it, take my arithmetic, slate, and pencil, and try to cipher a little. I often think how I should have been delighted to have had one fifth part of the advantages enjoyed by most of my descendants.” Confined to the house for seven weeks a little later as the result of accidents, he turned hungrily to such books as he could secure—Dilworth’s Arithmetic, Webster’s Abridged Grammar, and Salmon’s Universal English Geography. “This opened a new and astonishing field to me for contemplation. I now obtained the first glimpse of the boundaries of land and water, of the lofty mountains, and of the mighty rivers which had cut their channels through the earth. I read and surveyed the maps and meditated upon them until I began to lecture to my young companions, and was considered quite learned in geography. Having an object in view, I began to thirst for knowledge, and succeeded in borrowing in succession The Travels of Cyrus, Xerxes’ Expedition into Greece, The History of Alexander the Great, and Hannibal’s Invasion of Rome.” He proposed and brought about the formation of a society of young men in the town, for the improvement of minds and manners. There were fourteen young men, with an equal number of young women presently added, each furnishing a useful book as the beginning of a library. “We obtained some of the British classics, such as the Spectator, Guardian, etc., with a few histories; the subjects formed a foundation for conversation when we met together.”

Now the young man’s ambition turned from farming to school-teaching. He began with district schools, becoming a successful teacher from the start, prosecuting his own studies assiduously in every leisure hour, fired with a desire to improve the schools, which were everywhere as wretched as can well be imagined. For some months in 1795 he left teaching to join other young men in building a bridge at Tiverton, Rhode Island. Then he attended the academy at North Canterbury, Connecticut, under the charge of the eminent teacher, John Adams. “This was the only opportunity I ever enjoyed of attending a good school, and this was abridged to fulfill my engagement to teach the town school in Mansfield.” In 1796 he opened a private school in Norwich, adding the next year a morning school for young ladies and an evening school for apprentices and clerks, all of which flourished. During this time he was profoundly interested in religious matters, attending many revivals and becoming more and more concerned with moral and social problems. Now, too, he married, his wife being a daughter of Aaron Cleveland of Norwich, a strong character, afterwards a clergyman, “whose name you will find enrolled among the poets of Connecticut,” and who as early as 1775 published a poem on slavery, which, condemning slavery as wholly antichristian, attracted a good deal of notice. He was the first man in Connecticut to arraign slavery publicly. Elected to the General Assembly from Norwich on that issue, he introduced a bill in behalf of emancipation.

With health somewhat impaired and with family cares increasing, David Dodge now turned from teaching to trade. First it was as a clerk in Norwich, then as a partner in a general store, then as head of various dry goods establishments in Hartford and other Connecticut towns, always and everywhere successful. In 1805 Messrs. S. and H. Higginson of Boston, cousins of his wife, a firm of high standing and large capital, made him a proposition to enter into a copartnership with a view to establishing an extensive importing and jobbing store in the city of New York; and he accepted the proposition, going to New York the next year to take charge of the concern in that city. He took a store in Pearl Street, and the year afterwards the family took possession of the house connected with the store, still reserving the house in Hartford as a retreat in case of yellow fever in New York. From this time until his death, April 23, 1852, New York was, with occasional interruptions, his home and the center of his varied and ever enlarging activities. Just before the outbreak of the war with England his partners became bankrupt through losses in extensive shipping of American produce to Europe. “Bonaparte sprung his trap upon more than a million dollars of their property.” Mr. Dodge now established cotton factories in Connecticut, and later commenced anew the dry goods business in New York, his home for years alternating between New York and the Norwich neighborhood; and for the nine years following 1835 he occupied a large farm in Plainfield, New Jersey.

Active as was his business life, and faithful his devotion to his large business affairs,—and he came to rank with the most prominent mercantile men of his day,—his mind was always intent upon social and religious subjects. “During the years of 1808 to 1811 our business became extensive and demanded much thought and attention; yet I think my affections were on the subject of religion.” Revivals of religion, the interests of his church in Norwich or New York, the improvement of the lives of his factory operatives, the organization in New York of the Christian Friendly Society for the Promotion of Morals and Religion,—such were the objects which commanded him. Throughout his long residence in New York he was a prominent worker in the Presbyterian church, for many years an elder in the church. He took a leading part in organizing the New York Bible Society and the New York Tract Society, was much engaged in the early missionary movements in New York, and in promoting the education of young men for the ministry. He was a lover of knowledge, a great reader, and one who thought and wrote as he read. Deeply interested in history, ancient and modern, his chief interest was in theological discussion. He was familiar with the chief theological controversies of the day, and upon many of them committed his views to writing. His knowledge of the Bible was remarkable; he read it through critically in course forty-two times. He held firmly the Calvinistic system of doctrine, and he addressed to his children a series of letters, characterized by great ability and logical force, in defense of the faith, and constituting together a compendious system of theology.

Several of these letters are included in the memorial volume published for the family in 1854 under the editorial supervision of Rev. Matson M. Smith. This volume contains, besides the two essays on war here reprinted, and various verses and letters, the interesting autobiography which he prepared, at the request of his children, a few years before his death, and a supplementary biographical sketch by his pastor, Rev. Asa D. Smith. In the mass of manuscripts which he left behind was an essay upon “The Relation of the Church to the World,” and one upon “Retributive Judgment and Capital Punishment,”—to which he was sharply opposed. He was opposed indeed to so much in human governments as now constituted,—“whose ultimate reliance,” he said, “is the sword,” and whose laws he felt to be so often contrary to the laws of Christ to which he gave his sole allegiance,—that he would neither vote nor hold office. Strict and inflexible as he was in his views of political and religious duty, he was one of the most genial and delightful of men, a Christian in whom there was no guile, fond of the young, affectionate, courteous, “given to hospitality,” “careful habitually to make even the conventionalities of life a fitting accompaniment and expression of the inward principle of kindness.” A face as strong as it is gentle, and as gentle as it is strong, is that which looks at us in the beautiful portrait preserved in the family treasures, and a copy of which forms the frontispiece of the present volume.

The character and influence of the family which he founded in New York, during the three generations which have followed, constitute an impressive witness to David Dodge’s force and worth, his religious consecration, and high public spirit. At the junction of Broadway and Sixth Avenue stands the statue of his son, William Earl Dodge, whose life of almost fourscore years ended in 1883. For long years the head of the great house of Phelps, Dodge & Co., the manager of immense railway, lumber, and mining interests, the president of the New York Chamber of Commerce, a representative of New York in Congress, a leader in large work for temperance, for the freedmen, for the Indians, for theological education, for a score of high patriotic and philanthropic interests, New York had in his time no more representative, more useful, or more honored citizen. And what is said of him may be said in almost the same words of William Earl Dodge, his son, who died but yesterday, and who combined broad business and philanthropic activities in the same strong and influential way as his father and grandfather before him. President of many religious and benevolent associations, he was pre-eminently a patriot and an international man. The logic of his life and of his heritage placed him naturally at the head of the National Arbitration Committee, which was appointed at the great conference on international arbitration held at Washington in the spring of 1896, following the anxiety attendant upon President Cleveland’s Venezuelan message,—a committee which, under his chairmanship, and since his death that of Hon. John W. Foster, has during the decade rendered such great service to the peace and arbitration cause in this country. It is to be noted also that the names of his son and daughter, Cleveland H. Dodge and Grace H. Dodge, names so conspicuously associated to-day with charitable, religious, and educational efforts in New York, are associated, too, like his with the commanding cause of the world’s peace and better organization; both names stand upon the American Committee of the Thirteenth International Peace Congress, which met in Boston in 1904. Thus have the generations which have followed him well learned and strongly emphasized the lesson taught by David Dodge almost a century ago, that war is “inhuman, unwise, and criminal,” and “inconsistent with the religion of Jesus Christ.”

It was in 1805 that a startling personal experience prompted the train of thought which soon and forever made David L. Dodge the advocate of the thorough-going peace principles with which his name is chiefly identified, and led him to condemn all violence, even in self-defense, in dealings between men, as between nations. Accustomed to carry pistols when traveling with large sums of money, he was almost led to shoot his landlord in a tavern at Providence, Rhode Island, who by some blunder had come into his room at night and suddenly waked him. The thought of what his situation and feelings would have been had he taken the man’s life shocked him into most searching thinking. For two or three years his mind dwelt on the question. He turned to the teaching and example of Christ, and became persuaded that these were inconsistent with violence and the carrying of deadly weapons, and with war. The common churchman sanctioned such things, but not the early Christians; and he found strong words condemning war in Luther and Erasmus, the Moravians and Quakers. Discussing the matter with many pious and Christian men, he found them generally avoiding the gospel standard. He was shocked by the “general want of faith in the promises”; but he himself laid aside at once his pistols and the fear of robbers. He became absolutely convinced that fighting and warfare were “unlawful for the followers of Christ”; and from now on he began to bear public testimony against the war spirit.

Early in the spring of 1809 he published his essay, The Mediator’s Kingdom not of this World, which attracted so much attention that in two weeks nearly a thousand copies were sold. Three literary men joined in preparing a spirited and sarcastic criticism of it; and he immediately published a rejoinder. The Mediator’s Kingdom was republished in Philadelphia and in Providence, and Mr. Dodge writes truly: “These publications gave the first impulse in America, if we except the uniform influence of the Friends, to inquiry into the lawfulness of war by Christians. Some who were favorable to the doctrines of peace judged that, with a bold hand, I had carried the subject too far; and doubtless, as it was new and had not been much discussed, I wrote too unguardedly, not sufficiently defining my terms. The Rev. Dr. Noah Worcester was one who so judged, and a few years after he published his very spirited and able essay, The Solemn Review of War.” This famous essay of Worcester’s represents the platform of the great body of American peace workers for a century, the position of men like Channing and Ladd and Jay and Sumner; but to a nonresistant and opponent even of self-defense, like David Dodge, these seemed the exponents of a halfway covenant.

Mr. Dodge entered into private correspondence on the lawfulness of war with Rev. Lyman Beecher, Rev. Aaron Cleveland, his father-in-law, Rev. John B. Romeyn, and Rev. Walter King. He preserved among his manuscripts letters of twenty-five pages from Dr. Romeyn and Mr. Cleveland, and copies of his reply to Dr. Romeyn (one hundred and thirty-two pages) and to Dr. Beecher (forty-four pages). Important letters from Dr. Beecher and Governor Jay he had lost. All these took the position of Dr. Worcester, sanctioning strictly defensive war in extreme cases,—all except Mr. Cleveland, who finally came into complete accord with Mr. Dodge, and published two able sermons on “The Life of Man Inviolable by the Laws of Christ.”

Early in 1812 the friends of peace whom Mr. Dodge had gathered about him in New York conferred upon the forming of a peace society, “wholly confined to decided evangelical Christians, with a view to diffusing peace principles in the churches, avoiding all party questions.” There being at this juncture, however, intense political feeling over the threatened war with Great Britain, they feared their motives would be misapprehended, and decided for the moment simply to act individually in diffusing information. Mr. Dodge was appointed to prepare an essay on the subject of war, stating and answering objections; and, removing at this time to Norwich, he there, in a period of great business perplexity, completed his remarkable paper on “War Inconsistent with the Christian Religion,” which was published in the very midst of the war with England.

Upon his return to New York, the friends of peace there had two or three meetings relative to the organization of a society; and in August, 1815, they formed the New York Peace Society, of between thirty and forty members, their strict articles of association condemning all war, offensive and defensive, as wholly opposed to the example and spirit and precepts of Christ. The peace societies formed immediately afterwards in Massachusetts, Ohio, Rhode Island, and London were organized, according to Mr. Dodge, without any knowledge of each other, the movements being the simultaneous separate results of a common impulse. Of the New York society Mr. Dodge was unanimously elected president. Monthly meetings were arranged, and at the first of these Mr. Dodge read an address upon “The Kingdom of Peace under the Benign Reign of Messiah,” of which a thousand copies were at once printed and circulated. Within two years the society had increased to sixty members, men active not only against war—which the society regarded as “the greatest temporal evil, as almost every immorality is generated in its prosecution, and poverty, distress, famine, and pestilence follow in its train”—but in all the benevolent enterprises of that day. “Several respectable clergymen united with the society,—Rev. Drs. E. D. Griffin and M. L. Parvine, Rev. E. W. Baldwin (to whose pen we were much indebted), Rev. Samuel Whelpley, and his son, Rev. Melancthon Whelpley, Rev. H. G. Ufford, and Rev. S. H. Cox. Dr. Cox, however, afterwards entertained different views on the subject.”

The New York Peace Society had friendly correspondence with all the other peace societies, and for several years took two hundred copies of Dr. Worcester’s Friend of Peace. This seems finally to have contributed to divide the society, some relinquishing the nonresistant views of Mr. Dodge and adopting Worcester’s less extreme position. But our brave Tolstoian was a “thorough,” and never wavered. “If it was morally wrong for individuals to quarrel and fight, instead of returning good for evil,”—these are his last words on the subject in his autobiography,—“it was much more criminal for communities and nations to return evil for evil, and not strive to overcome evil with good. In fact, the great barrier to our progress was the example of our fathers in the American Revolution. That they were generally true patriots, in the political sense of the term, and many hopefully pious, I would not call in question, while I consider them as ill directed by education as St. Paul was when on his way to Damascus.”

