European settlement

“ Three quarters of a century have not yet passed since the United States ceased to be mere dependencies of England. And even if we date their origin from the period, when the first permanent European settlements, out of which they grew, were made on the western coast of the North Atlantic, the increase of their strength is unparalleled, either in rapidity or extent. ”

“ In middle Europe, during the twelve years between 1859 and 1871, the three Powers whose national unity, racially as well as politically, was already achieved at the time of the Congress of Vienna, were brought face to face with three new Powers, united Germany, united Italy, and the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary.
The nineteenth century has been called the age of European colonization. Europe began to follow its commerce with other continents by the imposition of its civilization and its political system upon weaker races. ”

“ All sorts of complications have arisen out of permission granted to Europeans to settle in the country: it depends on the European; he does something foolish, and legal or social or religious difficulties arise, and a storm in a teacup may end in serious dispute and a heavy indemnity to pay. ”

“ All that makes Europe Europe, all that parts off Europe from Africa and Asia, has been carried into America and Australia and Africa itself. The growth of this new Europe, no less than the changes of the old, is an essential part of European geography. ♦Barbarian dominion.♦ It is otherwise with territories, great or small, which have been occupied by England and other European powers merely for military or commercial purposes. Forts, factories, or empires, on barbarian soil, where no new European nation is likely ever to grow up, are not cases of true colonization ”

“ We have then traced the shiftings of the powers which lay wholly or partly beyond the bounds of either Empire, the great Slavonic mainland, the Scandinavian and the Iberian peninsulas, ending with that which is geographically the most isolated land of all, the other world of Britain. We have seen too how Europe may be said to have spread herself beyond her geographical limits in the foundation of new European states beyond the Ocean. ”

“ In contrast with these giant empires, the nation-states of Europe felt themselves out of scale, just as the Italian cities in the sixteenth century must have felt themselves out of scale in comparison with the new nation-states of Spain and France. To achieve the standard of the world-state, to make their own nations the controlling factors in wide dominions which should include territories and populations of varied types, became the ambition of the most powerful European states. A new political ideal had captivated the mind of Europe. ”

“ Spain, Portugal, England, France, Holland, Russia: these are the great imperial powers, and they are also the great nation-states. Denmark and Sweden have played a more modest part, in extra-European as in European affairs. Germany and Italy only began to conceive imperial ambitions after their tardy unification in the nineteenth century. Austria, which has never been a nation-state, never became a colonising power. Nationalism, then, with its eagerness for dominion, may be regarded as the chief source of imperialism ”

“ In some cases two European nations or a European nation and some other European population have been brought under a single government: in other cases a European nation has expanded by the foundation of colonies far away from its original abode: and yet again in some cases a European state has conquered a host of non-European peoples and formed them into a heterogeneous empire dependent on itself. ”

“ As a fact of history, we know that the former of these systems of relation between Europe and the outlying continents did prevail until the present century. It is not extinct yet. Spain to a considerable degree and France to a less degree still cling to the notion of dependent colonies as things worth having for what the mother country, in antagonism to their own interest and certainly in antagonism to that of any other European nation, can get out of them. ”

“ The men who planted Greater Britain, if so we are to call it, like the men who planted Greater Portugal, Greater Spain, or Greater France, were subjects of kingdoms. There is but one exception. The colonies of the United Netherlands were26 colonies planted by a commonwealth, and of all European colonies they have departed most widely from the old Greek model. But though colonies of a commonwealth, though colonies of a commonwealth in which cities played the chief part, they could hardly be called colonies of cities. ”

“ The intermingling of peoples and the difference of tradition between town and country over wide areas are in part the cause of this, but it has also been suggested that, in the east of Europe, we have still surviving an earlier stage of the process of settlement in the cleared forest than farther west, while in the south-east {89} we note the persistence of elements still hardly settled at all. ”

“ We have contrasted the different positions and destinies of the colonizing European powers—where, as in the days of Old Rome, a continuous territory has been extended over neighbouring barbarian lands—where growth beyond the sea was the natural outcome of growth at home—where European powers have colonized and conquered simply of their own free will. In thus tracing the historical geography of Europe, we have made the round of the world. But we have never lost sight of Europe; we have never lost sight of Rome. ”

“ A translation of “Mittel-Europa,” a German work outlining a plan for a permanent union of the Central European nations. “The nucleus of the organization is to consist of the German empire and Austria-Hungary. To this nucleus will be added the Balkans, Turkey, and the present neutral states to the north of the empire. Thus a combination will be effected that comprises a great stretch of territory through the heart of Europe, binding the members together with ties of common interest. At the same time the enemies of the empire will be separated. ”

“ Extension over barbarian lands was not a necessity, as in the case of Russia, nor did it spring naturally out of earlier circumstances, as in the case of Portugal. But the colonizing enterprise of England has done a greater work than the colonizing enterprise of any other European power. The greatest colony of England—for in a worthier use of language the word colony would imply independence rather than dependence [93] —is that great Confederation which is to us what Syracuse was to Corinth, what Milêtos was to Athens, what Gades and Carthage were to the cities of the older Canaan. ”

