LESSON 36 What is war?WHAT is war? I believe that half the people that talk about warhave not the slightest idea what it is. In a short sentenceit may be summed up to be the combination and concentration of all the horrors,atrocities, crimes, and sufferings of which human nature on this globe is capable.But what is even a rumor of war? Is there anybody here who has anything in the funds,or who is the owner of any railway stock; or anybody who has a large stock of raw materialor of manufactured goods? The funds have recently gone down 10 per cent.I do not say that the fall is all on account of this danger of war,but a great proportion of it undoubtedly is. A fall of 10 per cent,and railway stock having gone down 20 per cent, makes a difference of ￡60,000,000take the diminished prosperity and value of manufactures of all kindsduring the last few months, and you will under-state the actual loss to the country nowif you put it down at ￡200,000,000 sterling. But that is merely a rumor of war.That is war a long way off―the small cloud no bigger than a man's hand:what will it be if it comes nearer and becomes a fact?And surely sane men ought to consider whether the case is a good one,the ground fair, the necessity clear, before they drag a nation
第三十六课 战争是什么？战争是什么？我相信在谈论战争的人当中有一半的人对战争的定义没有概念。简单来说，战争可以总结为世界上由人类本性所导致的所有的恐怖、暴行、罪行和苦难的集合。战争的后果又是什么？有谁持有基金吗，或者有谁持有铁路股票吗，或者有谁拥有大量原材料或制成品库存？这些基金最近下跌了10%。我不敢说基金的下跌全由战争所致，但无疑战争是其主要原因。基金下降了10个百分点，in the funds is nearly ￡80,000,000 sterling of value;大概等同于80000000英镑的价值；铁路股票下跌了20%，这将影响该国in the value of the railway property of this country. Add the two―￡140,000,000―and价值60000000英镑的铁路财产。这两项加起来价值在140,000,000英镑，此外再加上过去几个月里各类制造业的萧条和下滑的价值，如果你的估值在200,000,000，那么你可能低估了国家的实际损失。而这仅仅是战争的一个后果，战争是一段漫长的旅程，而这只是大小还未比过手掌的一小朵云：如果战争更近了、爆发了，那么结果会是什么？当然，为了一个所有的欧洲国家都无法长期维持的腐朽而摇摇欲坠的帝国
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