The New York Peace Society maintained its existence and work for many years. In 1828 it united with other societies in the creation of the American Peace Society, which was organized in New York on May 8 of that year on the initiative of William Ladd. After this the New York society seems to have done little separate work, and finally its independent existence ceased. Mr. Dodge assisted in the organization of the new national society, and presided at its first annual meeting, May 13, 1829. He was chosen a member of its board of directors, and later became a life director, maintaining his connection with the society until his death in 1852, faithful to the end to the radical views by which he had become so powerfully possessed almost half a century before.

For two generations New York has been without a local peace society. The services of eminent individual citizens of the city and state of New York for the peace cause during that period, however, have been signal. Judge William Jay of New York was for a decade president of the American Peace Society,—the important decade covering the great peace congresses in Europe at the middle of the last century; and it was his proposal that an arbitration clause should be attached to all future commercial treaties which furnished the basis for the most constructive debates of the first congress, that at London in 1843. The three really important members of the American delegation at The Hague Conference were citizens of New York,—Andrew D. White, Seth Low, and Frederick W. Holls. A remarkable plan adopted by the New York State Bar Association suggested important features of The Hague Court as finally constituted. It is a citizen of New York, Andrew Carnegie, who has given $1,500,000 for a worthy building for the court at The Hague,—a temple of peace. Mr. Carnegie, whose influence in behalf of international fraternity is perhaps second to that of no other to-day, has also given $5,000,000 to establish a pension fund for “heroes of peace,” whose heroism, too long comparatively neglected, he rightly sees to be not less than the heroism of the soldier. The most important series of arbitration conferences in recent times have been those at Lake Mohonk, in the state of New York, arranged by Albert K. Smiley,—conferences of growing size and importance, commanding world-wide attention, and performing for this country almost the same service performed for France and England by their national peace congresses. Finally, it must not be forgotten that Theodore Roosevelt, the President of the United States, through whose initiative the second Hague Conference will presently meet, is also a citizen of New York.

At this very time a promising movement is gaining head to organize once more in David Dodge’s city a New York Peace Society. At one of the recent Mohonk conferences a large committee of New York men, under the chairmanship of Mr. Warner Van Norden, was formed for conference with this end in view. Upon the American committee of the International Peace Congress which met in Boston in 1904 were no less than sixteen residents of the city of New York,—Andrew Carnegie, Hon. Oscar S. Straus, Hon. George F. Seward, Walter S. Logan, Felix Adler, William D. Howells, Mrs. Charles Russell Lowell, Mrs. Anna Garlin Spencer, Miss Grace H. Dodge, Rev. Josiah Strong, Rev. Charles E. Jefferson, Cleveland H. Dodge, George Foster Peabody, Professor John B. Clark, Leander T. Chamberlain, and J. G. Phelps Stokes. In the week following the Boston congress a series of great peace meetings was held in New York, at the Cooper Union and elsewhere, arranged by members of this committee; and out of all this a new impulse has come to plans for local organization in New York. As one result a strong society was formed by the Germans of the city, and a large Women’s Peace Circle has since been organized and begun important educational work. The larger New York Peace Society is now certainly a thing of the near future. To the men and women who will constitute that society, the noble body of those now working in their various ways in the great city for the cause of peace, is dedicated especially this republication of the old essays of David Dodge, the founder of the first peace society in the world, who by his pioneering and prophetic service gave to New York a place so significant in the history of what is to-day the world’s most commanding cause.

WAR INCONSISTENT WITH THE RELIGION OF JESUS CHRIST

Humanity, wisdom, and goodness at once combine all that can be great and lovely in man. Inhumanity, folly, and wickedness reverse the picture, and at once represent all that can be odious and hateful. The former is the spirit of Heaven, and the latter the offspring of hell. The spirit of the gospel not only breathes “glory to God in the highest, but on earth peace, and good will to men.” The wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated; but the wisdom from beneath is earthly, sensual, and devilish.

It is exceedingly strange that any one under the light of the gospel, professing to be guided by its blessed precepts, with the Bible in his hand, while the whole creation around him is so often groaning under the weight and terrors of war, should have doubts whether any kind of wars under the gospel dispensation, except spiritual warfare, can be the dictate of any kind of wisdom except that from beneath; and much more so, to believe that they are the fruit of the Divine Spirit, which is love, joy, and peace.

An inspired apostle has informed us from whence come wars and fightings. They come from the lusts of men that war in their members. Ever since the fall, mankind have had naturally within them a spirit of pride, avarice, and revenge. The gospel is directly opposed to this spirit. It teaches humility, it inculcates love, it breathes pity and forgiveness even to enemies, and forbids rendering evil for evil to any man.

Believing as I do, after much reflection and, as I trust, prayerful investigation of the subject, that all kinds of carnal warfare are unlawful upon gospel principles, I shall now endeavor to prove that WAR is INHUMAN, UNWISE, and CRIMINAL, and then make some general remarks, and state and answer several objections. In attempting to do this I shall not always confine myself strictly to this order of the subject, but shall occasionally make such remarks as may occur, directly or indirectly, to show that the whole genius of war is contrary to the spirit and precepts of the gospel.

WAR IS INHUMAN

I. BECAUSE IT HARDENS THE HEART AND BLUNTS THE TENDER FEELINGS OF MANKIND

That it is the duty of mankind to be tender-hearted, feeling for the distress of others, and to do all in their power to prevent and alleviate their misery, is evident not only from the example of the Son of God but the precepts of the gospel.

When the Saviour of sinners visited this dark and cruel world he became a man of sorrow and was acquainted with grief, so that he was touched with the feeling of our infirmities. He went about continually healing the sick, opening the eyes of the blind, unstopping the ears of the deaf, raising the dead, as well as preaching the gospel of peace to the poor. He visited the houses of affliction and poured the balm of consolation into the wounded heart. He mourned with those who mourned, and wept with those that wept. Love to God and man flowed from his soul pure as the river of life, refreshing the thirsty desert around him. He was not only affectionate to his friends but kind to his enemies. He returned love for their hatred, and blessing for their cursing. When he was surrounded by all the powers of darkness and resigned himself into the hands of sinners to expiate their guilt, and they smote him on the cheek and plucked off the hair, he “was dumb and opened not his mouth.” While suffering all the contempt and torture which men and devils could invent, instead of returning evil for evil he prayed for his murderers and apologized for his persecutors, saying, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

The apostle exhorts Christians, saying, “Be ye kind and tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.”

Authority in abundance might be quoted to show that the spirit of the gospel absolutely requires the exercise of love, pity, and forgiveness, even to enemies.

But who will undertake to prove that soldiers are usually kind and tender-hearted, and that their employment has a natural tendency to promote active benevolence, while it requires all their study of mind and strength of body to injure their enemies to the greatest extent?

Though we often hear of the generosity and attention of soldiers to prisoners, and notwithstanding I am willing to allow that feelings of humanity are not altogether obliterated from every soldier, yet much of this apparent kindness may flow from a desire of better treatment themselves should circumstances be reversed, or from a hope of the applause of mankind. My object, however, is not to prove that all soldiers are destitute of humanity, but that their occupation has a natural tendency and actually does weaken their kind and tender feelings, and harden their hearts.

Is it not a fact that those who are engaged in the spirit of war, either in the council or in the field, are not usually so meek, lowly, kind, and tender-hearted as other men? Does the soldier usually become kind and tender-hearted while trained to the art of killing his fellow-man, or more so when engaged in the heat of the battle, stepping forward over the wounded and hearing the groans of the expiring? Does he actually put on bowels of tenderness, mercy, and forgiveness, while he bathes his sword in the blood of his brother? Do these scenes generally change the lion into the lamb? On the contrary, do not the history of ages and the voice of millions bear testimony that the whole trade of war has a natural tendency to blunt the tender edge of mercy and chill all the sympathizing feelings of the human heart? Who that is a parent, having an uncommonly hard-hearted and unfeeling son, would send him into the camp to subdue his inhumanity and to stamp upon him kind and tender feelings? If war has not a natural tendency to harden the heart, permit me to inquire why mankind do not usually feel as much at the distress occasioned by war as by other calamities?

It would be truly astonishing, were it not so common, to see with what composure the generality of mankind hear the account of barbarous and destructive battles. They may have some little excitement when they hear of savages—whose religion teaches them revenge—using the tomahawk and scalping knife; but when thousands are torn to pieces with shot and shells and butchered with polished steels, then it becomes a very polite and civil business, and those who perish are contemplated as only reclining on a bed of honor. If an individual in common life breaks a bone or fractures a limb, all around him not only sympathize but are ready to aid in alleviating his distress; but when thousands are slain and ten thousand wounded in the field of battle, the shock is but trifling, and the feelings are soon lost in admiring the gallantry of this hero and the prowess of that veteran. And why all this sensibility at the pains of an individual, and all this indifference at the sufferings of thousands, if war has not a natural tendency to harden the heart and destroy the tender feelings of mankind?

It is a fact, however, so notorious that the spirit and practice of war do actually harden the heart and chill the kind and tender feelings of mankind, that I think few will be found to deny it, and none who have ever known or felt the spirit of Christ.

The spirit of war must be very unlike the spirit of the gospel, for the gospel enforces no duty the practice of which has a natural tendency to harden men’s hearts, but in proportion as they are influenced by its spirit and actuated by its principles they will be humane; therefore, if war hardens men’s hearts it is not a Christian duty, and of course it cannot be right for Christians to engage in it.

II. WAR IS INHUMAN, AS IN ITS NATURE AND TENDENCY IT ABUSES GOD’S ANIMAL CREATION

When God at first created man, he gave him authority over the beasts of the field, the fowls of the air, and the fishes of the deep. After he had swept away the old ungodly world of mankind for their violence with all the animal creation, except those in the ark, he was pleased to renew to Noah the same privilege of being lord over the animal world.

It may not perhaps be improper here to digress a little and remark that this appears to have been the original bounds of man’s authority,—that of having dominion only over the animal world and not over his fellow-man. It appears that God reserved to himself the government of man, whom he originally created in his own image; from which it may be inferred that man has no lawful authority for governing his fellow-man except as the special executor of divine command, and that no government can be morally right except that which acknowledges and looks up to God as the supreme head and governor.

But to return: although the animal world is put under the dominion of man for his use, yet he has no authority to exercise cruelty towards it. “For the merciful man regardeth the life of his beast.” God is very merciful to his creatures; he not only hears the young ravens when they cry but he opens his hand and supplies the wants of the cattle upon a thousand hills.

Though God has decorated the earth with beauty and richly clothed it with food for man and beast, yet where an all-devouring army passes, notwithstanding the earth before them is like the garden of Eden, it is behind them a desolate wilderness; the lowing ox and bleating sheep may cry for food, but, alas! the destroyer hath destroyed it.

The noble horse, which God has made for the use and pleasure of man, shares largely in this desolating evil. He is often taken, without his customary food, to run with an express, until, exhausted by fatigue, he falls lifeless beneath his rider. Multitudes of them are chained to the harness with scanty food, and goaded forward to drag the baggage of an army and the thundering engines of death, until their strength has failed, their breath exhausted, and the kindness they then receive is the lash of the whip or the point of a spear. In such scenes the comfort of beasts is not thought of, except by a selfish owner who fears the loss of his property.

But all this is trifling compared with what these noble animals, who tamely bow to the yoke of man, suffer in the charge of the battle; the horse rushes into the combat not knowing that torture and death are before him. His sides are often perforated with the spur of his rider, notwithstanding he exerts all his strength to rush into the heat of the battle, while the strokes of the sabers and the wounds of the bullets lacerate his body, and instead of having God’s pure air to breathe to alleviate his pains, he can only snuff up the dust of his feet and the sulphurous smoke of the cannon, emblem of the infernal abode. Thus he has no ease for his pains unless God commissions the bayonet or the bullet to take away his life.

But if such is the cruelty to beasts in prosecuting war, what is the cruelty to man, born for immortality?

No wonder that those who feel so little for their fellow-men should feel less for beasts.

If war is an inhuman and cruel employment, it must be wrong for Christians to engage in it.

III. WAR IS INHUMAN, AS IT OPPRESSES THE POOR

To oppress the poor is everywhere in the Scriptures considered as a great sin: “For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the Lord”; “Whoso stoppeth his ears at the cry of the poor, he also shall cry himself and not be heard”; “What mean ye that ye beat my people to pieces, and grind the faces of the poor? saith the Lord God of hosts.”

The threatenings against those who oppress the poor, and the blessings pronounced upon those who plead their cause, are very numerous in the Scriptures. The threatenings are so tremendous and awful that all men ought to consider well before they are active in any step which has a natural tendency to oppress the poor and needy.

That war actually does oppress the poor may be heard from ten thousand wretched tongues who have felt its woe. Very few, comparatively, who are instigators of war actually take the field of battle, and are seldom seen in the front of the fire. It is usually those who are rioting on the labors of the poor that fan up the flame of war. The great mass of soldiers are generally from the poor of a country. They must gird on the harness and for a few cents per day endure all the hardships of a camp and be led forward like sheep to the slaughter. Though multitudes are fascinated to enlist by the intoxicating cup, the glitter of arms, the vainglory of heroes, and the empty sound of patriotism, yet many more are called away contrary to their wishes by the iron hand of despotic laws. Perhaps a parent is enrolled whose daily labor was hardly sufficient to supply a scanty pittance for a numerous offspring, who are in his absence crying for bread. And why all this sorrow in this poor and needy family? Because the husband and father is gone, and probably gone forever, most likely to gratify the wishes of some ambitious men who care as little as they think of his anxious family. Perhaps an only son is taken from old, decrepit parents, the only earthly prop of their declining years; and with cold poverty and sorrow their gray hairs are brought down to the dust.

