Page:The Science of History and the Hope of Mankind.djvu/49



lands and the decadence of the Spanish Habsburgs, so also the Revolution of 1688 which led to the dethronement of James II. and the establishment of constitutional monarchy in England was only one of the indirect and accidental consequences of those series of European movements which were organised against the absolute Cæsaropapism of Louis XIV., le grand monarque of France, through the instrumentality of his personal rival, William Prince of Orange.

This "glorious Revolution" was not effected in England in the interest of herself and through the heroism of Englishmen alone, but was simply a means to the ends of a foreign hero. The European situation had come to such a pass that even the Pope of Rome had to accept liberal tendencies