THE CAUSES OF THE WAR AND THE FOUNDATION OF PEACE Since the war, foreshadowed in these pages, has come and finds public opinion in America gravely shocked at a war it believes to be solely due to certain phases of European militarism, the writer is now persuaded to publish these articles, which at least have the merit of having been written well before the event, in the hope that they may furnish a more useful point of view.

For if one thing is certain it is that European militarism is no more the cause of this war than of any previous war.

Europe is not fighting to see who has the best army, or to test mere military efficiency, but because certain peoples wish certain things and are determined to get and keep them by an appeal to force.

If the armies and fleets were small the war would have broken out just the same, the parties and their claims, intentions, and positions being what they are.

To find the causes of the war we must seek the motives of the combatants, and if we would have a lasting peace the foundations upon which to build it must be laid bare by revealing those foundations on which the peace was broken.