This must almost raise a doubt as to the correctness of our conception.

But if military history leads to this conclusion when viewed in the mass the latest series of campaigns redeems our position.

The War of the French Revolution shows too plainly its reality, and only proves too clearly its necessity.

In these operations, and especially in the campaigns of Buonaparte, the conduct of War attained to that unlimited degree of energy which we have represented as the natural law of the element.

This degree is therefore possible, and if it is possible then it is necessary.
How could any one in fact justify in the eyes of reason the expenditure of forces in War, if acting was not the object?
The baker only heats his oven if he has bread to put into it; the horse is only yoked to the carriage if we mean to drive; why then make the enormous effort of a War if we look for nothing else by it but like efforts on the part of the enemy?
So much in justification of the general principle; now as to its modifications, as far as they lie in the nature of the thing and are independent of special cases.
There are three causes to be noticed here, which appear as innate counterpoises and prevent the over-rapid or uncontrollable movement of the wheel-work.
The first, which produces a constant tendency to delay, and is thereby a retarding principle, is the natural timidity and want of resolution in the human mind, a kind of inertia in the moral world, but which is produced not by attractive, but by repellent forces, that is to say, by dread of danger and responsibility.
In the burning element of War, ordinary natures appear to become heavier; the impulsion given must therefore be stronger and more frequently repeated if the motion is to be a continuous one.