The spirit of malice and distrust was the powder train by which the magazine of the world’s fury was exploded. The hands of both the crafty and the foolish helped to lay it. It has always been so, and will always be so until such work is done no more. While men distrust one another, look for unworthy motives in one another, or talk of and prepare for war with one another, there will be no end of strife. When men of all classes, nations, and races learn to genuinely love one another, the day of strife will cease. Some wars have been wars of punishment, but when the people of the earth learn to do right, there will be nothing to punish. With the life of the world actuated by unselfish motives, there will be no need for the avenger to march on errands of death, made necessary by some outrage or injustice. Until that time, peace will remain dim in the promise of any plan that we can formulate. Is there any reason why men should not do right? If duty were impossible, all creation would be a mockery and a moral contradiction. Other wars have been wars of contention, but when men deal justly there will be no longer anything for which to contend. The goods of the world may be very rich and lovely, but they are worth neither the price of life nor the stigma of murder. It is better, even for nations, to have less and have it honestly, to possess less and live in a world safe for each generation and its posterity. When the hearts of men are right, our economic systems will also be right. Every man will get his share and be content with it when he gets it. When the dream of world brotherhood has become a fact, we shall often think with a bitter surprise of the bickerings and misunderstandings of yesterday. The path to that time is the road of the heart. The only way to realize such an age is to begin to live its spirit. We shall have a world fraternity only when we all begin to be brothers. This will be a happy world when it becomes a kindly-hearted world, and it will never be a wholly happy one until it fulfills this law. The formula is simple and the conditions are plain. The time has come for selfish men to surrender their selfish ways and purposes. The service of self and the road of malice have been proven failures. They offer nothing which is permanently worth while, and they lead to endless trouble. For ages we have talked love. Our words will remain a mockery until we adopt it as a principle and apply it in life’s affairs. The time has come to take that forward step. The world is ready for anything that spells deliverance, and nothing will deliver humanity save rightness of heart. We had better make a garden of the world than to turn it into a vast cemetery for the bodies of the slain. Let us have a League of Nations, but let us build it on a safe foundation. Is It Nothing to You (1929)