applies pure and unalloyed when he comes to deal with foreigners as
nations. The economic conception--using the term in that wider sense
which I have indicated earlier in this article--which guides his
individual conduct is the antithesis of that which guides his national
conduct.

While the Christian does not believe in robbery inside the frontier, he
does without; while within the State he realises that greater advantage
lies on the side of each observing the general code, so that civilised
society can exist, instead of on the side of having society go to pieces
by each disregarding it; while within the State he realises that
government is a matter of administration, not the seizure of property;
that one town does not add to its wealth by "capturing" another, that
indeed one community cannot "own" another--while, I say, he believes all
these things in his daily life at home, he disregards them all when he
comes to the field of international relationship, _la haute politique_.
To annex some province by a cynical breach of treaty obligation (Austria
in Bosnia, Italy in Tripoli) is regarded as better politics than to act
loyally with the community of nations to enforce their common interest
in order and good government. In fact, we do not believe that there can
be a community of nations, because, in fact, we do not believe that
their interests are common, but rival; like the Turk, we believe that if
you do not exercise force upon your "rival" he will exercise it upon
you; that nations live upon one another, not by co-operation with one
another--and it is for this reason presumably that you must "own" as
much of your neighbours' as possible. It is the Turkish conception from
beginning to end.

And it is because these false beliefs prevent the nations of Christendom
acting loyally the one to the other, because each is playing for its own