Turning to the field of general history, there are certain facts, admittedly Napoleon's doing, which quite as certainly are among the most important factors of contemporary politics. Of themselves these would suffice to give him a high place in constructive history. In the first place, he deprived England of the monopoly in what had long been essentially and peculiarly her political ideal. What was the basis of the long conflict between England and France to which Napoleon fell heir? Was the struggle of these two glorious and enlightened sister nations a struggle for territorial ascendancy in Europe? Not entirely. Was it a life-and-death struggle for ascendancy in the western world? No. The Seven Years' War had decided that question against France, and the American war for independence had in a sense evened the score in its decision against England; for the prize had been awarded to a new people. No; the conflict did not rage over this. What, then, was the cause? Nothing less than a passion for the ascendancy of one of these highest forms of civilization throughout the globe, including both Europe and America. This Anglo-Saxon political, commercial, religious, and social conception was, after the Napoleonic wars, no longer confined to Great Britain. Thence onward the great powers of Europe have been chiefly concerned, aside from their care for self-preservation, in partitioning Africa and Asia among themselves; and this process is no sooner complete than they begin to murmur about the Monroe doctrine and to cast longing eyes toward Central and South America. The state system which was once European has become coextensive with the sphere on which we live, and this notion of world-domination, so denounced when held by Napoleon, has become the motive-power of every great modern civilization.