his own, a man ought to take account of the universal welfare, and not
allow his survey to be limited by the interest, or supposed interest,
of his own group or nation.

So long as national feeling exists, it is very important that each
nation should be self-governing as regards its internal affairs.
Government can only be carried on by force and tyranny if its subjects
view it with hostile eyes, and they will so view it if they feel that
it belongs to an alien nation. This principle meets with difficulties
in cases where men of different nations live side by side in the same
area, as happens in some parts of the Balkans. There are also
difficulties in regard to places which, for some geographical reason,
are of great international importance, such as the Suez Canal and the
Panama Canal. In such cases the purely local desires of the
inhabitants may have to give way before larger interests. But in
general, at any rate as applied to civilized communities, the
principle that the boundaries of nations ought to coincide with the
boundaries of states has very few exceptions.

This principle, however, does not decide how the relations between
states are to be regulated, or how a conflict of interests between
rival states is to be decided. At present, every great state claims
absolute sovereignty, not only in regard to its internal affairs but
also in regard to its external actions. This claim to absolute
sovereignty leads it into conflict with similar claims on the part of
other great states. Such conflicts at present can only be decided by
war or diplomacy, and diplomacy is in essence nothing but the threat
of war. There is no more justification for the claim to absolute
sovereignty on the part of a state than there would be for a similar
claim on the part of an individual. The claim to absolute sovereignty