Proper modes for the determination of international disputes are Negotiation, Mediation, Arbitration, and a Congress of Nations,--all practicable, and calculated to secure peaceful justice. Under existing Law of Nations these may be employed at any time. _But the very law sanctioning War may be changed_, as regards two or more nations by treaty between them, and as regards the body of nations by general consent. If nations can agree in solemn provisions of International Law to establish War as Arbiter of Justice, they can also agree to abolish this arbitrament, and to establish peaceful substitutes,--precisely as similar substitutes are established by Municipal Law to determine controversies among individuals. A system of Arbitration may be instituted, or a Congress of Nations, charged with the high duty of organizing an _Ultimate Tribunal_, instead of "these battles." To do this, the will only is required. Let it not be said, then, that war is a _necessity_; and may our country aspire to the glory of taking the lead in disowning the barbarous system of LYNCH LAW among nations, while it proclaims peaceful _substitutes_! Such a glory, unlike the earthly fame of battle, will be immortal as the stars, dropping perpetual light upon the souls of men. * * * * * 2. Another prejudice is founded on _the practice of nations_, past and present. There is no crime or enormity in morals which may not find the support of human example, often on an extended scale. But it will not be urged in our day that we are to look for a standard of duty in the conduct of vain, fallible, mistaken man. Not by any subtile alchemy can man transmute Wrong into Right. Because War is according to the practice of the world, it does not follow that it is right. For ages the world worshipped false gods,--not less false because all bowed before them. At this moment the prevailing numbers of mankind are heathen; but heathenism is not therefore true. Once it was the practice of nations to slaughter prisoners of war; but the Spirit of War recoils now from this bloody sacrifice. By a perverse morality in Sparta, theft, instead of being a crime, was, like War, dignified into an art and accomplishment; like War, it was admitted into the system of youthful education; and, like War, it was illustrated by an instance of unconquerable firmness, barbaric counterfeit of virtue. The Spartan youth, with the stolen fox beneath his robe eating into his bowels, is an example of fortitude not unlike that so often admired in the soldier. Other illustrations crowd upon the mind; but I will not dwell upon them. We turn with disgust from Spartan cruelty and the wolves of Taygetus,--from the awful cannibalism of the Feejee Islands,--from the profane rites of innumerable savages,--from the crushing Juggernaut,--from the Hindoo widow on her funeral pyre,--from the Indian dancing at the stake; but had not all these, like War, the sanction of established usage?