“ In this way, European integration emerged as part of the solution to the problem of ‘Europe’ in a world where Europe had been irrevocably deprived of its status as the only place of ‘civilisation’, and hence, sovereignty. ”

“ Is it, then, possible, when considering the lines of settlement, to lay down any general principles? The Europe which we have known has gone beyond recall; the new Europe which is coming to birth will be scarcely recognisable to those who have known its predecessor. Its political, racial, social, economic outlook will be radically changed. Let us then meet fate halfway and admit boldly that we want a new Europe. ”

“ The trading cities of medieval Europe, the emerging nations of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the colonizing empires of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and the industrial European empires of the nineteenth century devoted their energies increasingly to expanding into new territory, occupying and exploiting it, and fighting the wars which pock-marked the ceaseless struggle for pelf and power. ”

“ Since the sixteenth century the European States have been contending for mastery, not only over one another, but over the world. Colonial empires have risen and fallen. Portugal, Spain, Holland, in turn have won and lost. ”

“ But when they grew stronger and more numerous, they began to extend their territories; and, as it is natural for men to seek their own convenience, the desire of more fertile and agreeable habitations tempted them southward. There is land enough to the north and west of their settlements, which they may occupy with as good right as can be shown by the other European usurpers, and which neither the English nor Spaniards will contest; but of this cold region, they have enough already, and their resolution was to get a better country. ”

“ Matter of speculation might be found in raising the question whether it would have fared better or worse for the natives had only a single one of the European nationalities at the time maintained the exclusive right of commerce, conquest, and occupancy on the new continent. ”

“ In the southern states many of the concessions given to railway companies carried colonization clauses as a continuation of 159the deliberate, thoroughly worked out plan of the authorities by which during the nineteenth century settlements were made of Poles, Russians, Swiss, Germans and other European races, with the object of feeding the lines and stimulating agriculture. The European War has checked these plans: settlers from Europe will in all probability be scarce for many years to come, engaged as the racked countries will be in their own rehabilitation. ”

“ It is particularly illustrated by the stipulations of their most important treaties concerning those possessions, and the practice under them, viz., the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, and that of Paris in 1763.”
[Pg 177] The practice of European nations has certainly recognised in the nation which has first occupied the territory of savage tribes, that live by hunting, fishing, and roaming habits, the sole right of acquiring the soil from the natives by purchase, or cession, or conquest, for the purpose of establishing settlements. ”

“ Place should be made for Germany from Berlin to Vienna in the organization of a general European confederation which will give full satisfaction to Italy at Trieste, will install the Turkish Government in Asia, will bring about an agreement between the Christian Balkan States, and give the free disposal of their destinies to Poland, Denmark, Finland, Hungary, Rumania, and Alsace-Lorraine. ”

“ As the natives of these places were tractable and courteous, so they would be made easily subservient and assistant to any European nation that would come to make settlements among them, especially if those European nations treated them with humanity and courtesy ”

“ It is a reasonable conjecture that the general principles of settlement which they at first suggested originated with the more liberal statesmen of Germany and Austria, the men who have begun to feel the force of their own people's thought and purpose, while the concrete terms of actual settlement came from the military leaders who have no thought but to keep what they have got. ”

“ Colonies.—The application of commercial treaties to colonies depends upon the wording of each treaty. The earlier colonial policy of European states was to subordinate colonial interests to those of the mother country, to reserve colonial trade for the mother country, and to abstain from engagements contrary to these general rules. France, Portugal and Spain have adhered in principle to this policy. Germany and Holland have been more liberal. ”

“ We must have real Colonies, where German emigrants can settle and spread the national ideals of the Fatherland, and we must have a fleet and coaling stations to keep together the Colonies which we are bound to acquire. ”

“ Germany and Italy, which were respectively the seats of the Christian empire and the Papal dignity, formed the centre of Europe. Along with these two states, France and England were the most active, the most powerful, and the most influential members of the European commonwealth; while Spain was principally occupied with her own domestic contests against the Saracens. The Scandinavian countries were somewhat connected with the Germanic Empire, and Poland and Hungary, after they had embraced Christianity, were united with that empire in the closest bonds. ”

“ But in the first place we have learnt by a very long experience that in lands inhabited by European settlers, who bring with them European traditions, the only satisfactory solution is to be found in the concession of the fullest self-governing rights, since these settlers are able to use them, and in the encouragement of that sentiment of unity which we call the national spirit. ”

“ The formation of the modern European states system is therefore the main element of continuous interest and importance in the history of the seventeenth century, that is to say, the acquisition by the chief European states of the boundaries, which they have since substantially retained, the adoption by them of the form of government to which they have since adhered, and the assumption by them, relatively to the other states, of a position and influence in the affairs of Europe which they have since enjoyed. ”

“ Even the surprisingly large European colony has historic reasons for tending to divide into so many “nations.” These have little in common with the foreign colonies of Berlin, Paris, or Rome. Not students and people of leisure but merchants and missionaries make up the better part of the family that each embassy presides over in a sense unknown in Western cities. The days are gone by when the protection of the embassies had the literal meaning that once attached to many a garden wall. ”