War cannot be prosecuted without enormous expenses. The money that has been expended the last twenty years in war would doubtless have been sufficient not only to have rendered every poor person on earth comfortable—so far as money could do it—during the same period, but, if the residue had been applied to cultivate the earth, it would have literally turned the desert into a fruitful field. Only the interest of the money that has been expended in a few years by the European nations in prosecuting war would have been sufficient, under proper direction, to educate every poor child on earth in the common rudiments of learning, and to support missionaries in abundance to convey the gospel of peace to every creature. What a noble employment if those nations had exerted their powers for these objects as much as they have for injuring each other! And what a difference would have appeared in the world! Blessings would have fallen on millions ready to perish, instead of desolation, terror, and death.

The vast expenses of war must be met by corresponding taxes, whether by duties on merchandise or direct taxes on real estate; yet they fall most heavily on the poor. Whatever duty the merchant pays to the customhouse, he adds the amount to the price of his goods, so that the consumer actually pays the tax. If a tax is levied on real estate, the product of that estate is raised to meet it, and whoever consumes the product pays the tax. In times of war the prices of the necessaries of life are generally very much increased, but the prices of the labor of the poor do not usually rise in the same proportion, therefore it falls very heavily on them. When the honest laborers are suddenly called from the plow to take the sword and leave the tilling of the ground, either its seed is but sparingly sown or its fruit but partially gathered, scarcity ensues, high prices are the consequence, and the difficulty greatly increased for the poor to obtain the necessaries of life, especially if they were dependent on the product of a scanty farm which they are now deprived of cultivating. Many a poor widow, who has been able in times of peace to support her fatherless children, has been obliged in times of war in a great measure to depend on the cold hand of charity to supply their wants.

The calamities of war necessarily fall more on the poor than on the rich, because the poor of a country are generally a large majority of its inhabitants.

These are some of the evils of war at a distance, but when it comes to their doors, if they are favored personally to escape the ferocity of the soldiers, they fly from their habitations, leaving their little all to the fire and pillage, glad to escape with their lives, though destitute and dependent; and when they cast round their eyes for relief, they only meet a fellow-sufferer, who can sympathize with them but not supply their wants. Thus does war not only oppress the poor but adds multitudes to their number who before were comfortable.

If war actually does oppress the poor, then we may infer that in its nature and tendency it is very unlike the genius of the gospel, and not right for Christians to engage in it.

IV. WAR IS INHUMAN, AS IT SPREADS TERROR AND DISTRESS AMONG MANKIND

In the benign reign of Messiah the earth will be filled with the abundance of peace; there will be nothing to hurt or destroy; every one will sit quietly under his own vine and fig tree, having nothing to molest or make him afraid. But in times of war, mankind are usually full of anxiety, their hearts failing them for fear, looking for those things which are coming upon our wicked world.

One of the most delightful scenes on earth is a happy family where all the members dwell together in love, being influenced by the blessed precepts of the gospel of peace. But how soon does the sound of war disturb and distress the happy circle! If it is only the distant thunder of the cannon that salutes the ear, the mother starts from her repose, and all the children gather round her with looks full of anxiety to know the cause. Few women can so command their feelings as to hide the cause; and let it be said to the honor of the female sex that they have generally tender feelings, which cannot easily be disguised at the distress of their fellow-beings. Perhaps a mother’s heart is now wrung with anguish in the prospect that either the partner of her life or the sons of her care and sorrow, or both, are about to be called into the bloody field of battle. Perhaps the decrepit parent views his darling son leaving his peaceful abode to enter the ensanguined field, never more to return. How soon are these joyful little circles turned into mourning and sorrow!

Who can describe the distress of a happy village suddenly encompassed by two contending armies—perhaps so early and suddenly that its inhabitants are aroused from their peaceful slumbers by the confused noise of the warriors more ferocious than the beasts that prowl in the forest? Were it not for the tumult of the battle, shrieks of distress from innocent women and children might be heard from almost every abode. Children run to the arms of their distracted mothers, who are as unable to find a refuge for themselves as for their offspring. If they fly to the streets they are in the midst of death: hundreds of cannon are vomiting destruction in every quarter; the hoofs of horses trampling down everything in their way; bullets, stones, bricks, and splinters flying in every direction; houses pierced with cannon shot and shells which carry desolation in their course; without, multitudes of men rushing with deadly weapons upon each other with all the rage of tigers, plunging each other into eternity, until the streets are literally drenched with the blood of men. To increase the distress, the village is taken and retaken several times at the point of the bayonet. If the inhabitants fly to their cellars to escape the fury of the storm, their buildings may soon be wrapt in flames over their heads.

And for what, it may be asked, is all this inhuman sacrifice made? Probably to gain the empty bubble called honor,—a standard of right and wrong without form or dimensions. Let no one say that the writer’s imagination is heated while it is not in the power of his feeble pen to half describe the horror and distress of the scenes which are by no means uncommon in a state of war.

If such are some of the effects of war, then it must be a very inhuman employment, and wrong for Christians to engage in it.

V. WAR IS INHUMAN, AS IT INVOLVES MEN IN FATIGUE, FAMINE, AND ALL THE PAINS OF MUTILATED BODIES

To describe the fatigues and hardships of a soldier’s life would require the experience of a soldier, so that only some of their common sufferings can be touched upon by a person who is a stranger to the miseries of a camp.

A great majority of those who enter the ranks of an army are persons unaccustomed to great privations and severe fatigues; hence the great proportion of mortality among fresh recruits. Their habits and strength are unable to endure the hard fare, rapid and constant marches generally imposed upon them in active service.

The young soldier commonly exchanges a wholesome table, a comfortable dwelling, an easy bed, for bad food, the field for his house, the cold earth for his bed, and the heavens over him for his covering. He must stand at his post day and night, summer and winter; face the scorching sun, the chilling tempest, and be exposed to all the storms of the season, without any comfortable repose; perhaps during most of the time with a scanty allowance of the coarsest food, and often destitute of any, except the miserable supply he may have chance to plunder,—not enough to satisfy but only to keep alive the craving demands of nature; often compelled to march and countermarch several days and nights in succession, without a moment to prepare his provisions to nourish him and glad to get a little raw to sustain his life. Frequently this hardship is endured in the cold and inclement season, while his tattered clothing is only the remains of his summer dress. Barefooted and half naked, fatigued and chilled, he becomes a prey to disease, and is often left to perish without a human being to administer to him the least comfort. If he is carried to a hospital, he is there surrounded by the pestilential breath of hundreds of his poor fellow-sufferers, where the best comforts that can be afforded are but scanty and dismal.

But all this is comparatively trifling to the sufferings of the wounded on the field of battle. There thousands of mangled bodies lie on the cold ground hours, and sometimes days, without a friendly hand to bind up a wound; not a voice is heard except the dying groans of their fellow-sufferers around them. No one can describe the horrors of the scene: here lies one with a fractured skull, there another with a severed limb, and a third with a lacerated body; some fainting with the loss of blood, others distracted, and others again crying for help.

If such are some of the faint outlines of the fatigues and sufferings of soldiers, then their occupation must be an inhuman employment, for they are instrumental in bringing the same calamities on others which they suffer themselves; and of course it is unfriendly to the spirit of the gospel, and wrong for Christians to engage in it.

VI. WAR IS INHUMAN, AS IT DESTROYS THE YOUTH AND CUTS OFF THE HOPE OF GRAY HAIRS

Mankind are speedily hastening into eternity, and it might be supposed sufficiently fast without the aid of all the ingenuity and strength of man to hurry them forward; yet it is a melancholy truth that a great proportion of the wealth, talents, and labors of men are actually employed in inventing and using means for the premature destruction of their fellow-beings.

One generation passes away, and another follows in quick succession. The young are always the stay and hope of the aged; parents labor and toil for their children to supply their wants and to educate them to be happy, respectable, and useful, and then depend upon them to be their stay and comfort in their declining years. Alas, how many expectations of fond parents are blasted! Their sons are taken away from them and hurried into the field of slaughter.

In times of war the youth—the flower, strength, and beauty of the country—are called from their sober, honest, and useful employments, to the field of battle; and if they do not lose their lives or limbs, they generally lose their habits of morality and industry. Alas! few ever return again to the bosom of their friends. Though from their mistaken and fascinating views of a soldier’s life and honor they may be delighted in enlisting, and merry in their departure from their peaceful homes, yet their joy is soon turned into pain and sorrow. Unthinking youth, like the horse, rushes thoughtlessly into the battle. Repentance is then too late; to shrink back is death, and to go forward is only a faint hope of life. Here on the dreadful field are thousands and hundreds of thousands driven together to slaughter each other by a few ambitious men, perhaps none of whom are present. A large proportion are probably the youth of their country, the delight and comfort of their parents. All these opposing numbers are most likely persons who never knew or heard of each other, having no personal ill-will, most of whom would in any other circumstances not only not injure each other but be ready to aid in any kind office; yet by the act of war they are ranged against each other in all the hellish rage of revenge and slaughter.

No pen, much less that of the writer’s, can describe the inhumanity and horrors of a battle. All is confusion and dismay, dust and smoke arising, horses running, trumpets blasting, cannon roaring, bullets whistling, and the shrieks of the wounded and dying vibrating from every quarter. Column after column of men charge upon each other in furious onset, with the awful crash of bayonets and sabers, with eyes flashing and visages frightfully distorted with rage, rushing upon each other with the violence of brutish monsters; and when these are literally cut to pieces others march in quick succession, only to share the same cruel and bloody tragedy. Hundreds are parrying the blows; hundreds more are thrusting their bayonets into the bowels of their fellow-mortals, and many, while extricating them, have their own heads cleft asunder by swords and sabers; and all are hurried together before the tribunal of their Judge, with hearts full of rage and hands dyed in the blood of their brethren.

O horrid and debasing scene! my heart melts at the contemplation, and I forbear to dwell upon the inhuman employment.

VII. WAR IS INHUMAN, AS IT MULTIPLIES WIDOWS AND ORPHANS, AND CLOTHES THE LAND IN MOURNING

The widow and fatherless are special objects of divine compassion, and Christianity binds men under the strongest obligation to be kind and merciful towards them, as their situation is peculiarly tender and afflicting.

“A father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widow, is God in his holy habitation.” “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction.”

To be active in any measure which has a natural tendency to wantonly multiply widows and orphans in a land is the height of inhumanity as well as daring impiety.

I will venture to say that no one circumstance in our world has so greatly multiplied widows and fatherless children as that of war. What has humanity ever gained by war to counterbalance simply the afflictions of the widow and fatherless? I verily believe nothing comparatively. I am well aware that a very popular plea for war is to defend, as it is styled, “our firesides, our wives and children”; but this generally is only a specious address to the feelings, to rouse up a martial spirit which makes thousands of women and children wretched where one is made happy. I am sensible that those will sneer at my opinion who regard more the honor that comes from men than they do the consolation of the widow and the fatherless.

In times of war thousands of virtuous women are deprived of their husbands and ten thousands of helpless children of their fathers. The little tender children may now gather round their disconsolate mothers, anxiously inquiring about their fathers, remembering their kind visages, recollecting how they used fondly to dandle them on their knees and affectionately instruct them; but now they are torn from their embraces by the cruelty of war, and they have no fathers left them but their Father in heaven.

It is probably no exaggeration to suppose that in Europe there are now two hundred thousand widows and a million fatherless children occasioned by war. What a mass of affliction! humanity bleeds at the thought! These children must now roam about without a father to provide for, protect, or instruct them. They now become an easy prey to all kinds of vice; many probably will be trained up for ignominious death, and most of them fit only for a soldier’s life, to slaughter and to be slaughtered, unless some humane hand kindly takes them under its protection.

And here I cannot help admiring the spirit of Christianity. It is owing to the blessed spirit and temper of the gospel of peace that many of the evils of war are so much ameliorated at the present day as well as the inhuman slavery of men.

The numerous asylums that now exist for the relief of the needy, the widow, and the fatherless are some of the precious fruits of Christianity; and if this spirit were universal the bow would soon be broken to pieces, the spear cut asunder, and the chariots of war burnt with fire, and wars would cease to the ends of the earth.

And is it not the duty of all who name the name of Christ to do all in their power to counteract this destroying evil?

War not only multiplies widows and orphans but clothes the land in mourning. In times of war multitudes of people are clothed with ensigns of mourning. Here are gray-headed parents shrouded in blackness, weeping for the loss of darling sons; there are widows covered with veils mourning the loss of husbands, and refusing to be comforted; children crying because their fathers are no more. Cities and villages are covered in darkness and desolation; weeping and mourning arise from almost every abode.

And it may be asked, What inhuman hand is the cause of all this sorrow? Perhaps some rash man, in the impetuosity of his spirit, has taken some unjust, high ground, and is too proud to retrace a step, and had rather see millions wretched than to nobly confess that he had been in the wrong.

