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Title: Last Message to Mankind Author: Leo Tolstoy Date: 1909 Language: en Topics: speech Source: Original text from http://www.revoltlib.com/?id=10601, 2021.
Address to the Swedish Peace Congress in 1909, published in The Kingdom
of God and Peace Essays (translated by Aylmer Maude)
Dear Brothers,
We have met here to fight against war. War, the thing for the sake of
which all the nations of the earth - millions and millions of people -
place at the uncontrolled disposal of a few men or sometimes only one
man, not merely milliards of rubles, talers, francs or yen (representing
a very large share of their labor), but also their very lives.
And now we, a score of private people gathered from the various ends of
the earth, possessed of no special privileges and above all having no
power over anyone, intend to fight - and as we wish to fight we also
wish to conquer - this immense power not only of one government but of
all governments, which have at their disposal these milliards of money
and millions of soldiers and who are well aware that the exceptional
position of those who for the governments rests on the army alone: the
army which has a meaning and a purpose against which we wish to fight
and which we wish to abolish.
For us to struggle, the forces being so unequal, must appear insane. But
if we consider our opponent's means of strife and our own, it is not our
intention to fight that will seem absurd, but that the thing we mean to
fight will still exist. They have millions of money and millions of
obedient soldiers; we have only one thing, but that is the most powerful
thing in the world - Truth.
Therefore, insignificant as our forces may appear in comparison with
those of our opponents, our victory is as sure as the victory of the
light of the rising sun over the darkness of night.
Our victory is certain, but on one condition only - that when uttering
the truth we utter it all, without compromise, concession, or
modification. The truth so simple, so clear, so evident, so incumbent
not only on Christians but on all reasonable men, that it is only
necessary to speak it out in its full significance for it to be
irresistible.
The truth in its full meaning lies in what was said thousands of years
ago (in the law accepted among us as the Law of God) in four words:
"Thou shalt not kill." The truth is that man may not and should not in
any circumstances or under any pretext kill his fellow man. The truth is
so evident, so binding, and so generally acknowledged, that it is only
necessary to put it clearly before men for the evil called war to become
quite impossible.
And so I think that if we who are assembled here at this Peace Congress
should, instead of clearly and definitely voicing this truth, address
ourselves to the governments with various proposals for lessening the
evils of war or gradually diminishing its frequency, we should be like
men who having in their hand the key to a door, should try to break
through walls they know to be too strong for them.
Before us are millions of armed men, ever more and more efficiently
armed and trained for more and more rapid slaughter. We know that these
millions of people have no wish to kill their fellows and for the most
part do not even know why they are forced to do that repulsive work, and
that they are weary of their position of subjection and compulsion; we
know that the murders committed from time to time by these men are
committed by order of the governments; and we know that the existence of
the governments depends on the armies.
Can we then who desire the abolition of war, find nothing more conducive
to our aim than to propose to the governments which exist only by the
aid of armies and consequently by war - measures which would destroy
war? Are we to propose to the governments that they should destroy
themselves?
The governments will listen willingly to any speeches of that kind,
knowing that such discussions will neither destroy war nor undermine
their own power, but will only conceal yet more effectively what must be
concealed if wars and armies and themselves in control of armies are to
continue to exist.
'But', I shall be told, 'this is anarchism; people never have lived
without governments and States, and therefore governments and States and
military forces defending them are necessary for the existence of
nations.'
But leaving aside the question of whether the life of Christian and
other nations is possible without armies and wars to defend their
governments and States, or even supposing it to be necessary for their
welfare that they should slavishly submit to institutions called
governments (consisting of people they do not personally know), and that
it is necessary to yield up the produce of their labor to these
institutions and fulfill all their demands - including the murder of
their neighbors - granting them all that, there yet remains in our world
an unsolved difficulty.
This difficulty lies in the impossibility of making the Christian faith
(which those who form the governments profess with particular emphasis)
accord with armies composed of Christians trained to slay. However much
you may pervert the Christian teaching, however much you may hide its
main principles, its fundamental teaching is the love of God and one's
neighbor; of God - that is the highest perfection of virtue, and of
one's neighbor - that is all men without distinction.
And therefore it would seem inevitable that we must repudiate one of the
two, either Christianity is love of God and one's neighbor, or the State
with its armies and wars. Perhaps Christianity may be obsolete, and when
choosing between the two - Christianity and love of the State and
murder - the people of our time will conclude that the existence of the
State and murder is more important than Christianity. Perhaps we must
forgo Christianity and retain only what is important: the State and
murder.
That may be so - at least people may think and feel so. But in that case
they should say so! They should openly admit that people in our time
have ceased to believe in what the collective wisdom of mankind has
said, and what is said by the Law of God they profess: have ceased to
believe in what is written indelibly on the heart of each man, and must
now believe only in what is ordered by various people who by accident or
birth have happened to become emperors and kings, or by various
intrigues and elections have become presidents or members of senates and
parliaments - even if those orders include murder. That is what they
ought to say!
