With this exposition, which I hope is not too long, it is easy to see how completely a war between two nations is a duel,--and, yet further, how essential it is to that assured peace which civilization requires, that the duel, which is no longer tolerated as arbiter between individuals, between towns, between counties, between provinces, should cease to be tolerated as such between nations. Take our own country, for instance. In a controversy between towns, the local law provides a judicial tribunal; so also in a controversy between counties. Ascending still higher, suppose a controversy between two States of our Union; the National Constitution establishes a judicial tribunal, being the Supreme Court of the United States. But at the next stage there is a change. Let the controversy arise between two nations, and the Supreme Law, which is the Law of Nations, establishes, not a judicial tribunal, but the duel, as arbiter. What is true of our country is true of other countries where civilization has a foothold, and especially of France and Germany. The duel, though abolished as arbiter at home, is continued as arbiter abroad. And since it is recognized by International Law and subjected to a code, it is in all respects an Institution. War is an institution sanctioned by International Law, as Slavery, wherever it exists, is an institution sanctioned by Municipal Law. But this institution is nothing but the duel of the Dark Ages, prolonged into this generation, and showing itself in portentous barbarism. WHY THIS PARALLEL NOW? Therefore am I right, when I call the existing combat between France and Germany a Duel. I beg you to believe that I do this with no idle purpose of illustration or criticism, but because I would prepare the way for a proper comprehension of the remedy to be applied. How can this terrible controversy be adjusted? I see no practical method, which shall reconcile the sensibilities of France with the guaranties due to Germany, short of a radical change in the War System itself. That Security for the Future which Germany may justly exact can be obtained in no way so well as by the disarmament of France, to be followed naturally by the disarmament of other nations, and the substitution of some peaceful tribunal for the existing Trial by Battle. Any dismemberment, or curtailment of territory, will be poor and inadequate; for it will leave behind a perpetual sting. Something better must be done. SUDDENNESS OF THIS WAR. Never in history has so great a calamity descended so suddenly upon the Human Family, unless we except the earthquake toppling down cities and submerging a whole coast in a single night. But how small all that has ensued from any such convulsion, compared with the desolation and destruction already produced by this war! From the first murmur to the outbreak was a brief moment of time, as between the flash of lightning and the bursting of the thunder.