All this is the natural result of an appeal to war for the determination of _justice_. Justice implies the exercise of the judgment. Now war not only supersedes the judgment, but delivers over the pending question to superiority of _force_, or to _chance_. Superior force may end in conquest; this is the natural consequence; but it cannot adjudicate any right. We expose the absurdity of its arbitrament, when, by a familiar phrase of sarcasm, we deride _the right of the strongest_,--excluding, of course, all idea of right, except that of the lion as he springs upon a weaker beast, of the wolf as he tears in pieces the lamb, of the vulture as he devours the dove. The grossest spirits must admit that this is not justice. But the battle is not always to the strong. Superiority of force is often checked by the proverbial contingencies of war. Especially are such contingencies revealed in rankest absurdity, where nations, as is the acknowledged _custom_, without regard to their respective forces, whether weaker or stronger, voluntarily appeal to this mad umpirage. Who beforehand can measure the currents of the heady fight? In common language, we confess the "chances" of battle; and soldiers devoted to this harsh vocation yet call it a "game." The Great Captain of our age, who seemed to drag victory at his chariot-wheels, in a formal address to his officers, on entering Russia, says, "In war, _fortune_ has an equal share with ability in success."[33] The famous victory of Marengo, accident of an accident, wrested unexpectedly at close of day from a foe at an earlier hour successful, taught him the uncertainty of war. Afterwards, in bitterness of spirit, when his immense forces were shivered, and his triumphant eagles driven back with broken wing, he exclaimed, in that remarkable conversation recorded by his secretary, Fain,--"Well, this is War! High in the morning,--low enough at night! From a triumph to a fall is often but a step."[34] The same sentiment is repeated by the military historian of the Peninsular campaigns, when he says, "_Fortune_ always asserts her supremacy in war; and often from a slight mistake such disastrous consequences flow, that, in every age and every nation, the _uncertainty_ of arms has been proverbial."[35] And again, in another place, considering the conduct of Wellington, the same military historian, who is an unquestionable authority, confesses, "A few hours' delay, an accident, a turn of fortune, and he would have been foiled. Ay! but this is War, _always dangerous and uncertain_, an ever-rolling wheel, and armed with scythes."[36] And will intelligent man look for justice to an ever-rolling wheel armed with scythes? [33] Alison, Ch. 67, Vol. VIII. p. 815. [34] Alison, Ch. 72, Vol. IX. p. 497. [35] Napier, Book XXIV. ch. 6, Vol. VI. p. 687. [36] Ibid., Book XVI. ch. 7, Vol. IV. p. 476.