Surely Christians cannot be active in such measures without incurring the displeasure of God, who styles himself the father of the fatherless and the judge and avenger of the widow.

Thus I have shown that war is inhuman and therefore wholly inconsistent with Christianity, by proving that it tends to destroy humane dispositions; that it hardens the hearts and blunts the tender feelings of men; that it involves the abuse of God’s animal creation; that it oppresses the poor; that it spreads terror and distress among mankind; that it subjects soldiers to cruel privations and sufferings; that it destroys the youth and cuts off the hope of the aged; and that it multiplies widows and orphans and occasions mourning and sorrow.

The fact that war is inhuman is indeed one of those obvious truths which it is difficult to render more plain by argument; those who know in what war consists cannot help knowing that it is inhuman.

What Mr. Windham said with reference to the inhumanity of slavery may be said of the inhumanity of war. In one of his speeches in the House of Commons against the slave trade he stated his difficulty in arguing against such a trade to be of that kind which is felt in arguing in favor of a self-evident proposition. “If it were denied that two and two made four, it would not be a very easy task,” he said, “to find arguments to support the affirmative side of the question. Precisely similar was his embarrassment in having to prove that the slave trade was unjust and inhuman.”

Whoever admits that the slave trade is inhuman must admit that war is inhuman in a greater variety of ways and on a much larger scale.

The inhumanity of the slave trade was the great and, finally, triumphant argument by which it was proved to be inconsistent with Christianity.

The advocates of slavery, like the advocates of war, resorted to the Old Testament for support; but it appeared that slavery, as it appears that war, was permitted and approved of for reasons and on principles peculiar to the ancient economy. This is apparent as well from the difference between the general design of the old and new dispensations as from the whole genius and spirit of the gospel. Hence those who opposed the slave trade argued from the general nature and spirit of Christianity as the strongest ground which could be taken. If slavery was inconsistent with this, it ought not to be tolerated; but slavery is inhuman and is therefore inconsistent with Christianity. Exactly the same is true of war, nor can anything short of an express revelation from God, commanding war or slavery, render either of them justifiable.

It deserves to be distinctly considered that the gospel contains little or nothing directly by way of precept against slavery; but slavery is inconsistent with its general requirements and inculcations and is therefore wrong. But war, besides being inconsistent with the genius and spirit of the gospel, is prohibited by those precepts which forbid retaliation and revenge and those which require forgiveness and good will.

It is plain, then, that he who does not advocate and defend the slave trade, to be consistent, must grant that war is incompatible with Christianity, and that it is a violation of the gospel to countenance it.

WAR IS UNWISE

That the principles and practice of war are unwise I argue:

I. BECAUSE, INSTEAD OF PREVENTING, THEY PROVOKE INSULT AND MISCHIEF

The maxim, that in order to preserve peace, mankind must be prepared for war, has become so common, and sanctioned by such high authority, that few question its wisdom or policy; but if stripped of its specious garb, it may appear to proceed not from that wisdom which came down from above, which is “first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy”; and if it is not the wisdom from above, then it must be the wisdom from beneath.

Are not pride, avarice, and revenge the seeds of all kinds of carnal warfare? From these grow all the quarreling among children, the discord among families, the bickerings, law suits, and broils among neighbors, the boxing among bullies, the dueling among modern gentlemen, and wars among nations. They all originate from one and the same spirit.

Now, is the mild, meek, and peaceable man, unarmed, more liable to inspire jealousy in others that he is about to insult and abuse them than the high-toned duelist who constantly carries with him deathly weapons? Does he, in fact, so often get into difficulty, quarreling and fighting? The respectable Society of Friends stands a living monument to answer the question.

On the principles of self-defense, as they are styled, if one man suspects an injury from another, unless he is naturally a more powerful man, he must take a cane, as the principles of self-defense require a superior power in your own hand, either by art or muscular strength. When the other learns the suspicions and sees the preparation, he in his turn must take a bludgeon to preserve the balance of power and proclaim a threatening to awe his antagonist, who must now take a sword and return a threatening in order to maintain his dignity; for it will not do for men of honor to retract, however much they may be in the wrong. The other, again, must take a deathly weapon for his defense, and nothing is now wanting but an unhappy meeting to set each other’s blood a flowing.

Much in the same way do nations often get into desperate warfare. One nation is busily increasing its military strength on the plausible maxim of preserving peace and maintaining its rights. Another nation views the preparations with a jealous eye, and also goes to work on the same principle to make formidable preparations. All the nations around take the alarm, and on the same principle begin active preparations, all vying with each other to become the most formidable. If one sends an ambassador to inquire the cause of the great preparations, the answer always is, let the motive be what it may, For their own defense. Then the other makes new exertions and begins to fortify towns on the confines of his neighbor, who must not only do the same but march a large army for the defense of his frontier; and the other must do likewise. By this time, if no old quarrel remained unsettled, perhaps one charges the other with encroachment on territory; the other denies the charge, and contends sharply for his pretended rights. Ministers may be interchanged, and while negotiations are pending a high tone must be taken by both parties, for this is an essential principle in the doctrine of self-defense; the contrary would betray weakness and fear. Newspapers must be ushered forth with flaming pieces to rouse, as it is called, the spirit of the countries, so as to impress upon the populace the idea that the approaching war is just and necessary, for all wars must be just and necessary on both sides. In the meantime envoys extraordinary may be sent to other powers by each party to enlist their aid,—most of whom are already prepared for war,—and each one selects his side according to his interests and feelings. At length the ultimatum is given and refused, and the dreadful conflict commences. Few wars, however, begin in this slow and progressive mode; a trifling aggression is sufficient to blow up the flame with nations already prepared.

Thus, we see, nations resemble bulldogs who happen to meet. They will first raise their hairs, show their teeth, then growl, and then seize upon each other with all their strength and fury; and bulldogs have something of the same kind of honor, for they scorn to retreat.

Hence we see that the acknowledged principles of defensive war are the vital springs of most of the wars that agitate and desolate our world. The pretended distinction between offensive and defensive war is but a name. All parties engaged in war proclaim to the world that they only are fighting in defense of their rights, and that their enemies are the aggressors; while it may be impossible for man to decide which are most in the wrong.

The popular maxim of being prepared for war in order to be at peace may be seen to be erroneous in fact, for the history of nations abundantly shows that few nations ever made great preparations for war and remained long in peace. When nations prepare for war they actually go to war, and tell the world that their preparations were not a mere show.

Thus we may see that the principles and preparations of war actually engender war instead of promoting peace; and of course they are unwise, and, if unwise, then it is folly for Christians to engage in them.

II. WAR IS UNWISE, FOR INSTEAD OF DIMINISHING, IT INCREASES DIFFICULTIES

As the principles and preparations of war have a natural tendency to generate war and are actually the cause of a great proportion of the wars which do exist, so actual hostilities have a natural tendency to increase difficulties and to spread abroad the destroying evil.

It is almost impossible for any two nations to be long engaged in war without interfering with the rights and privileges of other nations, which generally awakes their jealousy and resentment, so that most of the surrounding nations are drawn into the destructive vortex, which is the more easily done, as war inflames the martial spirit in other nations not engaged, and rouses up the desperate passions of men. Besides, the belligerent nations are not content with suffering themselves, but use every art and persuasion to get the neighboring nations to join them; and they are generally too successful, for it seldom happens that two nations engage in war for a length of time and conclude a peace before they have involved other nations in their difficulties and distresses, and often a great proportion of the world is in arms.

Moreover, the nations who first engage in the contest always widen the breach between themselves by war.

It is much easier settling difficulties between individuals or nations before actual hostilities commence than afterwards. Mankind are not apt to be any more mild and accommodating in a state of actual warfare. Besides, new difficulties constantly arise. The passions become inflamed, and charges are often made of violating the established laws of civilized warfare, which laws, however, are generally bounded only by the strength of power. If one party makes an incursion into the other’s territory and storms a fortified place and burns the town, the other party must then make a desperate effort to retaliate the same kind of destruction, to a double degree, on the towns of their enemy. Retaliation, or “rendering evil for evil,” is not only allowed by Mahometans and pagans, but is an open and avowed principle in the doctrine of self-defense among professed Christian nations; not only is it sanctioned by the laity, but too often by the priests who minister in the name of Jesus Christ.

Both of the contending parties generally seize on each other’s possessions wherever they can get hold of them, whether on the seas or on the land. The barbarous spoliations on each other stir up the passions of the great mass of their inhabitants, until they esteem it a virtue to view each other as natural and perpetual enemies, and then their rulers can prosecute the war with what they call vigor.

Can the wound now be so easily healed as it could have been before it became thus lacerated and inflamed? Facts speak to the contrary, and nations seldom attempt negotiations for peace under such circumstances. They generally prosecute the war with all their power until one party or the other is overcome, or until both have exhausted their strength, and then they may mutually agree to a temporary peace to gain a little respite, when perhaps the original matter of dispute has become comparatively so trifling that it is almost left out of the account.

With a small spirit of forbearance and accommodation how easily might the difficulties have been settled before such an immense loss of blood and treasure!

If war does actually increase, instead of diminishing, difficulties, then it must be very unwise to engage in it.

III. WAR IS UNWISE, BECAUSE IT DESTROYS PROPERTY

Property is what a great proportion of mankind are struggling to obtain, and many at the hazard of their lives. Though in some instances they may misuse it, yet it is the gift of God, and when made subservient to more important things, it may be a blessing to individuals and communities. It has in it, therefore, a real value, and ought not to be wantonly destroyed while it may be used as an instrument for benefiting mankind.

It is a notorious fact that war does make a great destruction of property. Thousands of individuals on sea and on land lose their all, for the acquisition of which they may have spent the prime of their lives. Ships on the high seas are taken, often burnt or scuttled, and valuable cargoes sent to the bottom of the deep, some possibly laden with the necessaries of life and bound to ports where the innocent inhabitants were in a state of famine. Whole countries are laid waste by only the passing of an immense army: houses are defaced, furniture broken to pieces, the stores of families eaten up, cornfields trodden down, fences torn away and used for fuel, and everything swept in its train as with the besom of destruction more terrible to the inhabitants than the storms of heaven when sent in judgment. Beautiful towns are often literally torn to pieces with shot and shells. Venerable cities, the labor and pride of ages, are buried in ashes amid devouring flames, while in melancholy grandeur the fire and smoke rise to heaven and seem to cry for vengeance on the destroyers.

Notwithstanding an avaricious individual or nation may occasionally in war acquire by plunder from their brethren a little wealth, yet they usually lose on the whole more than they gain. On the general scale the loss is incalculable. It is not my object to examine the subject in relation to any particular nation or war, but upon the general scale in application to all warlike nations and all wars under the light of the gospel.

If war does destroy property, reduce individuals to beggary, and impoverish nations, then it is unwise to engage in it.

IV. WAR IS UNWISE, AS IT IS DANGEROUS TO THE LIBERTIES OF MEN

Liberty is the gift of God, and ought to be dear to every man; not, however, that licentious liberty which is not in subordination to his commands. Men are not independent of God. He is their creator, preserver, and benefactor. In his hand their breath is, and he has a right to do what he will with his own; and the Judge of all the earth will do right. As man is not the creator and proprietor of man, he has no right to infringe on his liberty or life without his express divine command; and then he acts only as the executor of God. Man, therefore, bears a very different relation to God from what he does to his fellow-man.

The whole system of war is tyrannical and subversive of the fundamental principles of liberty. It often brings the great mass of community under the severe bondage of military despotism, so that their lives and fortunes are at the sport of a tyrant. Where martial law is proclaimed, liberty is cast down, and despotism raises her horrid ensign in its place and fills the dungeons and scaffolds with her victims.

Soldiers in actual service are reduced to the most abject slavery, not able to command their time for a moment, and are constantly driven about like beasts by petty tyrants. In them is exhibited the ridiculous absurdity of men rushing into bondage and destruction to preserve or acquire their liberty and save their lives.

When the inhabitants of a country are cruelly oppressed by a despotic government, and they rise in mass to throw off the yoke, they are as often as otherwise crushed beneath the weight of the power under which they groaned, and then their sufferings are greatly increased; and if they gain their object after a long and sanguinary struggle, they actually suffer more on the whole than they would have suffered had they remained in peace. It is generally the providence of God, too, to make a people who have thrown off the yoke of their oppressor smart more severely under the government of their own choice than they did under the government which they destroyed. This fact ought well to be considered by every one of a revolutionary spirit.

War actually generates a spirit of anarchy and rebellion which is destructive to liberty. When the inhabitants of a country are engaged in the peaceable employments of agriculture, manufactures, and commerce, anarchy and rebellion seldom happen. When these useful employments flourish, abundance flows in on every side, gentleness and humanity cast a smile over the land, and pleasure beams in almost every countenance. To turn the attention of a nation from these honest employments to that of war is an evil of unspeakable magnitude. The great object in times of war is to rouse up what is styled the spirit of the country,—which, in fact, is nothing but inflaming the most destructive passions against its own peace and safety. If you infuse into a nation the spirit of war for the sake of fighting a foreign enemy, you do that which is often most dangerous to its own liberties; for if you make peace with the common enemy, you do not destroy the spirit of war among your own inhabitants; pride, discontent, and revenge will generally agitate the whole body, so that anarchy and confusion will fill the land, and nothing but a despotic power can restrain it; and often absolute despotism is too feeble to withstand it, and the only remedy is again to seek a common enemy. Nations have sometimes waged war against other nations because there was such a spirit of war among their own inhabitants that they could not be restrained from fighting, and if they had not a common foe they would fight one another. So when a nation once unsheathes the sword, it cannot easily return the sword again to the scabbard, but must keep it crimsoned with the blood of man until “they who take the sword shall perish with the sword,” agreeably to the denunciation of Heaven.

