Honolulu star-bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1912-2010, 1914-08-27

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most terrible consideration in connec.
ton with the European ,imbroglio is
| the blow that situation has delivered
to the pride we had in our ciyiliza-
| ton. A brief nine years ago the Ger
man kaiser startled into brief spasm
of gladness the advocates of world
| peace when he spoke openly and
bravely against war. The formation
| of the Hague conferences and the sub
sequent reference thereto of more
| than one international difficulty and
throughout the world propaganda
against war proceeding by leaps and
bounds gave us an added confidence.
We remember reading within the
| fortnight an article contributed to a
periodical in which its enthusiastic
author declared that great wars were
now an impossibility. He reasoned,
first, that the advance of death-deal-
| ing engines had made war too terrible
to be possible. But his chief point
was that civilization had wrested us
out of the animal hates that fer cen
turtles had made world history a his
tory of conflict. Civilization had won,
| he declared.
Well, he was wrong. The bright
claims that many of us made for civil
Iization, less optimistic than his yet
of a similar stripe, have received a
blow from which they will not sooiI
recover. We have learned that sci
ence and art and literature, protest
tations of brotherhood, interchange of
knowledge and the merely material
instruments like the telegraph and
the wireless have laid upon us We
neer of temporary politeness, but that
underneath dwell still the bitterest
passions, hiding their time.
The insignificance of the events
that led actually to the plunging OF
Europe into the mid-course of slaugh-
/ ter is indicative OF how close to the
surface these instincts lay The Aus
tro-Servian dispute was of little i'm
portance per sc, but 1t served as a
match to the fuel of hatred between
those countries. The SerVians and
Groatiaus, suffering long under Aus
tria's malignities, for once were IN.
willing to bear renewed indignity, and
their refusal of the Austrian demand
gave their neighbors an opportunity
long sought. In order, there was real.
lily little of sentiment in Russiass es-
pousal of the Balkan cause but, in
stead, an excellent opportunity to feed
fat her ancient grudge against Aus
tria Germany in turn, commercially
alarmed at Russia's activity, was not
displeased at IN excuse that would
permit her at last to try conclusions
with her hated neighbors. France,
with the bittnerness of 1870 still gnaw-
/ ing within her, stood but briefly upon
ceremony. Perhaps England. too.
jealous more of her commercial pros
poets even than her national honor,
and jealous of that as only England
can be, will have joined the melee be-
fore this comes into print.
Ready, then, for many years has
been the giant struggle that now is to
be waged. It is struggle of race
hatred in part and of industrial hat
reds more certainly 1t is a conflict
of rivals whose rivalry was of many
sorts so bitter that the polish of their
alleged civilization was too quickly
and too easily rubbed off. AS the
United States government, long look
| ing through the eyes of its capitalists
too greedily upon Mexico, sprang at
that country's throat at the most triv-
ial excuse, so have the countries Of
Europe reared into action. We are
not different from each other, Eu.
rope and America.
The present situation has, fortu.
nately, for all time given the lie to
the claim that the existence of pow,
erful navies and powerful armies was
in itself bar to war. The European
war promises to be the more terrible
because these engines of wholesale
destruction are available. Prepared.
ness of war only fastened in every in
stance in Europe the rushing of an
other and another nation into the
struggle.
What hope in all this there remains
for the believer in peace 1t is too early
to tell. From the least to the great
est human instinct, when its overt
manifestations have been fought by
rational persons, the reply has been
that instinct is as old and as power
full as the world and is not to be gain
said Drunkenness and prostitution
are not gone from the world after cen
turtles of opposition. Murder of in.
dividuals continues despite thousands
of prisons and gallows. And now ma
tons are again hurting themselves
into battle despite all the propagan-
da for peace that has filled the world.
But this propaganda is still very
young, so far as concerns its rational
direction 1t has yet, for instance, to
point out the economic causes that
lead to war and attempt, not so much
to create a mere sentiment against
war as a cruel thing, as to preach
against the killing commercial system
that makes war now apparently a
necessity When war is directed by
the warriors themselves. when COM
mon people, who have to give their
bodies to its grim demands, say If ii
shall occur. its doom is sealed. But
so long as they are the Instruments
OF a supposedly higher class in war
as they are In industry, the former
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