THE WAR CLOUDS.
THE outlook of Europe is on one side very bad. We are unable to accept either the ethics or the policy taught by the Peace Society, holding that war may sometimes be a duty, and often the least among many evils ; but the present astonishing development of the tendency towards war saddens us as much as it does Mr. Richard. Not only have the dreams of 1851 disappeared, the vision of a disarmed earth governed by arbitrators and oratory, but the hopes of 1870, when statesmen predicted that after the defeat of France the European world would have rest for a long time from fear. There is more fear abroad than there ever was since the First Napoleon fell, and more reason for fear. The nations are crushed with defensive armaments, the annual military expen- diture representing the interest at 4 per cent, upon three thousand millions sterling ; yet there is not a country in Europe, except England, which is not waiting for a great war as for something as unavoidable as winter, or which at heart feels itself beyond the danger of a war of sub- jugation. The great German Power which was to be so peaceful has been peaceful, but has produced no peace. Even the Austro-German alliance, which by combining a nearly irresistible mass of trained soldiers under one guidance seemed such a final guarantee, has given Central Europe no security. France is threatening England and defy- ing Germany. Germany is throbbing with expectation of a joint attack from France and Russia, in which, if she were defeated, her very independence might be lost. Half the Austrian Monarchy is clamouring for war as essential to its peace, and the other half is fearing it ; while Russia gloomily admits that war must be, though possibly not to-morrow. The health of the aged German Emperor is watched with a burning eagerness, which reflects itself every week on the Stock Exchanges, because it is supposed that his life is one of the best guarantees for peace, as, indeed, we greatly fear it is. The nations are pressing on the manu- facture of improved weapons with feverish recklessness, as if time were of the last importance, and even the publicists who denounce the expense dissuade the Parliaments from resistance, and only demand that the policy to be pursued in the approaching war shall be made clear. The repeating-rifle must be bought, they say, if the Treasury is emptied ; but tell us who is to be shot ? So far have matters gone, that the Austro-German alliance, which recently held the world in check, is cracking under a wish for war, and that Prince Bismarck openly defends himself for what his countrymen think weakness, by pleading the huge war he believes can be averted only by concession. For it is no "adventure," no short and sharp campaign, of which the nations are dreaming, but that gigantic calamity, a "European war," in which whole nations will be engaged, and first-class armies almost as large as peoples will slaughter one another, and the industry of a quarter of the globe will be mortgaged for half a century. Imagine Russia, Germany, Austria, Italy, and France all at once involved in a great war—and that is the anticipation—and where in Europe, except perhaps in this little island, will there be any peace, or at least any
peace that will allow industry to proceed ? It is a whole con- tinent which will be involved, and that the continent upon which the progress of the world depends. If Europe recedes, where is the motive-power to come from that will advance civilisation ? The fear may pass away, but at this moment there is no capital in Europe where the news of a decision which would make war on the grandest scale inevitable and immediate would be received with anything like surprise or incredulity. Europe, without wishing war, is listening for it.
The worst of it is, that this is no passing phase of affairs.
Nothing has happened that can end. There is no triumphant conqueror at the head of any State who is threatening all others with absorption or invasion. There has been no new explosion the effects of which cannot be righted without war. The Sovereigns and statesmen, who, according to Lord Beacons- field, govern the world, are not more eager for war than usual ; while the greatest among them dreads it, and to the extent of his authority forbids its outbreak.
The interests of the Kingdoms are not changed. The feelings which are to produce the next war are national feelings, many of them incurable except by the operation of periods of time almost geological in their extent. Nothing but battle will remove the fierce distrust between Russia and Austria, for nothing else can prevent their permanent interests from perpetually clashing in the most irritating way, or their peoples from being fiercely jealous of one another. The per-
manent feud between German and Slav, a feud based on a mixture of fear and distaste arising from the depths of their
characters, will not be extinguished by the death of Prince Bismarck or any other political event. The French eager- ness for revenge has lasted sixteen years, and if un- gratified, may last sixty. Changes in individual rulers yield. no hope, for the hatreds have spread down to the people, and. not only survive new facilities for intercommunication, but seem to be positively increased by them. It is as they come into touch with one another that Austria and Russia mutually show their teeth. The bitterness between Teuton and Slav in Prussian Poland has only this year been expressed by Prince Bismarck in decrees of unprecedented violence, based openly and avowedly upon race-jealousy ; and he himself declares only this week that if Germany is ever at war. France will need no alliance with the enemy of Germany to spring upon her back. Time, culture, intercourse, all seem powerless to soothe sentiments which defy reason, and survive any pressure of self-interest. It is madness for Germany and Austria to part, yet grave Magyar statesmen are advising, even urging, the divorce. We used to hope that with the rise of the peoples war would cease ; but the peoples, inspired with an incurable dread, bear their heavy taxation, and a conscription under which they writhe, without resistance ; and Parliaments elected by universal suffrage no- more murmur effectively against armies than the common people of Russia do. The only Parliament just now speaking on the subject, the Hungarian, is practically in favour of war, even if it is to cost Hungary an alliance which the most popular speakers declare to be most valuable. The slow rise of democracy is held to be unfavourable to war, the nations with a conscription declaring that they hate it ; but then, if democracy is opposed to. Chauvinism, it is favourable to that popular distrust and fear which, more than any vaingloriousness, is tempting the States
to fight. The French peasantry will not fight China, but they- are seizing foreigners everywhere as "spies of Bismarck." The- Hungarians want war, because they say unless they fight the• Slays will one day crush them ; they are ready, in fact, from dread. of being drowned, to jump into the river. As to compulsion, to keep the peace, there is not a sign of it, "Europe," the only effective compeller, being less capable of coherent or united action than at any period of her recent history. All statesmen say they want peace, but all increase their stores of powder, lest perchance because they are peaceful something should be taken away from them, or they should find themselves under the feet of a victorious enemy. There are a hundred good deeds which the Chancellors of the Three Empires would admit, if they spoke frankly, that they avoid out of pure fear of loss of strength, and M. de Freycinet would acknowledge in stronger words the same fear as the- Chancellors.
We are by no means certain that the war fever, at least in the form of panic, may not spread here. We have been a long while, quite sixteen years, without a panic, and it may be' the interest of European Powers to produce ono. Without be- lieving vague rumours from Constantinople, it is only too probable that Russia would like to embarrass us in Egypt, while France'
seems stricken with a sudden and unintelligible access of morbid vanity. The Russian journals declare that if England does anything, there will be war at once ; while respectable French journals order us out of Egypt, and less respectable ones threaten us with invasion by 500,000 men. Those are words, but they are words only uttered when nations
are ill at ease, raging with great chagrins, or thinking over great dangers, and they may be followed by acts,
which would at once produce one of those alarms, fol- lowed by feverish armaments, from which for years past we have been so free. If England once caught the alarm, we should have the extraordinary spectacle of all Europe expecting war at once, and that with scarcely a change in the circumstances which only three years ago were sup- posed to work together so strongly for peace. France will still be Republican, Germany united, Austria allied with Germany, and Russia honeycombed with insurrection ; and yet war, which those circumstances were to prevent, will be believed at hand.
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