To inflame a mild republic with the spirit of war is putting all its liberties to the utmost hazard, and is an evil that few appear to understand or appreciate. No person can calculate the greatness of the evil to transform the citizens of a peaceful, industrious republic into a band of furious soldiers; and yet the unhappy policy of nations is to cultivate a martial spirit that they may appear grand, powerful, and terrific, when in fact they are kindling flames that will eventually burn them up root and branch.

In confirmation of what has been said, if we examine the history of nations we shall find that they have generally lost their liberties in consequence of the spirit and practice of war. Thus have republics who have boasted of their freedom lost their liberty one after another, and that this has resulted from the very nature of war and its inseparable evils is evident from the fact that so violent and deadly is this current of ruin, republics have generally sunk down to the lowest abyss of tyranny and despotism, or have been annihilated and their inhabitants scattered to the four winds of heaven. Indeed, what nation that has become extinct did not first lose its liberty by war, and then hasten to its end under the dominion of those passions which war inflames?

Do nations ever enjoy so much liberty as when most free from the spirit of war? Are their liberties ever so little endangered as when this spirit is allayed and all its foreign excitements removed? Do not nations that have partially lost their civil liberties gradually regain them in proportion as they continue long without war? Is it not a common sentiment that the liberties of a people are in danger when war engrosses their attention? On the whole, is it not undeniable that peace is favorable to liberty, and that war is its enemy and its ruin? If so, what can be more unwise, what more opposite to every dictate of sound wisdom and policy, than the spirit and practice of war?

V. WAR IS UNWISE, AS IT DIMINISHES THE HAPPINESS OF MANKIND

Happiness is the professed object which most men are striving to obtain. Alas! few, comparatively, seek it where it is alone to be found. But that happiness which flows from the benevolent spirit of the gospel is to be prized far above rubies; it is a treasure infinitely surpassing anything that can be found merely in riches, honors, and pleasures.

But war always diminishes the aggregate of happiness in the world. When nations wage war upon each other, all classes of their inhabitants are more or less oppressed. They are subjected to various privations; prosperity declines; external sources of happiness are mostly dried up; anxiety for friends, loss of relations, loss of property, the fear of pillage, severe services, great privations, and the dread of conquest keep them constantly distressed. They are like the troubled sea that cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt.

Those actually engaged in war generally suffer privations and hardships of the severest kind. Even the sage counselors who declare wars are often in so great anxiety and pain as to the result of their enterprises as to be unable quietly to refresh themselves with food or sleep.

All the rejoicings occasioned by military success are fully counterbalanced by the pain and mortification of the vanquished; and, in short, all the interest and happiness resulting from war to individuals and nations are dearly bought, and are at the expense of other individuals and nations.

It is because war has no tendency to increase, but does in fact greatly diminish, happiness that it is so universally regarded and lamented as the greatest evil that visits our world. Hence fasting has generally been practiced by warlike Christian nations to deplore the calamity, to humble themselves before God, and to supplicate his mercy in turning away the judgment.

Though fasting and deep humility before God is highly suitable for sinners, with a hearty turning away from their sins and humble supplication for God’s mercy through the mediation of Christ, yet those fasts of nations who have voluntarily engaged in war and are determined to prosecute it until their lusts and passions are gratified do not appear to be such fasts as God requires.

Does it not appear absurd for nations voluntarily to engage in war, and then to proclaim a fast to humble themselves before God for its evils, while they have no desire to turn away from them, but, on the contrary, make it an express object to seek the divine aid in assisting them successfully to perpetuate it?

We often see contending nations, all of whom cannot be right, on any principle, proclaiming fasts, and chanting forth their solemn Te Deums as each may occasionally be victorious. Though such clashing hymns cannot mingle in the golden censer, yet few Christians seem to question the propriety of quarreling and fighting nations each in their turn supplicating aid in their unhallowed undertakings and returning thanks in case of success. Doubtless many would consider it as solemn mockery to see two duelists before their meeting supplicating God’s blessing and protection in the hour of conflict, and then to see the victor returning thanks for his success in shedding the blood of his brother; and yet, when nations carry on the business by wholesale (if I may be allowed the expression) it is considered a very pious employment. The Lord has said, “And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear; your hands are full of blood.”

Penitent Christians may weep and mourn with propriety for their own sins and the sins of the nations, with a hearty desire not only to forsake their own iniquities, but that the nations may be brought to confess and forsake their sins and turn from them to the living God. It is true that war is a judgment in God’s providence. It is also a sin of the highest magnitude and ought to be repented of. It is a crime so provoking to Heaven that other calamities generally attend it. The famine, fire, and pestilence often attend its horrors and spread distress through a land. War with its attending evils unquestionably diminishes the aggregate of happiness in the world, and is therefore unwise.

VI. WAR IS UNWISE, AS IT DOES NOT MEND, BUT INJURES, THE MORALS OF SOCIETY

The strength, defense, and glory of a country consists primarily in the good moral character of its inhabitants. The virtuous and the good are the salt that preserve it from ruin. Says the Rev. Dr. Miller in his sermon on the death of Dr. Rogers (pages 366 and 388 of the Memoirs), “It is manifest from the whole tenor of his word that God is slow to inflict heavy judgments upon a nation in which many of his people dwell; that he often spares it, spreads over it the protection of his providence, and finally delivers it for their sake; and, of course, that the presence of his beloved children, speaking after the manner of men, is a better defense than chariots and horsemen, a better defense than all the plans of mere politicians, than all the skill, courage, and activity of mere warriors.” Again, “I have no doubt that it is as great and precious a truth at this day as it ever was, that a praying people are, under God, the greatest security of a nation.”

When the inhabitants of a country become generally profane and dissolute in their manners, slaves to dissipation and vice, it is usually God’s providence soon to visit them in his wrath and let loose the instruments of his destroying vengeance; how important, therefore, in a temporal point of view, is the preservation of good morals to a nation. But no event has so powerful a tendency to destroy the morals of a people as that of actual war. It draws the attention of the inhabitants from useful employments; it generates curiosity, dissipation, and idleness, and awakes all the furious passions of men.

War occasions a great profanation of the Sabbath. Under God’s providence the Sabbath has always been a great barrier against vice, and the observance of it is indispensable to good morals.

In time of war the Sabbath among soldiers is often a day of parade. In the streets of the best-regulated cities may be seen soldiers marching, flags flying, drums and fifes playing, and a rabble of children following in the train. Now all this is not only calculated to dissipate all reverential respect for the solemnities of the day among the soldiers, but is calculated to destroy the respect and observance of the day with which the children and youth have been inspired. Add to this, flags are suspended from the windows of taverns and grogshops to entice in the youth by the intoxicating cup. In the camp the Sabbath is almost forgotten and rendered a common day. Armies from professing Christian nations as often begin offensive operations on the Sabbath as on any other day; and professing Christians not only tolerate all this but approve of it as a work of necessity and mercy.

War occasions dishonesty. In countries where armies are raised by voluntary enlistment all kinds of deception and art are practiced by recruiting officers, and connived at by their governments, to induce the heedless youth to enlist. The honor and glory of the employment is held up to view in false colors; the importance of their bounty and wages are magnified; the lightness of the duty and opportunities for amusements and recreation are held out; and probably one half have the assurances of being noncommissioned officers, with a flattering prospect of a speedy advancement; and prospects of plunder are also held out to their cupidity. These deceptive motives are daily urged under the stimulating power of ardent spirits and the fascinating charms of martial music and military finery. Many a young man who has entered the rendezvous from curiosity or for the sake of a dram, without the least idea of joining the army, has been entrapped into intoxication, and his hand then grasped the pen to seal his fate.

Recruits after joining the army find from experience that most of the allurements held out to them to enlist were but a deception, and from lust and want they often become petty thieves and plunderers to repay them for their great privations, fatigues, and sufferings.

War occasions drunkenness,—one of the greatest evils and most destructive to morality, as a multitude of other vices necessarily follow in its train. Many a young man has entered the military ranks temperate, and has returned from them a sot. All the enticements of liquor are exhibited in the most inviting forms to youth in the streets by the recruiting officer, to tempt them to enlist; and while those who have enrolled themselves remain at the rendezvous, they are probably every day intoxicated with the inebriating poison, soul and body, and soon the habit becomes confirmed. While in actual service their fatigues are so great that they greedily lay hold on the destroying liquor wherever they can find it to exhilarate their languid frames, even if they had not before acquired an insatiable thirst; and soon this detestable evil will become so enchanting that they will not only barter away their wages for it but their necessary clothing. If they survive the campaign and return to their homes, they are often the visitors of grogshops and taverns, and by their marvelous stories attract the populace around them, who must join them in circulating the cup; and thus they spread this destroying evil all around.

War occasions profaneness. Profaneness is an abomination in the sight of God: “For the Lord will not hold him guiltless who taketh his name in vain.” Profaneness draws down the judgments of heaven, “for because of swearing the land mourneth.”

That soldiers are generally considered more profane than other men is evident, because it has become a proverb that “such a person is as profane as a soldier, or a man-of-war’s man.” Young men who have been taught to revere the name of the God of their fathers may shudder at the awful profanations that fill their ears when they first enter an army; but if destitute of grace in the heart, the sound will soon cease to offend, and they will eagerly inhale the blasphemous breath and become champions in impiety. For want of habit they may not swear with so easy a grace as the older soldiers; they will for that reason make great exertions and invent new oaths, which will stimulate their fellows again to exceed in daring impiety. Seldom does a soldier return from the camp without the foul mouth of profanity. Astonishing to think that those who are most exposed to death should be most daring in wickedness!

War occasions gambling. A great proportion of the amusements of the camp are petty plays at chance, and the stake usually a drink of grog. The play is fascinating. Multitudes of soldiers become established gamblers to the extent of their ability, and often, if they return to society, spread the evil among their neighbors.

War begets a spirit of quarreling, boxing, and dueling; and no wonder that it should, for the whole business of war is nothing else but quarreling and fighting. The soldier’s ambition is to be a bully, a hero, and to be careless of his own life and the lives of others. He is therefore impatient in contradiction, receives an insult where none was intended, and is ready to redress the supposed injury with the valor of his own arms; for it will not do for soldiers to shrink from the contest and be cowards.

War destroys the habits of industry and produces idleness. Industry is necessary to good morals as well as to the wealth and happiness of a country, and every wise government will take all laudable means to encourage it; but a large proportion of common soldiers who may return from the armies have lost the relish and habits of manual labor and are often found loitering about in public places, and if they engage in any kinds of labor, it is with a heavy hand and generally to little purpose. They therefore make bad husbands, unhappy neighbors, and are worse than a dead weight in society. Their children are badly educated and provided for, and trained up to demoralizing habits, which are handed down from generation to generation.

These immoralities, and many more that might be named, are not confined to soldiers in time of war, but they are diffused more or less through the whole mass of community; and war produces a general corruption in a nation, and is therefore unwise, even in a temporal point of view. But when we consider the natural effects of these immoralities on the souls of men, all temporal advantages are in comparison annihilated. In this school of vice millions are ripening for eternal woe. The destroying influence will spread and diffuse itself through the whole mass of society unless the spirit of the Lord lifts up a standard against it.

The state of morals, so much depressed by the American Revolution, was only raised by the blessed effusions of God’s holy spirit.

If war does actually demoralize a people, then no wise person can consistently engage in it.

VII. WAR IS UNWISE, AS IT IS HAZARDING ETERNAL THINGS FOR ONLY THE CHANCE OF DEFENDING TEMPORAL THINGS

Says our blessed Saviour: “For what is a man profited, if he should gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”

The loss of a soul infinitely exceeds all finite calculations. It is not only deprived forever and ever of all good but is plunged into misery inexpressible and everlasting. All temporal things dwindle to nothing when placed in comparison with eternal realities. The rights, liberties, and wealth of nations are of little value compared with one immortal soul. But astonishing to think that millions and millions have been put at everlasting hazard only for the chance of defending temporal things!

The habits and manners of a soldier’s life are calculated, as we have already seen, to demoralize them, to obliterate all early serious impressions, to introduce and confirm them in the most daring wickedness and fit them for everlasting destruction. And notwithstanding God may have occasionally, to display his sovereign power, snatched some soldiers from the ranks of rebellion and made them the heirs of his grace, yet no sober Christian will say that the army is a likely place to promote their salvation; but, on the contrary, must acknowledge that it is a dangerous place for the souls of men. It may be assumed as an undeniable fact that the great mass of soldiers are notoriously depraved and wicked. With but few exceptions their impiety grows more daring the longer they practice war; and when it is considered that thousands and thousands of such are hurried by war prematurely into eternity, with all their sins unpardoned, what an amazing sacrifice appears only for some supposed temporal good. But when it is remembered that this infinite sacrifice is made merely for the chance of obtaining some temporal advantage, the folly of war appears in more glaring colors, as the battle is not always to the strong. Those who are contending for their rights, and are least in the wrong, are about as often unsuccessful as otherwise, and then they very much increase their evils in a temporal point of view. A wise man would not engage in a lawsuit to recover a cent, admitting that it was his just due, if the trial put to the hazard his whole estate. But this bears no comparison with one soul in competition with all temporal things; and yet men, professing to be wise, not only put one soul at hazard but millions, not for the chance of defending all temporal good, but often for a mere bubble, the hollow sound of honor; and many of those who are watching for souls, and must give an account, instead of sounding the alarm, approve of it.

