t? The
difficulty of answering these two questions would seem to argue in favor
of national wars. But is there no means of repelling such an invasion
without bringing about an uprising of the whole population and a war of
extermination? Is there no mean between these contests between the
people and the old regular method of war between permanent armies? Will
it not be sufficient, for the efficient defense of the country, to
organize a militia, or landwehr, which, uniformed and called by their
governments into service, would regulate the part the people should take
in the war, and place just limits to its barbarities?

I answer in the affirmative; and, applying this mixed system to the
cases stated above, I will guarantee that fifty thousand regular French
troops, supported by the National Guards of the East, would get the
better of this German army which had crossed the Vosges; for, reduced to
fifty thousand men by many detachments, upon nearing the Meuse or
arriving in Argonne it would have one hundred thousand men on its hands.
To attain this mean, we have laid it down as a necessity that good
national reserves be prepared for the army; which will be less expensive
in peace and will insure the defense of the country in war. This system
was used by France in 1792, imitated by Austria in 1809, and by the
whole of Germany in 1813.

I sum up this discussion by asserting that, without being a utopian
philanthropist, or a condottieri, a person may desire that wars of
extermination may be banished from the code of nations, and that the
defenses of nations by disciplined militia, with the aid of good
political alliances, may be sufficient to insure their independence.

As a soldier, preferring loyal and chivalrous warfare to organized
assassination, if it be necessary to make a choice, I acknowledge that
my prejudices are in favor of the good old times when the French and
English Guards courteously invited each other to fire first,--as at
Fontenoy,--preferring them to the frightful epoch when priests, women,
and children throughout Spain plotted the murder of isolated soldiers.

ARTICLE IX.

Civil Wars, and Wars of Religion.

Intestine wars, when not connected with a foreign quarrel, are generally
the result of a conflict of opinions, of political or religious
sectarianism. In the Middle Ages they were more frequently the
collisions of feudal parties. Religious wars are above all the most
deplorable.

We can