his horses' heads to be turned about, and they carried the human animals out of the village, as guiltless as they entered, and perchance somewhat wiser. This experiment on a small scale indicates how easy it would be to dispense with armies and navies, if men only had faith in the religion which they profess to believe. When France lately reduced her army, England immediately did the same; for the existence of one army creates the necessity for another, unless men are safely ensconced in the bomb-proof fortress above mentioned."

So many and different thoughts crowd upon us, on considering the truth and error, the good and bad tendencies,* mingled in this passage, that we have difficulty in disentangling them, so as not to mislead a reader as to our own sentiments. We have an unlimited faith in the power of pure moral influence, consistently exerted through an adequate length of time, to subdue brute force and passion, and assume a kind of divine authority. But in order that moral force may be as influential as the tale implies, it must ordinarily have been in exercise for a long time, and by its consistency and permanence have won respect and admiration. The immediate effect of such conduct as is described, on gross and hard natures, is to produce mere surprize and contempt, and, if leisure permit, a wanton wish to make practical trial whether the non-resistance is genuine or is a mere pretence. Happy exceptions there may be, as in the behaviour of the grave and noble-minded children of North America towards Penn and his followers, (whose superiority in all art and knowledge is not to be left out in reckoning the forces which acted on the Indian mind,) but as a general rule, infinite experience proves, that to conquer violence by pure moral influence is a process of intense suffering to those who undertake it. An individual strong in faith and deliberately choosing for himself the course of the martyr, as the highest mode of acting, may consistently oppose meekness and passiveness to raging passion; and if, as it is probable, he should be cut off prematurely, he often purchases a milder lot for his successors, should kindred spirits follow in his steps. Thus the Moravians and the Quakers in their earlier generations underwent severe persecution, until the persecutor gave up his attempts;-in the same spirit as a man who should

It is obvious that these townsmen are supposed totally indifferent to the tie of country, unconscious of duties towards a king and fellow-citizens, and willing to be transferred to the hands of every potentate in turn. But it is impossible to notice more than a fraction of what is here to be said.

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have tried to train cats to guard the house like a dog, after flogging and killing a dozen of the poor animals, would at last desist, and having learned the cat's nature, be satisfied to leave it a cat. Just so the great powers of the world have come to look on Moravians, and similar sects, as a sort of female population, and no longer dream of forcing them into battle: but they nevertheless take possession of them and of their property, and whenever occasion requires, know how to make them useful for military purposes. It is a great mistake to suppose that any softening moral influence has been felt, from conduct which appears to them only a whimsical fanaticism. If Mrs. Child's story is true, the military commander had, just then, other work on his hand; and thought it needless to lose his time upon a population, all of whose good things might at any moment be leisurely secured.

But we deeply object to the tone of the narrator and the moral which she deduces, because it tends to make men imagine that the path she recommends is easy and comfortable, instead of being the path of martyrdom: this is a most grave fault. Moreover, whether it would be lawful for a community tamely to endure that which wanton invaders have ten thousand times inflicted on a helpless population, we hold to be more than doubtful, except where non-resistance should be dictated by manifest physical weakness, and where an opposite conduct would only exasperate.

Mr. Sumner indeed furnishes us with a business-like proof from real life, that non-resistance is the safest and most comfortable, as well as cheapest, method. He quotes, as decisive, a passage from Mr. Jay, which it is hardly worth while to reproduce.

Those who with Messrs. Jay and Sumner suppose national non-resistance to be a cheap and comfortable mode of safety, ought to prove, that if no police force existed, and no magisterial authority were even pretended, (which is the international position,-unfortunately,) the unarmed individual would then be safer than the armed. Every great and civilized nation is (compared with savages) industrious and unwarlike, and its vast wealth makes it a mark for savage cupidity. If we can conceive for a moment a nation like England acting on the non-resisting principle, she would be a bait to spoilers, just as was the Roman Empire in its decline to the Northern barbarians, when imperial jealousy kept the provincials unarmed, and sudden reasons of

State called the imperial armies away. Many an innocent townpopulation was then massacred in cold blood by a sudden incursion. The infinite riches of the provinces lured the eagle from afar, and the taste of prey did but whet the appetite.-That was an awful experiment, on a prodigious scale, of the intense misery that civilized nations, when unarmed, suffer from barbarians. But what have we, civilized Europeans, in recent times, ourselves inflicted on savages or on one another? Unhappily there is no want of historical illustrations. When Ovando and his Spaniards had landed in Hispaniola, the native Queen Anacoana welcomed him, though a perfect stranger, with the warmest friendship. After he had received her hospitality and festivity for some days, he suddenly seized all her chief men and burned them alive; and having carried her off in chains, subjected her to a mock trial before Spanish judges, who had her publicly hanged. Avarice was the horrible vice of the Spaniards, but another, yet more shameful to name, is habitual to a soldiery, long restrained from female society. A town which calmly welcomes in a band of soldiers, perhaps of ruffians, ought to calculate on the possibility, that the chief officers will pick out the fairest maidens or matrons, and summon them to share their beds. What would parents think of their passive behaviour, if they found their male children carried off, some to be mutilated for the harem, others to be trained in warfare, and their most beautiful daughters to be sold as concubines ;- one and all to be separated from Christian influences for ever, and to be educated in a foreign religion or forced to assume its externals. Nay, the whole population may be sold into slavery, and any of them constrained to subserve the crimes or sins of their lords; perhaps, as some Helot, to follow him to battle, carry his armour, tend his horses.

