"For the man of arms the interest of the safety and success of the army will always take precedence of that of the inoffensive population, while the jurist, convinced that law is the safeguard of all, and especially for the weak against the strong, will ever feel it a duty to secure for private individuals in districts occupied by an enemy the indispensable protection of law. There may be members of the Institut who do not give up the hope that some day, thanks to the progress of civilisation, humanity will succeed in substituting an organised international justice for the wars which now-a-days take place between sovereign States. But the body of the Institut, as a whole, well knows that that hope has no chance of being realised in our time, and limits its action in this matter to two principal objects, the attainment of which is possible:-- "1. To open and facilitate the settlement of trifling disputes between nations by judicial methods, war being unquestionably a method out of all proportion in such cases. "2. To aid in elucidating and strengthening legal order even in time of war. "I acknowledge unreservedly that the customs of warfare have improved since the establishment of standing armies, a circumstance which has rendered possible a stricter discipline, and has necessitated a greater care for the provisionment of troops. I also acknowledge unreservedly that the chief credit for this improvement is due to military commanders. Brutal and barbarous pillage was prohibited by generals before jurists were convinced of its illegality. If in our own day a law recognised by the civilised world forbids, in a general way, the soldier to make booty in warfare on land, we have here a great advance in civilisation, and the jurists have had their share in bringing it about. Since compulsory service has turned standing armies into national armies, war has also become national. Laws of war are consequently more than ever important and necessary, since, in the differences of culture and opinion which prevail between individuals and classes, law is almost the only moral power the force of which is acknowledged by all, and which binds all together under common rules. This pleasing and cheering circumstance is one which constantly meets us in the Institut de Droit International. We see a general legal persuasion ever in process of more and more distinct formation uniting all civilised peoples. Men of nations readily disunited and opposed--Germans and French, English and Russians, Spaniards and Dutchmen, Italians and Austrians--are, as a rule, all of one mind as to the principles of international law.