Page:The Slavs among the nations by T G Masaryk.djvu/7

 In spite of the confidence which my dear colleague, M. Denis, has just expressed, a confidence which is certainly not entirely deserved, it will be almost impossible for me to treat in the detail which it deserves so vast, so complex, and so general a subject as “The Slavs among the Nations,” I should have less difficulty were it only a question of expressing the desires and hopes that, as a Slav, I feel for the Slavs, and, in consequence, for France, for the Allies, and for all mankind.

But I have undertaken to give you a concise analysis of all the principal problems met with in the course of a serious study of the Slav world; and in undertaking that task I fear that I can hardly do more than give you a “table of contents” to a general work on the Slavs.

I.—The Slavs among the Nations.—The title alone assumes the existence of some kind of unity between the different Slav nations, and it would seem that the organisers of these lectures also admit this unity. Lectures will be devoted to five different Slav nations and to the Slavs in general. This number of five nations is in itself a programme which I gladly adopt. The five