n can a real world-pacification be achieved.

The present alliance against the insufferable militarism of Germany may
very probably be the precursor of a much wider alliance against any
aggression whatever in the future. Only through some such arrangement is
there any reasonable hope of a control and cessation of that constant
international bickering and pressure, that rivalry in finance, that
competition for influence in weak neutral countries, which has initiated
all the struggles of the last century, and which is bound to accumulate
tensions for fresh wars so long as it goes on.

Already several States, and particularly the Government of the United
States of America, have signed treaties of arbitration, and The Hague
Tribunal spins a first web of obligations, exemplary if gossamer,
between the countries of the world. But these are but the faint initial
suggestions of much greater possibilities, and it is these greater
possibilities that have now to be realized if all the talk we have had
about a war to end war is to bear any fruit. What is now with each week
of the present struggle becoming more practicable is the setting up of a
new assembly that will take the place of the various embassies and
diplomatic organizations, of a mediaeval pattern and tradition, which
have hitherto conducted international affairs.

This war must end in a public settlement, to which all of the
belligerents will set their hands; it will not be a bundle of treaties,
but one treaty binding eight or nine or more powers. This settlement
will almost certainly be attained at a conference of representatives of
the various Foreign Offices involved. Quite possibly interested neutral
powers will also send representatives. There is no reason whatever why
this conference should dissolve, why it should not become a permanent
conference upon the inter-relations of the participating powers and the
maintenance of the peace of the world. It could have a seat and
officials, a staff, and a revenue of its own; it could sit and debate
openly, publish the generally binding treaties between its constituent
powers, and claim for the support of its decisions their military and
naval resources.

The predominance of the greater powers could be secured either by the
representatives having multiple votes, according to the population
represented, or by some sort of proportional representation. Each power
could appoint its representatives through its Foreign Office o