One wonders sometimes whether there exists on the -Continent anything
like a general dislike to the Conscription which may hereafter express itself in legislation. Nothing would alter the organisation of Continental society so com- pletely, or so radically modify the political relation of the different States. As yet there are few signs of the feeling, all the States having since 1870 materially enlarged the area of -.conscription, and this by popular vote, and without exciting -even an appearance of resistance. It is said, however, that the Austrian and German Governments both dread the in- .crease of the Socialist vote first of all because it would be 'fatal to the Army ; and this is the view also of M. Raynal, the French Minister of the Interior, and one of the strongest men in the Republic. Speaking at Lyons on Monday, he made it one of his charges against the "Internationalist" parties, that they necessarily developed hatred of the Army, which, in the absence of frontiers and of domestic disorder, -would become a useless and burdensome institution. He affirmed that, in their publications, the Army and its chiefs were constantly insulted. The Governments and M. Itaynal may, we imagine, rest tranquil. Hatreds springing from difference of rage will not be extinguished by Socialism, any more than by any other religion. It was while France was in her dream of universal brotherhood, that she first adopted the conscription and developed the spirit which made Napoleon master of Europe. Nothing promotes war so energetically as the doctrine of love when so fully embraced that its believer can honestly say "Love me, -or I will shoot you!"
