rivals strike hard in aggressive action against the foundations of England's prosperity. While the three great military empires, Russia, Germany, and France, are sedulously extending their territories and consolidating their power, England, with more to gain and more to lose in the result of competition and conflict, deprecates the employment of her armed strength, wastes her wealth in half-hearted struggles with barbarians, recedes from all points of vantage, and justifies her weakness with cant. We must either admit the certainty of speedy penalty for the infraction and neglect of the natural law of existence, or we must suppose the suspension, by a miracle, of its action in our particular case.

This reluctance to put out strength for the accomplishment of avowed objects, which is in itself a symptom of declining power and a presage of decay, is visible not only in the phrases employed by the ministers who now guide the affairs of England to excuse failure; not only in the practical renunciation of influence in external and foreign relations, not only in the affectation of ignorance, regarding the significance of acts such as that of France towards Tunis, and of Russia towards Turkestan, but even in the nearer and more obvious duty of maintaining order and tranquillity, in our midst. The violence which directed against an aggressive enemy is called 'blood-guiltiness' by Mr.

Gladstone is equally condemned by Mr. Bright, even when proved essential to keep the peace at home. 'Force,' he tells us, 'is no remedy,' and the result of acting according to that false dictum is shown in the barbarous outrages constantly inflicted on peaceable people in Ireland by ruffians against whose crimes force is not only a remedy, but the only remedy. If we turn to the arguments of Spencer from the opposite point of view, the view of the 'religion of amity,' we see that they would be far more cogent and consolatory if we could believe, from the consideration of any details of modern history, that we had reached the stage of progress wherein international relations can be made to dispense with war as their main guide, or wherein the existing Government of any nation can be efficient without force. But as things are, we not only see that that stage has not been reached, but it is yet as far distant apparently as ever.

Not only is there no practical change in the way in which mundane affairs settle themselves, but there is no prospect of any. When our philosopher tells us 'Severe and bloody as the process is, the killing-off of inferior races and inferior individuals leaves a balance of benefit to mankind, during phases of progress in which the moral development is low, and there are no quick sympathies to be continually seared by the infliction of pain and death,' we can only observe that the teach

ing of present events impresses us with the conviction that we have not yet emerged from that low state of moral development, and that we can only escape from the infliction of pain and death on ourselves by strength and energy in self-defence; when he says that-' But as there arise higher societies, implying individual characters fitted for closer co-operation, the destructive activities have injurious re-active effects on the moral natures of their members-injurious effects which outweigh the benefits resulting from the extirpation of inferior races,' we reply that if the destructive activities are weakened among ourselves while still in full force in other nations, we are, by the philosopher's own showing, certain to suffer the extreme penalty to which inferior races are subjected; for in face of the actual military operations continually carried on, it is certain that we have not realised the stage where, as Spencer says, 'the purifying process continuing still an important one, remains to be carried on by industrial war.' As a matter of fact, the purifying process is still carried on by the old methods of physical force and strife. And though no doubt industrial war is at work also, it has certainly not yet superseded, or even diminished, military operations in any part of the world.

The intelligent English reader will comprehend that, in treating him to a theoretical disquisition on the inception of war as a preface to an endeavour to

point out the nature of the menace now threatening his country, the author is only anxious to anticipate one of the stock answers to the clearest demonstration of the military disability under which we labour, viz. that war is growing out of fashion, that it is to be replaced in future by the politer process of arbitration, by the good taste and feeling of the 'comity of nations,' by the growing power of the 'religion of amity,' by the pacific counsels of orators who are glib about 'bloodguiltiness' and 'force being no remedy.' The plain truth being, and one which is thrust upon our notice more and more rudely every day, that these sentimental and fanciful theories set forward in these fine and specious phrases, are neither more nor less than pure moonshine, and mean, so far as the work of the world. is concerned, absolutely nothing. The danger to England is simple and obvious: it is the physical danger of a diminution of her combative strength relatively to that of her competitors among the other great nations of Europe, and no amount of sophistry, oratorical or otherwise, can change or modify the stubborn fact.

CHAPTER II.

VULNERABILITY OF ENGLAND.

WE have already seen that one of the effects of the material development of the age is to render the breaking out of hostilities among nations more sudden. than formerly. There is another effect of it upon the course of modern war, which is quite as certain, and touches us more nearly.

As the advancement of education tends to place the mental acquirements of men on a footing of equality by permitting lower capacities to be brought to an artificial level with the higher, as regards knowledge, so the result of progress in the machinery of war is to equalise to a considerable extent the troops of all the nations which are similarly armed.

There can be no doubt that the position of Great Britain, her greatness and power, have been due primarily to the combative qualities displayed by her people. Almost all her greatest victories have been won against superior numbers by dint of that quality which is best expressed by the term pugnacity. This is twin-born with the desire to pursue and to slay