that safety, not by the complicated and delicate combinations of diplomatists, but in the simple fulfilment of that law, binding upon every man, inscribed in all religous teachings, and present in every heart, not to do to others what you wish them not to do to you—above all, not to slay your neighbors.
Armies will first diminish, and then disappear, only when public opinion brands with contempt those who, whether from fear, or for advantage, sell their liberty and enter the ranks of those murderers, called soldiers; and when the men now ignored and even blamed—who, in despite of all the persecution and suffering they have borne—have refused to yield the control of their actions into the hands of others, and become the tools of murder—are recognized by public opinion, to be the foremost champions and benefactors of mankind. Only then will armies first diminish and then quite disappear, and a new era in the life of mankind will commence. And that time is near.
And that is why I think that your opinion that the refusals to serve in the army are facts of immense importance, and that they will emancipate mankind from the miseries of war, is perfectly just. But your opinion that the Conference may conduce toward this is quite an error. The Conference can only divert people's eyes from the sole path leading to safety and liberty.[1]
- ↑ A number of Swedish gentlemen addressed a letter to Tolstoï concerning the Tsar's Peace Conference, in reply to which he wrote them a letter.
Tolstoï is always most careful in the arrangement of the thoughts he puts before the world. His works are written over and over again before they are published. On this occasion, after he had despatched the letter, he felt that the manner in which he had expressed his opinion was not satisfactory. Eventually he rewrote the article, in such a way that the whole letter was recast in a fresh form, and hardly a paragraph of the original remained unaltered.—Tr.
