Page:The Rise of the Swiss Republic (1892).djvu/14

viii hastening the triumph of the common people over the privileged few, and turning great world-tendencies definitely toward democracy! How the victories of the peasantry at Morgarten and Sempach, where the flower of Austrian chivalry was utterly defeated, lighted up the gloom which brooded over the serfs of the middle ages! How Zwingli and Calvin strove to emancipate the human conscience from ecclesiastical tradition, and how such men as Lavater, Rousseau, and Pestalozzi, each after his own fashion, laid the foundation for that great study of humanity which has distinguished our own century!

The issue constantly at stake, throughout the history of the Swiss Confederation, has been one of the noblest and the most persistent with which human nature has had to grapple—the question of self-government. In these days Switzerland has become the standard-bearer in all reforms which make for direct democracy and pure politics. Her historical development ought, therefore, to be fully known and duly appreciated by American scholars.