Points of Friction
root of civilisation; it has its noble as well as its ignoble side; it is the mainspring of both nationalism and internationalism; it is the force which supports governments, and the force which violently disrupts them. Men have risen above self-interest for life; nations, superbly for a time. The sense of shock which was induced by Germany's acute reversion to barbarism was deeper than the sense of danger induced by her vaulting ambitions. There is no such passionate feeling in life as that which is stirred by the right and duty of defence; and for more than four years the Allied nations defended the world from evils which the world fancied it had long outgrown. The duration of the war is the most miraculous part of the miraculous tale. A monotony of heroism, a monotony of sacrifice, transcends imagination.
Now it is over. Citizens of the United States walked knee-deep in newspapers
82
