Modern war is so expensive that we feel trade to be a better avenue to plunder; but modern man inherits all the innate pugnacity and all the love of glory of his ancestors. Showing war’s irrationality and horror is of no effect upon him. The horrors make the fascination. War is the strong life; it is life in extremis; war-taxes are the only ones men never hesitate to pay; as the budgets of all nations show us.

William James (1842-1910) American psychologist and philosopher

Essay (1910-02), “The Moral Equivalent of War,” Popular Science Monthly, Vol. 77 (1910-10)
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