WHO will take issue with the assertion that war is a curse? Has it not been the scourge of mankind since the dawn of human history? In the Bible, the first record of strife appears in the fourth chapter of Genesis, when Cain's envy brings about the murder of his brother.
The steps leading up to this famous fratricide show the insanity of all warfare. Abel had done a better job than Cain. Did Cain rejoice with his brother over the excellence of his work? He did not. Did he resolve to profit by his brother's good example, and earn for his own labors the commendation given to Abel? He did not. He pouted. He was envious. The Bible record states that he "was very wroth, and his countenance fell. And the Lord said unto Cain, ... If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door" (Gen. 4:5–7). But this sane counsel could not penetrate the barrier of envy which was raised in Cain's mesmerized thought, and there followed the first recorded battle between brothers. In Samuel Butler's "Satire" occurs this wise observation:
"Hence bloody wars at first began,
The artificial plague of man,
That from his own invention rise
To scourge his own iniquities."
