Alexander : a history of the origin and growth of the art of war from ...

xuPREFACE.and such exertion, mental, moral and physical, as is knownto no one but the commander of a great army in time of war.The simple rests upon the difficult. What is treated of inthis book is not, as a rule, the minutiae, but the larger operations,though details have sometimes to be dwelt on for theirhistorical value. What is difficult to do may be easy to narrate.There is no pretense to make this a military text-book. Itcontains nothing but what the professional soldier alreadyknows. A military text-book is practically useless to the generalreader. Even Jomini acknowledged that he could notmake his books interesting except to ^professionals ; and thereare now enough good text-books accessible to those who wishto study the technical side of war. But it is hoped that thepresentation may commend itself to those military men whosestudies in their peculiar branch of the profession have ledthem in other directions, and who may wish to refresh theirknowledge of Alexander's campaigns, even if they do notagree with all the conclusions reached.It is assumed by some excellent military critics that thereare no lessons to be learned from antiquity. Tliis was notwhat Frederick and Napoleon thought or said. It is certainlydifficult to develop a text-book of the modern sciencefrom ancient campaigns alone ; illustrations and parallelismsmust for the most part be sought in the campaigns ofthe last three centuries. But it will not do to forget thatFrederick's victory at Leuthen was directly due to his knowledgeof Epaminondas' manoeuvre at Leuctra, or that thepassage of the Hydaspes has been the model for the crossingof rivers in the face of the enemy ever since. All gainis bred of the successes and failures of our predecessors inthe art ; it is well to know what these were. While aU theprinciples of the modern science of war are not shown in the