36. Swiss Peace Society 323 37. Swiss Committee for Study of Principles of Durable Treaty of Peace 323 VII HOLLAND 38. Nederlandsche Anti-Oorlog Raad (Dutch Anti-War Council) 325 VIII Norman Angell on Differential Neutrality for America 326 INDEX 333 INTRODUCTION When the storm has gone by and the skies after clearing have softened, we may discover that a corrected perspective is the result of the war that we are most conscious of. Familiar presumptions will appear foreshortened, and new distances of fact and possibility will lie before us. Before the fateful midsummer of 1914 the most thoughtful part of mankind confidently held a lot of agreeable presumptions which undoubtedly influenced individual and collective conduct. The more intangible of them were grouped under such name symbols as “idealism,” “humanitarian impulse,” “human brotherhood,” “Christian civilization.” The workaday ones were pigeonholed under the rubric: “enlightened economic interest.” Between the practical and the aspirational were distributed all the excellent Aristotelian middle course presumptions of the “rule of reason” order. And why not? The nineteenth century had closed in a blaze of scientific glory. By patient inductive research the human mind had found out nature’s way on earth and in the heavens, and with daring invention had turned knowledge to immediate practical account. The struggle for existence had become a mighty enterprise of progress. Steam and electricity had brought the utmost parts of the world together. Upon substantial material foundations the twentieth century would build a world republic, wherein justice should apportion abundance. Upon presumption we reared the tower of expectation. Yet on the horizon we might have seen—some of us did see—a thickening haze and warning thunderheads. Not much was said about them, but to some it seemed that the world behaved as if it felt the tension of a rising storm. With nervous eagerness the nations pushed their way into the domains of the backward peoples. They sought concessions, opportunities for investment, command of resources, exclusive trade, spheres of influence. Private negotiations were backed by diplomacy, and year after year diplomacy was backed by an ever more impressive show of naval and military power.