geographical configurations of the Continent. Among them France and
England had the advantage. They gained their unity as nations earlier
than any other countries of the West--England in a form which has lasted
substantially unaltered for six hundred years. Spain, which had been
torn asunder by the Moors, was not consolidated fully till the end of
the fifteenth century, in time to send the last of the crusaders under
Columbus in quest of fresh worlds to conquer across the Atlantic. But
Italy and Germany--and especially the latter--remained disintegrated
until our own time. Both gained their union about the same time, fifty
years ago, but by different methods and in a different spirit. Italy,
naturally a compact geographical unit, was welded by a democratic
enthusiasm, of which Cavour and Mazzini were the soul and Garibaldi the
right arm. Germany, vast in power and numbers, lay strongly entrenched
in the central area of the Continent, but failed to kindle into national
life at the same democratic moment. She was fashioned into political
existence by a Thor's hammer, which, as it rose and fell, dealt
shattering blows on friends as well as foes, in Austria as well as
France, on Danes and Poles, on Liberals and Socialists, on little kings
and great ecclesiastics. And now this Frankenstein creation among states
offers the most serious problem in adjusting national claims with
European unity. We have to check and to assimilate--if the world is to
live as one--the one Power which has hitherto developed most
persistently and successfully its own resources, but least in
subordination to the interests of the whole.

There are those who would regard all national barriers and organization
as somewhat of an obstruction, who would prefer a simple
internationalism to the world as we know it, with its pent-up passions
and attachments, its constant liability to explosion, its slow progress
by tortuous channels towards the larger view and the surer hold. Many