Mr. Sumner, we suppose, will reply, Such things cannot happen now, in Christian nations. Yet now men called Christians pay for invading the villages of unhappy Africa, and carry off her sons into slavery. It is evident that if they dared, and if it suited them, the same men would equally tear away Spaniards, Germans, or Englishmen, from their homes, families, country and religion, if it paid them. Is any one so childish as to doubt, whether it is the cannons and bayonets of Europe, which repel the slave-dealer and kidnapper from her shores? Why, it is a recent tale, within living memory, that Algerine and Greek pirates prowled about the Mediterranean coasts for Christians to sell as slaves at Constantinople or Morocco. The armies and

navies of Christendom, not Christian love and submission, have put down this horrible practice; and those who counsel the dismantling of fortresses, and disapprove all forcible resistance to violent invasion, must lay their account for a renewal of such atrocities. Granted that an individual of strong mind may choose the martyr's life for himself, he has no right to choose it for others; for his children, not yet of age to know the horrors in store for them: or for his neighbours, some of whom fail in courage when they discern what is coming. Indeed, the real problem, as it is found in life, is this: How are the able-bodied and youthful to act, when the feeble by age and sex implore their aid; when the brave men also, who are venturing their own lives in defence, claim that all who can assist, shall assist against lawless atrocity? If there is not entire concord in the innocent population, the few who resist bravely will exasperate the assailants to greater cruelty; and all semblance of the fair picture so praised by Mr. Sumner will vanish. A most essential fallacy is hidden in Mrs. Child's quiet remark, that "the experiment on a small scale indicates" what ought to be done in a nation at large. The concord in being willing to suffer which is not quite impossible in an enthusiastic sect, is simply impossible in an entire nation. The great majority will be depraved, not exalted, by the ordeal of martyrdom.

The persecution which the Christian Church endured under Decius and Galerian, only prepared it to covet earthly power, and to use that power harshly against its adversaries. The sufferings endured by Protestants made the English cruel towards Roman Catholics. The martyr-spirit belongs to very few, and nothing can be more mischievous than for those few to press the multitude into a position for which they have no faith.

We have thus at length urged the grounds which sometimes make defensive war a duty; because the opposite sentiment is a growing fanaticism, fostered by ignorance of the world, and plausible to young and tender natures. We do not thank Mr. Sumner for his concessions on this head, when we find them all neutralized and refuted by his arguments.

While thus forced to approve of defence, we are utterly averse to the compact according to which a soldier or sailor enters service. He is expected to fight in any war to which any Prime Minister may send him, however strong his conviction that it is unjust and aggressive. Theoretical means may be suggested of avoiding this difficulty; but it is certain that they will not be

adopted, as long as our recruiting-sergeants can pick up ablebodied youths who have no scruples; nor does the least indication appear that our aristocratic officers feel any difficulties of conscience on these heads.

Mr. Sumner, with others, has a vague feeling, but has not distinctly pointed out what it is that makes war a very improper mode of obtaining "redress of grievances." He has indeed the following remark:

"The object proposed in 1834 (on the part of the United States) by war with France, was, to secure the payment of five millions of dollars. It would be madness to term this a case of selfdefence. It has been happily said:-'If, because a man refuses to pay a just debt, I go to his house and beat him, that is not self-defence':-but such was precisely the conduct proposed to be adopted by our country."

The direct process in such a case is the barbarian one, of landing on the foreigner's coast and carrying off property; which is either detained as a pledge for the repayment due, or else sold to indemnify creditors and defray the expense of capture. This barbarian fashion appears to us in principle far preferable to declaring war; because in the latter case, in return for a limited injury, an unlimited punishment is inflicted, and on innocent parties; than which no wrong can be more execrable.-An obstinate or foolish French Minister refuses to pay American subjects their dues. In consequence, the Americans think they are justified in blowing up innocent French merchant ships, and, if occasion offer, laying French towns in ashes; a remedy disproportionate to the disease. But, in fact, if a modern State attempted to redress its pecuniary wrongs by a barbarian foray, it would have to calculate on retaliation; and not knowing on what part of its extensive dominions the retaliation would fall, it would need to keep up an entire war establishment for defence. This would more than swallow up the value of the property withheld, and would be utterly absurd, unless it could hope to make the other party pay this expense also; which undoubtedly could not be done except by a war on a large scale. For these reasons we fully agree with Mr. Sumner, that the truly dignified and politic way of behaving under pecuniary fraud, if it refer to a past transaction and has a limit, is to bear it, but with protest to other powers, and some separation of amity, such as may be felt.

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