Page:On War.djvu/11

2 2 ON WAR L^ooK vii. will, therelore, be the complement of om former train of thought ; and it will not infiequently happen that what is said on the attack will throw a new light on the defence. In treating of the attack we shall, of course, very fre- quently have the same subjects before us with which our attention has been occupied in the defence. But we have no intention, nor would it be consistent with the nature of the thing, to adopt the usual plan of works on fortification, and in treating of the attack, to circumvent or upset all that we have found of positive value in the defence, by showing that against every means of defence, there is an infallible method of attack. The defence has its strong points and weak ones ; if the first are even not unsurmountable, still they can only be overcome at a disproportionate price, and that must remain true fiom whatever point of view we look at it, or we get in- volved in a contradiction Further, it is not our intention thoroughly to review the reciprocal action of the means ; each means of defence suggests a means of attack ; but this is often so evident, that there is no occasion to transfer oneself from our standpoint in treating of the defence to a fresh one for the attack, in order to per- ceive it ; the one issues from the other of itself. Our object is, in each subject, to set forth the peculiar relations of the attack, so far as they do not directly come out of the defence, and this mode of treatment must necessarily lead us to many chapters to which there are no corresponding ones in the defence