The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-05-17


the defenders of a stormed fortress
were entitled to no quarter at the
hands of captors; and Shakespeare's
awful description still held good for
Great Britain's foremost soldier
THE gates of mercy shall be all shut
up,
And the rough soldier. flushed and
hard
In liberty of bloody hand, shall range,
With conscience wide as hen.'
But since. the book of Grotius, an up
ward tendency has shown itself, accel-
Grating with the passing years. AS
Mr.. Andrew Carnegie pointed out in
his speech as Lord Rector of st. An
drew's University, non-combatants are
now spared Women and children are
no longer massacred. Quarter is given
and prisoners are we'll cared for
Towns are not given over to. pillage.
Private property on land is exempt,
or If taken is paid or receipted for.
Poisoned wells, assassination of rulers
and commanders by private bargain
and deceptive agreements are infamies
of the past. On the sea, privateering
has been abolished, neutral rights
greatly extended. property protected.
and the right of search narrowly re-
stricted.
The general progress of the world
moves steadily toward the abandon
ment of the appeal to arms. The in
vention of improved weapons and the
evolution of new types of battleships
alone would in time abolish war, on
the score of its costliness. The navi-
cation of the air would in time abel-
| ish war. for its deadliness. And most
of all and surest of all, the increasing
revolt of enlightened human reason
would abolish war, on the score of its
utter uselessness.
And now, at last, simple morality
throws down the gage, before this
most persistent sayagery. Without an
army at it's back, without ship at its
command, without a weapon in it's
| hand, but on the basis of mere right
eousness, it challenges the old bad order
of the world.
The rest of this speech is current his
tory, and known to everybody. The
conscience of Christendom lays siege
to every military establishment and
walks, Christlike. upon the sea of an
/ cient violence. If courts of law and
courts of equity, it says, should settle
| individual disputes; then, equally, they
/ ought to settle national contentious, on
! the basis of righteousness and justice.
Every argument, adverse to such a
course, has been answered, and all the
obstacles to it are gradually disappear
ing, as the oceans narrow, and the air
becomes navigable.
Naturally, the Inauguration of the
new regime can only come by interna-
tional agreements. Many such are al
ready in operation and their number
| grows.
! Within about hundred years, ae,
eording to Mr.. Carnegie, no less than
| 81 international disputes have been
J settled by arbitration. In only one
case was the award disputed, and in
/ that case it appeared that the arbitra.
tors had misunderstood their powers
Within the last five years nearly a hun
%dred international treaties of obliga
tory arbitration have been signed, and
the United States was a party to one
half of the number
In short, the civilized world is senti
mentally committed to the principle OF
obligatory arbitration as a substitute
for war. What remains is simply tc
work out the details of a universal in
ternational agreement covering al
countries and all causes.
Such an agreement is bringing itself
to pass, steadily and irresistibly. The
|
progress in the world today is the
Temple of Peace at. The Hague. Il
marks, or is to mark, the summit of tht
divide that runs between cruelty anG
mercy, passion and reason, across the
plain of time.
The disposition of the treaty nations
to abide the results of arbitration
speaks volumes of testimony to the use
| lessness of war. There is no sheriff
with an armed posse to enforce thu
judgments. Tt is the moral weight OF
peace and honesty that makes them eff
fective and conclusive. The good opin
ion of the neighbors is as powerful $
motive with nations as with individ
uals.
The third International Peace Con
ference at The Hague will convene il
1915. A National Peace Conference
has just held most successful conven
ton in Chicago to consider, among
other things, the new measures thai
ought to come before the next great
convention of nations. That convention
already exerts much of the influence
OF legally-constituted internationa
congress, with power to render iudg
ments and see that they are carried out
1t ought, formally and finally, to be-
constituted such a congress at the
coming meeting and proceed to organ
lze a world court for the hearing and
determining of international causes
The greatest intellects of all the power:
VIII be enlisted in an effort to thai