Furthermore, the political philosopher has ever to answer the question, “What about the future?” What are we going to do after the present debauch of waste and murder is over? Are we to trust the world to the same old forces that brought us this ruin? One says that human nature is the same forever, that it learns only in the hard school of experience, and that it must fight its wars as the price it pays for being human nature. To such a man the Napoleonic wars did all that could be expected of them when they so impressed the world with the cost of war that a system was adopted which gave the world a measure of peace for a hundred years. “What more can you ask?” said such a philosopher to me. In humble responsibility to the throne of reason I reply that we can try as intelligent beings to remove the war madness permanently, making it our duty to posterity to do the best we can. Some generation must make the start, or we shall wring our hands forever. In this chapter I wish to show in what way the old system crumbled before the desire of world power. It seems a vicious system by virtue of its innate qualities of selfishness, and it is all the more to be feared because its subtle spirit gets control of our own hearts as well as the hearts of other men. While our opponents--Germany and Austria--were following the system to its bitter conclusion, our friends--Great Britain, France, and Italy--were doing nearly the same things, but in a slightly different way. And there is no reason to expect that under the continuation of the balancing of great and ambitious world powers we shall have more respect for the rights of one another than we had in the past. The system of Balance of Power flourished best in Bismarck’s time. It was his strong personality that held together the Three Emperors’ League for a brief season and the Triple Alliance for a longer period. Each of these groups had certain interests in common which gave them coherence: Bismarck alone knew how to exploit these mutual advantages and lessen the jars of clashing feelings. His objects were made easier by the fact that most of the other nations of Europe at that time had developed quarrels of their own. Great Britain and Russia were at swords’ points over the Far Eastern question, and France and Great Britain had not forgotten their century old antagonism, which only a minor dispute was sufficient to set aflame.