The elements of social science, or, Physical, sexual, and natural religion : an exposition of the true cause and only cure of the three primary social evils: poverty, prostitution and celibacy / by a doctor of medicine.

  • Drysdale, George R., 1825-1904.
Date:
1889
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The elements of social science, or, Physical, sexual, and natural religion : an exposition of the true cause and only cure of the three primary social evils: poverty, prostitution and celibacy / by a doctor of medicine. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    CAN WAH HE SUTPIIKSSED either tamely submit to what it considers an injustice, or iro to war to enlorce its nglits. But war, like the barbarous trial by combat in use among our ancestors, can never be a proper lest oC justice orof riL'ht, ior a war does not show which cause is just, but only which of the com- batants IS tlie stronger. So long, therefore, as governments may refuse arbitration and may go to war, injustice and lawless force are the final umpu-es in international disputes, and this must have a profoundlv tleraoralising eff.-ct on mankind and their rulers. In order to have eithe' peace or justice it is necessary to introduce law, which would compel arbitration, and secure, even to tne weakest among the uat'ons its ri-hts and redress for its injuries. This, too, is the only sure means for brintr- mg about a disarmament, for the real cause of the enormous armies (amounting at present m Europe alone to about ten millions of men) is the state of general insecurity and license arising from the absence of law. As there is no law to protect or rasti-ain them, nations arm partlv to protect themselves and ].artly to carry out secret projects of conquer and aggrandisement; and we can scarcely hope to see any satisfactory reduction of armaments till there is a real and eilective international law. How, then, can such a law be obtained ? We have seen that what is mainly needed for this purpose is a supreme authority, with adequate executive torce to give effect to the present international code, which as Mr. Gillie Leslie observes, has the features of law in its inchoate or rudimentary form.;' Now there is evidently only one wav in which an authority of the kind can be established, namely, by means of a combi- 7iatwn hvlween dijforeiit. Stoles. Nothing but the combined stren-nh of many States can force single States to obey the law and to keep th« peace. The real sanction of the law between individual and individual 18 the general community of individuals, and in Uke manner the sanc- tion ot the law between nation and nation can only be the communitv ot nations. It seems to me the clearest and most urgent duty of nations to take measures for introducing positive law between them and putting an end to war. Until provision can be made for the legal settlement of international disputes, the responsibility for war with all its horrors re^s m great part on the nations generally; and this leads to the utmost contusion of ideas with regard to the criminality of war. One of the most frightful of crimes is not generally seen to be a crime at all. Thus at present wars are commonly divided into jmt and unjust, because, iu the absence ot law, it is sometimes necessary, and even an act of ihd most heroic virtue in a nation to fight for its rights and liberties; but if law were once firmly established, and means of legal arbitration afforded, war would simply be a crime, to be repressed and its chief authors punished, as in the case of other heinous oflences. There would then be only one kind of lawful and justifiable war, namely, that which is analogous to the action of the police, and consists in putting down by force any resistance to the orders of the supreme authority. Not only can and ought the nations thus to put down war as a crime, but it is their most vita) interest to do so. At present any nation is liable at some