All the forces of mind and body and spirit become formidable in a
reckless hatred of the gross injustice of a fate that individually not one
of them has deserved.
But the moment remains. They compress into it the desires of a lifetime.
After years of proud individualism they have learned that they are atoms,
cogs, helpless, the sport of iron and steel and powder and the ambitions
and stupidities of men whose lives are never risked. Very well, turn the
ego loose to find what it can. If all they have learned from civilization
is as useless in this shrieking hell, as impotent as the dumb resentment of
the clod, they can at least be animals.
To talk of the ennobling influences of war is one of the lies of the
conventionalized mind anxious to avoid the truths of life and to extract
good from all evil--worthy but unintelligent. How can men in the trenches,
foul with dirt and vermin, stench forever in their nostrils, callous to
death and suffering, wallowing like pigs in a trough, compulsorily obscene,
be ennobled? Courage is the commonest attribute of man, a universal gift of
Nature that he may exist in a world bristling with dangers to frail human
life; never to be commended, only to be remarked when absent. If men lose
it in the city, the sedentary life, they recover it quickly in the camp.
The exceptions, the congenital cowards, slink out of war on any pretext,
but if drafted are likely to acquit themselves decently unless neurotic.
Pages:
342
343
344
345
346
347
348
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366