the process they find the society in which they live actually stronger and not weaker. Even when the weakening pinch comes it is countered by a spirit of sacrifice, altogether abnormal and not easily to be measured. So long as the army has a rag to its back, a crust of bread, and a cartridge, economic exhaustion is not complete. The end will probably come sooner, and defeat will be accepted out of calculation before it is accepted out of sheer necessity. What is much more probable is that a military decision will have been obtained at a much earlier stage, but with all this said there remains a perfectly clear distinction between assigning their due rôle to economic conditions on the one hand, and transforming an honour-war into a trade-*war on the other hand.
The worst sin of those who desire or seem to desire such a change is that of effecting a deterioration of the moral ideal of the Allies. This is no affair of fine words but of abiding realities. Either this is on our part a war into which we were forced by aggressive militarism—come to overt baseness in the Prussian breach of faith with Belgium and assault on peaceful France, and the Austrian blow of destruction at Serbia—or else it is a mere struggle for domination between greedy Powers. If it were the latter it would be wise to say no more of the antithesis between barbarism and civilisation. It would be wise to finish the nightmare of blood as well as we could, to pouch the spoils, and be
