‘Glaringly unjust is the war of him who declares war only from ambition and from the desire to extend his dominions beyond their legitimate boundaries, from the desire to possess a more commodious country in which to establish himself, from the fear of the great power of a neighbouring prince with whom he is at peace, or from the desire to despoil a rival solely because he is thought unworthy of the possessions or States he holds or of a right which legitimately belongs to him, because a ruler is inconvenienced by him and wants to get rid of this inconvenience by force of arms.’[91] On the other hand, there are an immense number of works to-day which need only a little twisting to make them justify every attempt at conquest. For instance, the view that a war is just ‘if it can invoke the necessity of safeguarding the common good and public tranquillity, the recapture of things unjustly carried off, the repression of rebels, the defence of the innocent’.[92] And the view which asserts that ‘war is just when it is necessary to a nation either to defend itself against invasion, or _to overthrow the obstacles thwarting the exercise of its rights_.’[93] At the beginning of the last century the Church still taught that war could only be just for one of the two belligerents.[94] It is heavy with consequences that she has now abandoned this position and to-day asserts that war may be just on both sides at once, ‘from the moment when each of the two adversaries, without being certain of its right, considers it as simply probable after having taken the opinion of its counsellors’.[95] Here is another serious thing: In the past, war would only be declared just when it was against an adversary who had committed an injury _accompanied by a moral intention_, whereas to-day it may be declared just if it is directed against a material injury caused without any malice,[96] for instance, an accidental violation of frontier. It is certain that to-day Napoleon and Bismarck could find in the teaching of the Church more justification than ever for their incursions.[97]