lanation of Great Britain's having had allies in
the past may therefore be that the independence of Great Britain was
threatened by the same danger which threatened the independence of other
Powers. This theory is made more probable by the fact that England's
great struggles--that of Queen Elizabeth against Spain, that of William
III. and Marlborough against Louis XIV., and of Pitt against
Napoleon--were, each one of them, against an adversary whose power was
so great as to overshadow the Continent and to threaten it with an
ascendency which, had it not been checked, might have developed into a
universal monarchy. It seems, therefore, that in the main England, in
defending her own interests, was consciously or unconsciously the
champion of the independence of nations against the predominance of any
one of their number. The effect of Great Britain's self-defence was to
facilitate the self-defence of other nations, and thus to preserve to
Europe its character of a community of independent States as opposed to
that which it might have acquired, if there had been no England, of a
single Empire, governed from a single capital.

This is, however, only half of the answer we want. It explains to some
extent why England could find other nations co-operating with her, and
reveals the general nature of the cause which they maintained in common.
But let us remember the distinction between a quarrel in which the main
thing is to be in the right, and a fight in which the main thing is to
win. The explanation just sketched is a justification of England's
policy, an attempt to show that in the main she had right on her side.
That is only part of the reason why she had allies. The other part is
that she was strong and could help them.

She had three modes of action. She used her navy to destroy the hostile
navy or navies and to obtain control of the seaways. Then she used that
control partly to destroy the seaborne trade of her enemies, and partly
to send armies across the sea to attack her enemies' armies. It was
because she could employ these three modes of warfare, and because two
of them were not available for other Powers, that her influence on the
course of events was so great.

The question of moral justification is more or less speculative. I have
treated it here on a hypothesis which is not new, though since I
propounded it many years ago it has met with little adverse criticism.
But the question of force is one of hard fact;