accident and another is this: You may have accidents any day in your lives and nobody will trouble themselves about them. But a man may have an accidental thought which may just supply what all the people round him are wanting, which will give him that which will reconcile that which seems to be irreconcileable, make practicable that which seems to be impracticable. This is what the historian has to go after. He has to think not merely of what is there, not simply to represent to himself what the people are doing. He has to represent to himself what they want and what the remedy is. And so as he studies the history of any time whatever, he cannot help having his heart warmed towards the men of that time. He sees them wandering about, as blind men wander, seeking an object which they cannot see, and often passing it by as not knowing where it is. In the meanwhile the historian standing, as it were, in a world apart, unable to speak to them, unable to guide them, can nevertheless feel his heart warm to those who are going through this time of trouble. And he rejoices with an exceeding great joy when he sees at last the solution grasped, at last the helping hand taken hold of and that epoch, that period of the world's struggle closed and the time of settlement come. That is the way in which his imagination must work, to see, as I said, not only that which is there but that which is not there. Now, is not this the thing that is needed for those who think about contemporary politics. Are not the men who strive even as their fathers were? Is it not that now as then, the world is a living world? We are moving, we are changing. Every life that drops out, every life that is born, brings a change, not merely of persons, but a certain change, small it may be, but still a certain change of aim, a certain change of purpose. New evils come up, new grievances, new desires to remedy them. We, too, look about and we know not how the remedy is to be found. What, though some will take refuge in saying there is no movement, no need of change, no need of help? What, though many of those who seek for help often fail in applying the true remedy, or attempt to apply one which can give no healing. They may

make errors and mistakes; it is well that they should be criticized; it is well they should bear the searching fire of hostile denunciation. It is well, too, that they should remember that it is only a coming age which will finally judge their efforts. After all, however, he will prove the greatest healer of the evils of the present, who has the truest imaginative conception of the future, and can place themselves as far as it is possible from the weakness of human nature, in the same relation to their own age as that in which the historian stands to the past.

The true statesman, like the true historian, knows that the right remedy is one which will reconcile and not divide, and that those who seek for this are walking in the steps of the greatest men of old. That which history has to teach to the statesman is method. The study of the past has done its work when men have learned from it really to know the present in its entirety, and in some measure to foresee the future. Such a study of history has risen into that higher purer atmosphere, where all sciences and all arts can embrace one another, but if there is one amongst the forms in that translucent air before whom the historian is most inclined to bow his head, it is that Master of the knowledge of humanity, cf whom I have already spokenWilliam Shakspere.

THE RISE OF

MODERN INTERNATIONAL LAW.

BY THE REV. T. J. LAWRENCE.

Among the few books that have changed the history of the world, must be reckoned the great work of Hugo Grotius, De Jure Belli ac Pacis. At the time of its publication a wave of utter lawlessness threatened to overwhelm all the barriers which had hitherto curbed the ambition of rulers and the ferocity of generals. During the middle ages the influence of the Pope and the Emperor had exercised some restraining force. The rudimentary International Law of that period was based upon the notion that there was a common superior over all States, and that his commands were to be obeyed in disputes between subordinate members of the family of nations. The idea had originated in the universal sovereignty of Imperial Rome; and for a long time fact and theory had corresponded exactly. In the palmy days of the Roman Empire disputes between inferior rulers were referred to the Emperor for settlement, and his decision terminated the controversy. International Law, like Municipal Law, was the command of a superior who had power to compel obedience. Its precepts were laws in the strictest sense. They imposed perfect obligations, and were armed with tremendous sanctions. Universal Sovereignty was a great reality. The Majestas Populi Romani became an object of religious reverence; and the Roman State, incarnate in the person of its Cæsar, was worshipped as a God.

After the fall of the Western Empire the theory of universal sovereignty still survived. Just as Greece conquered her con

querors by bringing them into subjection to her arts and her philosophy, so Rome, amid the ruins of her material power, enslaved the minds of the nations who no longer felt her political yoke. Men held that her dominion was to be eternal as well as universal. Though Rome had ceased to be the seat of Empire, still the Empire itself was Roman. It must live on, they thought, in some shape; and so they cast about to find a power which should be a fit possessor of its world-wide sovereignty. At first the only substitute to be found was the decaying Empire of the East; but from the coronation of Charlemagne in the Basilica of St. Peter at Rome, on Christmas Day, A.D. 800, the imperial power, and the universal dominion involved in it, were held to have passed to a new line of Frankish sovereigns. The RomanoGerman Emperors were believed to be the true successors of the Cæsars; and theoretically they possessed all the power of their political ancestors. But their claims were never left entirely unchallenged; and in practice the personal character of each Emperor largely determined the nature and extent of his iufluence. Gradually the Papacy, which had been the chief agent in reviving the Roman Empire, became its rival in pretensions to universal dominion. The pretended donation of Constantine, and the very real spiritual supremacy exercised by the Roman Pontiffs, formed the basis of a claim "To give and to take away empires, kingdoms, princedoms, marquisates, duchies, countships, and the possessions of all men.' And this claim was not an idle boast, as was proved in 1077, when the Emperor Henry IV., the most powerful prince in Europe, humbled himself at Canosa before the great Pope Gregory VII.

The International Law of the middle ages was influenced enormously by these conflicting claims of the Pope and the Emperor. The idea of a common superior still lingered among the nations, and greatly assisted the Roman Pontiffs in their efforts to obtain a suzerainty over all temporal sovereigns. For as the Empire founded

*

Quoted from Gregory VII.'s second sentence of excommunication on the Emperor Henry IV. See Bryce, Holy Roman Empire, Ch. X.

by Charlemagne gradually decreased in extent, till it scarcely extended beyond the limits of Germany, more and more difficulty was felt in ascribing to it universal dominion. Yet no one dreamed of asserting boldly that independent states had no earthly superior; and therefore, when the Papacy came forward with its claims, men's minds were predisposed to accept them. As an arbitrator between states the Pope often exercised great influence for good. In an age of force he introduced into the settlement of international disputes principles of humanity and justice; and had the Roman Curia always acted upon the principles which it invariably professed, its existence as a great court of international appeal would have been an unmixed benefit.

It is needless here to enter upon any discussion of the causes which undermined the authority of the Papacy, and brought about the Reformation. It will be sufficient to point out the bearing of that great series of events upon the generally received theory of international conduct. According to that theory either the Pope, or the Emperor, or both, should have calmed the waves of political and religious strife. But instead, they joined in the turmoil. The Popes, of course, opposed the Reformers; and the Emperors took the same side. Community of religion became a new bond between states. The Protestant Princes of the German Empire were often in arms against the Emperor. His authority was set at naught within the limits of his own dominions; and outside them he had long received nothing more than honorary precedence as the first potentate in Christendom. Thus the notion of a common superior, exercising sovereign rights over all nations, slowly faded away. Practically it had long been obsolete, and after the Reformation it ceased even in theory. New principles were required, unless states were openly to confess that in their mutual dealings they recognized no law but the right of the strongest.

For a time there was undoubtedly a reaction towards this view. In all periods of history great and unscrupulous rulers have acted upon it, and sometimes, like Frederick the Great and