January 1sts (Who Can Tell?)

1/1/1898

(William James Correspondence)

To F. W. H. Myers:

“...Well, our countries will soon be soaked in each other’s gore. You will be disemboweling me, and Hodgson cleaving Lodge’s skull. It will be a war of extermination when it comes, for neither side can tell when it is beaten, and the last man will bury the penultimate one, and then die himself....Both will unite against the Germans, and no one can foretell the end....Everyone goes about now saying war is not to be. But with these volcanic forces who can tell? I suppose that the offices of Germany or Italy might in any case, however, save us from what would be the worst disaster to civilization that our time could bring forth.”   

[Interesting: If social media existed in 1898, this would not be un-contemporaneous].

1/1/2009

New year and a new war between Israel and Gaza. The only thing missing from the cauldron of world affairs is a world war.