Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-01-23
WARS AND CENTURIES.
Belief That Nations Fight at Begin
ming of Each 100 Years.

From the New York Tribune.
The supersttious notion is extant that
there must soon be great war because
the opening years of every century have
always been thus marked. OF course, IL
the latter were true it would form no suffl-
cient reason for war at this time. A
century is not natural division of time.
as is a day, a season or a year, but is
entirely artificial, and there is no more
reason why war should occur at the begin
ming than at the middle the end of it.
However, as a matter of fact, the state
ment is not true, as every one at all ac-
quainted with history should know.
The nineteenth century began with the
establishment of more general peace than
the world had known for many years, and
if a couple of years later war broke out 1t
was only the renewal of the wars that had
marked the closing years of the preceding
century. The eighteenth century began
with wars, but they were merely the con-
tinuation of conflicts begun in the seven
teenth. The early years of the seventeenth
were marked with more peace making than
war making. The wars at the opening OF
the sixteenth century were prolongationS
of those in the fifteenth and were, at most.
petty affairs. Those at the opening of the
fifteenth were left over from the four
teenth. There We're no important wars
fury, save those at Constantinople and be-
tween England and Scotland, both legacies
from the thirteenth. No great war occur
red in the first decade of the thirteenth GEN.
fury or of the twelfth. At the opening of
the eleventh Mahmud of Ghazni invaded
India. The tenth was marked with no new
war, nor was the ninth. The eighth was
ten years old when the Saracens invaded
Spain. The beginning of the seventh was
peaceful. The first years of the sixth and
fifth saw Rome involved in war, but war
was then the habitual state of Rome. The
fourth and third began in comparative
peace. The second saw no new war, but
rather the ending of the old struggle in
Dacia, and the fierce conflicts of the early
years of the first century of our era were
merely the continuation of those begun n
dozen years before. In all these last nine
teen, centuries. indeed, not more than two
are to be charged with having opened with
new and important wars OF the centuries
before our era. the first began in peace;
the second with nothing but the second
Macedonian war; the third with the third
Samnite war; the fourth with great
struggle the fifth with the burning of Sar-
dis and the battle of Lake Regillus,
limitations of wars begun long before; the
sixth with ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS conquest OF
Jerusalem, and in the earlier centuries,
far chronology informs US, there were
no initial wars of magnitude.
The current superstition, then. is in
noteworthy degree contrary to the facts.
Instead of being invariably or even general
ly marked with the outbreakings of great
wars, the beginnings of centuries have in
the vast majority of cases been remarkably
free from such cataStrophes If we were to
form any rule from historical precedent, it
would be, therefore, that this year and
the next few years should be peaceful. But
we shall make no such prophecy. nor shall
we expect this exposition of the facts en-
tirely to demoish the foolishly false super,
stition which now so widely prevails.