He had his reward. In 1866 he fought a decisive war against Prussia’s old enemy, Austria, and won it so quickly that even the Prussians were astonished. In 1870-1871 he threw the state against France in a war that left the land of Napoleon as completely at his feet as Prussia had been at the feet of the Corsican. And then in the moment of exultation over the victory he founded the German empire by uniting with Prussia the numerous smaller German states. There is much to support the suggestion that a similar stroke is held in reserve to create a Mittel-Europa of Germany and Austria-Hungary as a final glory of the present war, if Germany shows herself able to carry off the victory. Bismarck’s ambition for Germany was to hold a position of arbiter in Continental affairs. He felt that this was the best way to make his country safe from hostile combinations, and it met his ideal of the dignity to which Germany ought to attain. He achieved his desire in the Three Emperors’ League and the Triple Alliance. Predominance in influence was the height of his ambition. The conquest of new lands, and the support of industry and trade by a policy of territorial expansion, were not within his plans. He was a man of an older generation to whom a predominance among the Great Powers was better than chasing the rainbow of world empire. In 1888 died Wilhelm I, the king whom Bismarck made Emperor. He was an honest man who loved the simple and sound Germany in which he was reared. At this time the leading men of 1871 were passing from power and a group was coming on the scene who were young men in the intoxicating times of Sedan and Metz. A new emperor came to the throne, possessing great energy and the capacity of forming vast plans. He was eleven years old when the empire was proclaimed at Versailles, the age at which ordinary boys begin to wake from the dreams of childhood. From such dreams Wilhelm II passed to dreams of imperial glory. The idea of bigness of authority that he thus formed has remained with him to this day. Add the effects of an impulsive disposition and an unusual amount of confidence in himself and you will account for the peculiar gloss spread over a character that is strong and otherwise wholesome. Early in his reign he gave ground for alarm by several acts that are hardly to be described in a less severe word than “bumptious.” He dismissed Bismarck from the Chancellorship, seemingly for no other reason than that he wished a chancellor who would be more obedient to the imperial will, and he uttered many sentiments which caused sober men to wonder what kind of emperor he was going to be. But as the years passed it was noticed that all his aberrations fell short of disaster, and as he was very energetic and devoted to efficiency in civil and military matters the world came at last to regard him with real esteem.