Homer, about eight hundred and fifty years before Christ, tells us it is by no means lit for a man stained with blood and gore to pray to the gods, and that "Religious, social and domestic ties alike he violates, who willingly would court the honors of internal strife." ('Iliad,' IX., 63.)
He makes Zeus, the cloud-gatherer, look sternly at Ares, the God of War, saying: "Nay, thou renegade, sit not by me and whine. Most hateful art thou to me of all the Gods that dwell in Olympus; thou ever lovest strife, and wars and battles." ('Iliad,' V., line 891.)
Euripides, 480-406 B. C., cries, "Hapless mortals, why do ye get your spears and deal out death to fellow-men? Stay! from such work forbear!"..."Oh fools all ye who try to win the meed of valor through war, seeking thus to still this mortal coil, for if bloody contests are to decide, strife will never cease!"
Thucydides, who wrote his great work sometime between 423 B. C. and 403 B. C., asserts that "Wars spring from unseen and generally insignificant causes, the first outbreak being often but an explosion of anger." And he gives us the needed lesson for our day which should be accepted as an axiom: "It is wicked to proceed against him as a wrong-doer who is ready to refer the question to arbitration." Aristides praised Pericles, because, to avoid war, 'he is willing to accept arbitration.'
Andocides, about 440-388 B. C, says: "This then is the distinction, Athenians, which I draw between the two: peace means security for the people, war inevitable downfall."
Isocrates, 436-338 B. C., teaches that "Peace should be made with all mankind. It should be our care not only to make peace, but to maintain it. But this will never be until we are persuaded that quiet is better than disturbance, justice than injustice, the care of our own than grasping at what belongs to others." ('Oration on Peace.')
The sacred books of the east make peace their chief concern.
"Thus does he (Buddha) live as a binder together of those who are divided, an encourager of those who are friends, a peacemaker, a lover of peace, impassioned for peace, a speaker of words that make for peace." ('Buddhist Suttas,' 5th century B. C.) "Now, wherein is his conduct good? Herein, that putting away the murder of that which lives, he abstains from destroying life. The cudgel and the sword he lays aside, and, full of modesty and pity, he is compassionate and kind to all creatures that have life." ('Buddhist Suttas.')
"Truly is the king our sovereign Lord! He has regulated the position of the princes; he has called in shields and spears; he has returned to their cases bows and arrows." ('The Shik King,' Decade I., Ode 10.)
Many hundred years before Christ, the Zendavesta pronounces 'Opposition to peace is a sin.'
