Although we have shown the existence of a mechanical tendency, yet our
labor is incomplete and practically useless unless we have shown how it
may be retarded or wholly counterbalanced. Some countervailing element
there must be, as is evident from the fact that, while the causes that
produce this tendency exist in modern society in tenfold greater power
than they ever had in ancient life, yet their operation has been, by
far, less rapid. Greece and Rome existed barely a thousand years, while
Anglo-Saxon civilization has already flourished much longer than that,
and as yet shows no signs of immediate decay.
The retarding cause is war. This does not strike at the root of the
matter and eradicate the love of physical prosperity, but only retards
the movement, by awaking men to see that their interests are inseparable
from those of the state. In the midst of war they see that one cannot
perform the duty of another, that hired soldiery cannot protect a state,
but their own hearts and arms must be enlisted unless they would be
buried in its ruins. It wakes up the dormant dynamical powers of courage
and heroism, and checks for a moment the selfish individualism that was
taking the life from the nation.
This only retards, it does not counterbalance or neutralize this
tendency. War was common to ancient and modern times alike; but that
cause which has so long held our society from ruin, and on which we base
our hope of an indestructible civilization, is the Christian religion.
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