Note 66 — Chapter VIII · CONCLUSION

What has the Rationalist to say to this state of things? What remedy does he propose to apply? The prophets foretell that we can look forward to the abolition of war only when the engines of destruction—flying ships armed with weapons of death, for example—are of so fearful a nature that it will at last be brought home to mortals that this clumsy and barbarous machine for settling disputes is too absurd, too suicidal for further employment. But need we wait long weary years, burdened with the thousand and one curses of war and militarism,66 till this supreme horror has been invented?