PEACE.
(The Opinion of Erasmus on)

Erasmus was a lover of peace, and knew the value of it. One of the finest dissertations that can be seen is that of Erasmus upon the proverb, “Want of experience makes war sweet.” He makes it appear therein that he had profoundly weighed the most important principles of reason and the gospel, and the most common causes of wars. He proves that the wickedness of some particular persons, and the folly of the people, are the source of almost every war, and that a thing so blamable in its causes, is commonly

followed by a very pernicious effect. He pretends that those, whose professions ought to lead them to dissuade from war, are the instigators of it. “If any one would examine this matter more thoroughly, he would find, that all the wars in Christendom have been owing either to folly or to malice. Some inexperienced young men, misled by the ill example of former reigns, inflamed by historical traditions, propagated from fool to fool, or hurried on by the persuasion of flatterers, the instigation of lawyers and divines, with the connivance, and perhaps, influence of bishops, have engaged themselves in wars, more out of rashness than malice, and, from so powerful a calamity, learn that war is an ill, which ought by all possible means to be avoided. Others precipitate themselves into wars from hatred, others from ambition, and some from a savageness of mind. Nor is our Iliad any thing else but a detail of the quarrels of foolish princes and their subjects.” He goes on, “laws, statutes, privileges, are all silenced by the din of arms; princes then find a hundred ways of attaining to arbitrary power; whence it happens that some of them cannot endure peace. Some there are whose sole motive to war is, that it gives them an opportunity of exercising their tyranny over their own subjects with the greater ease; for in times of peace, the authority of a senate, the dignity of magistrates, the love of the laws, are no small curb to a prince’s will. But in war, the management of all affairs is left to the caprice of a few. Those who are in their prince’s favour are raised, those in displeasure are trampled on; supplies are demanded in an arbitrary manner.; in a word, it is then they find themselves monarchs in reality. The chiefs in the mean time juggle together, till the poor people are totally robbed of their liberty. Can it be imagined that men of such a disposition would not willingly lay hold of the first opportunity of war which presented itself?” This dissertation is to be found in the adages of Erasmus, and has been printed apart under the title of Bellum.

Art. Erasmus.