e human race. Sacrifices and dangers
which a good man would think it his clear duty to accept if they fell on
himself alone wear another aspect if he is acting as trustee for a great
nation and for the interests of generations who are yet unborn. Nothing
is more calamitous than the divorce of politics from morals, but in
practical politics public and private morals will never absolutely
correspond. The public opinion of the nation will inevitably inspire and
control its statesmen. It creates in all countries an ethical code which
with greater or less perfection marks out for them the path of duty, and
though a great statesman may do something to raise its level, he can
never wholly escape its influence. In different nations it is higher or
lower--in truthfulness and sincerity of diplomacy the variations are
very great--but it will never be the exact code on which men act in
private life. It is certainly widely different from the Sermon on the
Mount.

There is one belief, half unconscious, half avowed, which in our
generation is passing widely over the world and is practically accepted
in a very large measure by the English-speaking nations. It is that to
reclaim savage tribes to civilisation, and to place the outlying
dominions of civilised countries which are anarchical or grossly
misgoverned in the hands of rulers who govern wisely and uprightly, are
sufficient justification for aggression and conquest. Many who, as a
general rule, would severely censure an unjust and unprovoked war,
carried on for the purpose of annexation by a strong Power against a
weak one, will excuse or scarcely condemn such a war if it is directed
against a country which has shown itself incapable of good government.
To place the world in the hands of those who can best govern it is
looked upon as a supreme end. Wars are not really undertaken for this
end. The philanthropy of nations when it takes the form of war and
conquest is seldom or never unmixed with selfishness, though strong
gusts of humanitarian enthusiasm often give an impulse, a pretext, or a
support to the calculated actions of statesmen. But when wars, however
selfish and unprovoked, contribute to enlarge the boundaries of
civilisation, to stimulate real progress, to put an end to savage
customs, to oppression or to anarchy, they are now very indulgently
judged even in the many cases in which the inhabitants of the conquered
Power do not desire the change and resist it strenuously