Page:Diplomacy and the Study of International Relations (1919).djvu/209



The Utopians thought that leagues are useless things, and that, if the common ties of human nature do not knit men together, the faith of promises will not be of great effect on them: the partnership of human nature, that which is of all men and for all men, is instead of a league.

But the contribution made by Rousseau, and partly by Saint-Pierre through him, to the promulgation of projects of Perpetual Peace has been so influential, and subsequent contributors have added so little of positive value, that a more explicit account of what he said and how he reasoned, may be allowed and may be of use.

The imperfections of governments, Rousseau argued, are due less to their constitution than to their external relations. The greater part of the care which ought to be devoted to internal administration and welfare is withheld owing to the need of mere external security; not the perfecting of itself,