Admiral Mahan, it is true, anticipates this criticism by pleading the complex character of human nature (which no one denies). He says: "Bronze is copper, and bronze is tin." But he entirely overlooks the fact that if one withholds copper or one withholds tin it is no longer bronze. The present author has never taken the ground that all international action can be explained in the terms of one narrow motive, but he does take the ground that if you can profoundly modify the bearing of a constituent, as important as the one to which Admiral Mahan has himself, in his own work, attributed such weight, you will profoundly modify the whole texture and character of international relations. Thus, even though it were true that the thesis here elaborated were as narrowly economic as the criticism I have quoted would imply, it would, nevertheless, have, on Admiral Mahan's own showing, a very profound bearing on the problems of international statecraft.
Not only do the principles elaborated here postulate no such narrow conception of human motive, but it is essential to realize that you cannot separate a problem of interest from a problem of right or morality in the absolute fashion that Admiral Mahan would imply, because right and morality connote the protection and promotion of the general interest.
A nation, a people, we are given to understand, have higher motives than money or "self-interest." What do we mean when we speak of the money of a nation, or the self-interest of a community? We mean--and in such a discussion as this can mean nothing else--better conditions for the great mass of the people, the fullest possible lives, the abolition or attenuation of poverty and of narrow circumstances; that the millions shall be better housed and clothed and fed, more capable of making provision for sickness and old age, with lives prolonged and cheered--and not merely this, but also that they shall be better educated, with character disciplined by steady labor and a better use of leisure; a general social atmosphere which shall make possible family affection, individual dignity and courtesy and the graces of life, not only among the few, but among the many.
Now, do these things constitute, as a national policy, an inspiring aim, or not? They are, speaking in terms of communities, pure self-interest--bound up with economic problems, with money. Does Admiral Mahan mean us to take him at his word when he would attach to such efforts the same discredit that one implies in talking of a mercenary individual? Would he have us believe that the typical great movements of our time--Socialism, Trades Unionism, Syndicalism, Insurance Acts, Land Reforms, Old Age Pensions, Charity Organization, improved Education--bound up as they all are with economic problems--are not the objects which, more and more, are absorbing the best activities of Christendom?