Such a possession, an empire in itself, held so precariously and offering such a ceaseless temptation to swarming land-hungry hordes, is rather a weakness than a strength to England on the threshold of the new era. And from all this Pacific region and its adjuncts where she has secured all the empty and desirable plots and pegged out so many claims for posterity, she has had to withdraw her fleets, as Rome had to draw in her legions from the outer provinces to defend the central heart of her empire. We may hope that this North Sea danger, so embarrassing and disastrous in its strategic needs to a power like England, whose empire is scattered over every ocean and continent, may disappear through the growth of better relations between the German and Anglo-Saxon branches of the Teutonic race. To that stock more than any other is committed the defence of Western and Christian ideas, and the great issues of the future may compel a Pan-Teutonic alliance, embracing the British and German Empires and the United States. England has two responsibilities in the Pacific--the one to herself and her empire, and the other to Christendom and Western civilization. If she is true to the former, she cannot well be false to the latter. She must bring her fleets back to this great ocean and assert an influence in its politics proportionate to her territorial domains and the extent of her commerce in those regions. But there are objects more important than the interests of any single Power. The entire coast of the Pacific from Behring Straits to the Horn, and round south by New Zealand and Australia, must be kept "white"--reserved, that is, for the Occidental and Christian races. Perhaps the United States may one day so far modify the Monroe doctrine as to welcome Germany to a sovereign foothold among the unstable politics of South America, in order to strengthen still more the outposts of Christian civilization in the Western hemisphere. It is possible to talk great nonsense about what is called the "yellow peril." No sensible person imagines that the nimble Japanese, the inscrutable Chinaman, and the subtle Hindoo are suddenly going to rise as one man and throw down the gage of challenge to Christianity and the West. East, like West, has its own political and religious divisions; nevertheless it is impossible to foresee what the results of the Oriental resurgence may mean, and England and the United States, and perhaps Germany, may some day have a joint responsibility in the Pacific compared with which their rivalries among themselves may seem trifling and irrational.