But, generally speaking, few modern wars can be called defensive.  A war, purely defensive, is that in which the inhabitants of a nation remain wholly at home to repel the attacks of another, and content themselves with sending protection to the settlements which belong to it.  But few instance are recorded of such wars.

But if there be often a difficulty in discerning between aggressive and defensive wars, and if, moreover, there is reason to suppose, that most of the modern wars are aggressive, or that both patties become aggressors in the course of the dispute, it becomes the rulers of nations to pause, and to examine their own consciences with fear and trembling, before they allow the Sword to bedrawn, lest a dreadful responsibility should fall upon their heads for all the destruction of happiness, all the havoc of life, and all the slaughter of morals that may ensue.

It is said, secondly, that if any nation were publicly to determine to relinquish the practice if war, or to act on the policy of the Gospel, it would be overrun by other nations which might act on the policy of the world.

This argument is neither more nor less than that of the Pagan Celsus, who said in the second century, that, if the rest of the Roman empire were Christians, it would be overrun by the Barbarians.

Independently of the protection, which such a nation might count upon from the moral Governor of the world, let us enquire, upon rational principles, what would be likely to be its fate.

Armies, we know, are kept up by one nation, principally because they are kept up by another.

And in proportion as one rival nation adds to its standing armies, it is thought by the other to be consistent with the policy of the world to do the same.  But if one nation were to decline keeping any armies at all, where would be the violence, to reason to suppose, that the other would follow the example?  Who would not be glad to get rid of the expence of keeping them, if they could do it with safety?  Nor is it likely, that any powerful nation, professing to relinquish war, would experience the calamities of it.  Its care to avoid provocation would be so great, and its language would be so temperate, and reasonable, and just, and conciliatory, in the case of any dispute which might arise, that it could hardly fail of obtaining an accommodation.  And the probability is, that such a nation would grow so high in esteem with other nations, that they would have recourse to it in their disputes with one another, and would abide by its decision.  “Add the general influence, says the great Bishop Butler in his Analogy, which each a kingdom would have over the face of the earth, by way of example particularly, and the reverence which would be paid to it.  It would plainly be superior to all others, and the world must gradually come under its empire, not by means of lawless violence, but partly by what must be allowed to be just conquest, and partly by other