But it is impossible to say it; and yet one of these two things has to
be said. If it is admitted that Christianity forbids murder, both armies
and governments become impossible. And if it is admitted that government
acknowledges the lawfulness of murder and denies Christianity, no one
will wish to obey a government that exists merely by its power to kill.
And besides, if murder is allowed in war it must be still more allowable
when a people seek its rights in a revolution. And therefore the
governments, being unable to say either one thing or the other, are
anxious to hid from their subjects the necessity of solving the dilemma.
And for us who are assembled here to counteract the evil of war, if we
really desire to attain our end, only one thing is necessary: namely to
put that dilemma quite clearly and definitely both to those who form
governments and to the masses of the people who compose the army.
To do that we must not only clearly and openly repeat the truth we all
know and cannot help knowing - that man should not slay his fellow man -
but we must also make it clear that no considerations can destroy the
demand made by the truth on people in the Christian world. Therefore I
propose that our Meeting draw up and publish an appeal to all men, and
especially to the Christian nations, in which we clearly and definitely
express what everybody knows, but hardly anyone says: namely war is
not - as most people assume - a good and laudable affair, but that like
all murder, it is a vile and criminal business not only for those who
voluntarily choose a military career but for those who submit to it from
avarice, or fear of punishment.
With regard to those who voluntarily choose a military career, I would
propose to state clearly and definitely that not withstanding all the
pomp, glitter, and general approval with which it is surrounded, it is a
criminal and shameful activity; and that the higher the position a man
holds in the military profession the more criminal and shameful his
occupation.
In the same way with regard to men of the people who are drawn into
military service by bribes or by threats of punishments, I propose to
speak clearly about the gross mistake they make - contrary to their
faith, morality and common sense - when they consent to enter the army;
contrary to their faith because when they enter the ranks of murderers
contrary to the Law of God which they acknowledge; contrary to morality,
because for pay or from fear of punishment they agreed to what in their
souls they know to be wrong; and contrary to common sense, because if
they enter the army and war breaks out they risk having to suffer any
consequences, bad or worse than those they are threatened with if they
refuse. Above all they act contrary to common sense in that they join
that caste of people which deprives them of freedom and compels them to
be soldiers.
With reference to both classes I propose in this appeal to express
clearly the thought that for men of true enlightenment, who are
therefore free from the superstition of military glory, (and their
number is growing every day) the military profession and calling not
withstanding all the efforts to hide its real meaning, is as shameful a
business as the executioner's and even more so. For the executioner only
holds himself in readiness to kill those who have been adjudged to be
harmful and criminal, while a soldier promises to kill all who he is
told to kill, even though they may be the dearest to him or the best of
men.
Humanity in general, and our Christian humanity in particular, has
reached a stage of such acute contradiction between its moral demands
and the existing social order, that a change has become inevitable, and
a change not in society's moral demand which are immutable, but in the
social order which can be altered. The demand for a different social
order, evoked by that inner contradiction which is so clearly
illustrated by our preparations for murder, becomes more and more
insistent every year and every day.
The tension which demands that alteration has reached such a degree
that, just as sometimes only a slight shock is required to change a
liquid into a solid body, so perhaps with a slight effort or even a
single word may be needed to change the cruel and irrational life of our
time - with its divisions, armaments and armies - into a reasonable life
in keeping with the consciousness of contemporary humanity.
Every such effort, every such word, may be the shock which will
instantly solidify the super cooled liquid. Why should not our gathering
be the shock?
In Andersen's fairy tale, when the King went in triumphal procession
through the streets of the town and all the people were delighted with
his beautiful new clothes, a word from a child who said what everybody
knew but had not said, changed everything. He said: 'He has nothing on!'
and the spell was broken, and the king became ashamed and all those who
had been assuring themselves that they saw him wearing beautiful new
clothes perceived that he was naked! We must say the same. We must say
what everybody knows but does not venture to say. We must say that by
whatever name people may call murder - murder always remains murder and
a criminal and shameful thing. And it is only necessary to say that
clearly, definitely, and loudly, as we can say it here, and men will
cease to see what they thought they saw, and will see what is really
before their eyes.
They will cease to see the service for their country, the heroism of
war, military glory, and patriotism, and will see what exists: the
naked, criminal business of murder!
And if people see that, the same thing will happen as in the fairy tale:
those who do the criminal thing will feel ashamed, and those who assure
themselves that they do not see the criminality of murder will perceive
it and cease to be murderers.
But how will nations defend themselves against their enemies, how will
they maintain internal order, and how can nations live without an army?
What form of life men will take after they repudiate murder we do not
and cannot know; but one thing is certain: that it is more natural for
men to be guided by reason and conscience with which they are endowed,
than to submit slavishly to people who arrange wholesale murders; and
that therefrom the form of social order assumed by the lives of those
who are guided in their actions not by violence based on threats of
murder, but by reason and conscience, will in any case be no worse than
that under which they now live.
That is all I want to say. I shall be sorry if it offends or grieves
anyone or evokes any ill feeling. But for me, a man eighty years old,
expecting to die at any moment, it would be shameful and criminal not to
speak out the whole truth as I understand it - the truth which, as I
firmly believe, is alone capable of relieving mankind from the
incalculable ills produced by war.