All who engage in war, either in the field or otherwise, practically regard time more than eternity, and temporal more than eternal things.

If souls are of more value than temporal things, and eternity of more consequence than time, it must be unwise to engage in a war and put souls to immediate hazard of everlasting ruin, and totally wrong for Christians to engage in it.

VIII. WAR IS UNWISE, AS IT DOES NOT ANSWER THE PROFESSED END FOR WHICH IT IS INTENDED

The professed object of war generally is to preserve liberty and produce a lasting peace; but war never did and never will preserve liberty and produce a lasting peace, for it is a divine decree that all nations who take the sword shall perish with the sword. War is no more adapted to preserve liberty and produce a lasting peace than midnight darkness is to produce noonday light.

The principles of war and the principles of the gospel are as unlike as heaven and hell. The principles of war are terror and force, but the principles of the gospel are mildness and persuasion. Overcome a man by the former and you subdue only his natural power, but not his spirit; overcome a man by the latter, and you conquer his spirit and render his natural power harmless. Evil can never be subdued by evil. It is returning good for evil that overcomes evil effectually. It is, therefore, alone the spirit of the gospel that can preserve liberty and produce a lasting peace. Wars can never cease until the principles and spirit of war are abolished.

Mankind have been making the experiment with war for ages to secure liberty and a lasting peace; or, rather, they have ostensibly held out these objects as a cover to their lusts and passions. And what has been the result? Generally the loss of liberty, the overturning of empires, the destruction of human happiness, and the drenching of the earth with the blood of man.

In most other pursuits mankind generally gain wisdom by experience; but the experiment of war has not been undertaken to acquire wisdom. It has, in fact, been undertaken and perpetuated for ages to gratify the corrupt desires of men. The worst of men have delighted in the honors of military fame and it is what they have a strong propensity for; and how can a Christian take pleasure in that employment which is the highest ambition of ungodly men? The things that are highly esteemed among men are an abomination in the sight of God. Is it not, therefore, important that every one naming the name of Christ should bear open testimony against the spirit and practice of war and exhibit the spirit and temper of the gospel before the world that lieth in wickedness, and let their lights shine before men?

But what can the men of the world think of such Christians as are daily praying that wars may cease to the ends of the earth, while they have done nothing and are doing nothing to counteract its destructive tendency? Alas! too many are doing much by their lives and conversation to support its spirit and principles. Can unbelievers rationally suppose such prayers to be sincere? Will they not rather conclude that they are perfect mockery? What would be thought of a man daily praying that the means used for his sick child might be blessed for his recovery, when he was constantly administering to him known poison? With the same propriety do those Christians pray that war may come to a final end, while they are supporting its vital principles.

It is contrary to fact that war is calculated to preserve liberty and secure a lasting peace; for it has done little else but destroy liberty and peace and make the earth groan under the weight of its terror and distress.

It is contrary to the word of God that war is calculated to promote peace on earth and good will toward men. The law that is to produce this happy effect will not be emitted from the council of war or the smoke of a camp; but the law shall go forth out of Zion, and the Lord shall rebuke the strong nations and they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; then nations shall no more lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn the art of war any more; then shall the earth be filled with the abundance of peace and there shall be nothing to hurt or destroy. It is reserved alone for the triumph of the gospel to produce peace on earth and good will to men.

If war does actually provoke insult and mischief; if it increases difficulties, destroys property and liberty; if it diminishes happiness, injures the morals of society, hazards eternal for only the chance of defending temporal things, and, finally, does not answer the end for which it was intended, then it must be very unwise to engage in it, and it must be wrong for Christians to do anything to promote it, and right to do all in their power to prevent it.

WAR IS CRIMINAL

I am now to show that war, when judged of on the principles of the gospel, is highly criminal.

I. GOING TO WAR IS NOT KEEPING FROM THE APPEARANCE OF EVIL, BUT IS RUNNING INTO TEMPTATION

... I would have it understood that I consider every act of mankind which is palpably contrary to the spirit and precepts of the gospel criminal.

It is an express precept of the gospel to abstain from all appearance of evil. “Watch and pray that ye enter not into temptation” is also an express command of Christ.

A person desiring not only to abstain from evil, but from the very appearance of it, will suffer wrong rather than hazard that conduct which may involve doing wrong. He will be so guarded that if he errs at all he will be likely to give up his right when he might retain it without injuring others.

No person, it is believed, will attempt to maintain that there is no appearance of evil in carnal warfare, or that it is not a scene of great temptation.

One great object of the gospel is to produce good morals, to subdue the irascible passions of men and bring them into sweet subjection to the gospel of peace.

But war cannot be prosecuted without rousing the corrupt passions of mankind. In fact, it is altogether the effect of lust and passion. In times of war almost every measure is taken for the express purpose of inflaming the passions of men, because they are the vital springs of war, and it would not exist without them. Those who are engaged in war, both in the council and in the field, have a feverish passion, which varies as circumstances may happen to change. Those who are actually engaged in the heat of battle are usually intoxicated with rage. Should this be denied by any one, I would appeal to the general approbation bestowed on the artist who displays most skill in painting scenes of this kind. He who can represent the muscular powers most strongly exerted, the passions most inflamed, and the visage most distorted with rage, will gain the highest applause. The truth of the assertion is, therefore, generally admitted. Some men, perhaps, may be so much under the influence of pride as to have the appearance of stoical indifference when their antagonists are at some distance, but let them meet sword in hand and the scene is at once changed.

The temptations for those who constitute, or those who encourage and support, armies to commit or to connive at immorality are too various and too multiplied to be distinctly mentioned.

Who can deny that war is altogether a business of strife? But, says an inspired apostle, “where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work.”

Now, if war is a scene of confusion and strife and every evil work, it is impossible for any one to engage in it and avoid the appearance of evil or be out of the way of temptation; those who are armed with deathly weapons and thirsting for the blood of their fellow-mortals surely cannot be said to exhibit no appearance of evil. But if engaging in wars is putting on the appearance of evil and running into temptation, then it is highly criminal to engage in it.

II. WAR IS CRIMINAL, AS IT NATURALLY INFLAMES THE PRIDE OF MAN

One of the abominable things which proceed out of the corrupt heart of man, as represented by our Saviour, is pride. “God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble.” “The Lord hates a proud look.” “Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord.” That pride is criminal and that humility is commendable will doubtless be admitted by all who believe the Scriptures.

Pride, however, is one of the chief sources of war. It is pride that makes men glory in their strength and prowess; it is pride that hinders them from confessing their faults and repairing the injury done to others.

Although pride is commonly condemned in the abstract, yet it is generally commended in soldiers and fanned by every species of art and adulation, not only by men of the world but too often by those who bear the Christian name. And why is it necessary to inflame the pride of soldiers? Because it is well understood that soldiers without pride are not fit for their business.

If war is a Christian duty, why should not the example and precepts of Christ, instead of the example of the heroes of this world, be exhibited to those who fight to stimulate them? Is not Christ as worthy of imitation as the Cæsars and Alexanders of this world? He was a triumphant conqueror; he vanquished death and hell, and purchased eternal redemption for his people; but he conquered by resignation and triumphed by his death. Here is an example worthy of the highest emulation. And why not animate soldiers by it? Only because it would unnerve their arms for war and render them harmless to their foes.

It is so common to compliment the pride of soldiers that, instead of considering it that abominable thing which the Lord hates, they consider it a virtue. We frequently hear “gentlemen of the sword,” as they are styled, in reply to the flattery bestowed upon them, frankly declare that it is their highest ambition to obtain the praise of their fellow-citizens; and, of course, they confess that they are seeking the praise of men more than the praise of God. These gentlemen, however, are far less criminal than those who lavish flattery on them; for doubtless most of them are sincere and think themselves in the way of their duty, while their profession often leads them, necessarily, from the means of knowing correctly what is duty. While professing Christians have been taught from their cradles that the profession of arms is not merely an allowable but a noble employment, it is easy for them to slide into the current and go with the multitude to celebrate victories and to eulogize heroes, without once reflecting whether they are imitating their Lord and Master. But is it not time for Christians to examine and ascertain if war is tolerated in the gospel of peace before they join in festivities to celebrate its bloody feats? How would a pagan be astonished if he had been taught the meek, lowly, and forgiving spirit and principles of the gospel, without knowing the practice of Christians, to see a host of men, professing to be influenced by these blessed principles, marshaled in all the pomp of military parade, threatening destruction to their fellow-mortals! Would he not conclude that either he or they had mistaken the genius of the gospel, or that they believed it to be but a fable?

It is a notorious fact, which requires no confirmation, that military men, decorated with finery and clad in the glitter of arms, instead of being meek and lowly in their temper and deportment, are generally flushed with pride and haughtiness; and, indeed, what purpose do their decorations and pageantry answer but that of swelling their vanity? Their employment is not soft and delicate. Other men who follow rough employments wear rough clothing; but the soldier’s occupation is not less rough than the butcher’s, though, in the world’s opinion, it is more honorable to kill men than to kill cattle.

But if war has a natural tendency to inflame, and does inflame and increase the pride of men, it is criminal; it does that which the Lord hates, and it must be highly criminal to engage in it.

III. WAR NECESSARILY INFRINGES ON THE CONSCIENCES OF MEN, AND THEREFORE IS CRIMINAL

Liberty of conscience is a sacred right delegated to man by his Creator, who has given no authority to man to infringe in the least on the conscience of his fellow-man. Though a man, by following the dictates of his conscience, may be injured by men, yet they have no authority to deprive him of the rights of conscience. To control the conscience is alone the prerogative of God. That man has no right to violate the conscience of his fellow-man is a truth which few, under the light of the gospel, since the days of ignorance and superstition, have ventured to call in question.

But military governments, from their very nature, necessarily infringe on the consciences of men. Though the word of God requires implicit obedience to rulers in all things not contrary to the Scriptures, it utterly forbids compliance with such commands as are inconsistent with the gospel. We must obey God rather than man, and fear God as well as honor the king. But governments, whether monarchial or republican, make laws as they please, and compel obedience at the point of the sword. They declare wars, and call upon all their subjects to support them.

Offensive war, by all professing Christians, is considered a violation of the laws of Heaven; but offensive war is openly prosecuted by professing Christians under the specious name of self-defense. France invaded Spain, Germany, and Russia; England invaded Holland and Denmark; and the United States invaded Canada, under the pretense of defensive war. The fact is, however, that no man can, on gospel principles, draw a line of distinction between offensive and defensive war so as to make the former a crime and the latter a duty, simply because the gospel has made no such distinction. But while many Christians profess to make the distinction, and to consider offensive war criminal, they ought to have the liberty to judge, when war is waged, whether it is offensive or defensive, and to give or withhold their aid accordingly; otherwise they are not permitted the free exercise of their consciences.

But suppose this principle adopted by governments. Could they prosecute war while they left every individual in the free exercise of his conscience to judge whether such war was offensive or defensive and to regulate his conduct accordingly? Would it be possible for governments to carry on war if they depended for support on the uncertain opinion of every individual? No; such a procedure would extinguish the vital strength of war and lay the sword in the dust. The fact is well known, and monarchs declare war and force their subjects to support it. The majority in republican governments declare war and demand and enforce obedience from the minority.

Though the constitutions of governments may, in the most solemn manner, guarantee to citizens the free exercise of their consciences, yet governments find it necessary practically to make an exception in relation to war, and a man may plead conscientious motives in vain to free himself from contributing to the support of war.

I think it proper here to notice what has appeared to me a gross absurdity among some Christians in this land. They have openly declared that in their opinion the late war was offensive; that it was contrary to the laws of God, and that they were opposed to it; but though they wished not to support it because it was criminal, yet they said, if they were called on in a constitutional way, they would support it. Thus did they publicly declare that they would, under certain circumstances, obey man rather than God.

But soldiers actually resign up their consciences to their commanders, without reserving any right to obey only in such cases as they may judge not contrary to the laws of God. Were they at liberty to judge whether commands were morally right or not, before they yielded obedience, it would be totally impracticable for nations to prosecute war. Ask a general if his soldiers have the privilege of determining whether his commands are right or not, and he will tell you it is their duty only to obey.

Suppose that a general and his army are shut up in a city in their own country, and that provisions are failing; that an army is advancing for their relief, but cannot reach the place until all means of sustenance will be consumed; that the inhabitants cannot be let out without admitting the besiegers; and that in this extremity, to preserve his army for the defense of his country, the commander orders his men to slay the inhabitants, doing this evil that good may come. But some conscientious soldiers refuse to obey a command to put the innocent to the sword for any supposed good. What must be the consequence? Their lives must answer for their disobedience. Nor is this contrary to the usages of war. And Christians satisfy their consciences upon the false principle that soldiers are not accountable for their conduct, be it ever so criminal, if they obey their commanders; all the blame must fall on the officers, which involves the absurdity of obeying man rather than God. Thus soldiers must be metamorphosed into something besides moral and accountable beings in order to prosecute war; and, in fact, they are treated generally not as moral agents but as a sort of machinery to execute the worst of purposes.

