Elements of Military Art and Science. H. W. Halleck
why we should neglect the means of self-defence.
It may seem, to us short-sighted mortals, better that we were placed in a world where there were no wars, or murders, or thefts; but God has seen fit to order it otherwise. Our duties and our relations to our fellow-men are made to suit the world as it is, and not such a world as we would make for ourselves.
We live among thieves: we must therefore resort to force to protect our property—that is, to locks, and bars, and bolts; we build walls thick and high between the robber and our merchandise. And more: we enact laws for his punishment, and employ civil officers to forcibly seize the guilty and inflict that degree of punishment necessary for the prevention of other thefts and robberies.
We live among murderers: if neither the law nor the ordinary physical protections suffice for the defence of our own lives and the lives of our innocent friends, we forcibly resist the murderer, even to his death, if need be. Moreover, to deter others from like crimes, we inflict the punishment of death upon him who has already taken life.
These relations of individuals and of society are laid down by all ethical writers as in accordance with the strictest rules of Christian morality. Even Dr. Wayland considers it not only the right, but the duty of individuals and of society to resort to these means, and to enact these laws for self-protection. Let us extend the same course of reasoning to the relations of different societies.
We live among nations who frequently wage unjust wars; who, disregarding the rights of others, oppress and rob, and even murder their citizens, in order to reach some unrighteous end. As individuals, we build fences and walls for the protection of our grounds and our merchandise; so, as a nation, we build ships and forts to protect our commerce, our harbors, and our cities. But the walls of our houses and stores are useless, unless made so strong and high that the robber cannot break through or scale them without great effort and personal danger; so our national ships and forts would be utterly useless for protection, unless fully armed and equipped.
Further: as individuals and as societies we employ civil officers for the protection of our property and lives, and, when necessary, arm them with the physical means of executing the laws, even though the employment of these means should cost human life. The prevention and punishment of crime causes much human suffering; nevertheless the good of community requires that crime should be prevented and punished. So, as a nation, we employ military officers to man our ships and forts, to protect our property and our persons, and to repel and punish those who seek to rob us of our life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. National aggressions are far more terrible in their results than individual crime; so also the means of prevention and punishment are far more stupendous, and the employment of these means causes a far greater amount of human suffering. This may be a good reason for greater caution in resorting to such means, but assuredly it is no argument against the moral right to use them.
IV. War is unjustifiable because unnecessary:
"1st. The very fact that a nation relied solely upon the justice of its measures, and the benevolence of its conduct, would do more than any thing else to prevent the occurrence of injury. The moral sentiment of every community would rise in opposition to injury inflicted upon the just the kind, and the merciful."
The moral duty of nations in this respect is the same as that of individuals. Active benevolence and forbearance should be employed, so far as may be proper; but there are points at which forbearance ceases to be a virtue. If we entirely forbear to punish the thief, the robber, and the murderer, think you that crime will be diminished? Reason and experience prove the contrary. Active benevolence and kindness should always attend just punishment, but they were never designed to prohibit it. The laws of God's universe are founded on justice as well as love. "The moral sentiment of every community rises in opposition to injury inflicted upon the just, the kind, and the merciful;" but this fact does not entirely prevent wicked men from robbing and murdering innocent persons, and therefore wise and just laws require that criminals shall be punished, in order that those who are dead to all moral restraints may be deterred from crime through fear of punishment.
"2d. But suppose the [national] injury to be done. I reply, the proper appeal for moral beings, upon moral questions, is not to physical force, but to the consciences of men. Let the wrong be set forth, but be set forth in the spirit of love; and in this manner, if in any, will the consciences of men be aroused to justice."
Argument, and "appeals to the consciences of men" should always be resorted to in preference to "physical force;" but when they fail to deter the wicked, force must be employed. I may reason with the robber and the murderer, to persuade him to desist from his attempt to rob my house, and murder my family; but if he refuse to listen to moral appeals, I employ physical force—I call in the strong arm of the law to assist me; and if no other means can be found to save innocent life that is assailed, the life of the assailant must be sacrificed.
"If," says Puffendorf, "some one treads the laws of peace under his feet, forming projects which tend to my ruin, he could not, without the highest degree of impudence, (impudentissime,) pretend that after this I should consider him as a sacred person, who ought not to be touched; in other words, that I should betray myself, and abandon the care of my own preservation, in order to give way to the malice of a criminal, that he may act with impunity and with full liberty. On the contrary, since he shows himself unsociable towards me, and since he has placed himself in a position which does not permit me safely to practice towards him the duties of peace, I have only to think of preventing the danger which menaces me; so that if I cannot do this without hurting him, he has to accuse himself only, since he has reduced me to this necessity." De Jure Nat. et Gent, lib. ii., ch. v., §1. This same course of reasoning is also applied to the duties of a nation towards its enemy in respect to war.
"3d. But suppose this method fail. Why, then, let us suffer the evil."
This principle, if applied to its full extent, would, we believe, be subversive of all right, and soon place all power in the hands of the most evil and wicked men in the community. Reason with the nation that invades our soil, and tramples under foot our rights and liberties, and should it not desist, why, then, suffer the evil! Reason with the murderer, and if he do not desist, why, then, suffer him to murder our wives and our children! Reason with the robber and the defaulter, and if they will not listen, why, then, let them take our property! We cannot appeal to the courts, for if their decisions be not respected, they employ force to compel obedience to their mandates. But Dr. Wayland considers the law of benevolence to forbid the use of force between men. He forgets this, it is true, in speaking of our duties towards our fellow-men of the same society, and even allows us to punish the murderer with death; but towards the foreigner he requires a greater forbearance and benevolence than towards our neighbor; for if another nation send its armies to oppress, and rob, and murder us by the thousand, we have no right to employ physical force either to prevent or to punish them, though we may do so to prevent or punish a neighbor for an individual act of the same character. The greater the scale of crime, then, the less the necessity of resorting to physical force to prevent it!
"4th. But it may be asked, what is to prevent repeated and continued aggression? I answer, first, not instruments of destruction, but the moral principle which God has placed in the bosom of every man. I think that obedience to the law of God, on the part of the injured, is the surest preventive against the repetition of injury. I answer, secondly, suppose that acting in obedience to the law of benevolence will not prevent the repetition of injury, will acting on the principle of retaliation prevent it?" Again; "I believe aggression from a foreign nation to be the intimation from God that we are disobeying the law of benevolence, and that this is his mode of teaching nations their duty, in this respect, to each other. So that aggression seems to me in no manner to call for retaliation and injury, but rather to call for special kindness and good-will."
This argument, if such it can be called, is equally applicable to individual aggressions. We are bound to regard them as intimations of our want of benevolence, and to reward the aggressors for the intimations! Is it true, that in this world the wicked only are oppressed, and that the good are always the prospered and happy? Even suppose this true, and that I, as a sinful man, deserve God's anger, is this any reason why I should not resist the assassin, and seek to bring