War is the great scavenger of thought. It is the sovereign disinfectant, and its red stream of blood is the Condy’s Fluid that cleans out the stagnant pools and clotted channels of the intellect.... We have awakened from an opium-dream of comfort, of ease, of that miserable poltroonery of “the sheltered life.” Our wish for indulgence of every sort, our laxity of manners, our wretched sensitiveness to personal inconvenience, these are suddenly lifted before us in their true guise as the spectres of national decay; and we have risen from the lethargy of our dilettantism to lay them, before it is too late, by the flashing of the unsheathed sword.
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British |
| Pub Place |
New York |
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Includes essay on "Napoloenic Wars in English Poetry" and also "War Poetry in France"
8vo. 248 pages. Hardcover bound in brown cloth with lettering in gilt. Covers are moderately worn and rubbed with bumps to the corners; spine is slightly darkened. Contents are clean and bright with an ownership signature on the front endpaper.
Inter arma enim silent leges is a Latin phrase meaning "In the face of arms, the law falls mute," although it is more popularly rendered as "In time of war, the laws fall silent." This maxim was likely first written in these words by Cicero in his published oration Pro Milone, although Cicero's actual wording was "Silent enim leges inter arma."
At the time when Cicero used this phrase, mob violence was common. Armed gangs led by thuggish partisan leaders controlled the streets of Rome. Such leaders were nevertheless elected to high offices.
In more modern usage, it has become a watchword about the erosion of civil liberties during wartime.
Edmund Gosse (1849 - 1888) was an English poet and critic. In 1867 he was appointed an assistant librarian in the British Museum, position which he held until 1875. From 1884 to 1890 he was Clark Lecturer in English Literature at Trinity College,
