We have, however, to deal with the present fact that the rivalry of nations is likely to issue in war. And hence it becomes necessary to take into consideration the impulse of pugnacity. The plain fact is that war has a fascination. Even if one’s own country be not involved, one turns eagerly to the war news in the daily papers. History is the history of wars. The attractiveness of war is expressed in the following verse of Richard Le Gallienne: “War I abhor And yet how sweet The sound along the marching street Of drum and fife! and I forget Wet eyes of widows, and forget Broken old mothers, and the whole Dark butchery without a soul.” There is that about the martial life which excites enthusiasm, and that enthusiasm gets connected with patriotism. Patriotism runs at high tide in war times.[28] And now, does the presence of the instinct of pugnacity compel at once an unfavorable verdict on patriotism? There is no doubt that pugnacity may lead to what is undesirable; it does become “dark butchery without a soul.” Is patriotism for that to be condemned? In answer to this two things may be said. To begin with, militancy may be a good, and can no more be condemned in the abstract than can pacifism. There is no ground for saying that pacifism is a virtue in itself. One might be pacifistic simply because he did not care about his fellow men, or simply because he was afraid to fight. Nonresistance is indeed under some conditions a good, and so is the impulse of pugnacity. Totally devoid of it, neither the individual nor the nation can live in other than pusillanimous cowardice; their ideals will not be much, and from them shall be taken even the little that they have. In the second place, patriotism does not issue exclusively in war. It has already been shown that it has a positive character of attachment, and may develop without reference to war, but wholly with reference to the pursuits of peace. The analysis of the impulses of patriotism has emphasized the truth of a proposition that was stated at the beginning; patriotism is a complex phenomenon. It is, as it actually appears, composed of a wide variety of impulses, which appear in shifting combinations, and show themselves now in one person and time and now in another. The conclusion may also be drawn that there has been found here no ground for passing a final verdict either favorable or unfavorable upon patriotism. There has been found in the instinctive basis of patriotism an element which gives it its tremendous power, but that result does not answer the question regarding the moral worth of patriotism. Instincts are just tendencies that taken simply as instincts have no moral character at all. Their moral worth depends upon the way in which they are used. Consequently, before one can estimate the worth of patriotism, he must see how these impulses are used in it.