Another fact dates from the same epoch, one which has held a great place in the history of Europe. In the fifteenth century, the relation of governments amongst themselves commenced to become frequent, regular, and permanent. Then were formed for the first time those great combinations and alliances, either for peace or war, which ultimately produced the system of the balance of power. Diplomacy in Europe dates from the fifteenth century. In fact, towards the end of that century, we see the principal powers of the continent, the popes, the dukes of Milan, the Venetians, the emperors of Germany, the kings of Spain, and the kings of France, form connections, negotiate, come to understandings, and unite amongst themselves, and balance their respective states. Thus at the time that Charles VIII. made his expedition for the conquest of Naples, a grand league was formed against him between Spain, the pope, and the Venetians. The league of Cambray was arranged some years later (in 1508) against the Venetians. The holy league, directed against Louis XII., succeeded, in 1511, the league of Cambray. All these combinations sprang from Italian politics, from the desire entertained by the different sovereigns to possess its territory, and from the fear that one of them, by seizing upon it exclusively, should gain too great a preponderance. This new order of facts was highly favourable to the development of the royal power. In the first place, from the very nature of the external relations of states, they can only be managed by one person, or by a small number of persons, and they require a certain degree of secrecy. In the next, the people possessed so little foresight that the consequences of a combination of this description were not appreciated by them; such things had for them no direct, home interest, and therefore they concerned themselves very little respecting them, and left them to the discretion of the central power. Thus diplomacy, as it arose, fell into the hands of the kings; and the idea that it belonged to them exclusively, that the country, even when free, and monopolising the right of levying its own taxes, and interfering in its own affairs, was not permitted to meddle with foreign concerns, was established in almost all minds as a settled principle, as a maxim of common right. Look at the history of England in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; we there perceive what power this idea possessed, and what obstacles it opposed to English liberties, in the reigns of Elizabeth, James I., and Charles I. It was always under plea of this principle that peace and war, commercial relations, in a word, all external affairs, belonged to the royal prerogative, that absolute power defended itself against the rights of the country. Nations have been excessively timid in confessing this portion of prerogative, and this shyness has been the more prejudicial to them, since, dating from the epoch upon