The only plausible method of which I can conceive to avoid the above consequences requires that soldiers should not practically resign their consciences, but, when commands which are morally wrong are given, that they should refuse obedience and die as martyrs. But to enter an army with such views would be to belie the very oath of obedience which they take. Besides, who could execute the martyrs and be innocent? In this way all might become martyrs, and the army be annihilated.

But if war does not admit the free exercise of conscience on Christian principles, then it is criminal for Christians to become soldiers, and the principles of war must be inconsistent with the principles of Christianity.

IV. WAR IS CRIMINAL, AS IT IS OPPOSED TO PATIENT SUFFERING UNDER UNJUST AND CRUEL TREATMENT

That patient suffering under unjust and cruel treatment from mankind is everywhere in the gospel held up to view as the highest Christian virtue probably few professing Christians will deny.

But notwithstanding this truth is generally admitted, there is very commonly introduced a carnal, sophistical mode of reasoning to limit, or explain away, this precious doctrine, which is peculiar to the gospel and which distinguishes it from all other kinds of morality and religion on earth. It has relation, it is said, only to matters of religion and religious persecution,—as if the gospel required mankind actually to regard a little wealth and a few temporal things more than all religious privileges and life itself; for, by this human maxim, men may fight to defend the former, but not the latter. And this maxim is built on the supposition that Christians are not bound strictly by gospel precepts in relation to temporal things, but only in relation to spiritual things. Hence it is said that the martyrs conducted nobly in refusing to fight for the privilege of worshiping the true God, but if Christians now refuse to fight to defend their money and their political freedom they act in a dastardly manner and violate the first principles of nature. Thus are temporal regarded more than spiritual and everlasting things.

The precepts of the gospel, however, unequivocally forbid returning evil for evil, and enjoin patient sufferings under injurious and cruel treatment. A few instances shall be quoted: “Now we exhort you, brethren, warn them that are unruly, comfort the feeble-minded, support the weak, be patient towards all men. See that none render evil for evil to any man; but ever follow that which is good, both among yourselves, and unto all men.” “If, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God.” The apostle James, in his solemn denunciation against oppressors, says, “Ye have condemned and killed the just, and he doth not resist you”; he then immediately exhorts the Christians, saying, “Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord.” “Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one for another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous, not rendering evil for evil, railing for railing; but contrariwise blessings, knowing that ye are thereunto called, that ye should inherit a blessing.” “For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open to their prayers; but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil. And who is he that will harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good?”

A patient, forbearing, suffering disposition is peculiar to the lamblike temper of the gospel, and is wholly opposed to the bold, contending, daring spirit of the world which leads mankind into quarreling and fighting.

It is generally admitted, I believe, that it is the duty of Christians patiently to suffer the loss of all temporal things, and even life itself, rather than willfully violate any of God’s commands. If, then, it is the duty of a Christian patiently to suffer death rather than bear false witness against his neighbor, be he friend or foe, is it not equally his duty patiently to suffer death rather than kill his neighbor, whether friend or foe? Not merely taking away the life of our neighbor is forbidden, but every exercise of heart and hand which may have a natural tendency to injure him. But which is the greatest evil,—telling a lie, or killing a man? By human maxims you may do the latter to save your life, but not the former; though the former might injure no one but yourself, while the latter, besides injuring yourself, might send your neighbor to eternal destruction.

The spirit of martyrdom is the true spirit of Christianity. Christ himself meekly and submissively died by the hands of his enemies, and instead of resistance, even by words, he prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Stephen, when expiring under a shower of stones from his infuriate murderers, prayed, “Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.” St. Paul testified that he was not only ready to be bound but to die for the Lord Jesus. The early martyrs resigned up their lives with patient submission as witnesses for Jesus,—and this at a time, when, Sir Henry Moncrief Wellwood in his Sermons, page 335, says, “Tertullian has told us that Christians were sufficiently numerous to have defended themselves against the persecutions excited against them by the heathen, if their religion had permitted them to have recourse to the sword.”

The spirit of martyrdom is the crowning test of Christianity. The martyr takes joyfully the spoiling of his goods, and counts not his life dear to himself.

But how opposite is the spirit of war to the spirit of martyrdom! The former is bold and vindictive, ready to defend property and honor at the hazard of life, ready to shed the blood of an enemy. The latter is meek and submissive, ready to resign property and life rather than injure even an enemy. Surely patient submission under cruel and unjust treatment is not only the highest Christian virtue but the most extreme contrast to the spirit of war.

Now if it is a duty required by the gospel not to return evil for evil, but to overcome evil with good; to suffer injustice and to receive injury with a mild, patient, and forgiving disposition,—not only in words but in actions,—then all kinds of carnal contention and warfare are criminal and totally repugnant to the gospel, whether engaged in by individuals or by communities.

Can it be right for Christians to attempt to defend with hostile weapons the things which they profess but little to regard? They profess to have their treasure not in this world but in heaven above, which is beyond the reach of earthly invaders, so that it is not in the power of earth or hell to take away their dearest interests. There may be a propriety in the men of the world exclaiming that their dearest rights are invaded when their property and political interests are infringed upon; but it is a shame for Christians to make this exclamation, while they profess to believe that their dearest interest is in the hand of Omnipotence, and that the Lord God of hosts is their defense.

Whoever, without divine command, dares to lift his hand with a deathly weapon against the life of his fellow-man for any supposed injury denies the Christian character in the very act, and relies on his own arm instead of relying on God for defense.

V. WAR IS CRIMINAL, AS IT IS NOT DOING TO OTHERS AS WE SHOULD WISH THEM TO DO TO US

Says our blessed Saviour, “All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them; for this is the law and the prophets.” Now if we wish men to be kind and forbearing to us, we must be kind and forbearing to them; if we wish them to return love for hatred and good for evil, then we must return love for hatred and good for evil; if we wish not to be injured by men, then we must not injure them; if we wish not to be killed, then we must not kill.

But what is the practical language of war? Does the man who is fighting his fellow-man and exerting all his strength to overcome him really wish to be overcome himself and to be treated as he is striving to treat his enemy? Can it be believed that England, in the late war, wished France to do to her what she endeavored to do to France; or that the latter really desired in return what she endeavored to inflict on England? If not, both violated this express precept of Christ.

None can say, consistently with the principles of the gospel, that they wish to be killed by their enemies; therefore none can, consistently with those principles, kill their enemies. But professing Christians do kill their enemies, and, notwithstanding all they may say to the contrary, their actions speak louder than their words. It is folly for a man to say he does not wish to do a thing while he is voluntarily exerting all his powers to accomplish it.

But if the act of war does violate this express precept of Christ, then it must be exceedingly criminal to engage in it.

VI. WAR IS INCONSISTENT WITH MERCY, AND IS THEREFORE CRIMINAL

Mercy is the grand characteristic of the gospel, and the practice of mercy is the indispensable duty of man. “Be ye merciful, as your Father also is merciful”; “For he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust”; “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy”; “For he shall have judgment without mercy, that hath showed no mercy.”

Mercy is that disposition which inclines us to relieve distress, to forgive injuries, and to promote the best good of those who are ill deserving. Mercy in us towards our enemies implies seeking and pursuing their best good for time and eternity. It is sinful to exercise any affection towards enemies short of that benevolence or mercy which involves the advancement of their best good, and Christians may not suspend this disposition, or do evil that any supposed good may come; for no law can be of higher authority than the express precept of Christ which requires this disposition towards enemies, and of course no other consideration can be paramount to this, for nations are as much bound as individuals.

It is surely too grossly absurd for any to pretend that destroying the property and lives of enemies is treating them mercifully, or pursuing their best good for time and eternity. Nor can any so impose upon their imaginations as to think that injuring mankind is treating them with benevolence or mercy.

But the direct object of war is injury to enemies; and the conduct of soldiers generally speaks a language not easily to be misunderstood. Though soldiers are not always as bad as they might be, their tender mercies are often but cruelty. When they storm a fortified place and do not put all the captives to the sword, they are complimented for exercising mercy, merely because they were not so cruel as they might have been. But shall a highway robber be called an honest man because he takes but half the money of him whom he robs? Is it an act of mercy, when a man encroaches on your property, to take away his life? Do nations exercise mercy towards each other when they enter into bloody wars in consequence of a dispute which shall govern a small portion of territory? or does a nation show mercy to another that has actually invaded its rights by falling upon the aggressor and doing all the injury in its power? This surely is not forgiving injuries. And when two contending armies come in contact and rush on each other with all the frightful engines of death and cut each other to pieces they do not appear to me as merciful, kind, and tender-hearted, forgiving one another in love, even as God for Christ’s sake forgives his children. Yet this is the rule by which they should act and by which they will at last be judged.

But the whole system of war is opposed to mercy, and is therefore altogether unlike the spirit of the gospel, and must be criminal.

VII. WAR IS CRIMINAL, AS THE PRACTICE OF IT IS INCONSISTENT WITH FORGIVING TRESPASSES AS WE WISH TO BE FORGIVEN BY THE FINAL JUDGE

Our Saviour says: “If ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; but if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your heavenly Father forgive your trespasses”; “Forgive, and ye shall be forgiven.”

Here it is evident that the everlasting salvation of men depends on their exercising forgiveness towards their enemies; for if they forgive not, they will not be forgiven of God, and with what measure they mete to others, it will be measured to them again.

To forgive is to pass by an offense, treating the offender not according to his desert, but as though he had done nothing amiss.

But do the principles of war lead individuals or nations to pass by offenses and to treat offenders as if they were innocent? Do they not, on the contrary, require justice and exact the very last mite? Has it the aspect of forgiveness for us, when an enemy trespasses on our rights, to arm with weapons of slaughter and meet him on the field of battle? Who, while piercing the heart of his enemy with a sword, can consistently utter this prayer: “Father, forgive my trespasses, as I have forgiven the trespasses of this my enemy”? But this, in reference to this subject, is the only prayer the gospel warrants him to make. And professing Christian nations, while at war and bathing their swords in each other’s blood to redress mutual trespasses, are daily in their public litanies offering this prayer; but is it not obvious that either their prayers are perfect mockery, or they desire not to be forgiven but to be punished to the extent of their deserts?

If individuals or nations desire that God would forgive their trespasses, then they must not only pray for it, but actually exercise forgiveness towards those who trespass against them; and then they may beat their useless swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks and learn war no more.

But it must be very criminal to engage in war, or to tolerate it in any way, if it is inconsistent with the forgiveness of injuries as we hope to be forgiven, and in this respect violates the precepts of the gospel.

VIII. ENGAGING IN WAR IS NOT MANIFESTING LOVE TO ENEMIES OR RETURNING GOOD FOR EVIL

Returning good for evil and manifesting benevolence to enemies is, perhaps, the most elevated and noble part of Christian practice,—the inculcation of which in the gospel exalts Christianity far above any other form of religion and proves it to be not only divine but efficacious to subdue the turbulent and corrupt passions of men; and for these reasons this part of duty ought to be zealously advocated and diligently performed by every one who bears the Christian name.

The ablest writers who have defended the divine origin of the Scriptures against infidels have urged this topic as constituting conclusive evidence in their favor; and unbelievers, instead of attempting to meet the argument fairly, have urged the inconsistency of Christians in acting contrary to so conspicuous a rule of duty; and such is and ever has been the most powerful weapon that infidels can wield against Christianity. But it is the will of God that by welldoing we should put to silence the ignorance of foolish men. Let Christians act in strict conformity to this part of Christian practice, and they will wrest from the infidel’s hand his strongest weapon.

That exercising benevolence towards enemies and returning good for evil is inculcated as one of the most important doctrines of the gospel is evident as well from the whole tenor of the New Testament as from the express commands of the Son of God: “I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you, that ye may be the children of your Father in heaven”; “If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink; for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head”; “Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.”

Such are some of the divine precepts on this subject. So different, however, are the laws of war among Christian nations, that rendering comfort or relief to enemies is considered high treason, and they punish with death the performance of the very duty which God commands as a condition of eternal life!

The common sense of every man revolts from the idea that resisting an enemy by war is returning good for evil. Who would receive the thrust of a sword as an act of kindness? Was it ever considered that killing a man was doing good to him? Has not death always been considered the greatest evil which could be returned for capital crimes? But the principles of war not only allow enemies to return evil for evil by killing one another, but secure the highest praise to him who kills the most. It is often said of those who distinguish themselves in butchering their fellow-men, that “they cover themselves with glory!”

Nations, when they go to war, do not so much as pretend to be actuated by love to their enemies; they do not hesitate to declare in the face of Heaven that their object is to avenge their wrongs. But, says an inspired apostle, “Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.” Retributive judgment, the execution of strict justice, or vengeance, God declares often, belongs to him. He has reserved it in his own hand as his sovereign prerogative.

It is not very surprising that savage pagans should glory in revenge, but that those should do so who have the Bible in their hands, and profess to take it as the rule of their faith and practice, is truly astonishing. Still more astonishing is it that some ministers of the gospel not only connive at but approve of the spirit and practice of revenge by war.

