Talking Peace - Preparing War by John S. Wightman

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jul 25, 1907

Talking Peace — Preparing War

By John S. Wightman

JOHN S. WIGHTMAN

TO-DAY the gaze of the world is fixed upon that momentous gathering, the Peace Conference at The Hague. June 15 its deliberations began. The czar’s rescript calling together the first Hague Conference was given only to those twenty-six nations that had diplomatic representatives at St. Petersburg. At the present conference representatives of every one of the forty-five nations of the world are present, and for the first time in history all the people of the earth will be represented to discuss affairs common to all. This congress, beyond doubt, is the greatest political event that has ever taken place. Emanuel Kant says, in his essay on “Eternal Peace,” that war will not cease until the world is organized; and the world can not be safely organized until the nations have representative government. Therefore the greatest international problem before the world is, How can this present Hague Peace Conference take the next great step toward world organization? Already we have The Hague or Supreme Court of the World. The next logical step in this international problem would be an international legislature; and if an international legislature, then an international executive, or world-head, whose work would be to see that the wishes of the international legislature were carried out.

The object of this vast confederation force in the Holland capital is, primarily and ostensibly, to ultimately secure the banishment of war from the established program of the nations, and to provide for international peace. Thus far the question is purely within the moral, and relatively, perhaps, within the religious sphere; but the student of political economy is rapidly beginning to perceive the larger question — the political — the merging of the world, the individual nations of the world, into one vast legislative brotherhood, under one universal and supreme world-ruler. And herein lies the danger, the danger of empire instead of republic, kingly rule in place of individual sovereignty. The long, dark history of the past is simply the history of universal dominion — world government.

A question anent the subject is: Will an international brotherhood of nations eliminate war and all its possibilities? Disarmament, it becomes apparent, can not possibly precede either one or the other of two events — the conversion of the world, or the political organization of the world. Laying the question of the conversion of the world aside, Mr. Hamilton Holt, of the Independent, says: “Clearly, then, the predominant issue is the proposition that the conference hereafter assemble periodically and automatically, and not at the call of some sovereign or monarch. For even if at first such a periodical and automatic congress can do no more than express pious resolutions, as time goes on, it will be given more and more power, just as in the future The Hague Court will be given more and more jurisdiction. Finally an international executive will be added, and then all questions of an international nature will be discussed, decided, and enforced according to law, and we shall have in very truth the Americanization of the world.”

Thus has the dream of empire actually taken possession of the world-peace promoters, and the question becomes infinitely greater; nor is it, nor can it be, quite divorced from the religious question, which will eventually, if world-organization is accomplished, become the paramount question of all others. M. Novikoff, in La Rue, clearly perceives the trend of this universal design. “The peace movement,” he said, “ought to change its name and be called federalist. It aims, in fact, at creating a federation which will in turn embrace all the nations of the world. Because the giant movement is said to be for ‘peace,’ and not for federation, it encounters all kinds of objections on the score of impracticability which it would not encounter if it changed, not its essence, but merely its name. It must plainly be shown that the kingdom of heaven is near at hand; when the peace party succeeds in imbuing the masses with this idea, there will be an immense and immediate reaction. Federation will then become the first popular cry. Very soon it will reach the passionate stage, and then nothing can stop it. Then exit international anarchy, and enter the United States of Europe.” This was July 1, 1901, and now M. Novikoff’s words are all the more significant, for the recent Peace Conference at New York City gave the clearest emphasis to the federation part of the peace movement; in fact, “peace” could alone result from “federation of the world — a parliament of man!” Novikoff was a prophet of his time: to-day all may see. Nor does it mean alone the United States of Europe; it is the United States of the World. It was Mr. Stead who connected “the-kingdom-of-heaven-is-at-hand” theme with that of the subject of the peace movement, and it may not be quite so far to that “passionate stage” as may appear: the history of the “passionate stage” of the Crusades of the early centuries may suffice to cause anxiety and apprehensive dread to the average mind that must enquire, “What do these things mean?” In the plainest language possible, the apostle declares that when “they” — evidently meaning the nations of the earth in congress assembled — “shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh . . . and they shall not escape.”

That this sudden destruction, much of it at least, is the destruction resulting from national war and carnage, there can be little doubt. Long ago the prophet Jeremiah cried out: “Destruction upon destruction . . . for the whole land is spoiled: suddenly are my tents spoiled, and my curtains in a moment.” “I can not hold my peace, because thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war.” War, cruel, devastating war, is the agency for the multiplied destruction — “destruction upon destruction.” Nor could the faithful prophet see any sign of real national or international peace, for of such he must have written, “Saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.”

Ezekiel writes: “Destruction cometh; and they shall seek peace, and there shall be none.” The writer holds that the peace movement is only a “cry,” and no more; according to the Word that is divinely inspired, it is a “cry” of peace where there is no peace. At the very time, the world is burdened with war preparations, as in no other age. The very chiefest question for which the first Hague Conference was called to discuss — the limitation of armament, or its reduction, by mutual consent of the European powers — proved to be a fruitless topic. And at the opening session of the present conference the key-note was sounded by M. Nelidoff, president of the conference, in behalf of Russia, when he said that “ultimate disarmament and the inauguration of universal peace is but an idle dream,” and advocated the widening of the door of arbitration that “conciliation and justice” might obtain. Mr. Stead writes to the London Times “that there will be practical unanimity among the governments as to the impossibility of forbidding the discussion of armaments at the conference, and an absolute unanimity as to the impossibility of arriving at any practical decision as to what should be done.”

(To be concluded)