Page:Popular Works of Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1889) Vol 2.djvu/248

 be better peopled, more rich in all human purposes,—then, without gaining territory, it has gained men as the strength and muscle of its State; and should they have come to it from other States, it has won them from its natural rivals. This is the first peaceful conquest, with which each less powerful State in Christian Europe may commence to work out its own elevation;—for the Christian Europeans are essentially but one people; recognise this common Europe as their one true Fatherland; and, from one end of it to the other, pursue nearly the same purposes, and are actuated by similar motives. They seek Personal Freedom,—Justice, and Laws under which all men shall be equal, and by which all shall be protected without exception or favour; they seek opportunity to earn their subsistence by labour and industry; they seek Religious Toleration for their creeds; Mental Freedom,—that they may think according to their own religious and scientific opinions, express these openly, and form their judgments thereby. Where any one of these elements is awanting, thence they long to depart; where these are secured to them, there they gladly resort. Now all these elements already belong to the necessary purposes of the State as such:—in the present position of individual States towards each other, these purposes are also forced upon it by necessity, and by the care for its own preservation; for the fear of subjugation compels it to self-aggrandizement, and it has, at first, no other means of aggrandizement than that which we have pointed out.

But there is another way by which the State may attract to itself, if not the men of neighbouring States, yet the powers of these men, and may make these powers tributary to itself; and this method plays too important a part in Modern History to be passed over in silence. It consists in a State monopolizing universal Commerce, acquiring exclusive possession of commodities which are generally sought for, and of money, the universal medium