But though the whole tenor of the gospel absolutely enjoins returning good for evil and blessing for cursing; yet the open and avowed principles of war are to return evil for evil, violence for violence.

Now if the principles of war are so directly opposed to the principles of the gospel, if the practice of war is so perfectly contrary to Christian practice, then it must be very criminal for Christians not to bear open testimony against war, and much more criminal to do anything to promote it.

IX. WAR IS CRIMINAL, BECAUSE IT IS ACTUALLY RENDERING EVIL FOR EVIL

It is a fact which can neither be disguised nor controverted that the whole trade of war is returning evil for evil. This is a fundamental principle in the system of self-defense. Therefore every exertion in the power of contending nations is made to inflict mutual injury, not merely upon persons in public employment and upon public property, but indiscriminately upon all persons and property. Hence it is an established rule of what is styled “civilized warfare” that if one party takes a person suspected of being a spy, they put him to death; which act is retaliated by the other the first opportunity. If one party storms a fortified place and puts the garrison or the inhabitants to the sword, the other, in their defense, must retaliate the same thing, and, if possible, to a greater degree. If one side executes a number of captives for some alleged extraordinary act, the other, on the principles of self-defense, may execute double the number; the first may then, on the same principles, double this number; and so they may proceed to return evil for evil, till one or the other yields.

The principles of self-defense require not merely an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, but for one eye two eyes, for one tooth two teeth. They require the retaliation of an injury to a double degree,—otherwise, there would be no balance in favor of the defensive side; but as both parties must always be on the defense, both must, of course, retaliate to a double degree. Thus war is aggravated and inflamed, and its criminality raised to the highest pitch.

The doctrine of retaliation is not only openly avowed and practiced by professing Christian nations, but is sometimes defended before national councils by professing Christians of high standing in churches. “O! tell it not in Gath! publish it not in the streets of Askelon! lest the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph!”

That the retaliation of injury, of whatever kind it may be and to whomsoever it may be offered, is most absolutely and unequivocally forbidden by the whole spirit of the gospel dispensation, as well as by its positive precepts, surely can never be fairly controverted.

Says the great Author and finisher of our faith, “Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: but I say unto you that ye resist not evil; but whosoever shall smite thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” Whether the literal import of these words be contended for or not, they cannot fairly be construed as teaching anything short of a positive and unconditional prohibition of the retaliation of injury. Had our Lord added to these words the maxim of the world, “If any man assaults you with deathly weapons, you may repel him with deathly weapons,” it would have directly contradicted the spirit of this command and made his sayings like a house divided against itself.

The apostles largely insist upon this doctrine of their divine Master, thus: “Recompense to no man evil for evil”; “Be ye all of one mind, not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing”; “See that none render evil for evil to any man.” These comprehensive passages make no conditions or limitations, and are, therefore, applicable to all men and binding upon all in all situations and circumstances under the light of the gospel; but had they added, “If any man injures you, you may return him an injury and repel violence with violence,” it would have been most palpably absurd, and the precepts of the gospel would have been truly what infidels have asserted they are,—a series of gross contradictions.

But I repeat that the open and avowed principles of war, even among Christian nations, are those of returning evil for evil. Surely, nations neither aim nor pretend to aim at the best good of their enemies; but, on the contrary, their real and professed object in the sight of God and man is to do them, while at war, all the injury in their power. What means that language which conveys instructions to those who command ships of war, to sink, burn, and destroy, if it does not mean evil to enemies? Why do nations encourage the cupidity of men by licensing and letting loose swarms of picaroons on their enemies, if it is not to inflict evil on them? But all this is sanctioned under the notion of self-defense, and, as though it were a light thing for men thus publicly to trample on the laws of the gospel, they lift up their daring hands to heaven and supplicate God’s help to assist them in violating his own commands! No apology can be made for such proceedings until it is shown that war is not returning evil for evil.

But what is it to return evil for evil?

When one man is injured by another and returns injury, he returns evil for evil and violates those precepts of the gospel which have been quoted. When one association of men is injured by another association and the injured returns an injury, evil is returned for evil and those precepts are violated. When one nation infringes on the rights of another and they in return infringe on the aggressor’s rights, they return evil for evil and violate those precepts. When one nation declares war against another and is repelled by war, evil is returned for evil and those precepts are violated. But these things are constantly practiced, without a blush or a question as to their propriety; and God is supplicated to aid in the business.

To what a state has sin reduced our world? Is not the church covered with darkness and the people with gross darkness? A man may now engage in war with his fellow-man and openly return evil for evil, and still remain in respectable standing in most of the churches, being at the same time highly applauded and caressed by the world lying in wickedness!

But if we are here to be directed and at last to be judged by the gospel, no man can return evil for evil, in war or otherwise, without aggravated guilt.

X. WAR IS CRIMINAL, AS IT IS ACTUALLY DOING EVIL THAT GOOD MAY COME; AND THIS IS THE BEST APOLOGY THAT CAN BE MADE FOR IT

That it is an evil to spread distress, desolation, and misery through a land and to stain it with the blood of men probably none will deny. War, with its attending horrors, is considered by all, even those who advocate and prosecute it, to be the greatest evil that ever befalls this wicked, bleeding, suffering world.

Though men go to war primarily to gratify their corrupt passions,—for they can never propose the attainment of any good by war which shall be commensurate with the natural and moral evils that will be occasioned by the acquisition,—yet the prospect of attaining some supposed good must be held out as a lure to the multitude and a means of self-justification.

Usually the object of war is pompously represented to be to preserve liberty, to produce honorable and lasting peace, and promote the happiness of mankind; to accomplish which, liberty, property, and honor—that honor which comes from men—must be defended, though war is the very thing that generally destroys liberty, property, and happiness, and prevents lasting peace. Such is the good proposed to be attained by the certain and overwhelming evil of war.

But no maxim is more corrupt, more false in its nature, or more ruinous in its results than that which tolerates doing evil that good may come. Nor can any defend this maxim without taking the part of infidels and atheists, to whom it appropriately belongs, and with whose principles and practice alone it is consistent.

The apostle Paul reprobates this maxim in the severest terms, and he considered it the greatest scandal of Christian character to be accused of approving it: “As we be slanderously reported,” says he, “and as some affirm that we say, Let us do evil that good may come; whose damnation is just.”

Now if war is in fact an evil, and it is prosecuted with a view to attain some good, then going to war is doing evil that good may come. It is therefore doing that which scandalizes Christian character; that which is wholly irreconcilable with the principles of the gospel, and which it is highly criminal for any man or nation to do.

XI. WAR IS OPPOSED TO THE EXAMPLE OF THE SON OF GOD, AND IS THEREFORE CRIMINAL

The example of the Son of God is the only perfect model of moral excellence, and his moral conduct, so far as he acted as man, remains a perfect example for Christians.

But did he appear in this world as a great military character, wearing a sword of steel, clothed with military finery, and surrounded by glittering soldiers, marching in the pomp and parade of a warrior? No; he was the meek and lowly Jesus, despised and rejected of men. He was King of kings and Lord of lords, but his kingdom was not of this world. Had his kingdom been of this world, then would he have appeared as an earthly conqueror, and his servants would have been warriors.

Though a prince, he was the Prince of Peace. At his advent the angels sang, “Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, good will to men.” “He came not to destroy men’s lives, but to save them.” He was the Lamb of God, meek and lowly. He followed peace with all men; he returned good for evil and blessing for cursing, and “when he was reviled he reviled not again.” Finally, he was “brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth.” That he did this as a necessary part of his mediatorial work need not be denied; but that he intended it also as an example to his followers is fully confirmed by an inspired apostle, who says, “If, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God. For hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, threatened not; but committed himself to him who judgeth righteously.”

Christ taught his disciples the doctrines of peace, and commanded them to take up the cross and follow him; to live in peace and to follow peace with all men. His last gift to them was peace. He said to them, when about to send them into the world, “Behold I send you forth as lambs among wolves”; thus teaching them what treatment they might expect and what character they must maintain among wicked men. The nature of lambs and wolves is too well known for any one to mistake this figurative representation. Wolves are fierce, bloody, and ravenous beasts; but lambs are mild, inoffensive, and unresisting, having no means of relief but by flight. Now if a host of professing Christian warriors, marshaled under the ensign of a preying eagle or a prowling lion, clothed in all the splendor of deathly armor, and rushing forward to destroy their fellow-creatures, are in figurative language but lambs, I confess I am at a loss where to look for the wolves! Do these warlike Christians appear mild as lambs and harmless as doves, kind and tender-hearted, doing good to all, to friends and foes, as they have opportunity? Can fighting be living peaceably with all men? Is it returning good for evil, and overcoming evil with good? If not, it is not imitating the example of Christ.

If Christians were like Christ, their warfare would not be carnal, but spiritual, corresponding with the armor which he has provided. They would conquer by faith and overcome by the blood of the Lamb, not counting their lives dear to themselves.

On the whole, if to engage in war is not avoiding the appearance of evil, but is running into temptation; if it inflates the pride of men; if it infringes on the rights of conscience; if it is not forgiving trespasses as we wish to be forgiven; if it is not patient suffering under unjust and cruel treatment; if it is not doing to others as we would have them do to us; if it is not manifesting love to enemies and returning good for evil; if it is rendering evil for evil; if it is doing evil that good may come; and if it is inconsistent with the example of Christ, then it is altogether contrary to the spirit and precepts of the gospel and is highly criminal. Then Christians cannot engage in war or approve of it without incurring the displeasure of Heaven.

In view of the subject, if what has been said is in substance correct, and of this I desire the reader conscientiously to judge, then the criminality of war and its inconsistency with the gospel are undeniable.

It is admitted by all that war cannot exist without criminality somewhere, and generally where quarreling and strife are, there is blame on both sides. And how it is that many Christians who manifest a laudable zeal to expose and counteract vice and wickedness in various other forms are silent on the subject of war, silent as to those parts or practices of war which are manifestly and undisputably criminal, is to me mysterious. There has been a noble and persevering opposition against the inhuman and cruel practice of the slave trade; and by the blessing of God the efforts against it have been successful, probably, for the time, beyond the most sanguine expectations. When the lawfulness of this practice was first called in question, it was violently defended as well by professing Christians as by others. Comparatively few Christians fifty years ago doubted the propriety of buying and holding slaves; but now a man advocating the slave trade could hardly hold in this vicinity a charitable standing in any of the churches. But whence has arisen so great a revolution in the minds of the mass of professing Christians on this subject? It has happened not because the spirit or precepts of the gospel have changed, but because they are better understood.

Christians who have been early educated to believe that a doctrine is correct, and who cherish a respect for the instructions of their parents and teachers, seldom inquire for themselves, after arriving at years of maturity, unless something special calls up their attention; and then they are too apt to defend the doctrine they have imbibed before they examine it, and to exert themselves only to find evidence in its favor. Thus error is perpetuated from generation to generation until God, in his providence, raises up some to bear open testimony against it; and as it becomes a subject of controversy, one after another gains light, and truth is at length disclosed and established. Hence it is the solemn duty of every one, however feeble his powers, to bear open testimony against whatever error prevails, for God is able from small means to produce great effects.

There is at present in many of our churches a noble standard lifted up against the abominable sin of intemperance, the greatest evil, perhaps, war excepted, in the land, and this destructive vice has already received a check from which it will never recover unless Christians relax their exertions. But if war is a greater evil than drunkenness, how can Christians remain silent respecting it and be innocent?

Public teachers consider it to be their duty boldly and openly to oppose vice. From the press and from the pulpit they denounce theft, profaneness, Sabbath breaking, and intemperance; but war is a greater evil than all these, for these and many other evils follow in its train.

Most Christians believe that in the millennial day all weapons of war will be converted into harmless utensils of use, that wars will cease to the ends of the earth, and that the benign spirit of peace will cover the earth as the waters do the seas. But there will be then no new gospel, no new doctrines of peace; the same blessed gospel which we enjoy will produce “peace on earth and good will to men.” And is it not the duty of every Christian now to exhibit the same spirit and temper which will be then manifested? If so, let every one “follow the things that make for peace,” and the God of peace shall bless him.

OBJECTIONS ANSWERED

As was proposed, a number of objections to the general sentiments that have been advocated shall be stated and answered.

Objection first. Shall we stand still and suffer an assassin to enter our houses without resistance and let him murder ourselves and families?

Answer. I begin with this because it is generally the first objection that is made to the doctrine of peace by all persons, high and low, learned and unlearned; notwithstanding it is an objection derived from a fear of consequences and not from a conviction of duty, and might with the same propriety have been made to the martyrs who, for conscience’ sake, refused to repel their murderers with carnal weapons, as to Christians who, for conscience’ sake, refuse at this day to resist evil. No Christian will pretend that defense with carnal weapons is not criminal, if the gospel really forbids it, let the consequences of nonresistance be what they may. For the requisitions of the gospel are the rule of duty. But I presume the objection above stated arises altogether from an apprehension of consequences rather than from regard to duty.

Every candid person must admit that this objection is of no force, until the question whether the gospel does or does not prohibit resistance with deathly weapons is first settled. It might, therefore, justly be dismissed without further remark; but as mankind are often more influenced by supposed consequences than by considerations of duty, and as the objection is very popular, it may deserve a more particular reply.