history. So, e.g., the current, nineteenth and
twentieth century, economic policy of the Prussian-Imperial statesmen is
still drawn on lines within which Frederick II, called the Great, would
have felt well at home.

Like other preparation for hostilities this reduction of the country to
the status of a self-contained economic organisation is costly, but
like other preparation for hostilities it also puts the nation in a
position of greater readiness to break off friendly relations with its
neighbors. It is a war measure, commonly spoken for by its advocates as
a measure of self-defense; but whatever the merits of the
self-defenders' contention, this measure is a war measure. As such it
can reasonably claim no hearing in the counsels of a pacific league of
neutrals, whose purpose it is to make war impracticable. Particularly
can there be no reasonable question of admitting a policy of trade
discrimination and isolation on the part of a nation which has, for
purposes of warlike aggression, pursued such a policy in the past, and
which it is the immediate purpose of the league to bind over to keep the
peace.

There has been a volume of loose talk spent on the justice and
expediency of boycotting the trade of the peoples of the Empire after
the return of peace, as a penalty and as a preventive measure designed
to retard their recovery of strength with which to enter on a further
warlike enterprise. Such a measure would necessarily be somewhat futile;
since "Business is business," after all, and the practical limitations
imposed on an unprofitable boycott by the moral necessity to buy cheap
and sell dear that rests on all businessmen would surreptitiously
mitigate it to the point of negligibility. It is inconceivable--or it
would be inconceivable in the absence of imbecile politicians and
self-seeking businessmen--that measures looking to the trade isolation
of any one of these countries could be entertained as a point of policy
to be pursued by a league of neutrals. And it is only in so far as
patriotic jealousy and vindictive sentiments are allowed to displace the
aspiration for peace and security, that such measures can claim
consideration. Considered as a penalty to be imposed on the erring
nations who set this warlike adventure afoot, it should be sufficiently
plain that such a measure as a trade boycott could not touch the chief
offenders, or even their responsible abettors. It would, rather, play
into the hands of