ER THE WAR 305

XI HUMANISM 309

XII AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE IN EDUCATION 315

XIII MOODS AND EDUCATION: A REVIEW 319

BIBLIOGRAPHY 327

INDEX 331

PART I

NATIONAL CONSCIOUSNESS AND THE MOTIVES OF WAR

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF NATIONS

A CONTRIBUTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY

CHAPTER I

ORIGINS AND BIOLOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS

The simplest possible interpretation of the causes of war that might
be offered is that war is a natural relation between original herds or
groups of men, inspired by the predatory instinct or by some other
instinct of the herd. To explain war, then, one need only refer to
this instinct as final, or at most account for the origin and genesis
of the instinct in question in the animal world. Some writers express
this very view, calling war an expression of an instinct or of several
instincts; others find different or more complex beginnings of war.

Nusbaum (86) says that both offense and defense are based upon an
_expansion impulse_. Nicolai (79) sees the beginning of war in
individual predatory acts, involving violence and the need of defense.
Again we find the migratory instinct, the instinct that has led groups
of men to move and thus to interfere with one another, regarded as the
cause of war, or as an important factor in the causes. Sometimes a
purely physiological or growth impulse is invoked, or vaguely the
inability of primitive groups to adapt themselves to conditions, or to
gain access to the necessities of life. Le Bon (42) speaks of the
hunger and the desire that led Germanic forces as ancient hordes to
turn themselves loose upon the world.

Leaving aside for the moment the question of the nature of the
impulses or instincts which actuated the conduct of men originally and
brought them into opposition, as groups, to one another, we do find at
least some suggestion of a working hypothesis in these simple
explanations of war. Granted the existence of groups formed by the
accident of birth and based upon the most primitive protective and
economic associations, and assuming the presence of the emotions of
anger and fear or any instinct which is expressed as an impulse or
habit of the group, we might say that the conditions and factors for
the