ption of all
improvements in this materiel made in other countries.

5. It is necessary that the study of the military sciences should be
encouraged and rewarded, as well as courage and zeal. The scientific
military corps should be esteemed and honored: this is the only way of
securing for the army men of merit and genius.

6. The general staff in times of peace should be employed in labors
preparatory for all possible contingencies of war. Its archives should
be furnished with numerous historical details of the past, and with all
statistical, geographical, topographical, and strategic treatises and
papers for the present and future. Hence it is essential that the chief
of this corps, with a number of its officers, should be permanently
stationed at the capital in time of peace, and the war-office should be
simply that of the general staff, except that there should be a secret
department for those documents to be concealed from the subalterns of
the corps.

7. Nothing should be neglected to acquire a knowledge of the geography
and the military statistics of other states, so as to know their
material and moral capacity for attack and defense, as well as the
strategic advantages of the two parties. Distinguished officers should
be employed in these scientific labors, and should be rewarded when they
acquit themselves with marked ability.

8. When a war is decided upon, it becomes necessary to prepare, not an
entire plan of operations,--which is always impossible,--but a system of
operations in reference to a prescribed aim; to provide a base, as well
as all the material means necessary to guarantee the success of the
enterprise.

9. The system of operations ought to be determined by the object of the
war, the kind of forces of the enemy, the nature and resources of the
country, the characters of the nations and of their chiefs, whether of
the army or of the state. In fine, it should be based upon the moral and
material means of attack or defense which the enemy may be able to bring
into action; and it ought to take into consideration the probable
alliances that may obtain in favor of or against either of the parties
during the war.

10. The financial condition of a nation is to be weighed among the
chances of a war. Still, it would be dangerous to constantly attribute
to this condition the importance attached to it by Frederick the Great
in the history of his times. He was probably right at his epoch, when
armies