[92] Erasmi Adagia, Chil. III. Cent. VII. Prov. 1: Scarabæus aquilam quærit. Hallam, Literature of Europe, Part I. ch. 4. sec. 43, 44.
[93] If countenance were needed in thus exposing a pernicious maxim, I might find it in the German philosopher Kant, whose work on Perpetual Peace treats it with very little respect. (Kant, Sämmtliche Werke, Band VII., Zum Ewigen Frieden, § 1.) Since this Oration, Sir Robert Peel and the Earl of Aberdeen, each Prime Minister of England, and practically conversant with the question, have given their valuable testimony in the same direction. Life has its surprises; and I confess one in my own, when the latter, in conversation on this maxim, most kindly thanked me for what I had said against it.
[94] Address before the American Peace Society, pp. 23, 24.
[95] Scholars will remember the incident recorded by Homer in the Odyssey (XIV. 30, 31), where Ulysses, on reaching his loved Ithaca, is beset by dogs, described as wild beasts in ferocity, who rush towards him barking; but he, with craft (that is the word of Homer), seats himself upon the ground and lets his staff fall from his hand. A similar incident is noticed by Mr. Mure, in his entertaining travels in Greece, and also by Mr. Borrow, in his "Bible in Spain." Pliny remarks, that all dogs may be appeased in the same way: "Impetus eorum et sævitia mitigatur ab homine considente humi." Nat. Hist., Lib. VIII. cap. 40.
[96] Book XXIV.
[97] Liv., Lib. V. cap. 41. Plutarch, Life of Camillus.
[98] Moffat, Missionary Labors and Scenes in Southern Africa, Ch. 32.
[99] "Ille regit dictis animos et pectora mulcet."
Æneid, I. 146-154.
[100] Guizot, Histoire de la Civilisation en France, Tom. II. p. 36.