The Netherlands were preëminently fitted to carry on great commercial pursuits by virtue of their geographical situation and long combat and association with the sea. Possessing the natural outlet to a great part of Europe, it was reasonable that the Netherlands should play an important part in the Hanseatic League, and that her fleets should trade on every sea and her coffers be enriched by barter in the produce of every clime. It was a golden age for the Lowlands, from 1350 to 1625, for their trade made them one of the wealthiest and most important nations in the world. Their situation between the trading countries of the South and the North made them, as it were, the commercial exchange of Europe. The consequent wealth could not lie dormant, therefore much of it was used in building notable architectural structures, encouraging Painting, and developing the then infant art of Music. It is unnecessary to mention the famous structures which were the result of this period, and it is but necessary to name Hubert Van Eyck, Rubens, Van Dyck, to understand the prominence given to the art of Painting by the acquisition of this enormous wealth. And it is largely due to this commercial activity that the school of the Netherlands attained such an undying fame. One other influence, and that dependent on commercial activity, produced great results. Art is not sectional, it is universal; and great art works are produced not by local influences but by association, or contact, with the world. For this reason, the intercourse with the entire world generated by the great commercial activity of the times produced the first great world School of Music. Intercourse developed emotion and produced broader and less localized view-points of life: it brought into close association the art life of different nations and infused a unity of emotion wherever it occurred. In short, Music, by being brought into contact with the ideas of the world instead of a local association, took on a universal form and feeling never before felt and never to be relinquished. For this reason, Music unconsciously advanced from Paris to the Netherlands, toward the greater sphere of influence, stopping for only a short period with the Gallo-Belgic school, where it was prepared technically for its new growth as a world form.