Pindar's words are: γλυκὑ δ' ἁπεἱροισι πὁλεμοϛ. [glyky d' apeiroisi polemos].
Concrete or abstract, there are general resemblances between any two wars, and so war lends itself readily to allegories. Every one has read Bunyan's Holy War. Not every one has read Spangenberg's Grammatical War. It is an ingenious performance, which fell into my hands many years after I had gone forth to see and to feel what war was like. In Spangenberg's Grammatical War the nouns and the verbs are the contending parties. Poeta is king of the nouns, and Amo king of the verbs. There is a regular debate between the two sovereigns. The king of the verbs summons the adverbs to his help, the king of the nouns the pronouns. The camps are pitched, the forces marshalled. The neutral power, participle, is invoked by both parties, but declines to send open assistance to either, hoping that in this contest between noun and verb the third party will acquire the rule over the whole territory of language. After a final summons on the part of the king of the verbs, and a fierce response from the rival monarch, active hostilities begin. We read of raids and forays. Prisoners are treated with contumely, and their skirts are docked as in the Biblical narrative. Treachery adds excitement to the situation. Skirmishes precede the great engagement, in which the nouns are worsted, though they have come off with some of the spoils of war; and peace is made on terms dictated by Priscian, Servius, and Donatus. Spangenberg's Grammatical War is a not uninteresting, not uninstructive squib, and the salt of it, or saltpetre of it, has not all evaporated after the lapse of some three centuries. There are bits that remind one of the Greco-Turkish war of a few weeks ago.
Terror and Affright, Il. 15, 19: ὡϛ φἁτο καἱ ῥ ἱππουϛ κἑλετο Δεἱμὁν τε Φὁβον τε | ζευγνὑμεν [hôs phato kai rh' hippous keleto Deimon te Phobon te | zeugnymen]. These horses of Ares furnished the names Deimos and Phobos for the two satellites of the planet Mars. Such traces of familiarity with the classics are refreshing to one who lives in an age when allusion is under the ban. How many appreciate the appropriateness of the Baltimore County Timonium, named after Mark Antony's growlery in Plutarch? Not many of the sports who some years ago laid their bets on Irex recalled the line of the Odyssey 13, 86:
οὑδἑ κεν ἱρηξ
κἱρκοϛ ὁμαρτἡσειεν ἑλαφρὁτατοϛ πετεηνὡν.
[oude ken irêx
kirkos homartêseien elaphrotatos peteênôn.]
But there is no military science in Bunyan's Holy War nor in Spangenberg's Grammatical War: why should there be? Practical warfare is rough work. To frighten, to wound, to kill,—these three abide under all forms of military doctrine, and the greatest of these is frightening. Ares, the god of war, has two satellites, Terror and Affright. Fear is the Gorgon's head. The serpents are very real, very effective, in their way, but logically they are unessential tresses. The Gorgon stares you out of countenance, and that suffices. The object is the removal of an obstacle. Killing and wounding are but means to an end. Hand-to-hand fighting is rare, and it would be easy to count the instances in which cavalry meets the shock of cavalry. Crossing sabres is not a common pastime in the red game of war. It makes a fine picture, to be sure, the finer for the rarity of the thing itself.
To frighten, to wound, to kill, being the essential processes, war amounts to the same thing the world over, world of time and world of space. Whether death or disability comes by Belgian ball or Spencer bullet, by the stone of a Balearic slinger, by a bolt from a crossbow, is a matter of detail which need not trouble the philosophic mind, and the ancients showed their sense in ascribing fear to divine inspiration.