ok that the right of nations is the
right of war; and you have glorified violence, paying honours to
conquering generals and raising statues in your public squares to them
and their war-horses.

"And you have laid it down, 'There is violence that is right, and
violence that is wrong. And this is the right of nations and this is the
law.' But so soon as the men shall have put you outside the law, they
will be the law, even as you became the law, when you had overthrown the
tyrant that was the law before you.

"Now, be assured, it is very certain that there is no true right save in
the renouncing of right. There is no hallowed law save in love. There is
no Justice save in Charity. 'Tis not by force we should resist force,
for strife only hardens the fighters' hearts and the issue of battles is
aye dubious. But if we oppose gentleness to violence, this latter
getting no hold upon its adversary, falls dead of itself.

"It is related by learned men in the _Bestiaries_ how the unicorn, which
bears on its forehead a flaming sword, transfixes the hunter in his
coat-of-mail, but falls to its knees before a pure virgin. Be ye
gentle-hearted, therefore, and simple-souled; keep your heart pure, and
ye shall fear nothing.

"Put not your trust in the sword of the Condottieri, for did not the
shepherd boy's smooth stone pierce Goliath's brow? But be ye strong in
love, and love them that hate you. Hate, when unreturned, is robbed of
half its sting; and what is left is weak, widowed, and like to die.
Strip yourselves, that other men strip you not. Love your enemies, that
they become your friends. Forgive, that ye may be forgiven. Say not,
'Gentleness is a bane to the shepherds of the peoples.' For how can you
know, seeing these have never tried? They profess by harshness to have
lessened the evil of the world. Yet is evil still rampant among men, and
there is never a sign of its growing less.

"I said to some, 'Be not oppressors,' and to others, 'Rise not in revolt
against oppression,'--and neither hearkened to me. They cast the stone
of derision at me. Because I was on all men's side, each reproached me
and said, 'You are not on my side.'

"I said, 'I am the friend of the wretched.' But you never thought I was
your friend, because in your pride, you know not that you are wretched.
Nevertheless the wretchedness of the master is more cruel than that of
the slave. My tender pity for your woes only made you think I was
mocking you;