Page:The Science of History and the Hope of Mankind.djvu/46



Take, for example, the declaration of Dutch Independence, which towards the close of the sixteenth century threw a new power into European politics.

The power and prestige of the Spanish Habsburgs, the rulers of the Netherlands, had for a long time been on the wane. The monarchs of France, having consolidated their kingdom, were extending their arms of conquest and expansion, and so came into natural conflict with the Spanish Emperor, over whose dominions the sun never set. The Holy Roman Emperor was a Habsburg, and hence his relative, but had no sympathy with the proselytising Catholicism of the Spanish autocrat. The diplomatic Elizabeth of England also pursued a religious policy which ran directly