Universal peace—from a woman's standpoint

by Bertha von Suttner

Transcriber’s Note:

The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

UNIVERSAL PEACE—FROM A WOMAN’S STANDPOINT.

BY BARONESS BERTHA VON SÜTTNER.

I have been requested to write a contribution to these pages with the above title. The subject of Universal Peace occupies my thoughts and actions so completely, and the opportunity of addressing myself to a circle of American readers is so welcome to me, that I was most willing to comply with the wish of the Editor, although I should certainly have chosen another title. For although it is self-evident that everything that a woman writes must be written from a woman’s standpoint, it does not agree with my principles to treat the problem of peace and war exclusively, or even principally, in its relations to the feelings and lives of women. Such relations certainly exist, and it will be of great service to the progress of the peace movement if women, as such, will oppose the institution hateful to mothers, and if women’s associations (as daily occurs more often) will place the questions of peace and arbitration on the order of the day at their meetings. But I believe that more and more women, who reflect upon this important subject, will leave the specifically feminine standpoint, to judge of this, so eminently the universal concern of humanity, from a more general point of view. It is only too natural that women should hate war, which robs them of the support and the joys of their existence, and for that very reason until to-day this hatred has done nothing towards the struggle against war; on the contrary, only such women as could triumph over their natural feelings of abhorrence, who, putting aside their own grief, could incite to war, or even themselves perform warlike deeds, only such women were brought into prominence by history; only these were praised, because, overcoming their egoism, they had performed their duty by performing brave deeds of sacrifice.

Women who cry, “War must cease because we suffer from it, because we may lose our dearest by it,” these, so long as war was looked upon as natural and serviceable to the fatherland, certainly stood morally lower than those who said: “What matters our misery, the common weal comes first;” or those who bade their sons: “Return home victorious or dead.”

Any opposition arising from particular interests, whether it be the interest of rank, class or sex, is deficient in ethical causes, and has therefore also no ethical efficacy. The great influence that women are beginning to exert to-day on questions of social progress, arises from the fact that they have stepped out from their limited sphere of sex, and have learned to judge these questions in their importance to universal humanity. The woman who was capable of becoming an enthusiast for war and joyfully sacrificing to it the supporter of her home and her beloved sons, certainly stood higher than she who was wanting in such powers of sacrifice; but on a far higher level stands the woman who opposes war, not because it threatens her home, but because she has comprehended that it is an evil for the whole human race. Not because they are daughters, wives, and mothers, do modern women wish to undermine the institution called war, but they do it because they are the rational moiety of a humanity that is becoming rational, and comprehend that war represents a check to the development of culture, and that from every standpoint—the moral and the economical, the religious and the philosophical—it is harmful and to be condemned. The New Woman alone will work successfully for the abolition of war. The woman of yesterday, in spite of isolated complaints and warnings, did the contrary: she incited silently or aloud to war—silently, by the admiration which she cherished for heroism, and the pleasure which she found in uniforms; aloud, by direct encouragement to fight.

The following episode has been related to me. It was before the Polish insurrection, in the year 1863. In the house of an aristocratic lady the élite of Warsaw society were invited to dinner. After the meal, in the smoking-room, the gentlemen were talking over the political situation. The leaders of the subsequent insurrection were among those present. The question was seriously discussed, whether it was possible to enter upon a movement of insurrection with any prospect of success. The conclusion was arrived at that under the existing circumstances such a movement would be hopeless, and would only result in bloody massacre and increased severity instead of deliverance, all agreeing that the plans for a rising must be given up, at least for the moment. Nothing was to be said to the ladies of this resolve on returning to the drawing-room, for it would certainly incur their disapproval. One of the gentlemen, however, was faithless to this resolution. He let the secret out. “What! not possible!” cried the women in chorus. “That can only be a jest—no Pole is capable of such cowardice! Who could propose anything so disgraceful?” “Of course it was only a jest,” agreed the others, who would have found the contempt of the women intolerable, and on the following day the revolution, which resulted so unfortunately for Poland, was set in motion by the same men who had resolved among themselves not to attempt a rising, but who could not endure to displease their wives.

One may presuppose that among the many motives which in the future will work against militarism and war, the following powerful motive will be found: the change in women’s favor. When once a higher reward of love is granted to men for the heroic deeds of peace than for those of war, when they know that they will only earn the admiration of the best women by working for the new ideals of justice; and, on the contrary, will arouse the abhorrence of noble women by supporting the system of force, then one of the strongest motives which now drive young men into the profession of arms will be overcome. The true and most important connection between the woman’s question and the peace question is this: the realization of the ideals of peace presupposes that the whole of humanity should rise to a higher level than that upon which it now stands in an overwhelming majority. In order that the element of force and oppression, which governs the history of society in the past and in the present, should yield to the element of right and freedom, a higher type of man must be evolved. We are now witnessing this evolution. It is, however, not apparent only in one sphere, but in many at the same time, and especially strongly in the sphere of the women’s movement. To the attainment of the ideal towards which modern endeavors are moving, the unimpeded development is necessary of all mental germs in the whole human race. None of the gifts shared by all may be suppressed by reason of supposed unsuitability to the race, or class, or even sex; and the virtues, the larger diffusion of which is to characterize the new type, must be no longer divided into two halves; gentleness and moderation on the feminine, courage and intellectual power on the masculine, side.

No; every person will have to exhibit these virtues, no matter to which sex one may belong. Just as at the present day there are many common qualities, without which neither woman nor man can lay claim to esteem, such as honesty, cleanliness, diligence, love of truth, sense of duty, in the same manner does the new ideal of perfection exact all human virtues from all human beings at the same time. With the removal of other privileges those of crime must also cease, and man shall no longer pride himself on his excesses. Courage, that model virtue, first of the lion, then of the savage, then of the hero, lastly of the soldier always ready for battle, must lose its halo, and must not be practised only by men to the point of contempt of life, but will be required in hours of danger, in life’s difficult situations in a like measure from the perfectly human woman. The human race will not be left alone to the care of woman, but every perfect human being must disdain to be a slave to the pleasure of the senses without love or in treacherous disloyalty. Thus it will happen by the falling of the fetters which one sex has borne so long, that not it alone, but also the other will rise to a higher human dignity. Exactly the contrary will take place of what is dreaded by the opponents of the emancipation of women: the woman will not assume gross masculine defects, the man will not sink into womanish effeminacy, but both united, among them the best, the strongest, and the most intelligent, will form models of a nobler race.