Page:Diplomacy and the Study of International Relations (1919).djvu/42

20 lodgings, rather than bearing swords to fight. It was only gradually that the function of ambassadors broadened out into the conduct of relations, and the maintenance of good relations, between their own States and those to which they were accredited. From the time of the Treaty of Westphalia—the treaty basis of much of the modern history of Europe —that higher and broader function could not be escaped; and it is from that Treaty that the institution of permanent diplomatic representatives became general in Europe. In all the development of diplomacy from Charles VIII’s invasion of Italy in 1494 to the close of the Thirty Years’ War, thence, for a hundred years, to the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, and occasionally, at least, since that Treaty, the leading influence has been exerted by the consideration of the balance of power, with its nice avoidance of a hegemony, and its requirement of guarantees, in principle and in effective force, for the rights and security of the smaller States. The process has been a long and arduous one, tortuous and inconclusive. In shaping its