Conscience was powerless to prevent it because conscience
had ceased to believe in its own power, had come to think of itself as a
vain and inexplicable rebellion against the nature of things. This
rebellion we call sentimentality, meaning thereby that it is really not
even moral; for true morality would recognize the process to which the
nature of man is subject, of which that nature is itself a part; and
would cure man of his futile rebellions so that he should not suffer
needlessly from them. It would cure man of pity, because it is through
pity that he suffers. He is a machine, and, if he is a conscious
machine, he should be conscious of the fact that he is one. Such is the
belief that has been growing upon us for fifty years or more with many
strange effects. It has not destroyed our sense of pity, but has
confused and exasperated it. We pity and love still, but with
desperation, not like Christians assured that these things are according
to the order of the universe, but fearing that they are wilful
exceptions to that order, costly luxuries that we indulge in at our own
peril. We seem to ourselves lonely in our pity and love; the supreme
process knows nothing of them; the God, who is love, does not exist.
In the past wars have happened with the consent of mankind; but this war
did not happen so. Even in Germany there was something hysterical in the
praise of war, as if it were the worship of an idol both hated and
feared.
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