Machiavelli’s assertion that power is the keynote of all policy has been grasped by the German war-philosophers, who flatter themselves they see clearly when looking upon the present epoch through the eyes of an unscrupulous fifteenth-century Italian. Machiavelli perhaps spoke truth for his time—a truth, moreover, still real for our own; but his word _power_ has now a different significance. Now only is the power of reason generally developed; now only the many nations of the world speak the same moral language; now only the masses, formerly forced to be war-like animals, are thinking and, to a great extent, cultured beings. But what is the use of reiterating what every thoughtful mind has heard crying to-day over the bleeding earth? That Reason which vast catastrophes invariably rouse to ephemeral life soon dies in the gathering storm-cloud of humanity’s innately savage passions! If the race most boastful of its culture, a race which leapt so rapidly from the confining narrowness of old-time heresies, could give birth to the devastating horror that has reigned for nearly five years, and threatened to thrust the world back into medieval darkness, what faith can be placed in mere Reason? What faith can be placed in any human argument, ideal, or belief—what faith in Man himself?—The majesty of human intellect, before so deliberate a destruction of its own works, is made to appear no more than a vain invention of fancy; and the supreme creature of all knowable creation appears of no more enduring significance than as depicted by Lamartine: “Ce pauvre insecte c’est l’homme, qui chante quelques jours devant Dieu sa jeunesse et ses amours, et puis se tait pour l’éternité!” VIII