To deal with the true causes of war one must begin by recognizing as of prime relevancy to the solution of the problem the familiar fact that civilization is a partial, incomplete, and, to a great extent, superficial modification of barbarism.
Interpretation
Civilization is merely an advanced form of human behavior that still contains underlying primitive instincts.
Elihu Root’s quote suggests that in order to truly address the root causes of war, one must understand that civilization is not fundamentally different from barbarism; rather, it is an alteration of it. He emphasizes that the complexities of human society can often mask deeper, inherent tendencies towards conflict and primal behavior, which must be acknowledged to find viable solutions to war.
In practice
During a lecture on international relations, one might use this quote to highlight the historical roots of conflict.
The methods of peace propaganda which aim at establishing peace doctrine by argument and by creating a feeling favorable to peace in general seem to fall short of reaching the springs of human action and of dealing with the causes of the conduct which they seek to modify.
It is not uncommon in modern times to see governments straining every nerve to keep the peace, and the people whom they represent, with patriotic enthusiasm and resentment over real or fancied wrongs, urging them forward to war.
Oft expectation fails, and most oft there where most it promises; and oft it hits where hope is coldest, and despair most fits.
Because you see when a new baby laughs for the first time a new fairy is born, and as there are always new babies there are always new fairies. They live in nests on the tops of trees; and the mauve ones are boys and the white ones are girls, and the blue ones are just little sillies who are not sure what they are.
Potentially evil. Potentially good, too, I suppose. Just this huge powerful potentiality waiting to be shaped.
A monomaniac is a sick person whose mentality is perfectly healthy in all respects but one; he has a single flaw, clearly localized. At times, for example, he has an unreasonable and absurd desire to drink or steal or use abusive language; but all his other acts and all his other thoughts are strictly correct.
Your mind makes out the orange by seeing it, hearing it, touching it, smelling it, tasting it and thinking about it but without this mind, you call it, the orange would not be seen or heard or smelled or tasted or even mentally noticed, it's actually, that orange, depending on your mind to exist! Don't you see that? By itself it's a no-thing, it's really mental, it's seen only of your mind. In other words it's empty and awake.
It is possible that mankind is on the threshold of a golden age; but, if so, it will be necessary first to slay the dragon that guards the door, and this dragon is religion.
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