Imperialism than Rome with an identical fate? There _is_ a third alternative; there may be more, but the one which makes its argument for acceptance on the basis of history and experience is here put forward for consideration. In three books already published in this series which has been issued from time to time during the Great War--“The Nemesis of Mediocrity,” “The Great Thousand Years” and “The Sins of the Fathers”--I have tried to determine certain of the causes which led to the tragical _débâcle_ of modern civilization at the very moment of its highest supremacy; and now while mediocrity pitifully struggles to meet and solve an avalanche of problems it cannot cope withal, and anarchy, like Alaric and Attila and Genseric at the head of their united hosts, beat against the dissolving barriers of a forlorn and impotent and discredited culture, I would try to find some hints of the saving alternative, and if possible discover some way out of the deadly _impasse_ in which the world finds itself. From “The Nemesis of Mediocrity” it should be sufficiently clear that I do not believe that any mechanical devices whatever will serve the purpose: neither the buoyant plan to “make the world safe for democracy,” nor any extension and amplification of “democratic” methods onward to woman’s suffrage or direct legislation or proletarian absolutism through Russian soviets, nor socialistic panaceas varying from a mild collectivism to Marxism and the _Internationale_, nor a league of nations and an imposing but impotent “Covenant,” nor even a world-wide “League to Enforce Peace.” We have heard something too much of late of peace, and not enough of justice; peace is not an end in itself, it is rather a by-product of justice. Through justice the world can attain peace, but through peace there is no guaranty that justice may be achieved. There must always be the material enginery through the operation of which the ideal is put into practice, but in the ideal lies the determining force, whether for good or evil, and by just so far as this is right in its nature will the mechanism operate for good ends. The best agent in the world, even the Catholic Church or the American Republic, may be employed towards evil and vicious ends whenever the energizing force is of a nature that operates towards darkness and away from the light.