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Anti-war essays, poems, short stories and literary excerpts
British writers on peace and war
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George Berkeley
From Thoughts on Alliances in War
[It] cannot be denied that one party may, without consent of the rest, break off from an alliance in war originally founded on honourable motives, upon conviction that the ends for which the war was begun are sufficiently answered; although his allies, whether blinded by passion or finding their advantage in carrying on the war, should not concur with him in the same judgment. For it is no excuse for a man acting against his conscience that he made a bargain to do so. You’ll demand what must be thought in case it was a fundamental article of the alliance, that no one party should hearken to proposals of peace without consent of the rest. I answer that any such engagement is in and of itself absolutely void, for as much as it is sinful, and what no Prince or State can lawfully enter into, it being in effect no less than binding themselves to the commission of murder, rapine, sacrilege, and of violence, so long as it shall seem good…
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