after us are to find in that new Europe real possibilities of advance in
all the higher kinds of civilisation. Not only are the various states to
contain sane and healthy people who desire to live in peace with their
neighbours, but people who will desire to realise themselves in science,
in philosophic thought, in art, in literature. What is an indispensable
condition for an evolution of this sort? It must be the absence of all
uneasiness, the growth of a serene confidence and trust, the obliteration
of envy, jealousy, and every kind of unreasonableness. The cause, above
all others, which has produced an opposite condition of things, which has
created the unfortunate Europe in which we have hitherto had to live, is
the growth and extension of armaments. The main factor, then, in our
problem is the existence of such swollen armaments as have wasted the
resources of every nation and embittered the minds of rival peoples. How
are we to meet this intolerable evil of armaments?

ABSENCE OF PROVOCATION

In the first place, let us remark that on our supposition--the eventual
victory of the Allies--one of the great disturbing elements will have been
put out of the field. Europe has hitherto been lulled into an uneasy and
fractious sleep by the balance of two great organisations. Under the
happiest hypothesis the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente will have
disappeared into the deep backward and abysm of time. For all practical
purposes there will be no Triple Alliance, and therefore no Triple Entente
to confront it. With Austria wiped out of the map for all purposes of
offence, and Germany restricted within modest dimensions, the three powers
of the Triple Entente--Great Britain, France, and Russia--can do what they
like, and as they are sworn friends and allies they can take their own
steps undisturbed by fears of hostile combinations. Why should these
three allies consent any further to keep up bloated armaments? It is
against their own interests and against the interests of the world. So
long as Germany existed as a power and developed her own ambitions, we
were always on the edge of a catastrophe. With the conquest of Germany
that nightmare will have gone. And observe some of the consequences which
must inevitably follow. It was against the menace of Germany that France
had to pass her three years' law of military service: in the absence of
the German army France can reduce as she pleases her military
establishment.