XVI. PROBLEMS OF THE CARIBBEAN
XVII. WORLD RELATIONSHIPS
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE



THE PATH OF EMPIRE


CHAPTER I. The Monroe Doctrine

In 1815 the world found peace after twenty-two years of continual
war. In the forests of Canada and the pampas of South America,
throughout all the countries of Europe, over the plains of Russia
and the hills of Palestine, men and women had known what war was
and had prayed that its horrors might never return. In even the
most autocratic states subjects and rulers were for once of one
mind: in the future war must be prevented. To secure peace
forever was the earnest desire of two statesmen so strongly
contrasted as the impressionable Czar Alexander I of Russia,
acclaimed as the "White Angel" and the "Universal Savior," and
Prince Metternich, the real ruler of Austria, the spider who was
for the next thirty years to spin the web of European secret
diplomacy. While the Czar invited all governments to unite in a
"Holy Alliance" to prevent war, Metternich for the same purpose
formed the less holy but more powerful "Quadruple Alliance" of
Russia, Prussia, Austria, and England.

The designs of Metternich, however, went far beyond the mere
prevention of war. To his mind the cause of all the upheavals