1. The man who is to be an influence on public opinion in favour of peace must himself be peaceable. Some of us can recall vividly the unpleasant shock we received when we came upon the new version of the angels’ song. “On earth peace among men in whom he is well-pleased” (Luk_2:14). It seemed to substitute for a simple, flowing song a clumsy bit of prose. Yet it is in the new rendering that we find the real sense of what the angels proclaimed as the meaning of the coming of Christ. It was a great gift which had come to the world; but it was not an outright gift of peace and goodwill, “born in heaven and radiant here.” The song of the angels, and the Gospel of the Christ whose birth they sang, made clear the way of peace, how it could be gained and kept here on earth. It could come only among “men of good pleasure,” men whose lives were pleasing to God, and men whose hearts were full of goodwill toward other men. “Peace through goodwill”—that is what the angels sang. Not peace the gift of God; rather peace the fruit of God’s Spirit in the hearts of men; peace the product of goodwill between man and man, and between man and God. The hearts of men must be purified, their minds enlarged, their wills changed; love must be made the dominating force throughout the world’s life. There must be goodwill, with all which that implies, love in place of hate, patience instead of hasty resentment, confidence instead of suspicion, justice in place of exploitation; the fear of being unjust must be stronger than the fear of being unjustly treated. Goodwill must become not merely an amiable sentiment, but an operative force, in the life of the world.
“The Prince of Peace” works, as at the first, through those souls whom He has made His own. Through them He reaches and leavens the mass around. Any of us can contribute something to His work, or can refuse the contribution. And each soul that is at peace with itself and with God, works thereby for the cause of universal peace; works for the harmony of the Church and of the world; works for the credit and glory of the “Prince of Peace.” [Note: H. P. Liddon, Advent in St. Paul’s, 269.]
2. Whilst, then, the lovers of peace will do all that they can to promote the international use of every means offered for the maintenance of peace, and especially the League of Nations, yet the direct concern of our faith in Christ is not so much with expedients as with tempers and affections. And the properly Christian spirit, if it responds to the heavenly voice which is bidding it claim public affairs as one sphere of its duty, cannot fail to be a powerful influence in the promotion of international peace.
In so far as his abilities and influence are of any value, the Christian man will throw them all, and on every occasion, on the side of peace, not because he is of necessity a peace-at-any-price man, but because he knows that the war passion is so strong in the world, and has such an immense backing amongst those who live by it and for it, that the help of every believer in peace is needed to produce anything like a balance of power between these forms of faith. Sane, reasonable, intelligent, the Christian will know that in opposing war he is opposing one of the strongest lusts of the human heart—the lust to kill. And he will expect no easy victory.
All turns finally on the measure of justice and mercy which individuals acknowledge, and on the number of just and merciful men within the governing democracies of the civilized world; and so Christianity, the religion of individual redemption, remains the sure hope of humanity, and the pledge of ultimate peace. Only where the Prince of Peace sets up His invisible but all-embracing Kingdom are the fierce and selfish rivalries of secular Powers held in check, and the fair potencies of human life disclosed. Justly, then, did the Evangelist picture the coming of Jesus as the bringing of peace to the world.
3. What does this demand of us? First of all, Faith. We know how swiftly the prophets of world-peace have been compelled to bow to the inevitable. Facts have forced them regretfully to acknowledge that the war spirit is not dead. The Crystal Palace, that fragile monument to splendid hopes, had scarcely been erected when the spectre of war was abroad again in Europe and soldiers were being starved and poisoned to glut the greed of venal contractors. Kings, princes, and statesmen welcomed the conference at The Hague. It was to herald the dawning of a new era for the human race. And the cannon began to thunder over the African veldt and slaughter was abroad once more. Need we be surprised if this experience, so frequently repeated, should make men dubious of the time ever coming when the spear shall become the pruning-hook?
All honour, then, to the men who, amidst these repeated discouragements, have yet maintained unimpaired their faith in the ultimate victory of peace. True it is that Moltke spoke of their inspiration as a dream, and an ignoble dream. But those who have realized how deep is the need for peace are not at all ashamed of their cause, even in the presence of military statesmen. They know it to be indispensable for the solution of our vexed problems, the necessary prelude to that enfranchisement of the multitude which has become the day-star of the new democracy. If it be a dream that some day the masses of the world’s workers may live in concord with each other, at least it is not an ignoble dream.
(1) It demands Education. We must educate public opinion, and especially in the knowledge of true glory and honour. We hear much of the glory to be obtained by the soldier who has learned how to scorn his life and seek for death. When we come to investigate it more closely the glory is apt to pale and become something much less alluring. Following in the track of Napoleon’s eagles across the Niemen, Chuquet puts it down as his deliberate opinion that soldiering is a convict’s trade. “There is no administration, as usual, and the army must live by plunder.” The peasants’ farms must bear the burden of this mighty mass of hungry men. Women and children must starve that the legions of an immortal robber may advance with full stomachs. These are the incidentals of war, the daily commonplaces to which the military man must accommodate himself as the robber of graves must habituate himself to the contact with putrefying corpses. We do good service to humanity when we help men to understand what this ghastly trade really means, when we strip it of all its cheap gewgaws, its stupid flouncings, and show it forth to men as a hateful brigandage.
(3) And above all Prayer. Pray always for Peace, as for the one and only life worth living. War tempts us horribly to accept it, to be preoccupied with its anxieties, to be dulled to its shame. We commit ourselves to it so rapidly: and then we become excited by its strange heroism, by its rare glories. This amazing outcome of self-sacrifice seems to us to justify it. We are fired by the ancient primitive passions. Peace has no such victories as these, we soon cry. After all, this is the old noble life. “Sound the trumpet! blow the fife!” This temper rushes over us. And it is all wrong. Peace is life, not war. We witness to our own degradation, if we are unable to recognize or obey the law of sacrifice in any other form but that of War. It shows on how low a level we are living, if we cannot understand how to give our life for our brothers except at the cost of taking the life of someone else.
“War is Hell.” So all true soldiers tell us. So Sherman said, as Walt Whitman reminds us: “The people who like the wars should be compelled to fight the wars. They are hellish business—wars—all wars. I was in the midst of it—saw war where war is worst—not in the battlefield, but in the hospital.” “War is Hell.” We ought all to keep saying that to ourselves, deep down in our heart of hearts. “War is Hell.” Christ is the King of Peace. We stand with Christ, for peace and goodwill to all mankind. Goodwill towards Germany! Peace with the good German people! We look for nothing but that as our goal. God grant it swiftly! [Note: H. Scott Holland, So as by Fire, 1. 120.]
